Apple will commission and fund games Apple Arcade, and these exclusives won’t appear anywhere else — not even the iOS store.
When Apple announced that it was launching Apple Arcade as a gaming subscription today (without revealing a price), it took a deeper step into the game business than it has ever done before by funding new titles.
Apple will commission and fund games for the service, and these exclusives won’t appear anywhere else. They’ll just be on the Apple Arcade subscription service. They won’t even be available as paid individual apps in the iOS app store.
The funding part is likely why the company has been able to sign up legendary game designers like Will Wright, creator of games like Sim City and The Sims, as makers of exclusive content for Apple Arcade.
Sam Rosenthal and Cedric Adams, makers of Where Cards Fall, are making an exclusive title for Apple Arcade. Hironobu Sakaguchi, the creator of Final Fantasy and founder of Mistwalker, is working on something called Fantasian for the service. Denis Mikan showed a game called Lifelike, where a player controls a swarm of fish or other creatures.
Bekah Saltzman is working on Overland, an indie title set in the post-apocalyptic world. Charles Cecil and Dave Gibbons (creator of Watchmen) are working on Beyond a Steel Sky, which is like a console game on mobile. Overall, Apple listed 35 developers and publishers working on Apple Arcade.
