At its heart, Star Paint is a simple untangle-it game. It’s a solid title and bundled in a nice theme, and OpenFeint integration is always a plus. However, it does lack a few important functions (like a resume feature), the instructions aren’t clear, and there’s not much variety to spice things up. Star Paint is a good game nevertheless, but I’d like to see some updates.

As you may have guessed by the title, Star Paint is star-themed; each stage consists of a number of stars connected by a tangled mess of lines, constellation-style. Your job is to untangle them by dragging the stars around the screen. It starts out simply, but by the time you’re playing hard mode you’ll have to sink quite a bit of time into each puzzle. Puzzles are randomly generated, so you never “run out,” per se, but I did think that they got repetitive—once you develop a strategy, it can be applied to pretty much every puzzle. Once you complete a puzzle, you’re taken to the next one. While there are three modes (Normal, Medium, and Hard), all are essentially Endless modes with varying levels of complexity. Supposedly there’s a time limit, but I moved quickly enough that it wasn’t an issue.

There’s also a Constellation mode, which, as far as I can tell, just lets you play with the stars and, if you know how, rearrange them into the shapes of famous constellations like Aries. I didn’t really see a point to Constellation mode, but I might have missed something. The instructions don’t cover that mode at all, and are rather sparse for the main game as well.

One more thing about Star Paint: OpenFeint integration! StarPaint alerts you to in-game achievements as you play, and Medium and Hard modes are unlocked by completing two basic achievements.

The game itself works, but integration is lacking. There’s no “resume” function, and closing the app means that you lose all of your progress. This might have something to do with the randomly generated maps, but users will doubtlessly be irked to see their high scores cut off mid-game just because they went to check their mail and the developers didn’t feel like including an auto-save function. The presentation could also use some work; the music annoyed me and the graphics, while adequate, aren’t stellar either.

Star Paint is a decent game. Unfortunately, it’s not much more than a simple distraction built on a simple premise, and without any new twists to make it interesting, there are countless clones that offer similar gameplay. Don’t get me wrong: if you like untangle-games, this is a good implementation of a classic, though auto-save really needs to be present. But more importantly, the novelty soon wore off and I was stuck with randomly-generated maps that still managed to feel repetitive.

Scrabble is bloated and slow-loading. Lexulous, my previous online Scrabble application of choice, has recently been plagued by bugs. Enter Words With Friends: a shiny, nimble Scrabble clone complete with Push notifications (hallelujah!) and blazing-fast speeds. Compared to its competition, Words With Friends offers fewer features; however, the speed of the app and the eager player pool are enough to have me hooked.

One of the most notable features absent from Words With Friends: ranking systems. You’re matched with a random opponent, unless—as the title suggests—you have a specific friend you want to play with. You do have to register, which is annoying; I wish that the game used Facebook Connect, OpenFeint, or Plus+, though that could impact the speed. Either way, once registered, it’s easy to find your friends; I’ve already played games with Jeff and Chris!

Once you start playing, you’ll quickly notice differences from standard Scrabble, which are presumably there to prevent lawsuits. You’ve still got seven letters, but the board layout is different, with eight triple-word spaces instead of four and a different scattering of bonus tiles in general. The dictionary also appears to be different, but I can’t be sure: an in-game dictionary is yet another absent feature. Other absent features include a moves history, a Facebook counerpart, and a preview of what your score will be. Let me restate that: you’re not told your score until after you move. So, yes, you’ll need mental math skills if you want to nitpick over points. Not such a bad thing, in my opinion; God knows I need the practice.

But Words With Friends still shines, in part because of its simplicity. The streamlined app loads quickly, and everything is easily accessible. The user interface is extremely well designed, with clever details that show a high level of polish; animations are smooth and snappy. “Last moved” timers are updated almost in real-time, so you can be immediately appraised of when it’s your turn if you leave the app open. If you’re occupied elsewhere, Push notifications prompt you to move, though these are often delayed by a few minutes and Apple’s system for missed Push notifications is less than optimal. At least there are badge alerts on the app’s icon!

I think it’s the Push notifications that contribute to the active nature of the app’s user base. You’re compelled to move quickly, though there’s no formal time limit. On average, it took me about a day to finish a game. Compared to my other online Scrabble games, which often last a week or more, that’s great, and it’s the main reason why I love Words With Friends. The Push notifications and quick plays make it addicting, and more sedate user pools can’t beat it.

The one exception to the app’s well-thought-out execution is the Pass ‘n’ Play feature, which lets two players play on one device. My questions: why can’t I play with three or four people? Why can’t I name the other player? Why isn’t there some sort of pause screen, as in Scrabble? (As it is, as soon as you move you can see your opponent’s tiles.) The Pass ‘n’ Play mode is tacked on as an afterthought, a notable exception to the consistent quality of the rest.

The game does have its quirks. But it’s clear that the developers intended for it be a simple, speedy application that didn’t waste time with superfluous features. The game is there, the player base is engaged and everything just works. (Well, the online mode, at least.) If you’re a Scrabble fan, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be playing Words With Friends. If you fancy a challenge, try me: my name’s bonniee in the game. I’ll be waiting! (Be warned, she’ll crush you! -Chris)

In my years of being a consumer, I’ve found that messing with genre boundaries is a messy thing. For every ‘Walk This Way‘ you get 5 ‘N 2Gether Now’s, forcing most people (developers in this case) so stick to genre norms. With the iPhone being a perfect platform for the ‘Tower Defense’ genre, it seems so simple to just stick with what works. As Aerosmith and Run D.M.C would tell you though, stepping outside of the norm can be just what the doctor ordered.

Zombie Attack! Second Wave (ZA2) is a ‘Tower Defense’ game in its truest sense, but has some unconventional tweaks that make the game unique. The goal of ZA2 is simple, defend your home from the wave of oncoming zombies. To do this, you use your 6 upgradeable weapons (towers), most of which are standard fare, some of which aren’t, to create the closest thing you can to an impenetrable wall. Instead of traditionally acting as the god of the screen, you use your character (the last survivor) to move around the map and build the towers wherever you please. You can also attack zombies with your character, but once you get to the later levels it doesn’t work out so well (inerestingly, you can get your “last survivor” killed as much as you want, he comes back after a timed re-spawn… does that make you a zombie?).

At first glance, the game seems quite entertaining, with bright graphics, good sound, and an entertaining premise, but I quickly found a few critical flaws. Problem #1 stems from the different game modes, or lack thereof, that the game presents you. In a standard game, any kind of game, there is a goal that you are aiming to achieve. In Mario, you are looking to kill Bowser, in Zelda, you kill Gannon, in Fieldrunners, you get to level 100. ZA2 gives you nothing… nothing to play for, no levels to unlock, no weapons to gain, only an online high score that you can attempt to beat and four different levels. There are two game modes, ‘Survivor’ and ‘Challenge’, but both just have you fighting endless waves of zombies until you die. ‘Challenge is slightly more entertaining because it changes up the gameplay a bit (limit weapon choices, make your house weaker), but neither give you anything to really strive for. You just play because it’s something to do, and most of the time I could be doing something somewhat fulfilling to do with my time.

Problem #2 is the way weapon upgrades work. Let’s say you have 4 towers, and you really like your flamethrower the best. You go on to neglect your other towers because you want to upgrade to the best flamethrower possible, costing a bunch of money. After you get your flamethrower to the max upgrade, you find out that upgrading your other towers costs more money now than it did when you started. I don’t know what metric they use for the pricing scale, but the fact that I have to think about it leads me to some odd budgeting struggles, which leads me to the next problem.

Problem #3. Because upgrading towers after a while becomes exponentially more expensive, you can choose one of two strategies. On one hand, you could build a bunch of towers and keep them at low level upgrades, or you can build a few and make them really strong. Either way, the later level zombies will take forever to kill, and because of their slow movement (they are zombies after all), the game is slowed down considerably. There were so many instances where I would set up my towers and then leave to grab some food, coming back to the exact situation that I was in when I left. I really just want to try to build up a super defense with my little guy, trying to weave in and out of the zombies to build more towers. Having a way to win would be pretty awesome too… but I already discussed that in problem #1.

