Scott Foe leaves Nokia with parting advice for mobile games industry
Reset Generation producer on toilets, dancing bears and consumer bullets
Scott Foe, the senior producer in Nokia's games division who was the brains behind Reset Generation for N-Gage (and Pocket Kingdom before it) has left the company.
However, he's signed off with a column for PocketGamer.biz in which he passes on his personal learnings from his last six years making mobile games.
"Designing a truly great mobile game is akin to designing a truly great toilet, in that the product of your design should be so easy to use, and so satisfying when you use it," he writes.
He suggests that 2D is more accessible than 3D, real-time is more accessible than turn-based, showing everything on screen at once is more accessible than scrolling, and having one player character is more accessible than multiple ones.
Foe also says there are "way too many apologists working in mobile gaming today", suggests developers should spend more time actually playing mobile games out in the real world, and reckons the best games will be the ones that people have to show off.
"Does your game have that "HOLY SHIT YOU MUST SEE THIS" moment? Are you incentivising your players to become the most valuable members of your sales force?"
The full column is well worth a read. Foe hasn't said what he plans to do next: we suspect this isn't the last pocket gamers will hear of him.
