476
people found this helpful, as of 2023
ranked #39,562 most helpful
out of 571,544,897 reviews
★★★★☆
Hoping Amazon plans to restore hundreds of missing apps soon
I really wanted to love this device. However, as I write this, there are hundreds of apps/games in the Amazon App store that are showing as not compatible with the "Fire TV", but are compatible with the "Fire TV (Previous Generation)". I have called Amazon's Fire TV Support about this, and when I do the agents put me on hold, and then come back and tell me that Amazon is aware of this issue. I would love for Amazon to comment on this review and tell us that they are working on a fix for this. Here are some details of the data that I have gathered from the Amazon App store.
1) Doing a search for Apps & Games/Fire TV Apps (All Models), it currently comes back with:
Fire TV (3,823)
Fire TV (Previous Generation) (4,059)
2) Doing a search for Apps & Games/Fire TV Apps (All Models):Games, it currently comes back with:
Fire TV (1,030)
Fire TV (Previous Generation): (1,161)
A sampling of some games that I found in the App Store to be compatible with "Fire TV (Previous Generation)", but not with "Fire TV" are:
Grand Theft Auto (various versions), Asphalt 8, Modern Combat 4.
Since the new Fire TV has a more powerful processor than the "Previous Generation", this doesn't make sense to me. I preordered this device to supplement my Fire TV Stick to be able to play all those additional games (that the App Store had said, before this new version, had worked with the Fire TV). Does Amazon have to recertify each of the apps for the new version of the Fire TV, and that hasn't happened yet?
*** Update 10/11/2015:
1) The Grand Theft Auto (GTA) games are now showing in the App Store as compatible with the new Fire TV.
2) When I check the four counts again for Apps and for Games, there is a very small variation from before (less than 20 for each of the counts), and with "Fire TV (Previous Generation)" still far exceeding "Fire TV".
*** Update 10/29/2015:
More and more games are showing up under "Fire TV". I see that "Asphalt 8:Airborne" has become compatible since the last time I had checked. That's good. Perhaps it's the case that authors are needing to provide updates for their apps under the latest Fire TV platform. I am raising my rating.
October 2015 · Electronics · verified purchase