Being a fairly slow, hard to manage, winner-less game, ZA2 has quite a bit of charm. I’ve come back to it many more times than I thought I would after my first go around, but I really just can’t see this one as staying on my iDevice for too much longer. I really like to win, and without a solid way to do that, I have a hard time moving on. I’m really hoping that a future update will provide me with some kind of finish line. For the current price of $3.99, I’d only really recommend this one if you have already mastered the giants of the tower defense genre (geoDefense Swarm, Fieldrunners, Sentinel 2) and are just looking for something to hold you over until the next big thing.

The very first game console I ever owned was an Atari. I spent countless hours with classics such like Astroblast, Combat, Pacman and yes even Pitfall. Hook’s art style is a throw back to the old pixelated days of terrible graphics where gameplay separated the good from the bad. Hook Champ art style draws heavily from games of that era, and adds in simple humour that works really well here.

Hook Champ has a very simple gameplay design. Move left to right using a hook shot (hence the name) in a very linear style map where a giant creature is chasing you. There are alternate paths with the more difficult ones filled with more treasure then the easier ones. The basic gameplay sounds simple and boring, but this is definitely not the case. The controls of jumping, running, swinging and shooting your hook shot make the gameplay tight and rewarding. The dev’s have added some additional touches to the experience that really expand on the game that really take it to the next level for me. With all your collected treasure you need a place to spend it, and that comes in the form of the ever so accurately named “Shop”. There you can pimp out your character with sweet hats that include the beener, a miner cap and the top hot. You can also upgrade your running speed, hook, rope, buy a shotgun to help protect you from the ghost and give you a boost. There are also a few other items in there that will help you along in your retro adventure.

At first I had a hard time getting used to the controls, but as soon as I upgraded my rope and hook the game felt much smoother. Once I got used to the controls the game opened up considerably. There is a definite easy to learn, difficult to master aspect to this game. Many maps, I made constant mistakes, missed the good treasures because I was terrible but it definitely felt that if I kept playing I could nail those tricky shots.

The game starts out with giving you access to just one set of maps. As you collect the coins in the maps, you can then purchase maps to get access to the other animal themed idols with an increasing difficulty. You’ll definitely need to upgrade at some points to give you that extra boost to get through the trickier levels. Each map has a local and global leaderboard that tracks a combination of time and treasure collection. In total you get 5 sets of levels with a difficult curve suggested by the Devs of Wimpy -> Monkey -> Bat -> Frog -> Bull.

This game is exactly what I love about the iPhone. A small time developer has a great simple idea, executes it extremely well and can put it out for me to consume and enjoy. I can’t recommend this retro style platformer enough, especially at the price of $2.99. It’s the first game I’ve reviewed here that I think is a must buy. It’s too bad this game isn’t in the top 100 of games sold on the appstore, because it definitely should be. The game currently has a 4.5 star rating average on the appstore, and it’s definitely well deserved.

Following on from Doom Resurrection, the slightly revamped, slightly modernized version of good ol’ Doom, iD Software thought you’d like the classic experience, and so this week they announced the release of Doom Classic, for iPhone (and iPod touch) – and this time my friends, it is the Doom we all know and love. You won’t find polished graphics here. This is the classic 8-bit Doomfest you’ve been waiting for. Nostalgia overload.

If you’re reading this you probably know what Doom is, but believe it or not there are still people out there who have yet to experience it. Doom was introduced in 1993 as a science-fiction horror based FPS, and when first introduced was looked upon as the first of it’s kind, sparking what many see as the thriving FPS genre we have and buy into today. This release takes everything you loved about the original Doom and shrunk it down to fit inside your pocket!

The game sees you play through 36 missions, in 4 episodes. The first 3 episodes are the original ones you know and love. These include: Knee-Deep in the Dead, Shores of Hell, Inferno, and the latest – Thy Flesh Consumed. Playing the actual game is simple enough. Controls are touch based, and you have a three different control options.

The first configuration (and the default when opening the game for the first time) is a movable joystick-like area located on the left-hand side of the screen. This controls your characters directional movement. Opposite this is your ‘tap to fire’ button. The second configuration sees a d-pad introduced into the left side of the screen, which is static. Opposite this is the right is the joy-stick which controls both vertical and horizontal movement, and above this is the ‘tap to fire’ button. The last and final configuration for controls in Doom Classic sees a navigation ‘wheel’ added (on the left), allowing control of your camera view, alongside a full d-pad (on the right). On this configuration, your ‘tap to fire’ button stays in the same position as on configuration 2. When moving a control element around the screen, once you lift your finger up, the control snaps back into the corner. This is great as it means you don’t have control items cluttering up the screen.

Moving in-game, while the controls are easy to use, and having 3 different configurations to choose from definitely helps, gameplay can be a bit fast – I’ll explain what I mean by that. I’m not referring to the length of the game, but instead the ’speed’ your character moves around the maps. In my experience it can get a little nauseating. But this is really all I can fault in this port. While it doesn’t ruin the game, you’ll likely find it a little harder to reach and navigate to places you’d like to because of it.

In-game stats like your health, amount of ammo remaining and percentage of armour you have remaining are displayed in a static bar on the bottom of the screen. Tapping the animated character head thorws up your weapon inventory. Available weapons in the game include: Your fist, Pistols, Shotgun, Chaingun, Rockets, Plasma, BFG, Chainsaw and the DBLShotgun. Ammo for all of these can be picked up in game.

If you’re not a big FPS fan, graphically you might find the game disappointing. There are no flashy visuals here. Just pure, true, “bloody” Doomilicious FPS. Graphics resemble that of Duke Nukem, sporting that ‘pixelated’ look you die-hard Doom fans craved all those years ago.

There are a few welcome changes though, the first being multiplayer ability. Doom Classic offers two multiplayer modes including: Deathmatch and co-operative multiplayer which in trun supports up to 4 players at any one time, via Wi-Fi. The game also features the original Doom soundtrack which plays throughout, although this can also be disabled allowing you to use your own music from iPod.app.

Overall, Doom Classic for iPhone is a worthy port of a retro gaming classic. A nostalgia title recommended for fans of the franchise, iD Software have managed to pull off bringing the game to the iPhone, in a user intuitive and graphically pleasing way. While I found the game could do with a few more control tweaking options, this can be overlooked (in a way), by the amount of content packaged within this port, and your bang for buck.

“Push News” is about as literal a name as you can get: this is a news app that sends you push notifications whenever an update from your favorite source comes in. For now, there are ten sources to chose from, and you can add as many as you like (I’m subscribed to NPR and CNBC, for example). Unfortunately, the app isn’t perfect, and I’d rather just use Google Reader.

Subscribing to news feeds is done in the “options” pane; there’s a simple on/off switch for each source along with a note detailing how many notifications you can expect to receive. CNN Breaking News provides only 1-2 messages a day; others, like Google News, send up to to ten notifications per hour. It’s all up to you.

When a notification comes in, the app opens up, and you can see a full queue of all the news items you’ve missed. Well, not quite all. My current queue seems to contain up to day’s worth of headlines, which really isn’t much. Anyway, each entry has both the post’s headline and a small blurb of text, just as you’d see in your typical RSS feed. Tapping on an entry allows you to view it on the source’s mobile site, all while staying in the Push News app…at least, it should.

This is where I began to experience problems. Most NPR stories view fine, for example, but others present only text blurbs when you open them; it took me a little while to realize that these were audio-only stories that required clicking through to the full version. I couldn’t get CNBC to load at all, which kind of defeats the purpose of the app. Other sources were also strangely buggy. Sometimes I don’t get notifications at all; other times, I get repeats. Sometimes previously-checked sources mysteriously switch to “OFF.” And too many of the sources either don’t have mobile versions, or the app doesn’t use them, resulting in needlessly long load times. There’s no “open in Safari” option within the app itself, either.

And then there are features that I really wish the developers had included. You can’t delete already-read stories from your queue. You can’t load older posts (there’s no “read more” or “load more” button), and scrolling through the list without any interface feedback (no scrollbar on the side, for example) makes it hard to tell where you are; there’s also no “tap header bar to scroll to top” feature, which I rely heavily on.

For the most part, Push News works, and I know that plenty of avid news readers will appreciate the instant gratification of quick news delivery. But there are just so many little quirks that annoy me, and I personally don’t need to be reminded to check the news—RSS feed readers work fine for me. A few tweaks could make Push News a contender for a part in my daily routine, but for now, it’s just a half-decent execution of a relatively good idea.

Push notifications are lovely things; I just wished that all of the services I used supported them! Enter Boxcar: a so-called “Free+” app and one of the best Push notification solutions for Facebook, Twitter, and email. It’s by far the simplest, most intuitive notification app I’ve used so far, and the fact that you get one service for free makes it a steal.

