This one touch puzzle platformer ramps up the difficulty and will toss you into a world fille dwith more than 45 levels along with a time trial gameplay mode. Loads of opportunities for increasing your score and shaving milliseconds off of your best times along with GameCenter support add loads of replayability to this one. Don't miss it!
Whirl The Squirrel has lost all of his precious THINGS to his 'nenemies. It's up to you to race through 18 wonderfully designed levels in this speed-run, racing platformer. Perfect for fans of Sonic the Hedgehog!
An interesting Lane-Defense title from Syrenaica Development. Help Count Dolfus defend his treasure against the onslaught of knights and adventurers who are trying to steal it away from him. Only $0.99 in the AppStore!
Easily one of the best fighting games on the iOS, Kinetic Damage presents an amount of depth that's rarely seen within the genre. Fans and newcomers alike should jump on this one ASAP!
Check out a brawler specifically designed for the touchscreens from Heavy Boat Games and Cartoon Network! 3 worlds, 15 levels and some intense action staring Mordecai and Rigby from CN's Regular Show! Be sure and grab this great little beat-em-up!
From Level-5 and Grasshopper, the action packed mech shooter; Liberation Maiden is now available on the iOS! With improved graphics and controls, this is definitely one to dive in to.
Friday, September 30, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Gyro13, the amazingly beautiful Unreal Engine powered physics based helicopter arcade game has just had a price drop. $5.99 down to $0.99! We recently got the chance to review this awesome game, and are still blown away by it's challenging gameplay and fantastic visuals. If the premium pricing was just a little too steep for your wallet, now's your chance to pick it up.
This sale will not last long, so look under your bed, in-between couch cushions, and in the pockets of the pants in the washer, run up to the bank, and throw a buck in so you can experience one of the best games of 2011.
Cinemax has also made the soundtrack available for online play/listening on their website (http://gyro13.com/) - they've also said that they're thinking about making it available for download (no word on if it will need to be purchased or not yet) - but if you're enjoying it as much as we are, this is a pretty big deal.
Friday, September 30, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Space Junk is a new retro styled shooter by Upside Down Games, a 2 man (Ned Langman, and Greg Michael) indie development studio based in the UK. Ned Langman worked on the 80's Amiga game, Silkworm, as well as SWIV, and Super SWIV, as well as a favorite of mine, Forsaken for the N64, PSX, and PC, along with more games in between and after. Greg Michael worked on Double Dragon III for the Amiga and Atari in the late 80's, as well as being the lead programmer for the PSX title, Alien Trilogy, and then also on the oh so memorable Forsaken on the PSX, and, also, many more games. Needless to say, these guys know exactly what they're doing when it comes to making games.
In Space Junk, you’ll control a little space man through Asteroids type levels, using a joystick to rotate, a button to thrust, and a button to shoot, while clearing out all of the objects in each of the 25 levels. Each of the objects you destroy will break up into smaller objects, and each one of those will break into even smaller objects. After that, once destroyed, a tool will appear, and these are what you’ll need to collect in order to score big points.
The retro vector graphics work well here, and there are plenty of different objects that you will encounter while making your way through the levels. Satellites, moon cheese, dogs, asteroids, space ships, and other various objects and shapes will be the main objects in each level, destroying these while they are in their first appearance stages, gives you a multiplier that‘s connected to the amount of tools that you pickup. For instance, if you‘re thrown into a level with 15 objects, and you destroy 5 of them before they start disappearing, which happens faster if you don‘t thrust around the levels, the amount of tools that you pick up will be multiplied by 5 in the end of the level bonus. The scoring system can get a little confusing, but mainly, if you keep moving around, and destroy as much as you can as quick as you can, while collecting as many dropped tools as you can, your score will shoot up. You are also rewarded for being accurate, getting a bigger bonus score the more accurate you are. There are also UFOs thrown into the mix, and destroying these will release a power-up, which could be a shield, extra life, powered up weapon, or a magnet that collects all dropped tools in the level.
