Every iOS app I've shipped over the last nine years started the same way: a Rails developer with a great web app, users who want it in the App Store, and weeks spent on Xcode, signing certificates, and Swift boilerplate that has nothing to do with the actual product.
Since the launch of the App Store in 2008, Apple has paid out a whopping $550 billion to developers. This is according to figures shared by Apple about a record year in 2025 for its services. In addition to the App Store, Apple Music and Apple TV also grew strongly. Since Apple itself historically received 30 percent of all App Store spending, it has also earned hundreds of billions of dollars. However, that percentage has declined somewhat since about 10 years ago.
Apple in 2017 added a rule to its App Review Guidelines, which lists the specific requirements for mini apps. In guideline 4.7, the company gives developers permission to run mini apps, mini games, streaming games, chatbots, plug-ins, and game emulators that offer software not in the main app's binary. It also describes how they're to process sensitive data or filter objectionable material, similar to native apps.
Things really took off when [Steve] Jobs and Apple launched the original iPhone in 2007, which going back to that day, actually, it was a closed ecosystem. There was no app store when Apple launched the iPhone. That first year in 2007, which is when I became interested in gaming as a business, a team of coders cracked the phone,
The best puzzle games are ones that force you to take a moment to consider your next move, the world around you, the rules that you're being forced to operate under, and, sometimes, all of the above. They're delicately balanced experiences, carefully threading the needle between being too easy and satisfying and avoiding being too difficult and frustrating. These are experiences that ask a lot of their players, anticipating a level