Boxcar offers a number of services: Facebook notifications, email alerts, or Twitter alerts. I’m going to go through a brief explanation of how each service works:

1. Facebook
This is what I use Boxcar primarily for, since I’m not too active on Twitter. Facebook Connect logs you into your account, and then you’re set; all of your notifications get pushed without any problems at all. I love this for a somewhat silly reason: my Scrabble games. Finally, I don’t have to keep re-opening apps to check and see if it’s my turn to move!

Note that Push notifications are supposedly coming in the next official version of the Facebook app, so this function may become obsolete. For now, however, Boxcar delivers a much-needed service that the official app can’t match.

2. Email
Boxcar’s method of email notifications is somewhat unique, and it’s very different from how applications like GPush handle things. You’re given a Boxcar email address, and then you have to set up email forwarding to that address. In gmail, this is a cinch to do, but I’m not sure about other email clients. Either way, it’s well worth the effort. Boxcar says that they don’t store the emails, and with this method, you never have to reveal your password.

3. Twitter
Boxcar has quite a few delectable options for Twitter users. Not only can you get @replies and DMs pushed to your iPhone, but you can also get you’re whole timeline pushed out. Now, I wouldn’t recommend this if you’re following more than a handful of people, but it’s a nice option. (And, thankfully, it is optional.) The best part, however, is that Boxcar will connect with your Twitter client, and you can chose to automatically open that app instead of Boxcar when you get a new notification. (Popular ones on the list: Tweetie 2, Twitteriffic, and Echofon.)

Okay, so there’s the functionality of Boxcar in a nutshell. The real joy, however, is found in the execution. Notifications are sent relatively quickly; my Facebook ones are nearly instant. Then there are the levels of customization: choosing different sounds per service, setting how to open each push notification (Facebook mobile? Gmail.com? Boxcar?), and being able to turn certain portions of each service or off at the flick of a switch. There are many other great features: the way that new notifications are stored within the app itself, for example, and the option to have generic, “private” alerts that simply read, “You have a new message on Twitter!”

There are some features I’d like to see: the ability to set a “quiet time” when notifications aren’t sent or a giant “silence switch” would be fantastic. But all told, Boxcar pulls of everything with flair and ease. The interface is slick, the services work wonderfully, and I love getting my notifications. And then there’s the fact that it’s free—well, for the first service, anyway. You’ll have to pay $0.99 for extra ones. But honestly, Boxcar is by far the best Push notification app I’ve used, and it just works.

So. Go on. Download it already!

By far the most fascinating application I’ve reviewed in a while, QuickReader is designed to improve your reading speed. I was cautiously skeptical at first, but after a few sessions with the app, I can actually feel myself improving. Anyone willing to invest the time in developing their speed-reading skills should grab this app immediately.

As one iTunes store reviewer put it, QuickReader is like a metronome for reading. By default, the app is set to 3 “stops” per line and 300 words per minute. A “stop” is essentially a highlighted portion of the text; it’s the digital equivalent to traditional methods like using a pen to track your progress. The highlight steadily moves across the page according to the pace you set, and you’re supposed to follow along with it. It’s supposed to allow you to focus on groups of words and to read properly from side to side, because your eye focuses naturally on movement.

If it sounds simple, that’s because it is. I can’t explain the science behind it myself, but after using it for just a few days, I can see a marked improvement in my speed. There’s a speed test included with the application, and I was reading around 325 words per minute at the beginning; now, I’m hovering between 585 and 608. I have to put forth a conscious effort to read quickly, but it feels comfortable. What shocked me most was that I was able to retain what I had read, at nearly double the speed—and I haven’t even been using QuickReader for a week! Granted, that speed hasn’t quite translated into the offscreen world, but if I focus, I can approach similar speeds.

There are three modes within the application: Guided Reading, Normal Reading, and Speed Test. I recommend taking a Speed Test prior to starting with the app, so that you can nudge the words per minute rate just a little higher than your current speed. Normal Reading is good if you just want to read the bundled classics. Thankfully, you can switch freely through the modes mid-read without having to navigate back to the menu. You can also fully customize font and color schemes, which makes QuickReader a solid eBook reader as well as a reading-improvement device. Both landscape and portrait reading modes are supported.

The application comes with 21 classic eBooks for you to practice with. I’m working with Sherlock Holmes, which might account for my speed; though a classic, it’s hardly as dense as, say, a textbook. The developers apparently have plans to incorporate an eBook store in the future, but I’d love to be able to upload my own eBooks into the reader—I have quite a few sitting around on my hard drive.

I suspect that your mileage may vary with QuickReader. I was already a relatively fast reader (a little over a page per minute with a real book?), and I adapted to the methods used here quickly. Others may struggle. Still, for me, it’s an incredibly useful tool, and I’m glad that I downloaded it. If you’re a frequent reader, you should definitely give this application a try; even if the price makes you hesitate, you need to check out the lite version. The effects are nothing short of magical.

Command and Conquer: Red Alert is the latest blockbuster game to be ported to the App Store, landing in the somewhat lacking RTS genre. But does it transfer well?

One of the best parts about Red Alert is the great story line that is likely familiar to many. The game is set in an alternate reality in which Einstein has invented a time machine and gone back in time to kill Hitler, thus preventing the rise of Nazi Germany. However, without the Nazis to keep them in check, the Soviets begin taking over the entire continent and escalating a huge war between Soviets and Allies. The implementation of the story into the game is sub-par, however. Cut-scenes are noticeably absent and the dialogue in campaign mode hardly advances the story. As for the gameplay, Red Alert is a classic RTS through and through. There is construction of buildings such as factories and radars, all of which you can place anywhere, and construction of units, which vary depending on which faction you’re playing with and can be moved individually or in a group. The goal of the game is to strategically build up units and resources and infiltrate the opponent’s headquarters. Unfortunately, there aren’t as many elements as say, the PC version, and there are a limited number of units and special abilities. I fear this game will fall in between being a casual RTS like Robocalypse and something that hardcore players crave. That’s not to say that it’s not a fun game, but will likely be either too easy or too frustrating for the majority of players.

When it comes to content, $9.99 doesn’t get you a lot. There are five campaign levels for each faction (Allied or Soviet) and two skirmish maps. Tragically, there is no semblance of online multiplayer. There is one DLC expansion pack in the initial release that gives you six skirmish maps for $.99, essentially half the content of the main game for 1/10 of the price.

The controls work surprisingly well. Building units and the like is handled through touch-enabled menus, and moving is as easy as selecting a unit and then tapping a spot. To select multiple units, you touch the box icon and then drag a box around your desired units. I had doubts about this system, but it works surprisingly well. You can additionally zoom in and out using the standard iPhone pinch gestures. The interface is a bit overly-bulky, as it is situated on either side of the screen, though it gets the job done.

The graphics are high quality and fully 3D, and though they are blocky in some places, overall they’re pretty impressive. I do have a bone to pick with the animations however. First, they are frequently choppy. In addition, the movement of units’ legs is oddly disjointed and makes it look like you are moving action figures around. Be warned that the app crashes regularly, though progressive saving somewhat alleviates this. The music is great, as is to be expected, and the voice acting is pretty good.

If you were to strip the “Command and Conquer” label off of this game, it’d just be a good, but excessively priced RTS. I’d still recommend it to fans of the genre, but be wary. There are only a few games that earn their $9.99 price tag, and Red Alert is not one of them.

33rd Division is the second release from Craneballs Studios. Their first release, Blimp, was a very interesting and beautifully created pseudo-platformer, this new release delves into the hugely popular path drawing genre.

The latest entry into the path drawing / casual management / chaos management genre popularized originally by Flight Control. This game you are drawing paths for soldiers as they pass enemy lines. It’s an interesting take on the path drawing genre and that ends up being a decent casual game. You start off the game with 1 play field with 3 additional unlockable different play fields.

Each different play field provides a different set of obstacles and enemy formations helping to keep the game fresh. There are also two different play modes. One mode you play with a certain number of lives, the other, a certain amount of time. For each mode you get extensions based on how well you play.

The OpenFeint social gaming network is integrated with this game. This provides global leaderboards and the ability to check your rank with everyone or just your friends. Always a good thing for a game.

