With the recent announcement of the iPhone 4 Apple once again makes us salivate with all their shiny, technological goodness. Just last month the iPad was released in Japan and having some playtime with one of those made me all giddy. As our company's technology is specifically designed to be malleable and adapt to new consoles we obviously already had some thoughts on iPad, and will of course be thinking about the new iPhone's higher resolution and features. Though we won't be rushing to release anything substandard, we do think the devices can offer some interesting possibilities and open up new markets.

The iPad is an almost perfect web browsing device that is incredibly easy to use, it will undoubtedly open up technology to people previously put off. I'm thinking specifically of the older generation who have stayed away from the web and home computers, in the same way the Nintendo Wii opened up the market to people who didn't want to have to deal with controllers with 2 sticks and 20 buttons. It's missing the front-facing camera, of course, at least in version 1, but imagine being able to video chat with your parents or grandparents on an iPad - awesome! We'll see how well this feature will work on the iPhone 4, where the face-to-face video chat functionality is one of the main reasons I'll consider switching.

Most surprisingly, really, is the sheer number of YouTube videos that have been posted with toddlers playing on an iPad. Intuitive and sheer fun, developers who aim at toddlers could make a killing. Not just apps, mind you, but interactive children's books too could do extremely well. And finally, let's not forget that often overlooked pet market - kittens playing on iPads is not only feasible but damn cute to watch on YouTube clips.

The higher resolution and the bigger screen on the iPad could be a blessing for some, a curse for others. The small size and low budgets of iPhone development has opened the doors to many amateur developers, hobbyists and independents, in somewhat of a great democratization of the market. The iPad will continue this trend, we think, allowing developers to make bigger, better and more beautiful games that mightn't have worked on the iPhone smaller screen. But of course, some developers won't be able to cope; bigger budgets and longer development time, combined with the ruthless, self-inflicted pricing model of the Appstore will be difficult for some, and substandard applications won't be able to get away with so much anymore either, but it might separate the wheat from the chaff, and for the consumers this can only be a good thing.

Many have said this before us but the iPad's screen is stunning! Already people are getting excited about reading newspapers, books and magazines on the device, but mostly people are excited about comics - they simply look fantastic. That said, the "PDF zine" culture, which has been plodding along on the web, could see a massive surge with iPads as the main and best device to read them on. Personally I am most interested in seeing what amateur magazine makers will come up with.

Finally, a lot has been said about the Appstore; it's a closed system that paradoxically is also too open. The race to the bottom has pretty much been completed, with the perfect price point for apps being around $0, forcing developers and publishers to get more creative in order to continue to make money. This, in a sense, is good. The main thing, though, is that it's an established outlet that works and that people know. Having it available as-is for the iPad is perfect and the jump from iPhone to iPad will be as easy for consumers as it will be for developers. There is no unproven thing about it. We have yet to see how the market will behave, whether prices will increase for iPad apps, but the device came into existence with an entire market already in place.

The big question is, of course, are we going to be releasing our games on iPad? The answer is, well, probably, yes, at some point. We are committed to quality and we feel we don't just want to port our iPhone games to a bigger screen. In the same way we designed our games specifically for the iPhone, its screen and controls, so do we want to focus specifically on the iPad and find and utilise what it has to offer in the best possible way. iPad is in our longer term future, for sure, but it won't be our sole focus.

That said, possibly due to the retro nature of the graphics, I was personally quite pleased how well Flock It!, our flagship iPhone game, holds up on the big screen, zoomed x2. If you have an iPad be sure to check it out !

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