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Wed, 15 Jul 2009 Chillingo announces Crystal social gaming platform for iPhone

Crystal was announced at the iPhone Develop Conference in Brighton this week

Nick Spence

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UK iPhone software publisher and Macworld Awards Winner Chillingo, has announced Crystal, a free social gaming platform for iPhone and iPod touch which the company believes will significantly enhance the iPhone gaming experience for both gamers and developers.

Crystal was announced at the iPhone Develop Conference in Brighton this week.

According to Chillingo, Crystal will embrace the powerful features of the new iPhone OS 3.0 and provide developers with a fully integrated and transparent framework to include social features in their games.

Crystal is rather ambitiously being talked up as the iPhone's answer to Microsoft's Xbox Live.

Chillingo believes social gaming networks have great potential for both iPhone gamers and developers. The company points to figures from Nielsen, which suggest total minutes spent on social networking sites in the US have increased 83 per cent year-over-year.

Total minutes spent on Facebook meanwhile, have increased nearly 700 per cent year-over-year, growing from 1.7 billion minutes in April 2008 to 13.9 billion in April 2009.

Chillingo are responsible for a range of popular award-winning iPhone and iPod touch games.

Crystal will offer players the opportunity to create their own profile, add friends, store achievements and game histories and compete with friends via direct challenges in multiple games. Crystal is also fully integrated with popular social networks including Facebook and Twitter.

Also a marketing tool, Crystal will allow players to discover games they like more easily says the makers.

Chillingo will open up the Crystal platform for all game publishers and developers, and promises a host of new innovative features for the social gaming platform.

iPhone developers are invited to register at www.crystalsdk.com

Chillingo has an excellent track for fun and innovative iPhone gaming. Chillingo won Best iPhone/iPod touch game at the recent Macworld Awards for Zen Bound.

"Zen Bound makes fantastic use of the iPhone controls, plenty of challenge and variety ensure you won't get bored in a hurry, great visuals and audio," Macworld said at the time.

Check out our new Macworld Mobile site.

Follow Macworld UK on twitter: www.twitter.com/macworlduk

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