Overall, 33rd Division is an interesting take on path drawing genre. While I’m not sure if the game will have the lasting appeal of other games in this genre such as Flight Control or Harbor Master, it has enough unique characteristics to be compelling in it’s own right.

Developers, up to now, have had an interesting time making sports games on the iPhone. We’ve seen all sorts of attempts at a true genre showcase, but people just can’t seem to figure out what consumers actually want. Companies like Freeverse have the Flick series that takes games to their most basic components, providing people with stripped down, but addictive time wasters. Other companies like Gameloft have found their niche creating seemingly realistic games that have some arcade elements to speed up gameplay. Being the grandaddy of all video game sports, EA has decided that they will just port their hit console titles directly to the iPhone, cramming in as many features and do-dads that they can get onto the small screen.

What I’ve noticed about EA’s other games (Madden, FIFA, Tiger Woods) is that they provide what seems to be the most complete simulation available, but the games lack heart. Part of the difficulty with these games, and especially reviewing these games, is that while they are all fairly impressive, I stop playing them shortly after reviewing them. Thus far, there just hasn’t been enough in any of them to grab me… to make me just want to play another game like I would on their console alternative.

Cool replay, but what is the defense looking at?

Now comes NBA Live, one of EA Sports’ most storied franchises. The brand has lost a bit of its luster on the console side with some uninspiring versions after the ‘05 season (I personally think it went downhill after ‘03), but being the first on the iPhone, I had high expectations. To me, my biggest fear with something like NBA Live is that it would try to do too much. The graphics don’t have to be great, but they need to be fluid. Same with the gameplay and the controls. Well, much like Madden before it, after firing up NBA Live, everyone around me said, “Wow”, and I said, “Meh”.

After starting the game up, I quickly started an exhibition game. I figured that a good Rockets vs Lakers rematch would be good, even if my team would be Yao and T-Mac-less. To my surprise, standing in the center of the court was Yao, and he tipped it directly to T-Mac! Oh geeze. Apparently the game just uses the rosters and disregards player injuries that have completely devastated teams. Don’t get me wrong, I like playing with Yao, but little details like this bring up red flags. After the tip, I noticed that the game was rather choppy, but I’ll attribute that to my ownership of an old 3G. With that said, I would definitely think twice before picking this up on anything less than a 3GS.

Von Wafer isn't even in the NBA anymore! Come on EA!

My first drive resulted in a rather acrobatic T-Mac dunk… shocking after that micro-fracture surgery. The next drive ended with a similarly acrobatic Trevor Ariza dunk. Then a Yao dunk, then a Battier dunk… and so on. I pulled up for a 3 eventually and it fell right in. On defense, I didn’t even bother trying to steal the ball. I found that if you just stand near the other player the computer will either get a 24 second violation or miss the shot. (On a side note, trying to get the ball faster will stop Marv Albert from saying, “he sets the pick” every 5 seconds) The bots will score occasionally, but with the newly revamped dunkfest Rockets, I had no problem winning by 15. The final score was a whopping 52-37. After convincingly beating the best team by 15, I figured that I would up the difficulty or see if I could slide some sliders… something. Well, after jacking up the difficulty a bit, my next game started a little tougher. The computer made its first two shots, but really just couldn’t compete with the beast man that is T-Mac. I think I put down 15 windmill dunks (the exact same windmill dunk) in a row, which made an LA comeback pretty improbable. For a while, I thought that passing would be a good idea, but then the ball landed in the hands of T-Mac, which again resulted in the same windmill dunk. For the record, there were no crossovers or pump fakes that got me a free pass to the basket, all I had to do was sprint to the hoop and hit the shoot button. If you do this, you’ll win, I promise.

(One odd thing of note… If the ball goes for a long bounce off of the rim and clearly goes out of bounds, don’t think that it could be blown dead. I was caught off guard multiple times by computer players landing whole body lengths out of bounds and then taking shots over the back of the rim. They don’t typically go in, but it would certainly be nice to know what out of bounds is.)

Yeah, that stat line seems pretty correct.

I thought about starting a whole season of this, but thought that a season long T-Mac dunk fest would get old pretty fast. There is just no challenge in running to the hoop and hitting shoot. No tough shots, no amazing crossovers, no crazy passes… just run and dunk. Maybe I should’ve been the Suns!

Aside from the gameplay, the rest of the game was fairly well put together. The opening menu looks quite nice and has the traditional big name NBA Live rap tracks backing it. The options are fairly light, with the only play options being season, playoffs, and exhibition. There are no online features as of now, but with defense being as pointless as it is, I don’t really think watching a back and forth windmill dunkfest would be too exciting.

Well, NBA Live unfortunately turned out to be exactly what I thought it would be. It’s basketball, but it certainly won’t make you want to come back for more. There’s only so much that Marv Alberts voice and EA’s logo can do to make you want to keep playing. I know that this is fairly impressive for a cell phone, but just because the concept is cool doesn’t make the game fun. Someday, developers will learn that they need to start with the basics. Maybe a little NBA Jam is all the iPhone gamer wants. Just give me some 2 on 2 and let me do somersault dunks. Let me get on fire and run around with my glowing red ball. BOOMSHAKALAKA!

Please come to the iPhone!

Giving a presentation isn’t always fun, per se, but it doesn’t have to be difficult. My main gripe with PowerPoints is simple: making a PowerPoint progress without darting back to my laptop every five seconds usually requires a friend or teacher tapping patiently on the “Enter” key. Slideshow Remote from LogicInMind finally puts the controls in your hand, and allows you to focus on what a presentation should really be about: presenting rather than wrestling with technology.

In order for the app to work, you’ll need to download and install the Logic Server application. I initially had some trouble getting it to work, but their support team is very helpful. I had Skype running, which apparently uses the same port as Logic Server, so I had to close it. No biggie. Pairing your device with Logic Server is simple after that; once paired, your iPhone will automatically connect upon opening the app, though you can always add more networks. Note that a WiFi network is required, and Slideshow Remote takes advantage of Apple’s Bonjour service, so you’ll need that too.

So, once you have the application working…now what? The first order of business is to open your PowerPoint file and start the show. An image of the current slide will appear on the screen (assuming that you’re in the “Main” tab).

Click over to the “Controls” tab and you can accomplish basic functions: next slide, previous slide, first slide, and last slide. Navigating to next and previous slides can also be done with a simple forward or backwards swipe, or, for the next slide, a simple tap. This allows for eyes-free control of your slideshow, which can be a huge boon. There are also “Start” and “Stop” buttons on the control screen.

In addition to simply controlling your presentation, Slideshow Remote has a few extra features. One is a timer, which provides a handy meter if you need to keep your presentation within a time limit. The other is a “Notes” view, which presents your PowerPoint notes in a discreet, easily accessible format. I must admit that the notes function never really made sense to me; after all, you don’t want to stare at the screen while giving your presentation. But keeping your notes in the palm of your hand? Now they’re actually usable!

Slideshow Remote isn’t perfect. For one, it’s Windows-exclusive; secondly, the fact that a second piece of software is required is a (necessary) annoyance. Setup isn’t completely seamless, and it may take a small amount of tweaking to get everything working perfectly. The controls available in the app aren’t exactly complex, either.

But what more do you really need? Slideshow Remote is meant to accomplish one task: remote control of your PowerPoint presentations. And it does that rather well. While I certainly wouldn’t rely on your presentation hall to have an open WiFi network that you can use, it could come in handy in plenty of situations, and Slideshow Remote is just the app for the job.

Typically, when it comes to 3D graphics and apps that cost more than a dollar, you can count me in. With a price tag like this, along with the promise of some great 3D gameplay, I’m expecting a pretty good game. Unfortunately, I’m just not feeling this app… I mean the 3D graphics suit this genre perfectly, but the gameplay just isn’t very so complete.

Most 3D graphical games these days a very admirable titles from distinguished developers. With the App Store evolving the way it is, the indie iPhone dev’s are now playing their hands in more advanced designs. Remember how successful Pocket God became… the indie developer (Dave Cazz) went from un-noticable to one of the best dev’s around, and still is today. Many indie dev’s are trying as hard as ever to compete with the big devs with advanced 3D titles, but it’s certainly an uphill battle.

Bumpoid, developed and published by Cigra Games, is a bizarrely different 3D space game. Essentially, you’re in space with space-aircraft, and your mission is to get as many points as possible before time runs out. I must warn you about the awkwardness of this game. You start by bumping into other space-craft to get them bouncing around. When you bump into a specific color, you’ll change into that color as well. You mission is to keep bumping into the same color you are, which earns you points. You’ll notice a variety of colored circles on the space-craft(s) that represent the color of them.

