It was only a matter of time, but get ready to break out the DLC via the iPhone OS updates due out this summer.  In a press conference yesterday, Apple made a number of official announcements concerning the iPhone OS update, most notably, the inclusion of microtransactions, specifically called the ‘In-App Purchase’.

Obviously, news of microtransactions being made available via the app store changes the entire landscape of gaming on the iPhone, but that’ not all.  Apple also revealed that they’re tossing in a whole slew of features that could very well make the iPhone a preferred gaming device.  iPhone OS 3 will also allow for mulitplayer peer-to-peer gaming thanks to wireless play (WoW for iPhone?).  iPhone will utilize bluetooth and scan a 10 meter (approx. 30 feet) range for other handsets running the same application, allowing users to challenge each other in head-to-head competition.  At the present time, there are probably only a handful of games that could successfully pull this off, but given then lead time, I’m quite sure that a number of iPhone app developers have just rescheduled their vacations.

Another feature that Apple’s been promising for quite a some time, but until now failing to deliver; push notification.  Rather than having to manually check for updates, the new OS will allow developers to push updates directly to a users’ phone, thereby providing real time updates in socially oriented and multiplayer games.  What’s more, users do not even need to be in-game to receive invitations to play from friends to ‘come out and play’.  Likewise, the new update will also support in-game chat and even access to your iPod all from within the game.

Both EA and ngmoco were featured during this announcement, demonstrating a host of the new features.  EA showed how microtransactions will be made available in ‘The Sims 3’ via furniture and clothing options which will be available for $0.99.  ngmoco’s LiveFire is a multiplayer first person shooter that makes use of a number of the new features including in-game chat, and on-the-fly weapons purchases.

So what are the implications for developers and gaming studios working on iPhone apps?  Beyond the obvious revenue generation streams now sanctioned by Apple (don’t forget about iMafia’s backdoor microtransactions), this move releases a tremendous amount of pressure on the already cut throat Apple iPhone application store.  Amongst the 6000+ applications in the app store, price wars have been brewing for quite a while now.  A glance at the top 100 iPhone applications at any given time reveals that 98 of them are at a $5.99 price point or lower, with some top shelf apps, including Warner Bros. “Watchmen” at the shockingly low price of $0.99.  What this means is that there a lot of games available for the iPhone that aren’t making a whole lot of money.  With the announcement of microtransactions being introduced, developers now have a whole new way of looking at how they price their product on the app store.  Apple has not sanctioned microtransactions for free applications, but buy releasing a bare minimum price version of the application, developers can now walk the user through the whole experience, and not hope that they come back to the store to upgrade to the more ‘robust’ version.  What developers need to keep in mind is scalability.  If they’re going to focus on monetization via microtransactions they’ve simply got to make sure that the pipe is full and constantly being refueled.  If the available content doesn’t meet user demand, consumers will simply take their business elsewhere.

With the iGames Summit 09 coming up tomorrow in San Francisco, this iPhone OS 3.0 news couldn’t have come at a better time, and I suspect that a number of presenters are scrambling to re-write their speeches right now.  More news to come as we draw closer to OS3 launch date.

Related articles by Zemanta

• The iPhone OS 3.0 Announcement Scorecard (mobilecrunch.com)
• Apple iPhone 3.0 event tomorrow might reveal a tablet (Seth Weintraub/Computerworld Blogs) (techmeme.com)