Thanks to HTML5 bundled with either CSS3 or Javascript, developers are starting to put more of their code on the client-side rather than making people install plugins like Adobe’s Flash does. However, according to the infographic below from gaming site One More Level, not all popular game makers are making the jump yet.

Why you ask? Most likely it’s because HTML5 is currently only supported by 40% of web browsers, while Flash is supported by 99% of them. Even though HTML5 provides an increase in performance for gamers and requires fewer CPU cycles, it’s not quite “there” yet.

Popular Facebook game creator Zynga is tinkering around with both technologies, with its most popular game Cityville available in Flash, and its second most popular game available on HTML5 and Flash. It looks like the company is doing a bit of A/B testing and seeing how users react. Companies who are eying a move to HTML5 will do so because of the cross-platform capabilities of HTML5 as well as support for mobile. You can’t play a Flash game on an iOS device though, remember?

You can find a full size version here.

Created by: One More Level

Wikia is a popular content sharing site that lets its community create Wiki’s on any topic for free. What you might not know about Wikia is that it has quickly become the number two destination on the web for gaming content based on traffic stats reported by comScore. The site just hopped past GameSpot and now sits behind IGN.

Overall, the site saw pretty impressive growth in 2011 and sports some eye-catching numbers:

Nearly 50 million global unique visitors/month
Over 850 million page views/month
42% traffic growth year-over-year

If you haven’t heard of Wikia, you’ve probably landed on one of its sites while googling something. In the same way that Wikipedia lets its community create and collaborate on content, Wikia does the same with more of a focus on entertainment and pop culture. In fact, the company is the for-profit arm of Wikipedia, founded by Jimmy Wales. What the company couldn’t have seen coming is the massive usage it gets for gaming content covering every platform from Atari to Xbox.

In December 2011, Wikia’s gaming traffic jumped 50.7% and totaled 25.7M unique visitors. Those numbers were good enough to put it into the number two spot for gaming networks on the web. With IGN sitting at number one, Wikia decided to poach two of its top editors.

Hilary Goldstein and Eric Moro are joining Wikia to focus solely on its Gaming property. The two are big losses for IGN, as Goldstein served as Editor-in-Chief of IGN Games, and Moro was Editor-in-Chief of IGN’s Movies site. Combined, the two have fifteen years of experience at IGN and should help turn Wikia into the number one gaming destination on the web.

Wikia’s CEO, Craig Palmer, sees content partners being its top focus right now:

Eric and Hilary are visionaries with a finger on the pulse of these highly engaged audiences. We’re just beginning to really scratch the surface on how brands and our users can work together, and they will be instrumental in curating and surfacing these new experiences for users and industry partners.

When it comes to community generated content, curation is the key to make the content available to visitors. Wikia has done a fantastic job of curating the content that its community has made, and my only knock on them is that the ads on the site can sometimes be a bit obnoxious. I completely understand that you need to make money when having a free site, but I’m hopeful that the two new hires will help build relationships with advertisers who don’t want to buy flashing banners.

$4.3M in funding, 20 employees, and 70 apps using its platform. What’s the key to Kiip‘s success? Happiness, says founder Brian Wong.

I sat down with Kiip’s founder and CEO today to discuss his reward platform that is making real waves in Silicon Valley. With companies looking for new ways to acquire customers, Kiip has found itself a sweet spot that is making gamers, developers, and partners extremely happy.

If you’re not sure what Kiip is, it’s a platform that developers can use in their games that get users real-world rewards from well-known brands like Best Buy, Sears, and Vitamin Water. Most games have some sort of leader-board or achievement functionality, so Kiip fits in quite nicely.

2011 was said to be a $1.2 billion year for mobile advertising, but Wong doesn’t refer to his reward network as pure display advertising. Kiip sees itself as a hybrid opportunity for advertisers, utilizing tried and true display ad methods along with promotional and marketing opportunities.

