The Apple App Store gaming update is Gamertell’s weekly look at the previous week’s Apple App Store game releases. We cover them all – good and not so good – in their respective categories with a breakdown of the great games and the free games right where you want ‘em, at the top and in your face. The list is available every Monday, right as you are about to start that long work week. This is the first installment of the iPad-only games update.

In theory, the iPad seems like an absolutely incredible idea.

Then again, that’s what a company does when it’s doing something new for itself and its customers. It trie to make it seem much better than it actually is. So, you’re probably wondering what could go wrong.

Well, entirely too much can go wrong.

There are quite a few games I’m eager to try out on the iPad and I’m going to list off ten of them over two articles. The five here are games I’ve already played on my iPhone. Later this week I’ll round up five I haven’t yet played, either because they haven’t been released or I just didn’t think the iPhone would do them justice. I have no guarantee that iPad optimized versions of any of these games will be released but I think that most are a safe bet, starting with…

At first glance it is an oversized iPod Touch complete with a screen for the primary surface area (although a wider-than-iPhone border), a Home button, a SD card slot along the side, a USB port and a bottom power-dock slot.

As a game system, the iPad certainly has the screen advantage. It will be the largest screen of any handheld game device, if we can even call it a handheld device and not a netbook or tablet (or netablet?).

It will also have benefit of a massive library of games although a decent percentage will need to be reworked for the iPad’s size. The accelerometer makes it great for driving and balance games but the size, even light and thin, is going to be too wide, tall and slippery for swinging moves easily accomplished with the iPhone and iPod Touch.

The battery life is not very impressive and may prove a nasty sticking point for gamers. Not being able to run Flash games is also an issue Apple will eventually need to address. The biggest sticking point will be, of course, the price. Five hundred dollars is a bit much for a console let alone a handheld. Of course, with the unexpected early adoption of previous Apple i-creations, this will likely be in a lot of hands and games will certainly sell well.