While we’ve covered games for the iPod Touch before, they generally require that you’ve Jailbroken your PMP first; it’s a hassle many won’t consider, especially when you factor in the potential effect on your warranty and Apple’s firmware updates being generally unfriendly to hacks.  Yet so far Apple has been slow to introduce gaming to either the iPod Touch or the iPhone, despite titles being available for other iPods in the company’s range.  A patent published this week could cast some light on that, however; it might be that, rather than being lazy, Apple in fact has been putting their time to good use by developing MultiTouch-compatible games that, rather than comprising simple button-bashing, demand a more naturalistic interface.

The success of the Wii has shown that people are willing to interact with games titles in ways other than joysticks and control pads, and the Apple patent would appear to suggest that the Cupertino company

“The input area can additionally resemble or approximate the shape of a scene (e.g., game scene) to allow a person to provide input in a more intuitive way. Accordingly, input can be provided in a simple and more intuitive manner by effectively allowing the user to interact with the input area in a way that mimics or approximates a desired action (e.g., moving a ball or bat around by inputting a rotational movement)” Apple patent 20070279394

Part of the patent hints at dual-application displays, where a game shares screen-space with iTunes control, but other elements seem to be describing some sort of on-screen control subsection - such as the rendered controls in the GBA emulator.  As usual, the desire to script up a patent that is as broad as possible makes narrowing down real-world applications difficult, but with Apple namechecking gaming as a possible use for the technology it looks likely that official titles will be available at some point in the iPod Touch’s future.

[via ArsTechnica]