[whatwg] Forcing orientation in content

[Ian Hickson]

On Fri, 12 Jul 2013, Peter Occil wrote:
>
> One use case I can think of is games.  For instance, there are several 
> games for Android that run the game in a particular orientation, such as 
> Jewels Deluxe, Shoot the Apple, and similar puzzle and casual games.
> 
> I can't speak for why that's the case exactly, but I believe it's for at 
> least one of the following:
> 
> - Some puzzle games have a non-square gameboard, such as many jewel/gem
> matching games.  Using two different orientations might force the gameboard to
> look smaller in one orientation than the other.
> - In some games, resizing the viewport to either orientation causes two
> issues:  The game might look squashed in one orientation but not the other, or
> the game will be letterboxed in one orientation if aspect ratio is preserved.
> - It might be more costly to create game assets and user experience for both
> orientations.

Sure, some orientations might be better -- just like the HTML spec is more 
readable on a taller large screen than on a landscape phone screen -- but 
if the user wants to play the other way, it seems wrong to be able to 
prevent it.

-- 
Ian Hickson               U+1047E                )\._.,--....,'``.    fL
http://ln.hixie.ch/       U+263A                /,   _.. \   _\  ;`._ ,.
Things that are impossible just take longer.   `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.'