Every 4 levels, you’ll encounter a bonus or challenge stage, where you’ll need to destroy all toolboxes and pick up all the tools in a set amount of time, or avoid a bunch of asteroids for 30 seconds while only using your thruster. This does add a nice break into the frantic gameplay, and if you pull off each challenge or bonus perfectly, can add to your score quite a bit.
You are able to play in portrait or landscape mode, and there are no borders on any of the levels. If you fly to the right, you’ll end up running into objects that were on the left side of the screen, but you can keep flying right forever, and your character is always in the center of the screen. This can be a big help if used right, chasing after UFOs is a lot easier if you go away from them instead of follow them, you’ll run into them quicker, and the same with all the other objects that will be flying all around you.
There are no online leader boards in version 1.0, which is kind of upsetting, considering this is a game that revolves a lot around high-scores. But even without online support at the moment, and only one game mode, Space Junk really is a very nicely done old-style arcade shooter. If you grew up playing games in the 80’s and early 90’s, you’ll most likely really enjoy this one. It’s pretty much an expanded Asteroids, with great vector graphics, awesome music, a really nice scoring system, 3 different difficulties, and cool weapons and power-ups. Being $0.99, and Universal, with talk of iCade and GameCenter support coming in the near future, it’s well worth the price, and then some. The developers are also very responsive on the TA Forums, and their FaceBook page, so with the help of the gamers who are playing this one, I can see it turning into something really special over the next few updates.
We mentioned in an earlier review that the iDevices, with their option for tilting controls, have opened up another little world for game development and genre expansion. Here we have another example of a genre expanded by these tilt controls, ball rollers. Escape From Cyborgia is a new addition the genre, developed by Maniac Dreamers.
First off, the graphics, like most other great ball rollers, are very immersive, drawing you into the dark world full of hazards and obstacles. The animations for all the moving objects, liquids, steams, and fires in throughout the game are also done very nicely. Coupled with the awesome music, great physics, and ability to tilt the camera by swiping on the screen you can see the levels from different angles, the developers have created an amazing atmosphere, making Escape From Cyborgia a game that you’ll experience just as much as you’ll play. There is also a story that is accessible from the main menu, which does add to the experience and feel of the game if you decide to take the time to read it. It’s pretty interesting finding out why you’re trying to “escape from Cyborgia.”
To make it through each of the 30 levels, you will need to guide your mechanical orb through the maze of paths, hitting switches that allow access to new areas, and collecting green, red, and blue orbs that give you points. These points can be used to slow down the timer or plant new checkpoints. You don’t need to plant checkpoints, but if you want to make it through the levels in a timely matter, it’s a good idea. Sometimes the orbs need to be collected by pushing crates or barrels over edges into the orbs, which counts towards your collected points as if you had run into the orb yourself. With this feature, the developers were able to make collecting all of the orbs a task that generally only the better players will be able to do, by placing some on the ground floor, which you are not able to touch without dying, in fire, at the bottom of holes in the floors, or behind other hazards, only accessible by finding the right switch, or moving a crate or barrel to the area, and dropping it on the orb.
You do not need to collect all of the orbs in order to finish the levels, but you will need to open up pathways by clicking on certain switches, which does require quite a bit of backtracking. The level design is extremely well thought out, giving players the opportunity to either spend more time in a level, and gain more points, but also run the risk of dying more, or let players try and speed roll through each of the levels, making it through as fast as they can, gaining a higher star ranking in the level.
The controls and UI in Escape From Cyborgia are very tight, and nicely laid out. You can adjust the calibration at any time in the main, or pause menus, as well as the tilt sensitivity. There are 3 buttons on the bottom right, and 3 on the bottom left corners of the screen. On the left, you can pause, go back to your last planted checkpoint, or reset your checkpoint to the beginning of the level. On the right, you can slow down the timer, requiring 1,500 points, set a new checkpoint, requiring 1,000 points, or enter the birds eye view of the level, which you are able to zoom in and out of as well as swipe and scroll around in. You can also swipe the screen at any point while playing the game to tilt the camera at a different angle, seeing if the pathways are slanted up or down, or maybe see if a path is accessible by seeing the set-up at a different angle.
