Any five-hour airport delay would be a lot more interesting if I could bang out Zork or A Bard's Tale or entertain my son with Oregon Trail on that terrific Kindle battery while I was waiting. And I'd wager there might even be a market for vintage text-based computer games, many of which are terrific to play for a few minutes at a clip. It's easy to imagine crosswords, Sudoku, Scrabble, and the like for Kindle - it's almost unfair to call this casual gaming, since its fans are so passionate. The Kindle already has two word-puzzle games available, Every Word and Shuffled Row. The sweet spot seems to be black-and-white word games, like you might find in a book or newspaper. These aren't just technical, but are circumscribed by the Kindle's user base, few of whom are likely to use the Kindle for heavy gaming even if they're interested in it. Here, Vrignaud and Amazon face a challenge, as they have to chart a game platform strategy that works within the Kindle's limitations. A revitalized, multiplatform game streaming or download service for Amazon is intriguing, but let's set it aside for now to focus on gaming for Kindle. Now, Vrignaud worked on many different platforms at Microsoft, from XBox and XBox Live to PCs and mobile phones presumably, he'll do the same for Amazon, especially since Amazon already offers casual game downloads for Windows PCs. A recent high-profile hire at Amazon offers one possibility for the future of Kindle apps, while two Kindle-watchers have offered different forecasts.Īmazon recently hired away Andre Vrignaud, Microsoft's Director of Game Platform Strategy. But that doesn't mean we won't see a rich variety of specialized applications for it. Amazon's Kindle reader isn't going to get amenities like color, video capability, a camera, or an accelerometer in the foreseeable future.

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