Daily Web Ramblings

The iPhone should be an ideal device for playing video games.

After all, it has a gloriously large touch-sensitive screen and sensors that can detect when it’s being tilted: a mash-up of the best features of Nintendo’s DS handheld and Wii home console.

But games for Apple’s iPhone are off to a slow start as the company concentrates instead on making sure the device’s primary features of voice, music and web browsing run smoothly.

Those of you with an iPhone can already play a number of games, but the first batch of titles has been mainly those that were hastily adapted to fit the screen’s format.

Like other iPhone programs not made by Apple itself, games are limited to running within the Safari web browser and cannot be installed “natively” - meaning directly on the device - without using work-around solutions that are too much hassle for most consumers to bother with.

That poses a few challenges to game developers. Some ways of using the touch controls, such as dragging items across the screen, don’t work within the browser. Playing through the browser also means you’ll be out of luck if you’re outside of a coverage area.

EA, which has formed closer ties with Apple in recent months with more support for its Macintosh computers, is also professing love for the iPhone as it mounts a push into the area of casual games.

And there are hints that Apple is working on games of its own.

When Apple updated the iTunes software used to activate the iPhone, curious hackers who looked under the hood quickly found lines of software code indicating that games will be eventually run directly on the iPhone rather than in the browser.