The the arrival of Resident Evil 7 on iOS a few weeks ago It was a new step in Apple’s ambitious plans to make the iPhone a relatively solvent platform for playing demanding titles. Last year, at WWDC 2023, Cupertino made some very interesting announcements in this sense, but initially they were limited to macOS, their desktop operating system, so the surprise came in September, during the presentation of the iPhone 15.

In this presentation, we saw that one of the notable points of the A17 Pro SoC was the improvement of its GPU, completely redesigned with respect to previous versions, and that, among other novelties, it will allow the arrival of ray tracing in the Pro. current generation models. But the matter did not end there, because after the announcement of this technological leap, those from Cupertino They have confirmed the arrival of several triple A gamessuch as Death Stranding, Assassin’s Creed Mirage, Resident Evil Village and Resident Evil 4 Remake.

Already last month we could read that its commercial performance is quite limited, with sales volumes that make us question whether the editing and publication of these versions has been profitable for its distributors. And as we read today in Mobilegamer, it seems that a new attempt in this sense could repeat the bad numbers of the previous ones, because Resident Evil 7 for iOS would sell less than 2,000 copies after a few weeks of release.

It’s true, yes, we’re talking about a recent launch, so it still has room to improve its numbers, but it’s also true that The highest volume of game sales is usually concentrated in the first weeks on the marketso if that formula applies in this case, we’d be facing a huge “stab” that could jeopardize the publisher’s plans for more double- or triple-A games adapted for iOS.

Why are iOS games selling poorly? There is no definite answer to this, although we can theorize and in that case I would focus on two points. The first, of course, is that at the moment these games are only available for the iPhone 15 Pro, which is already a very important limitation in their reach. Will this be fixed with the future iPhone 16? And on the other hand, we’re also finding that a certain gaming culture is still missing from the iPhone ecosystem, and that’s something that can be fixed over time if Apple, developers, and distributors follow through on their commitment.

I’ve read that there are even those who suggest that the problem is due to the size of iPhone screens, which are theoretically too small for gaming. However, the success of portable video game consoles discredits this view and shows that the key factor is not the size of the screen, but the adaptation of the game to it. With good work in this regard, the gaming experience can be very rewarding. And as an even clearer example of this, we have the Razer Kishi controllers which They allow you to turn your iPhone into a very, very nice portable console.

The question is, as indicated earlier, whether the industry will continue to support this commitment. A fairly widespread rumor is that it is Apple itself that is “paying for the party”, i.e. taking the cost of adapting the games to the platform, which would actually make a lot of sense, as it’s hard to imagine more than one study involving such a risk. And if that’s really the case, I think so The best they can do in Cupertino is keep trying, at least in the short to medium term to provide more room for growth opportunities for “Pro” gaming on the iPhone. And if it goes well and has the means to do so, it will be another highlight for the tech company’s smartphones.