Here’s a demo and explanation of Kiip:

Kiip didn’t come out of nowhere though, having spent almost eight months in stealth mode while it built its network. Wong explains:

We launched the network in April of 2011, and we spent a good 6-8 months building the network. The reason why is because I was trying to build up enough traction before we revealed the network. We wanted to be like a raging pitbull. The positioning was nailed on day one.

While mobile advertising is an over billion dollar industry, Wong doesn’t see the reward replacing it:

Ads will always be there, there will always be a time and place for ads. But I also feel like we’ve extracted a new layer of value. I view the world as being a very reciprocal place.

This reciprocity aspect is key for Kiip, as the company allows gamers to unlock rewards as it plays a game, and lets them give that reward away to anyone they wish. It was a feature that the company accidentally stumbled onto Wong told me. Emotional context has become a powerful way for a brand to gain lifetime customers moving forward in the digital age and rewards give advertisers that emotional context that display ads simply can’t touch.

The power of emotion is a marketing technique employed for years by companies like Coca Cola and Red Bull. If a brand can engage a customer at their happiest moment, like an achievement in a game, the customer will always remember that brand in that context. It’s quite brilliant, actually. The partners that Kiip works with seem to get it too, as Wong revealed to me:

Most brands calculate their spend with us based on the lifetime value of the customer.

How happy are these customers? Wong showed me a piece of fan mail that the company received, asking them to get its reward system placed in their favorite games. That’s impressive affinity for a reward system that only launched in April of last year.

The company recently released a new feature on its site, called Kiip Spotlight, which features popular games that use its reward system. There are currently 70 games using Kiip, and they’re pretty popular ones.

The key to Kiip’s success could be the happiness that gamers feel when they unlock and achievement and receive a reward like a cup of coffee or $5 Best Buy gift card. Wong says the company unlocked something powerful when it launched and allowed gamers to send their rewards as a gift.

It was an afterthought and not much of a strategy at the time, but after digging through some of the messages that went along with those rewards, Kiip has found that this type of advertising makes brand affinity tangible. Not only are gamers earning rewards, they’re sending the rewards to their girlfriends, boyfriends, and moms.

These aren’t phrases you would normally associate with a “regular old ad”:

Thanks to this analysis of an accidental hit, Kiip now incorporates its learnings with potential advertisers. Wong shared these presentation slides exclusively with The Next Web:

In 2012, the company is focused on brings its reward system to international customers, bolstering its destination site so gamers feel more comfortable cashing in rewards, and looking at different areas than gaming that are ripe for rewards. This could be anywhere from uses in schools, the workplace, or fitness programs.

It looks like Kiip has been successful in bringing the “happy”, and it’s turning into a real boom for the company, which saw its network of games unlock 31,544,566 achievements in December 2011 alone.

➤ Kiip

There are quite a few games for iOS that make your iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad feel like a pretty hip version of a Game Boy. You don’t play them for hours on end, but they’re good for wasting time now and again. Having said that, calling an iOS device a “gaming console” still feels like a reach. Gaming consoles like XBox and PS3 give you more a lean back experience, meaning you’re probably plopped down on the couch playing them and not touching a screen.

A company called 60Beat aims to change that with the release of its new iOS accessory, the GamePad.

There’s no doubt that gaming consoles are a massive market, with 1.7 million of Microsoft’s Xbox flying off of the shelves last November. I’m actually quite surprised that Apple hasn’t come out with its own controller, but that could very well be something it’s working on for 2012, along with new iPads.

The 60Beat GamePad plugs into the headphone jack of your device, and can only be played with compatible games. Unfortunately, 60Beat only lists two games that are compatible with its GamePad, Aftermath and Bugdom 2. While that might scare you away from its $50 price tag, the company does promise more of a selection by February.

Check out this demo of the GamePad:

As it goes for any device, the library of games compatible with the add-on will make it or break it. If you’re wondering how you’ll be able to hear the sound from the games with the GamePad plugged in, it comes with an audio splitter that will require headphones or an external speaker.