My issue with the game is that it can get very bland and boring. I find it hard to stay concentrated for longer than 20-30 minutes at a time. The reason being is that bumping into colored, circled, spacey, octagon-shaped, space-craft just isn’t enough to grab my attention. Doing basically the same task over and over again through 99 levels becomes extremely tedious without much of a reward in return.

For $2.99, the app really isn’t a terrible value, as long as you don’t burn yourself out too quick. You have 99 levels and 3D graphics that genuinely work, so if you are looking for a decent looking time waster, you wouldn’t be doing yourself too much of a disservice by giving this one a shot.

When I was a kid I lived on an island, ao get off the island and visit the rest of the world you had to take a ferry ride. This ferry ride was about an hour long and to kill time they had arcade cabinets ranging from Mortal Kombat to Turtles in Time. To this day I believe this was one of the sources of my love affair with video games. One of those arcade cabinets was 1942 by Capcom. The famous top down world war based military shooter got remade last year on XBLA and PSN networks last summer and sold fairly well, but this review not for that game. Richard Wilson, an ex-Rare developer, has created a fairly faithful homage to that game in Skysmash 1918.

Skysmash is a top down shooter in it’s purist form. Top down shooters have chosen a few varying control schemes to try and deal with the fact that your finger is in the way of your plane and having to fire constantly. Here you captain a plane from an overhead view by moving your finger around the screen, and double tapping to activate a variety of secondary effects that are picked up by destroying the enemies on screen. SkySmash decided to go with this simple control scheme and it that works really well here. I’m glad Richard didn’t try to do something gimmicky with the accelemerator as some devs have tried to do.

The core gameplay is a straight forward romp through a single player campaign of countless enemies trying to take you out. At the end of each level there are large bosses that try their best to throw as much as they can at you at once. Most shooters really live or die by the boss fights, and Skysmash really holds up well here.

The entire package is well put together, it’s tight, the polish is there but the extra features I like to see in apps to push it to that next level are just not there. Once the user has completed the game, there just isn’t any reason to pick it back up. Sure there is improving your score, your firing percentage, etc but overall, I just didn’t see much of a reason to pick it back up.

I would have love to seen some online leaderboards, maybe some twitter/facebook integration, alternate gameplay modes. I guess the power of the app store is that these can always be added as updates later, and with the success this game has seen in some territories I hope the dev decides to continue to support and expand the game.

The good platformers on the iPhone so far have been non-traditional affairs (with the notable exception of Castle of Magic) that leverage the iPhone’s strength’s rather than requiring pixel perfect precision. Now along comes Soosiz, a run-and-jump platformer with a gravity twist.

Soosiz starts off with some inconsequential back story about the land of Soosiz being and peril and the main character having to journey throughout the land and save little Soosizes (or is it Soosi?). You’ll have to journey throughout seven worlds, each with seven levels, to save your world. Each level is, basically, a start to finish affair. The main goal is to get to the portal at the end of the level, but additionally, you can go off the path a bit to rescue little Soosizes. At the end of the level, you are awarded a gold, silver, or bronze medal based on the number of little guys you saved.

As far as gameplay is concerned, Soosiz delivers. Each platform has its own gravity, but that gravity is only activated when your character lands on that platform. Most platforms you can walk all the way around, but some have sharp edges that you’ll fall off if you walk too far. The gravity element really is central to the game; it is always well-implemented and never feels gimmicky. As far as enemies go, there’s enough, but Soosiz could use a little more variety and creativity in this department. There are stars with spikes, homing jellyfish, and hammer bros-like characters, and overall most of the enemies feel too closely related to the Mario family. All enemies are defeated by bouncing on their heads. When it comes to game elements, though, Soosiz doesn’t disappoint. There are penguins with springs on their heads, buttons, disappearing platforms, star power (invincibility that is activated by choice after racking up 100 coins, which are scattered throughout levels), hidden secrets, and a plethora more. These elements are introduced gradually and go along well with the smooth difficulty curve. In addition to rescuing Soosizes for medals, you will occasionally rescue Soosizes that give you special abilities like super speed, super jump, and best of all, extra lives (this Soosiz adds two to your always starting three lives per level). The world mechanic is also implemented well. In addition to aesthetic differences, each world has some sort of twist, like the ice world being slippery and the physics in the space world being floaty. There are two types of special levels: boss levels and hidden levels. Boss levels occur at the end of each world and are fairly epic. Hidden levels are unlocked by earning gold medals on normal levels. These levels are non-traditional and vary greatly. Some even involve rolling using the accelerometer Rolando-style. For these levels, the goal is to get as many of the 50 coins as possible before time runs out. There are only two wishes I have for Soosiz gameplay and format-wise. First, I wish there was a more robust medal system that included coins or time. Second, there is no reward for killing enemies and thus it is often better to just avoid them entirely.

Soosiz’s control scheme is bare-bones simple. On the left, there are two buttons, a left movement arrow and a right movement arrow. On the right, there is a jump button, and above it, if you have 100 coins, a button to activate star power. Nothing else is needed. All the buttons are the perfect size, sensitivity, and transparency. If you fail, you have no excuses. The only fault is the proximity of the star power button to the jump button.

Due to its graphics, Soosiz is quite a charmer. All of it is 2D, a wise decision by the developers. Each world has its distinctive illustrations, and the game looks like a slightly glossier and more charming Rolando 1. There are also some cool background-changing visual effects. The graphics walk the fine line between charming and overly cutesy. Unfortunately, the audio does not share the same discretion. The in-level music is decent enough, but each level complete screen is accompanied by the inexplicable and utterly annoying “Up on the Rooftop” Christmas Carol.

I’m sure that many of us have heard of this fantastically morbid handbook series. Worst Case Scenario normally presents you with ridiculously dire situations, and forces you to choose between bizarre best choices to the worst-case scenarios. The series has been ported the iPhone by Namco Networks, but does the game maintain the series’ classic appeal? The answer is yes and no. It’s the same Worst Case Scenario we know and love…and yet it’s not.

Let me begin by explaining how the game works. You can either enter into a sixteen-question “Survival Test” or choose the Endless mode. You are presented with questions, one at a time, which have multiple-choice answers. The questions come in different forms (true/false, pure facts, picture-based, etc) but it’s all pretty straightforward. Many of the questions should make you laugh, whether from sheer ridiculousness or from sadistic glee. And besides, some of this stuff is good to learn. Did you know that, if you encounter a bear, you should stand still and flare out your coat to make yourself seem larger?

But most of the information you’ll learn from this app isn’t that helpful. Too often, the questions don’t represent “worst-case” scenarios at all. Knowing how to hide a beer belly is not at all the same as knowing how to escape an angry alligator. While there are classic questions like “Where should you grasp a tiger to prevent it from biting you?”, there are also many whimsical ones that just aren’t serious, and therefore aren’t really funny. (I want to know why there are so many golf-themed ones!)

In addition, the questions start repeating far to soon; even though the app supposedly comes pre-loaded with 300 questions, I encountered thee repeats the second time I played through the Survival Test…and there are only sixteen questions per Survival Test anyway! On my third-play through, I saw one question for the third time, as well as other repeats. Jeez! I know that you can purchase extra questions in sets of 300, but why would I waste my money purchasing extras when even a library of 300 feels tiny?

I have other, more minor gripes as well. The interface is often quirky, sometimes moving to quickly and sometimes not moving at all. Something about the app as a whole makes it feel unfinished. While part of Worst Case Scenario’s charm has always come from its rustic feel, I fear that Namco just didn’t put a lot of effort into this app. Simple isn’t always good. The audio could definitely use some work, too.

So, should you grab Worst Case Scenario? My advice, unfortunately, is no. Too many of the questions are boring or simply off-topic; while I do love my history, obscure factoids about Boss Tweed and the Spanish-American War don’t exactly relate to Worst Case Scenario. And having such an absurd number of repeats with each play-through greatly detracts from the overall experience. The handbooks are excellent, but there’s something missing from this app. I think that Worst-Case Scenario is best experienced the old-fashioned way: with a group of friends or family, reading aloud bizarre questions after bizarre question from a physical book. The experience found here just isn’t the same.

