At the Casual Connect conference in Seattle today, some numbers were thrown out there, talking about just how big gaming is now on the iPhone. Of the nearly 70,000 apps in the App Store, some 20% are games. Yes, that means there are between 10,000 and 15,000 apps that are games, just for the iPhone alone. To put that in perspective, that is more than the total number of apps that all of the App Store’s big competitors (Android Market, Nokia Ovi Store, Palm’s App Catalog, BlackBerry’s App World) have — combined.

Sure, all of those stores are younger than the App Store, but it’s already clear that none are taking hold as true gaming platforms like the iPhone is. At least Palm has already come to that realization early in its lifespan, and has started trying to hire gaming engineers to try and change that. But there are no shortage of questions as to just how well webOS, an OS built on web technologies like HTML, CSS and JavaScript, will be able to handle graphic-intense gaming, like the iPhone can.

And the competitors have another problem: The games on the iPhone are getting even better.

If there’s one trend I’ve noticed in the App Store over the past few months, it’s that every week without fail now there are at least a handful of really, really good games hitting the store. I’m someone who, as I’ve grown older, has found that I don’t have much time or patience for gaming. But there I am on the iPhone at least once a week now checking for the hot new games and downloading them. They’re fantastic, and they’re not $50 or $60 like current console games are.

Some, like FlightControl are simple and addictive. Others like Rolando 2, make perfect use of all the iPhone’s capabilities like multi-touch and the accelerometer. Some rival fun I have with console versions, like Tiger Woods an Peggle. Some bring a feeling of nostalgia for the old NES days (with better graphics), like Castle of Magic. I could go on — StoneLoops of Jurrasica, GloBall, Tap Tap Revenge 2, Moonlights — these are all great games. And these are just games I’ve gotten in the past few weeks.

And now, with the launch of the iPhone 3GS, there is hardware that will be able to handle even more impressive gaming. While Apple’s competitors are busy trying to build phones to dethrone the iPhone, Apple has built a device that not only is still running laps around them, it’s also taking on devices like the Sony PSP and the Nintendo DS.

And naturally, with success, a lot of developers making games for the iPhone are making a lot of money off of the platform. SGN’s Shervin Pishevar says his top games are seeing 25,000 to 40,000 daily installs. If those games are $9.99, that’s $250,000 to $400,000 a day (before Apple’s 30% cut), just for one game, as VC Jeff Clavier points out.

Now, not all developers are having such success. But that’s partially due to the fact that there are so many of them now making games. And the fact that the iPhone has turned into a gaming platform has attracted the big boys, like EA.

“Every day, the gap with Apple gets wider and wider,” Sling Media co-founder Blake Krikorian told Bloomberg today refering to the iPhone’s competitors. He had bought a Palm Pre when it came out, but switched back to the iPhone three days later because he couldn’t live without Tiger Woods. I completely understand. I just don’t understand why the iPhone’s competitors don’t seem to.

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Research In Motion has acquired Dash Navigation for an undisclosed amount, according to a spokeswoman for RIM. Dash, which makes makes the car GPS device Dash Express (read our review of the device here), had been struggling to compete with GPS device competitors like Garmin, and shifted its focus away from the hardware business last year towards selling its software to other device manufacturers.

Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia backed, Dash originally manufactured a network-connected GPS that pooled the location and speeds of all nearby Dash owners to give them back real-time traffic reports. The device has some notable features but couldn’t build a large user base and was forced to change its business plan and lay off 65% of its staff in November. We wrote back then that Dash’s API program was strong, so switching to licensing its software made sense. But the primary appeal of Dash’s software, which is built around being connected to other Dash owners and sharing driving data with each other, could be lost if the software is licensed by a device manufacturer.

RIM refused to comment on how Dash will be incorporated into its business but it’s safe to assume that the company will use Dash’s technology to upgrade the GPS in their devices in some capacity. This is similar to Nokia’s acquisition of digital map maker NAVTEQ in 2008 to help add map technology to their devices. Although RIM’s acquisition is on a slightly smaller scale, Dash’s technology does give RIM some important mapping and car navigation technologies, many of which can be applied more broadly to cell phones. If the connectivity feature of Dash is maintained by RIM, this could prove to be a useful tool for Blackberry users, given how many Blackberry devices are out there.

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But there must be some significant overlap, because 400,000 people downloaded the MySpace Blackberry application in the last week, says MySpace – it was launched on November 12.

Both RIM and MySpace say this is a record – no other application has been downloaded so quickly onto Blackberry devices, and MySpace has never had an application on any platform be downloaded as often.

MySpace also says that 15 million messages have been sent and received via the mobile app, and users have updated their mood and status more than 2 million times.

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The platform wars are going mobile. Whether it’s the iPhone, Blackberry, Android or Windows Mobile, the mobile platform that will win in the end will be the one with the best and broadest collection of applications. To give developers a little extra financial motivation, funds are being set up to invest in them. Google announced a $10 million Android challenge back in November, and Kleiner Perkins announced its $100 million iFund for iPhone-only startups in March. Now, it looks like Research in Motion is about to announce its own $150 million Blackberry Partners Fund (site not up yet) to spur applications and services for its mobile device.

At least, that is what VentureBeat reports in an item that appeared in its feed, but has since been pulled from the site (see headline here. Update: the first link above is now live). According to that post (excerpt):

Research In Motion, the RBC and Thomson Reuters have invested in an $150 million venture investment fund, called the BlackBerry Partners Fund, to support developers of applications running primarily on the Blackberry.

The announcement will be made in Orlando at a convention on Monday.

The venture firm backing the fund is Canada’s JLA Ventures, a Montreal and Toronto firm active in mobile. That firm will co-manage the investing process, together with the investment group of Canada’s largest bank, RBC Venture Partners. RIM, RBC and Thomson are anchor investors in the fund. Jim Balsillie, Co-CEO, Research In Motion, is on the advisory board of JLA Ventures.

The fund will focus on Blackberry apps, but will also be free to to invest in startups that develop for other mobile platforms as well. That’s smart because no startup should restrict itself to just one device.

But doesn’t it seem like everyone thinks they need to dangle money in front of startups to attract them to their platform these days? (See also the fbFund for Facebook startups and and the MySpace incubator spinoff Slingshot Labs). What ever happened to simply building the best damn platform in the world and letting the app developers come to you because that’s where all the users are?

Update 2: VentureBeat also has a Q&A with one of teh venture partners here.

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A picture of what may or may not be the next-generation Blackberry 9000 popped up in an online forum. The device does not appear to have a touchscreen, but it does sport a black iPhone-like sheen. Again, this could be the real deal, a hoax, or some unrelated prototype. But one thing is for sure: iPhones and Blackberries are on a collision course. As iPhones gain more enterprise-class e-mail capabilities, Blackberries will add more consumer-friendly design to its devices.

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