While the GamePad does negate the coolness factor of the touchscreen features on iOS devices, the fact that you can put your slim iPad in a stand on a table and sit back for video game playing is a neat look towards Apple’s future. You can’t put your Xbox in a backpack and easily set it up on the go, can you?

➤ 60Beat GamePad

Paprika Lab is a South Korean gaming startup which has developed several mobile and social games over the past four years. The firm has targeted the global market right from the beginning with its titles, which are developed by a strong team that includes staff who’ve worked at major Korean game companies such as NCsoft, Nexon, Neowiz and NHN.

Although Paprika Lab is a game developer, that is not how it originally started out. The company’s first service — ‘FaceWorthy’ — was a social discovery network, which launched in December 2007. The site allowed users to showcase themselves by uploading photos and getting other users to vote for them. Interestingly, the site was developed with language support for Portuguese which saw it become popular in Brazil.

Focus on mobile gaming

The company then turned its focus to developing games for mobile platforms, and specifically iOS devices. In 2009, it teamed up with NeoLAB, another startup which has offices in Korea and Japan. The two companies decided to work together to build a quiz game for smartphones aimed at the Japanese market; NeoLAB provided the content while Paprika Lab developed the app. The app does not have an English name (it roughly translates to ‘Love-Attracting Wisdom 2000′)  it reached number six across of all app categories on the Japanese App Store.

Another mobile app launched earlier the same year was HenHouse: Count Attack, a simple but difficult game to test one’s reflexes by touching eggs in numerical order as they appear, in as little time as possible. Players can share their times with others around the world.

Social gaming

As users all over the global continued to embrace social media, Paprika Lab moved into the social game space. Its most popular title Hero City, racked up an impressive 3 million users worldwide thanks to a range of social networks including Facebook, Korea’s Cyworld and Russia’s Odnoklassniki and Vkontakte.

The game sees players build their own city while taking charge of a superhero and sending him on missions to gain experience. Users can also interact with each other to form alliances and exchange gifts and ‘energy’.

Another game which the company released on Facebook, Pirate Legacy, is a turn-based RPG in which players control a pirate ship and use the help of their friends to advance in the game.

CEO of Paprika Lab John Kim explained the company’s plan for the new year.

“We are currently preparing for our next release and recruiting more staff to work in our mobile social game team. We look forward to using our knowledge from developing web-based social games to create synergy when working on our mobile-based social games.”

Though the company has previously only developed mobile games for iOS to keep a consistent developing environment and reduce the number of versions, the company is preparing to make the move to Android to match its rapid growth.

Paprika Lab is currently working to develop a new unique game using its experience with mobile and social platforms. The company is keeping tight-lipped on the content of its new product which is currently in the closed beta stage of testing, but it maintains that the game will provide a high-quality and new gaming experience. 

Previously, things had not been easy for game developers in South Korea due to the mobile game categories being blocked over concerns about ratings. However, since the recent opening of the game category on iTunes, Korean game developers can now easily market their games to both domestic and global users.

With many Korean mobile game startups now hiring staff who have worked at major game companies, there is a high possibility that we can look forward to more exciting games appearing on the mobile market in the near future.

➤ Paprika Lab

Facebook has released its top 10 most popular games of 2011, and shockingly Zynga didn’t take the top prize. The list was assembled using data based on which game had the most active users and had the highest recommendations, and includes games built all over the globe.

It wasn’t a complete failure for the company that just went public, though. Zynga had four titles in the top 10, with Cityville in the #3 spot. Playdom, now a Disney company, took the top spot with Gardens of Time.