Developed by 1337 Game Design, Dark Nebula is one of those titles which you look at it, and you can almost smell the amount of work which has gone into making it what it is.

Set in a futuristic environment, the game is based on tilting a ‘disc-like’ ball through a maze of hazardous obstacles, in order to reach the finish point. Episode 1 in the series will bring you roughly an hours worth of gameplay.

The game consists of 10 individual levels. These include; Ascension, Speed Zone A, Leap of Faith, The Grindhouse, Kinetics, Speed Zone B, Crossfire, The Abyss, Nemesis and The Mainframe. Each of which bring different challenges for you to overcome. You are a disc like object, surrounded by a glowing neon shield. By default you start off with 3 lives. Your aim is to collect all the energy orbs you can within a level, while trying to avoid potentially hazardous situations, and all the while trying to keep your shield in tact. Collecting 100 of these energy orbs will result in you gaining another life, which could be very precious (and useful) to you in a future level.

But it won’t be a clean ride, far from it! Progressing through each level you’ll come across various coloured laser fields in which you have to pass through, in order to continue. To be able to do this though, you’ll have to find and reach certain coloured ports scattered about. These ports will make your surrounding shield change to the corresponding color on the port. Your shield must glow the same colour as the laser field(s) in order for you to pass through. In certain levels, you may find yourself having to change colours multiple times, in order to get access to other colour ports.

As well as trying to pass through these fields – as expected – Dark Nebula’s levels are also littered with unparalleled danger. From shooting robotic turrets, to spike covered walls, to rotating deathly stars, to sliding blocks and even .. sheer drops, the game will have you sliding, slowing down, avoiding, meandering, bouncing around – and more.

Each time you manage to complete a level, you’ll be graded on your performance in three areas. These include: The amount of orbs collected, completion time and the amount of shields lost during gameplay. Each of these factors are ranked from sliver, to bronze, and if you’re really, really, good – Gold. But it’s the visual aspect of Dark Nebula which really sets this game apart. You can just tell a lot of time and effort has gone into it, and although a $0.99 title – it feels worth it. Two fold.

With realistic sound effects and immersive environments, Dark Nebula: Episode 1 evolves the user, bringing challenge and fast paced action to the iPhone. Having fully completed all 10 levels of the game, I can honestly say that while the game was short in length, actually playing it was a joy. I really couldn’t find a fault with this game. In fact, I still find myself wanting to play it, again. And, again. And again. I put this down to the star awards, and wanting to complete each of the 10 levels to a ‘Gold Star’ standard. It somehow adds re-playability to the title.

Here’s a quick gameplay video I put together:

You have to give it to the guys at 1337 Game Design. Dark Nebula: Episode 1 is elite – Pun intended. It’s in a completely different league to anything else that I’ve personally come across on the store. The gel of user intuitive controls, with detailed visuals and challenging gameplay makes for a seriously great gaming experience.

You know when an app comes along, and you feel that you just have to include it in every iTunes sync? GeoDefense managed to do it, and I feel Dark Nebula: Episode 1 is another one of those titles you’ll just want to have on your iPhone (or iPod touch). To think this is just episode 1? I cannot wait to see what the developers have in store for the sequel, and beyond!

Earthworm Jim was originally released in 1994 on the Sega Genesis. Since then, the game has been subsequently updated and ported to several other platforms, the newest being the iPhone. Earthworm Jim is an unforgettable game in terms of both gameplay and difficulty, but was Gameloft able to successfully port it to a device with no physical buttons?

One of the best features of Earthworm Jim is its humor. For those of you who have yet to play it, in Earthworm Jim, you play as Jim, an initially lowly earthworm. One day, a super-powered suit falls from space and gives Jim super powers. Of course, Jim’s adventure involves saving a princess, “Queen Slug-for-a-Butt”. Saving the princess involves, like all platformers, the basic mechanic of running and jumping onto platforms. There are numerous enemies along the way, which Jim can attack in one of two ways, depending on the enemy: using his gun or using his head as a whip. The whip can also be used as a sort of pseudo grappling rope. In addition to the normal in-level enemies, there are bosses which often require special mechanics. One of the best things about Earthworm Jim is the absolute plethora of gameplay elements it contains. There are wires to be crossed using your head, conveyer belts of garbage, teleportation devices, underwater hiding spots, and more. The level design is superb. Earthworm Jim is known for being extremely difficult, but to help out more casual gamers, Gameloft has included four difficulty levels, the hardest one being “original.” In addition to the normal platforming levels, Earthworm Jim contains intermediary tunnel racing levels in which you race an enemy. These are controlled using the accelerometer, and they are very similar to other App Store tunnel games: avoid some objects, collect others. Including these levels, Earthworm Jim has 16 levels in all. The game is a little short, though the individual levels are long. Frustratingly, there are no mid-level saves, eliminating “pick up and play” value.

I couldn’t have ever imagined a perfect control scheme for Earthworm Jim for the iPhone, but Gameloft did the best they could. Movement is done using a virtual d-pad or analog stick. While for me, the d-pad was by far easier to use, it lacked a big enough sensitivity area. There are on-screen action buttons for jumping, using the gun, and using the whip. These are a bit too bunched together. The controls take some time to master, and of course lack the precision of physical controls which is frustrating, but are not a deal-breaker because of the adjustable difficulty levels.

Gameloft's superb graphics enhancements

Gameloft has clearly taken time and effort in recreating Earthworm Jim, as evidenced by the graphics. They have all been lovingly remastered, and look fantastic. The presentation is comical, and is well-implemented. This is the best looking version of Earthworm Jim yet. The audio is great as well, with recreated sound effects and music that do nothing but add to the humorous feel of the game.

It’s rare that I come across an app or game so bad that it’s nearly unusable…but Real Foosball is simply horrid. The controls are horrible, the physics are weak, and the game as a whole just needs to be avoided. Enough said. Read on if you must, but the bottom line is that Real Foosball feels like an unfinished, barely functional prototype.

I absolutely love Foosball in real life, so I was excited to try Real Foosball. Instead, I was greeted by a maddeningly confusing, muddled mess. “Real” Foosball is anything but realistic. Let’s begin with the touch control scheme, which works by moving your finger over the rods. When using touch controls, the rods move too quickly, jerk around, and often snap back to their original positions when you let go; meanwhile, the animations flicker confusingly.

The other control option is motion controls, which suffers from an opposite problem: it’s excruciatingly slow. On top of that, there isn’t any calibration option, so you’ll need to tilt your iPhone at ridiculous angles (often losing sight of the screen!) in order to play with motion controls.

The game, of course, works like any normal Foosball game; you can set the number of goals necessary to win, and then it’s a simple battle to see who scores the goals first. Here’s a hint: given the control scheme, it will probably be the computer. There’s no original twist, no gimmicks, no added features to try and make the game more exciting or long-lasting.

Graphics and audio are merely mediocre; the menus in particular show a lack of attention to detail, and the fonts and colors used for the text just scream “I’m unfinished.” And as if I needed more evidence of the developers’ carelessness, there’s no save or auto-resume function. Accidentally hit the home button? Congratulations: you’re back to the start page with no records of your game. Not that it really matters; after all, there aren’t even local leaderboards or a records page, so who cares if you were doing well?

Under normal circumstances, an app like this wouldn’t even warrant a review. But, hey, might as well warn you folks, right? Do you wallets a favor, and stay away from Real Foosball. Sometimes I wonder if Apple’s review team will ever stop blocking things like Google Voice and get rid of games like this instead.

A highly anticipated title, Com2us’ Sniper Vs Sniper Online brings the massive multiplayer online concept to life. Based on a two player scenario, the game sees players trying to hunt down and eventually kill each other, with the help of snipers. Although the game has been hyped, you shouldn’t be two quick to purchase. While the game is enjoyable for a short period of time, the way Sniper Vs Sniper Online is marketed it seems to imply I was in store for in-depth and lengthy gameplay, although in my personal experience playing the game, this wasn’t the case.

The game centers around two or more players fighting to find, and eliminate each other. Opening Sniper Vs Sniper Online for the first time, the game will ask you to setup a handle (username), and a password – which will also be used in the event of you switching your device for another. It’s sorta like an ‘authorisation’ system they’ve built into the game. This is a one time setup, and afterward you’ll join the company’s online servers. From there the game plays out in two modes: Single Mission and Online Play.

