Quote:
Originally Posted by WillysJeepMan
Where the Surface line (and Windows tablets in general) fall short is in the quantity of quality Modern UI apps.
My Surface 2 makes a terrific netbook, but a poor tablet... because of the apps.
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I guess, that brings it to the point exactly!
On the train, while on a business trip, I often stroll around.
I mostly see iPads. (Not so many iPhones though, here in Germany Samsung is dominating the smartphone market.)
If I catch a glimpse, most people are:
- Watching movies.
- Playing games. Sometimes the well known casual ones, often enough some action games.
- Rarely reading.
If I check on issue #2, games: There are some spectacular ones on Windows 8. Mainly the ones from Microsoft themselves, Halo for example.
And especially the action games really shine, you natively can use any XBOX 360 controller, even the wireless ones.
But even I, as only an occasional gamer, see that the most famous titles are missing: No field runners, no Plant vs. Zombies, most of the Gameloft titles missing.
Being Microsoft, I'd go for the obvious solution:
Integrate the desktop titles into the Microsoft Store on the tablets as well. Now it's a link to the external websites and you have to download the .exe files and install manually. It would be way more convenient, faster and way more neatly arranged, to install them directly from the Store. I can't imagine, that licensing would be an issue.
For one, Microsoft now isn't directly involved either.
Last but not least: Why should Capcom not be interested, to significantly increase the number of potential buyers of Plants v. Zombies?
But as the situation is now, anyone looking for a gadget most likely will root for an iPad. As a toy, I love my iPad mini. It can't do the most basic business stuff for me, but as a gadget it's close to perfection.
And that's in my opinion the simple explanation for the (unfortunately) limited success of Windows 8 tablets:
If you're a private user and want to have a gadget, it ranks #3 behind Android and even more so iOS.
If you're a business user, you take what your employer is offering. And that's probably not a tablet, which might be considered too much of a "fun" unit...
Still: I consider my Surface Pro 2 a fantastic tablet. That's why I've instantly pre-ordered Surface Pro 3. But you're definitely right: With offering the 1.000 most popular apps (my gut says, now they may have 30% to 50% tops) as native Windows 8 apps, they would appeal to lots of additional target groups.