Most popular Facebook games in 2011:
1. Gardens of Time (By Playdom)
2. The Sims Social (By EA)
3. Cityville (By Zynga)
4. DoubleDown Casino (by DoubleDown Entertainment)
5. Indiana Jones Adventure World (By Zynga)
6. Words With Friends (By Zynga)
7. Bingo Blitz (By Buffalo Studios)
8. Empires & Allies (By Zynga)
9. Slotomania-Slot Machines (By Playtika)
10. Diamond Dash (By wooga)

Along with the top 10, the social network shared some statistics showing that Facebook gamers are engaged and come back for more, almost daily:

• Over 25% of monthly gamers play games at least every other day
• The average gamer plays games on over 50% of the days they visit Facebook
• The average gamer plays over 3 different gaming titles on Facebook each month

Zynga has quite a few executives who are extremely competitive, so not hitting #1 has to have some of them fuming. Better luck next year!

The 7th annual German Game Developer Awards have recently concluded in Düsseldorf, Germany, and Vienna based Socialspiel’s Tight Lines Fishing has walked away with the Best Social Game 2011 award.

Facing stiff competition from some of Europe’s largest names in gaming, including Wooga’s “Diamond Dash” (recently spotlighted at LeWeb), and Bigpoint’s “Skyrama,” the angel funded startup snagged the hearts and minds of both audience members and Academy of German Game Developers judges with it’s immersive fishing village story.

The game has been live on Facebook for the past 8 weeks, and counts approximately 50,000 Monthly Active Users, and 3,000 daily active users, according to App Data. Tight Lines Fishing’s story centers around players receiving a small plot of land from a now missing uncle, who also happens to be the local fishing legend. With the assistance of the loving family friend Marv, a.k.a the in-game guide, players must try their skill and luck at a wide variety of angling based challenges, resulting in a progressive series of rewards and village customization options. Admittedly, there are some heavy FarmVille overtones, as there appears to be a lot of catch this, share that, ask friends for… But if social challenges, collecting, and gaming together are your bailiwick, Tight Lines Fishing puts a creative twist on the familiar game format.

“The incredibly positive feedback we’ve received from gaming fans and the press has shown that we have touched a nerve with Tight Lines Fishing. By creating highly-immersive, quality experiences on social platforms around the World, we’re showing the World that Vienna’s game development industry is alive and well, in addition to proving stiff competition to some of the largest social games developers around the World.”

-Socialspiel CEO Helmut Hutterer

And if you’re wondering exactly where this talent is coming from, you’ll only need to look at Vienna’s video gaming history, as Socialspiel is comprised of team members from both the former Rockstar Games Vienna studio, as well as Deep Silver Games Vienna.

The awards ceremony was held in the historic Altes Kesselhaus in Düsseldorf, and had well over 1,000 video gaming fans in attendance. The German Developer Prize seeks to showcase and the reward the best and most successful video games developed in the German speaking market.

The full list of German Game Developer Award 2011 winners:

• Best Games Technology – Crytek
• Best Browser Game – Drakensang Online
• Best Soundtrack – Crysis
• Best Mobile Game – The Great Jitters: Pudding Panic
• Best Game Design – Zeit²
• Best Casual Game – Runes of Magic – Lands of Despair
• Best Console Game – Crysis 2
• Best Handheld Game – Demolition Dash
• Best Graphics – Crysis 2
• Best Publisher – Travian Games
• Best Art Design – Harveys neue Augen (Harvey’s new eyes)
• Best Story – Harveys neue Augen (Harvey’s new eyes)
• Gameforge Newcomer Award – Tiny & Big – Grandpa’s Leftovers, Neodrome, G.E.A.R.
• Best Simulation – Landwirtschafts-Simulator (Farming Sim)
• Best Children’s – Living Stories – Das verlorene Herz (The Lost Heart)
• Best Strategy – Patrizier IV – Aufstieg einer Dynastie (The Rise of a Dynasty)
• Best Learning – Crazy Machines Elements
• Best RPG – Drakensang Online
• Best Sports – Mein Fitness-Coach Club
• Best Serious Game – Ludwig
• Best Teen – Harveys neue Augen (Harvey’s new eyes)
• Best Adventure – Harveys neue Augen (Harvey’s new eyes)
• Best Action – Crysis 2

