Tablet Market: How to know if a game supports tablet size?

Question

I'm shopping the android market on my tablet (TF Prime) but can't seem to find anywhere if an app/game support tablet size.

I don't want to spend money on a game that is zoomed so much that I can count the pixels =)

How to tell if an app in the market supports tablet size?

Answer 1

One way is to ask the developer via the contact information provided in the application's Google Play page.

Where an application or game has a free- or paid-version, you could just try the free version. Unless it's stated in the description that the paid version actually supports higher resolutions, it's usually a safe assumption that if the free version looks a certain way, the paid version will look similar.

A final way is to simply buy the application and try it within the 15 minute refund period. If you're not pleased with the way the application or game is formatted for your screen, simply refund it. Keep in mind, though, that you're only allowed to refund an app once. If you re-install it after refunding, you will no longer have the option to refund and will be billed immediately.

Answer 2

While not universally accurate, the easiest way to tell is to find apps with "HD" in the title; this is almost universally meant to mean "tablet optimized". This is most commonly done with games.

Hopefully in the future the market is sorted better and apps are developed better for tablets, but there currently is no sorting/filtering option or easy way to check if something is tablet optimized or not.

The Amazon App store is also a good place to look; all those apps are vetted to work well on the 7 inch Kindle Fire. Not the same size as the TF Prime but you can be sure they're not only designed for phones.

Answer 3

Unfortunately at the moment is not possible filter the market by device resolution and maybe it will be never done, because Google does not test all apps and it relies on what publisher says. In addition could be not only a problem of resolution, sometimes the Tegra 2/3 chips are not still well supported by apps developer, or the problem could be related to ICS too.

I have an Asus Transformer (1280x800) and here are the rules that I try to follow before spending money on market:

• As already suggested, if there is a FREE version of an app I try it first to check if is fully compatible with my tablet;
• I always read the recent changelog to see if there are fixes especially targeted to ICS or Tablets/HD devices;
• I check the User Reviews through Google Play website, so I can use my device filter to check reviews related to it:
• In addition, if I look for tablets-ready apps, I check the page Featured Android Apps for Tablets;
• You can do similar research through website dedicated to app reviews that support tablet filtering (like, for example, AndroidTapp)

Hope it helps!