Choose Single Mission and you’ll have a choice of six different ‘areas’ in which you can play. These include: Training Field, Building, Village, Forest, Temple and City. By default, Building, Village, Forest, Temple and City are locked until you complete the ‘Training Field’ stage. Selecting any one of the areas gives you a few further playing options. These include: Campaign, 1 vs 1 and Special Missions. In campaign mode you will be given a series of task to complete per area. For example, in the first area, your task is to shoot down five sets of five targets, with each future set of targets becoming smaller, and moving further and further away from you.

1 vs 1 is a little different. In this mode you’ll be set a challenge which is timed. Basically, your against the clock. For example, In the first mission on the ‘Training Field’ area, you’ll have to shoot down 10 targets, avoiding shooting anything other than the 10 targets in question, and all the while completing it within 5 minutes. Choosing the ‘Special Mission’ mode brings up 5 further missions to which you can complete, each offering a different task with a time limit attached.

Entering ‘Online Play’ mode sees you pitt yourself against players across the globe. Here, you can join a networked game, or if you like, an alliance attack. This involves you teaming up with someone already in the online lobby, to build a ‘team’. Or maybe you just want to play with a family member who’s already in the same room as you? A 1 vs 1 match which allows you to do just this.

Online matches consist of looking at a block of windows, and trying to spot and shoot your opponent. Controlled by accelerometer, online matches see you tilting your device to scour the playing field. While fun, I found doing this is somewhat limited, with your ’sniper sight’ not being able to fully pan to the edge of the screen. It’s like there’s some kind of invisible limit – which is very noticeable.

In-game you have two objects which are there to assist you in making a successful kill. The first is your two-scope binoculars, which in turn allow you to pan a larger area of the screen. The second is of course, your sniper. These are toggled by hitting the appropriate symbolized buttons. As well as switching inventory items, you can also send 1 of 7 ‘audio’ segments, which will convey how you feel about your opponents progress. Live chat is also available, allowing you to chat with opponents or members of your alliance.

After you’ve completed a match you’ll have the option to share your score with the world, either via Facebook, or Twitter. One aspect I have to admit caught my eye with this is the game will actually put the gamer tag (handle) of whoever you were playing, in the tweet or status update. A little addition, but a nice one!

Overall, Sniper Vs Sniper: Online combines the use of tilt controlled gameplay, with satisfactory graphics. With realistic sound effects, and fluent animation in-game, the game holds up. While I enjoyed playing the game for a few minutes, it got boring – fast. The factor I put this down to is the game is centered around the ‘visuals’ rather than actual gameplay. There’s no doubting the visuals of this game have been well thought out, but in my opinion, there isn’t anything of real substance to actually involve the user, other than tilt and shoot, which for what should be an in-depth immersive title, doesn’t cut it.

Fun for a few rounds with the mates – sure, but unfortunately didn’t turn out as good as I was anticipating it was going to be.

With the music tapping genre being somewhat of a cultural phenomenon, explaining the basics of Tap Tap Revenge 3 would be a bit of a waste. Basically, the point is to tap away to you favorite songs, score points, earn coins, and chat with your long distant friends. I picked up TTR3 a few days after it came out, more than excited to get this game going. Being a Tap Tap Revenge fanatic, I was quite excited when Tapulous released what I now consider its best game to date. This game really does bring on a whole new level of tapping.

“It’s back! Tap and shake to the beats of the most popular game on the App Store. The all-new, awesome 3.0 release features tons of great FREE songs, including hits by Tiesto and LMFAO. Purchase affordably-priced top hits by mega-artists.” – iTunes Description

I’m sure that a majority of you aren’t expecting anything more than a minor facelift of the previous Tap Tap Revenge(s), but that is just not the case. There are many old features that still stand tall, but a few new ones that are definitely welcomed to the Tap Tap Revenge family.

Before you start tapping away, you must create a Tapulous account (if you don’t already have one). With this account, you can access your very own avatar, level, online rating, and much more.

This game is set in a cosmic setting, giving you a quite a few selections to choose from. As I brought up earlier, there are many great new features and many familiar old ones as well. For example, you still have the amusing Single Player, Two Player, Online play included. But, what we didn’t have was a Song Store, as I like to call it. In this song store there are over 100 free indie music tracks to choose from (you are only given 2 free tracks to begin with, so these 100 free songs are quite nice to have available). Additionally, you can purchase two songs for 99¢ or a track bundle for $2.99. With hundreds (maybe thousands) of free and priced artists, I’m sure you’ll find a song or two that suits your taste.

The online play is fairly similar to previous versions, as you’re given around 12 gameplay rooms, each with it’s very own random artist/song selections. In these rooms, you are shown as a participant with your profile. Your profile shows your Online Rating, Avatar, Photo (If you have one), Level, and Amount Of Coins (currently). If the timer (until the song begins) shows a long wait, you can head to the Inside-Game Chat room and chat with other competitors. Once started, you and your opponent are displayed to the right, showing your avatars and position your currently in. If you look above the avatars, you’ll see your position shown in number(s) and your amount of points for the song.

All-in-all, this game is absolutely marvelous, and, with the addition of the new song store, becomes more substantial every day. If you’ve never experienced any of the Tap Tap Revenge variations, now’s the time to do it. If your a fan of music and/or your iPhone/iPod touch, you’ll most definitely want to pick this one up. Trust me, you’ll be an addict in seconds!

We all know match-3. You match up 3 types of a certain object or colored object, and the matches which include 3 or more, gain you points. The concept isn’t exactly new, in fact it’s been around for quite a while now. I ran into Chromodyne a few days ago. The game takes this simple – almost ancient – concept, and adds a little depth. Literally.

Back story – The earth is in peril. There is a huge asteroid about to hit us – but wait – a machine called the Chromodyne has the power to stop it. As a lone Chromodyne operator, you battle to solve the mystery of the Chromodyne, all the while trying to defend off purposeful attacks from two mischievous aliens.

“As a Quantum Chromodynamic Cyclotron, or Chromodyne, operator, you are the last line of defense the Earth has against interstellar catastrophe! Should the planet become endangered by an asteroid, comet or some other Massive Extra-Solar Smasher (MESS for short) it is your job to use the Chromodyne to combine exotic matter, shooting it into the MESS and causing it to shrink and eventually phase out of our universe, thus saving the Earth from certain doom!”

Developed by Colin Walsh of Celsiusgs Game Studios, Chromodyne sees match 3 go 3D, and from the second I picked up the game somehow I instinctively knew how to play.

Set in a cosmic rendered environment, the game starts off with a board of 80 different multicolored and quite futuristic symbols, set out in a cylindrical fashion. This cylinder is called the Chromodyne, and it’s split up into concentric rings, each of which are rotatable to up to 360°. As with all match 3-type games, your aim is to match up 3 or more of the same shape along the length of the Chromodyne.

The game plays out in two modes. Story Mode and Survival. In Story Mode you’ll be introduced into the story behind Chromodyne, and as you can probably guess – being cosmic based, it centers around the survival of earth and all it’s inhabitants. This is also the part of the game you’ll be introduced to the ‘retro-type’ character design. Between each stage you complete on Story Mode, you’ll come across Gary and Zarlax, otherwise known as ‘the bad guys’. These guys are set on making your life hell, and succeeding in making the asteroid hit Earth. While these characters have dialog within the game, you won’t find voice-overs here.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve found this with a number of games, and while it doesn’t totally spoil them, (and there’s no doubting that some of this dialog is genius), it still doesn’t change the fact that if a character’s mouth is moving on screen, I kinda find myself wanting to hear a voice. It builds character personality, so I can relate to the situation. Just a little niggle I had. Moving on .. During each stage of Story Mode you get ten minutes to complete as many matches as possible. The amount of matches and points these have gained for you are shown in the bottom left. The amount of time you have left before the round ends is shown in the bottom right. Need to pause the game? You’ll find the pause button on the right in the center.

Survival Mode on the other hand is a little different. In this mode the pressure is really piled on. In this mode, we see the introduction of a black hole, which gradually gets bigger as the level progresses, and in the top left you’ll find a meter which monitors the size of this black hole. In order to reduce the black hole, you have to keep matching, matching, matching. Each match of 3 or more incrementally reduces it’s size. The game ends when the black hole indicator reaches the circumference of the meter. In the last few seconds before the game ends, this meter will frequently flash red, warning you the black hole is about to devour your Chromodyne.