Let’s be frank; 99% of the education games out there suck. Either the graphics are sub-par, the game play is lackluster, or it’s simply a matter of multiple choice pointlessness. With grade school students heading home to the multi-pixel wonderment that is all things Xbox, PS3, or PC gaming, it’s no wonder why they’d rather scrape lead based paint off the walls than play another education focused video game in the classroom. But who says it has to be this way? It’s exactly this line of thinking that’s got some very bright minds working on a tough question, and coming up with the first educational game that I’ve ever wanted to play.

The road to Ludwig

While ovos is a development firm building multi-media experiences for clients including Sony, Siemens, and NASA, founder Joerg Hofstaetter says that his organization always has experimental side projects running, including the current Ludwig project. The firm was awarded a government grant to pursue and develop a new form of interactive TV, and building upon a long-standing tradition of physics education within this context, they sought to bring the method to a new level.

“Instead of the traditional route of the user being shown an experiment, and the results explained, we wanted to put the experiment, and experience, directly in the user’s hands,” says ovos founder Joerg Hofstaetter.

After a drawn out series of discussions with various television networks, Hofstaetter and his team realized that perhaps they were just a bit too ahead of their time for the television market, and focused their full efforts on building a top notch physics education product, regardless of the platform. While the development of the product we see today took 2-3 years, once the team dropped the TV angle, the educational aspects began to include a curriculum based approach, with physics teaching doctors from the University of Graz becoming involved, providing crucial knowledge of both physics and physics learning.

Once the decision was made to transform Ludwig into an educational based game the ovos team sought out to answer a simple question, “Why can’t we make a game which is both of value when it comes to design and gameplay, and of value to educators?” With this in mind, the ovos team began charting concept maps that outlined how various physical principles interplay with noted physicist Dr. Leopold Mathelitsch commenting,

“We’re moving from a content based learning approach to a competence based approach.”

These concept maps grew in size and scope, and now include a full curriculum for physics concepts that students in grades 5-8 should be familiar with.

Through this marriage of game makers, physicists, and scientists of learning, Ludwig the game came to fruition.

Play Ludwig

Building upon these concept maps, ovos decided to break Ludwig down into 4 main theme worlds; Combustion, Water, Wind and Solar. Any of these ringing any bells from your own physics education?

Using a historical context, combustion is the first unit of gameplay as it represents how humans have created energy from the Industrial Period through today. Likewise, sticking to real world circumstances and outcomes, students who play Ludwig will quickly realize that whenever they use fossil fuels to create energy, these supply materials are exhausted and must be replaced.

Ludwig’s story revolves around a lovable research robot of the same name who has crashed landed on Earth and needs materials to return to his home planet.

“The whole game, the entire story is focused on energy. From the minute you start the game, it’s very clear to you what the game is all about, and what you need to do,” says conceptional design and production lead Jochen Kranzer, “it’s a problem based learning approach.”

The further a player progresses within Ludwig, the more options and higher level of physics learning comes into play. Ranging from scanning to building tools, students have showed increasing levels of engagement the further they delve into the game. And as any good robot will store its knowledge, Ludwig does the same, offering students a quasi-self-made roadmap of physical principles, as well as how they relate to the current and past state of play.

In addition to teaching students physical properties through interactive gameplay, the title also tests students before they can progress further. If they don’t apply what they’ve learned (or were meant to learn), gameplay halts and users must repeat the mission (ok, it’s a lesson…but don’t tell students that).

Teacher and Student Feedback

Ovos might have plenty of experience and know-how when it comes to building games and interactive digital media, but for the Ludwig project they wanted to involve and develop the title for and with educators. The team has been vigorously testing the title with 5 schools across Austria, spread out over approximately 300 classrooms and 10,000 student licenses. In addition to the human component, the team also sampled the levels of IT facilities at the various schools, identifying the lowest specifications model, and purchasing a matching model to be used in-house to ensure that there would be no degradation of game quality even when played on he most minimal of machines.

