How Samsung Galaxy S4 Will Compete With Sony PlayStation 4

The mobile market continues to evolve at a rapid rate with new smartphones and tablets being introduced by Apple, Samsung, Acer, Asus, HP, Toshiba, Vizio and other big companies at a brisk (almost monthly) pace. Samsung is the latest big consumer electronics company to one-up the competition with its Galaxy S4.

With the advances in processing power in these mobile devices (and Moore’s Law), mobile devices – and the games being developed for them – are quickly catching up with what current generation consoles can do. In the US, the Galaxy S4 will sport a 1.9 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 processor that has already been tested by Laptop Mag and put up there

with the new HTC One. When you factor in the benchmarks set by NVIDIA Tegra 4 technology, which was demonstrated at CES 2013 with new games like Dead Trigger II, the gap between consoles and portable games is closing even faster.

At its New York City press event at Radio City Music Hall, Samsung showed its commitment to gaming with the Galaxy S4 gamepad. The company had a game arcade section set up for press and attendees to gets hands-on time with the new smartphone playing games like Sega’s Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 2 and Electronic Arts’ Real Racing 3. Check out the video below to see the new phone in action.

EA will have 16 games available for the smartphone’s April 26 launch, including The Sims, Simpsons: Tapped Out, Plants vs. Zombies, Need for Speed: Most Wanted, Monopoly, and Bejeweled Blitz.

“We’re delighted to be partnered with Samsung to bring some of our fans’ favorite mobile gaming titles to the Samsung Galaxy S4 in time for launch,” said EA vice president of new platforms Glenn Roland in a press release. “The device’s higher resolution, larger screen and increased processing power will give our games an opportunity to look even more beautiful for Samsung consumers.”

The Samsung Galaxy S4 sports a 5-inch, 1080p screen, 2GB of RAM, and 16 to 64 GB, which is perfect for gaming. In May, Samsung will release a Game Arcade gamepad that looks very similar to an Xbox 360 controller with dual analog sticks and shoulder, D-pad and four face buttons. It attaches to the bottom of the Galaxy S4 and rumors online are circulating that it will also work with the currently unannounced Galaxy Note 3, as well. The controller, which has yet to be priced, will come with eight bundled games and will work with 80 Android games at launch. It’s smaller and lighter than other portable controllers.

Like many newer mobile gaming devices, including the upcoming NVIDIA Project SHIELD featuring Tegra 4 technology, the Galaxy S4 also connects to your big HD TV. That’s where Sony’s PlayStation 4 (and the unannounced new Xbox console) come into play as competition. The rate at which developers are pushing mobile games (and if you haven’t been playing them, check out titles like Epic Games’ Infinity Blade 2 and Phosphor Games’ Horn), the window is narrowing between consoles and portable. And it won’t be very long that current gen and mobile are even (likely this year given the Tegra 4 game demos).

The fact that Samsung is putting its marketing power behind gaming – something Apple has never supported through its own gaming peripherals for iPhone or iPad devices – shows that Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo are facing new competition. There are also new mobile threats from Project SHIELD, Green Throttle Games and Moga.

If the Samsung S4 eye tracking technology is something that game developers are able to utilize, that could introduce some really cool exclusive new games to the market, as well.