Well, this isn’t too big of a surprise to any of us (well, to me at least), that Apple will be bringing iOS gaming to the Apple TV along with it being hinted in future iOS firmwares as well, however, let’s not jump to any conclusions just so fast. Some new code in the iOS 4.3 beta 3 firmware hints that Apple TV may soon support online gaming (hopefully).

Several references have been found pertaining to “ATVGames” and “ATVThunder” that point to a controller of some sort, leaderboards (think Game Center), a way to schedule games (multiplayer?), and a store front (think App Store, iTunes). We’re particularly intrigued by two strings — “com.apple.appletv.play.live.thunder” and “.play.archive.thunder” — but what those actually mean in the grand scheme of things is ultimately ambiguous. Apple TV’s minimum storage capacity (about 8GB) suggests the company might look to streaming not entirely unlike how OnLive works; as our tipster speculates, the OpenGL is mature and thoroughly implemented enough that streaming low bandwidth data and computing locally could happen, but that’s just theoretical with nothing in the code to back it up.” — Engadget

While this does sound very intriguing, it will be interesting to see how this evolves and as we get more information on this matter. If Apple does bring gaming to the Apple TV, hopefully it will turn into something big and possibly compete with the PS3, XBOX 360, and Wii. While that is a stretch, hopefully it will happen though.

[Engadget]