From a teacher’s standpoint, Kranzer admits that teachers within this initial 5 school test were those that showed an affinity for technology in the classroom, and are quite often gamers at home. The Ludwig team knew that these teachers would be biased towards the game, however these teachers provided a number of feedback items that had more to do with the playing of the game rather than the game itself.

“We were afraid that girls wouldn’t like the character because it’s a robot and has lots of toolsets, and ‘tech stuff’. We were thrilled when the first feedback came in and girls loved the game too, but for different reasons,” comments Kranzer. “We didn’t plan it this way, but as luck would have it, our lead designer Vivien Schreiber really struck a chord with girls.”

The second item that teachers regularly commented on was the level of gamer. Meaning, in every classroom there’s bound to be three unique levels of gamers; hardcore, casual and non. The trick here was to create an experience that isn’t boring to your World of Warcraft fanatic, while still being comprehensible to non-gamers.

The team found that the division between hardcore and non ran in close parallel to the gender divisions.

“We found that boys tend to have a goal orientated, performance driven way of playing the game, whereas girls tend to sit together and talk about what they should do within the game,” says Hofstaetter.

While focusing on a balanced game for all, teachers reported that the hardcore gamers were naturally a bit more critical of specific game mechanics and actions, but that once they had completed their missions, they often moved off their machine to help others within the classroom. Students teaching students. What’s a teacher not to love?

To be certain, Kranzer says that Ludwig is in no way designed to replace the teacher in the classroom, but only further add another dimension to a teacher’s curriculum and engage students on a platform that they’re familiar with, but possibly haven’t used for learning and discussion. The Ludwig team has also found that a number of the evaluation teachers have been using the game as a homework mechanism. If students spent their classroom time learning about various physical properties of wind, their homework assignment is to complete the wind module of the game.

Currently, the game content has been designed by the above mentioned science and learning departments at the University of Graz, but Hofstaetter informs me that plans are already in the works to allow teachers to eventually upload and incorporate their own customized learning materials (lesson plans, experiment guidelines, worksheets, etc.) within the game. Online user profiles are also planned, allowing teachers to pinpoint exactly which students are excelling in which area, and which are having troubles grasping certain concepts. Hofstaetter points to the Khan Academy as a main source of inspiration for this real-time feedback mechanism.

Revenues and Funding

Ludwig received financial support three ways; grants, license sponsoring, and private investments.

Both the City of Vienna and the Austrian Ministry of Science are the primary grant supporters of the Ludwig project.

Under the licensing column, the Ludwig team quickly ran into a common problem; school boards are cash strapped and often can’t afford licenses for students. To remedy this all-too-common scenario, Hofstaetter and Co. found a number of business sponsors that were willing to pay for and provide licenses for students.

The one caveat that ovos stuck to was that these supporters could in no way have their product or message incorporated into the game in any way. Hofstaetter admits that this wasn’t the easiest challenge. Students do not see any corporate messaging within the game, save for a mention in the credits, and a logo on the load screen. There’s no direct push from these sponsors, but they’d obviously be happy to arrange a class visit to one of their facilities to further enhance students’ real-world experience with a matching Ludwig themeworld.

Hofstaetter and company have also donated their time and experience, as the team has poured hours and hours of unpaid work into the project.

Ludwig’s online shop has recently been launched to the public and is available as both single and classroom licensing fees.

Future plans

Ludwig is a single player game, and the company plans on keeping it that way.

“One of the questions we get all the time concerns multi-player and collaborative learning,” says Hofstaetter. “Yes, this would certainly scale the game a few hundred percent, but it needs to remain a title where students can learn at their own pace. Every other point-and-click adventure is a single player game where you can advance at your own pace.”

