《华尔街日报》日前的报道称独立应用商店的运营情况不容乐观，第三方应用商店HandMark的董事长甚至直言因为面临来自谷歌的竞争压力，他不能将整个公司的命运押在独立应用销售业务上。

这种说法也许还是不够谨慎，因为HTML5时代的来临，很可能再度挤压独立应用商店的生存空间。

HTML5 & mobile

来自荷兰的全球在线休闲游戏公司SPIL Games目前用户已超过1.3亿人，该公司称如果休闲游戏转换成应用模式，玩家的游戏体验将大受影响。

SPIL Games公司首席执行官Peter Driessen表示，SPIL Games一直致力于为用户提供即时快捷的游戏体验，用户不需要下载安装软件，只要打开浏览器就能开始玩游戏。体验游戏玩家在锁定一款游戏之前，往往都会尝试五六款不同的游戏。

SPIL Games于是将包含47个游戏页面的网站移植到了支持HTML5技术的移动平台，以便手机用户可以快速浏览游戏列表，试玩不同的游戏。

Driessen声称，“我们也试过将游戏投放到应用商店，但这种模式不能提供方便、休闲的体验。而HTML5却能兼容电视、iOS、Android、PC等多种平台，为用户提供不打折扣的游戏体验。”

谷歌和苹果将Latitude、Google Voice这类服务投放到iOS平台时也曾采用HTML5的技术支持，采用这种方式，就不需要受限于苹果App Store之类应用商店的条条框框，因为应用商店的产品往往针对特定的手机平台，而一款功能齐全的HTML5网页应用就不存在这个问题，HTML5游戏也同样如此，只需要编写一次程序，就能覆盖多个平台。

对于主要开发Flash网页游戏的公司而言，游戏移植的成功率非常关键。即使是Facebook上的头号游戏开发商Zynga公司，已经推出了20多款社交游戏，但在转战手机领域时也难免犹豫。

Zynga目前仅向iOS平台移植了5款最受欢迎的游戏，直到前不久才正式宣布出击Android市场。而且Zynga最为得意的一款iOS游戏《Farmville》，最近在iTunes免费应用100强榜单上也不过排在第64名而已。

Driessen认为，对所有的开发商来说，HTML5可以提供一步到位的服务，无论他们是想开发手机游戏，还是想在不同平台投放游戏，都只要使用同一个HTML5源代码。

他还预测，在未来三年内，HTML5游戏将占SPIL Games业务总数的一半。Driessen号召游戏开发商踊跃报名参加SPIL举办的HTML5休闲游戏设计大赛，表示相信HTML5是游戏的未来发展方向，他们每月都会收到大量不错的参赛游戏，但有些游戏还处于初级水平，暂时不那么理想。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，转载请注明来源：游戏邦）

The App Store model faces disruption from HTML5

Today’s Wall Street Journal features an article by Christopher Lawton that talks about the difficulty independent app stores face when competing with Apple and Google for developer and consumer attention. Paul Reddick, chief executive of third-party app store HandMark told WSJ that he couldn’t simply bet the whole company’s fate on independently distributing apps with a presence like Google to compete against.

It may not even be a prudent bet to be in the app store business at all.

SPIL Games, a Dutch company that built its audience of more than 130 million gamers on browser-based Flash games, has found that the behavior of casual gamers doesn’t translate well to the app-based distribution model.

“We have always had the kind of experience where users can play immediately,” Peter Driessen, CEO of SPIL Games told Betanews this morning. “There’s no downloading and installing. It’s just browse and play right away. Casual gamers usually try five or six different games before they settle on one they like.”

SPIL, therefore, has ported its entire network of 47 casual gaming sites into mobile-friendly HTML5, so users can quickly browse through the lists of games, trying different ones on for size.

“We’ve tested in app stores, and we can’t bring that quick, casual experience into [them]. HTML5 lets us bring that experience to users on all the compatible platforms out there…connected TVs, iOS devices, Android devices, PCs, and others,” Driessen said.

It’s an approach that Google and Apple have taken for bringing services like Latitude and Google Voice to the iOS platform. Unlike an app that would have to adhere to Apple’s strict App Store guidelines while simultaneously catering to the feature-disparate iPhone versions, a fully-featured HTML5 Web app could cover more ground. HTML5 games, likewise, could be written once, and cover a lot more devices.

With companies that deal mostly in Flash-based games, this portability is crucial. Take, for example, Zynga, makers of intensely popular Flash-based social games like Farmville and Mafia Wars. Even though the company has more than 20 social games, and is the top Facebook application developer by a rather large margin, the company has not necessarily translated this into a great presence in the mobile space.

Zynga has made iOS apps out of five of its most popular games, and only recently announced that it would be developing apps for Android. Farmville for iOS, Zynga’s best-performing iOS app, is currently ranked #64 in iTunes’ top 100 free apps.

“For developers, everything is tied together.” said Driessen. “If they want to make a mobile game, or to launch on a new platform, they can base everything on the same [HTML5] source code.”

In three years’ time, Driessen expects half of SPIL’s business to come from its HTML5 games. By that point, the burgeoning Web standard should be reaching the candidate recommendation stage and its presence in mobile handsets, PCs, and connected entertainment devices. In the meantime, the company is hoping to attract indie game developers to the HTML5 camp with a six-month long contest to develop the best HTML5 casual games, with three winners every month.

“We believe it’ll be the future of gaming. Every month we’ve gotten quite a few great new game submissions, and sometimes we can’t put some of them up because they’re still very experimental,” Driessen said.（source:betanews）