There are a few niggles with the game though. As mentioned above, the lack of voice over on written dialog doesn’t really connect you with the in-game characters. Also, the lack of an online leader board or any form of multiplayer option means that for now, you’ll be playing on your own, trying to beat your own score. That said, Chromodyne does seem to put a different and refreshing little spin on the whole match-3 diddy. The game is both visually exciting, and not to mention the soundtrack. I wasn’t expecting the soundtrack. It’s like a techno-like space-ish beat fest. Something that, although loops, is seriously great to listen to.

Taking everything into account, I like Chromodyne. It’s certainly not the finished product, with no Twitter and Facebook integration, and no online leader board, this game can feel like you’re playing it alone, and in my opinion it could do with a few additions as I mentioned above, a few of which I know Colin has in mind for the upcoming update. These include: New chapters to the story, Online leaderboards, and Head-to-Head multiplayer.

A refreshing title to watch, which (in my opinion) can only get better.

Word Ace is a mash-up of Texas Hold’em and an anagram game, and that’s all you really need to know in order to understand the gameplay. It’s intuitive and engaging, and requires both standard poker skills and word-building prowess. My kind of game? Oh, yes. I just wish that there were more offline options; as it is now, you more or less need an internet connection in order to play.

In Word Ace, each card is decorated with both a letter and a point value; they’re also color-coded by value, with blue for low-point letters, red for mid-point letters, and yellow for high-value ones, such as Q or X. There are also gray “backward letters,” which are worth negative points. Each game starts with players being dealt two cards. From there, things proceed much like Texas Hold’em; there are no new tricks to learn with regards to betting or gameplay. Trust me, this is a good thing: it makes Word Ace extremely easy to learn.

At the end of a hand, your timer bar (which is normally yellow) turns red, and everyone remaining in the game must assemble their final word before time runs out. To create a word, you tap each card; the letters appear at the bottom of the screen. Tapping the check mark that says, “Use this word!” saves the word, leaving you free to experiment with other possibilities. Once time is up, point values are compared; the player with the most valuable word wins the hand!

Of course, waiting until the last minute to assemble your word is a foolish move. You can start creating words at any point during the game, and you can save them, too. So, for example, if four cards are displayed on the table and you see a great word, you can spell that one out so that you needn’t worry about forgetting it. It’s an important caveat, certainly.

Also worth noting is that words longer than four letters receive point bonuses, which can easily give you the upper hand. Also, there isn’t an in-game dictionary, which forces you to actually know how to spell the word you’re trying to play. I’m all for this feature (one of my opponents once tried to spell “PONYS,” and there really isn’t an excuse for that), but it does encourage cautious play; you never know if a vaguely remembered word is actually real.

One more thing to note: If you look for Word Ace in the App Store, you’ll likely see a “pro” version. Here’s the thing: the Pro version just enables in-app purchases so that you can buy more chips. But Word Ace gives you 1,000 chips per day anyway; as long as you can play well, you shouldn’t need any more!

Playing online is a lot of fun, and while there don’t seem to be huge amounts of players online, I was never without a match. This is partly because the game is multi-platform; there’s an even split of iPhone and Palm Pre users. But while the online mode is great, the offline “practice” mode is sorely lacking. The bots consistently demonstrate their complete lack of spelling skills. If you want a game for travel, this isn’t one to get. I’d love to see a full-fledged offline mode.

In terms of presentation and execution, Word Ace has some nice touches: the three-image avatar whose expression can be changed with a finger swipe (from happy to impassive to angry) is neat, and the graphics are good. There isn’t anything mind-blowing, but then, there doesn’t have to be.

There is one thing about Word Ace that’s unbeatable: its price! There are few games of this caliber that are available for free, no strings attached, and this more than makes up for some of the game’s rougher edges, not that there were too many anyway. Self Aware games has a great product on their hands, and word-game aficionados should definitely give this one a go.

Sometimes I find myself getting lost in the vast sea of the app world. I get wrapped up into all sorts of games that provide fleeting fun, but lose site of some of the little things that make me the happiest. I’ll never forget the dumb laughs that we would get playing iBeer or flicking the stupid Zippo Lighter over and over again. Don’t get me wrong, I’m super grateful that I get to play games like geoDefense Swarm on my iPhone every day, but it’s important not to lose sight of the little things that keep me entertained. Since the app stores inception, these little novelty apps have grown from being digital beers to somewhat impressive things, like augmented reality apps and highly entertaining photo manipulators. Fortunately for me, while digging for the next great novelty app, I found Ransom Letters sitting in the ‘What’s Hot’ section of the app store and decided to give it a go.

Ransom Notes is a simple little app that let’s you put ransom note letters (you know, the ones that are cut from magazines in all different sizes) on any picture you take. Within the app, just take the picture, type in the sentence you want to display over the picture, and KABLAM, you have a ransom note made up that you can send to any of your unsuspecting friends / co-workers.

As a typical customer, I’d just leave it at that, but as a reviewer I feel the need to dive in a bit in order to fully grasp what I’ve got here. The apps controls are fairly simple, giving you a small but effective number of options to work with. Typing your word in is as simple as clicking on the ‘type it’ button. It’s extremely intuitive, but there is definitely a glaring flaw. I can type words out to my hearts content, but what is typically the point of a ransom letter… to get money right? Well, I hope you’re prepared to type in the word dollars, because the dollar sign is not part of Ransom Letters repertoire, an omission that will hopefully be fixed on a later version. Once you type your word in, it is quite simple to move words around the page with your finger and the sizes are batch changed by pinching. There is no individual word sizing unfortunately, but I hear it may be included in a future update. Also, to make your words that much more cryptic, you can shake to shuffle, giving you scrambled sentences that will have your victims panicking in cold sweat.

Assuming that you are a fan of the concept, there really isn’t much not to like about Ransom Letters. It’s fun, it’s fast, and it only costs 99 cents. I know that it’s simple, but I’ll probably be happily using this app long after I’m done playing larger, more expensive apps like Rock Band and Madden.

There’s a lot to say about iPuppy World. On the surface, it looks great: slick graphics, great animations, and a plethora of activities. But iPuppy World just doesn’t hit the sweet spot that makes pet simulations so appealing. There’s not enough interactivity, and too much time spent staring at the screen. Yes, your five-year-old might squeal over the cute puppies prancing on the screen, but I became utterly bored far too quickly.

When you start the app, you get to pick out a puppy, of course! You can choose its gender, name, and breed; the current breeds include huskies, schnauzers, dalmatians, Labradors, chihuahuas, and toy poodles. Then, you’re introduced to your house, which depicts your new pet frolicking around the room.

Tapping the picture of the dog’s head in the top-right corner reveals the menu options. In the bottom-right, there’s a door icon that lets you visit other puppies or take walks. Next is a tennis ball icon, which lets you play with toys, and a T-shirt icon for dressing up your pet. On the right, there are icons for bathing and feeding your pet, as well as one for putting it to sleep. Tapping a different dog’s head icon at the top will let you see your pet’s status.

Here’s my problem with iPuppy World: all of these various options might sound enticing, but in reality, there’s hardly anything to do. “Playing” with your puppy involves tossing a toy into the room and watching. “Bathing” means just rubbing your finger over your dog. Not exactly the most thrilling mini-game, but it’s actually the most involved one. Feeding your pet? Sit there and watch. Take your dog for a walk? Sit back and watch the linear, boring sidewalk. Put your pet to sleep? Even worse: you’re expected to stare at a black screen! There’s not even sound effects for your snoring puppy! Plus, when an activity is designed to increase some status variable (hunger, thirst, cleanliness), you have to pause and visit the status menu. Without a progress bar, the tedious tasks are even more tedious. The best part is dressing up your pet, but that requires money…which isn’t easy to come by in this game.

Visiting other puppies isn’t exactly thrilling, either. You can sniff around their room in hopes of finding something (isn’t that theft?) and you can exchange “badges” to prove that you’ve seen them. But again, interactivity is extremely limited.

Though it’s listed under “games,” iPuppy barely has any game-like elements whatsoever. The focus on pretending that you have a puppy, but you don’t get to play with it…or train it…or choose where to walk…or anything like that. Children will be amazed by the graphics, sure, but I can’t help but feel that iPuppy’s only draw is the eye candy. I would recommend waiting for a better pet simulator…ngmoco’s upcoming “Touch Pets,” perhaps.

Come on, Triniti! I loved your other game, Ancient War–why is iPuppy packed full of so much tedious fluff?