There are no immediate plans to convert Ludwig to a mobile version, but Hofstaetter says that there are a number of labs (mini-games) within the main title that could easily be ported for mobile use.

“Since Unity is really good at cross platform publishing, this should be easily do-able. Theoretically”.

Kranzer agrees, but I detected a heavy dose of sarcasm, particularly when the world “easily” left Hofstaetter’s mouth.

Impressions

Having played Ludwig a few times through at home, I can honestly say it’s quite impressive. While I was reviewing the game post-conversation with Hofstaetter and Kranzer, and certainly knew what I was looking at and what the end goal is, I was pleasantly surprised on how well developed the storyline is and how detailed the graphics are. Ludwig is currently available only to Windows gamers students, but I had no problem playing Ludwig via Parallels on my iMac.

The Unity engine ensures that game physics are held in check in this physics learning game, and delivers rock solid graphics that non-gamers will be blown away by, and that hardcore gamers have come to expect as daily fair.

One themeworld took me approximately 8 hours of play time to finish, so when combined with the other 3, there’s quite a lot of material to be consumed, and should keep both students and teachers happy and engaged.

Overall in the general landscape of PC games, Ludwig has enough modern features, actions, and challenges to stand shoulder to should with a number of games on the market today. When viewed in the light of an educational game, Ludwig is the best one I’ve seen to date.

Ludwig is now available from PlayLudwig.com for an introductory price of €19.90 and includes the Combustion and Water themeworlds. For the same price, users will receive Wind and Solar updates for free when they become available (2012). Teachers can license Ludwig per 30 user classroom for €349. If you’re looking to do a bit of tire kicking before you buy, Ludwig also offers a playable demo that can easily be upgraded to a full license at any time.

➤  PlayLudwig.com

For more on this topic, read about how The Internet is Revolutionizing Education here and Clayton Christensen on Why online education is ready for disruption, now.

Remember the memory game you might have played with your parents? A bunch of cards were placed face down, shuffled up, and you’d have to flip them over two at a time to find a match.

It was one of my favorite childhood games. Today, developer Sponge Forge has released Instamory for iPad. The app is absolutely gorgeous and lets you interact with the huge database of photos unleashed by Instagram‘s API.

The Instamory app shows once again why a great public API can help bring services to those who wouldn’t have used it before. Even if you’re not an advid photo sharer on Instagram, this game will appeal to you. Instamory is $2.99, and worth every penny.

Playing Memory with Instagram photos

The premise is simple, and the features are plentiful. If you’d like to play memory with your own photos, just log in with your Instagram account. If you don’t have an account, you can still play the game with public photos that are popular, featured, or match certain tags on Instagram. You can play at varying difficulties, using 6, 15 or 24 pairs of cards.

Your high scores are tracked, and you can shuffle your photos at any time to keep game play fresh. If you have a few friends to play with, Instamory really shines then.

Multi-player memory

Up to four players can sit around an iPad to play a competitive game of memory. When its your turn, the orientation of the iPad is changed so that you don’t have to move the device around to play.

My fiancée and I recently played Instamory during a camping trip and we couldn’t have had more fun. Of course we had WiFi readily available, and you’ll need to have a connected iPad to play this game. Unfortunately there isn’t an offline mode. I’d love to see something like that in the future.

A new way to interact

You can use Instamory to browse and discover Instagram photos, as you create customized sets of pictures to play memory with. You can also “like” photos and become a follower of an Instagram user right from the app. I’d like to be able to comment on photos too, making Instamory a gaming portal to replace the need for a real Instagram iPad native app.

This is the perfect app to gift to someone who has just gotten their first iPad. Furthermore, if that person is a heavy Instagram user, you’ll become their best friend for sending this one to them. Instamory is another perfect example of other things you can do with photos.

Apple has been a runaway train since its release of the iPod. People from 10-70 years old are carrying some sort of Apple device in their pockets these days.

Remember when you got your first iPhone? Taking the first generation iPhone of your pocket was magical for some, people would come up to you and ask to touch it. It’s true. Apple has stood for something magical for a long time. Steve Jobs was a big part of that, but its simplistic design and ability to lead the customer with a deep pass has kept the company in the game.

The iPhone 4S is an unfortunate release for the company. Unfortunate not because the device isn’t great, but unfortunate that the passing of its leader and headaches around patents have stalled out the excitement that comes along with its telephony-changing device. The phone has a great camera, a great new voice feature in Siri, yet people aren’t as excited as they used to be.

Why is that?

The reason why the “excitement” doesn’t seem to be what it used to is that the device is now accessible to most Americans. With Sprint and Verizon now carrying the device, it’s no longer a parlor trick to slide and unlock your phone in public. We’re waiting for the “one more thing”, as Apple has trained us to do.

How can Apple remain magical? These three markets will keep the company in the driver’s seat for a long time to come.

Mobile is the hub

Microsoft focused on the home. Bill Gates and company told us that the home was the core of computing, data sharing, and entertainment. This is no longer true, and Apple is in a position to take hold of the idea that one device can control an entire household and lifestyle.

Steve Jobs realized very early on that a happy life isn’t one chained to a computer. A happy life with technology doesn’t rely on a large hard drive attached to a network of devices in your living room.

Mobile is the future, plain and simple. If you aren’t doing it already, all of the important data you collect doesn’t happen in your home. The things you see, touch, and hear all happen while you’re outside of your home. Your friends at work tell you about a new show or ask you if you saw that big pass in the football game the night before.

Your mobile device is your hub. You enter information in, and sit back and watch once you get home. That’s not to say that a TV shouldn’t be the focus for Apple, but it’s not what controls your life.

The iPhone 5 will have to be the most powerful device you’ve ever held in your hand.

Gaming

It’s time for Apple to get serious about gaming at home. The iPod Touch, iPhone, and iPad are great gaming devices. But the games you see on the app store are for small appetites and passing moments. Immersive gaming experiences don’t exist on iOS as of yet. What is Apple waiting for?

Playing a game on the train, and then picking it up on my TV is an experience that is needed. Microsoft has done one thing well in the past five years, and it came from the Xbox team. The Xbox platform has grown by leaps and bounds, letting you do more and more in the home. But once I leave my house, I have to think about coming home and playing Xbox. Why should I have to wait?

How can Apple nail gaming? Perhaps it’s that TV we heard that Mr. Jobs “cracked”. Perhaps it’s upping the ante on the existing Apple TV and letting us use apps.

Television

Mobile to home information transfer and gaming needs one more thing. A connected television with the horse power to run the best software in the world. Remember, Apple started out as a hardware company and has morphed into a company nearly perfecting both hardware and software. Microsoft started out as a software company and has embraced hardware with its phones and gaming device. The two companies have gotten to the same point in two very different paths.

What is usually the centerpiece of your living room other than pictures of your family? The television. Big ones, with features. Apple can and will get into the television game. But when? The company has beautiful monitors, so it knows how to create displays. It has a beautiful OS that can sit on any device. Going from mobile to home is the future.

The Apple TV will let you pick up where you left off. While you’re at work, on your mobile device, and on the way home, your Apple TV will be sitting there connected to the internet. The television will watch what you do, read what you read, and think what you think. It’s just a pretty monitor, after all.

You will no longer have to rely on Netflix to suggest movies for you. Your world around you, and the actions you take within that world will tell your entertainment device what you want to watch.

A mobile Apple device will be your remote to the world. Guaranteed.

Mobile is the difference, though. The TV has to compliment what you do when you’re not watching it. Microsoft wanted the TV to run your life, while Apple should build the TV to make your life better.

Can Apple stay magical? Of course it can, because it’s one of the few companies that ever became magical in the first place.