For Maniac Dreamers first iOS release, Escape From Cyborgia is a very immersive addition to the ball roller genre. The only cons I can see is that there is no online integration, so there’s less drive to go back and replay levels with the hopes of bettering your score or ranking. Also, the level select screen always starts on level 0, so you will always need to scroll through the levels to find the one you last completed. There are also some sections on the paths, in the first couple levels, that have slight tilts on them. These slight tilts are almost impossible to see, even while tilting the camera. To make it over these slanted areas, players will need to tilt their devices to a pretty uncomfortable position. When you finally do make it past the slanted area, your ball will almost always go flying across the path. This isn’t too big of a deal, because the levels that do have these slants are only in the beginning, and there’s guard-rails on the path-ways, so you will not fling your ball onto the floor or into the green goo, but it is kind of strange that these sections only appear in the beginning of the game, and that more was not done to make them visible. Aside from that, which really isn’t anything to seriously complain about, and nothing that could not be fixed in an update, Escape From Cyborgia is a very well made, with skillfully thought out levels and textures. $2.99 for this Universal game is a solid price.
Thursday, September 29, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Last month, The App Shack was lucky enough to be given the chance to review ShockPanda's game, Cubes Vs. Spheres. Since then, it has become one of our favorite games of the year. The graphics are awesome, modern minimal, and very stylish, and the gameplay is intense, yet easily accessible to casual gamers as well as hardcore gamers.
Cubes vs. Spheres is exactly what it sounds like. You'll toss cubes at spheres, trying to take them out before they reach your area. Now you're able to check out this awesome game for free. ShockPanda has given gamers the chance to see what all of us who already have the game have been obsessing about. And once you do, you'll be hooked.
There's GameCenter integration, upgrades, unlockable cubes, amazing level designs, exceptional graphics, and gameplay that will stick with you for quite some time. So head on over to the AppStore, and pick up this amazing game for free while you can, because this offer will not last long. You've got nothing to loose, and an amazing gaming experience to gain. What are you waiting for? GO GO GO!
Wednesday, September 28, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
With Apple bringing gamers a device that can utilize tilting controls, developers have pretty much been able to invent new genres of games based around that device function. Tilt To Live is one of these types of games, making gamers tilt their iPods to maneuver their triangle through dots/enemies on the screen, using power-ups to defeat them. Since then, there’s been quite a few games that have built on this type of gameplay, and created a whole “Tilt To Live” genre of games for the iOS. The newest addition to the TTL genre is FlipShip, by ByteSize Games, which is their first iOS release. And what a great first release it is.
Expanding on the Tilt To Live idea, you’ll maneuver one of three types of ships around your screen, dodging two different colors of enemy ships, shooting, and using power-ups to take as many of them out as you can. Here’s the catch; to shoot an enemy, your ship must be the same color as that enemy, and to change colors, you simply tap the screen. Also, the longer you stay one color, the bigger your combo gets, and the more points you get per destroyed ship - but that combo score is banked, and only added to your total score once you change the color of your ship again. This can lead to the loss of millions of points if you’re not careful, but also gives gamers a very nice risk/reward gameplay mechanic.
The controls for FlipShip are, like you’d hope for in a game like this, very nice and tight, making weaving in-between groups of enemies doable, if you’re careful. One tap on the screen changes the color of your ship, and resets your combo score, saving the score you’ve built up, and tapping on the icon in the lower right corner (this can also be changed to go into the left corner) will activate your special ability, which is different with each ship. There are quite a few calibration options, but by default, the game will automatically calibrate at the beginning of every game, and every time you resume the game from the pause menu. You can also adjust the sensitivity of the vertical and horizontal tilting aspects.
The graphics are retro/vector styled, and really feel quite nice. There is more detail than most vector styled iOS games within the different ships and enemies. The backgrounds are all pretty much the same, but each time you play, the background and enemies will all be different colors. There’s red, blue, green and yellow, and each time you play, two of these colors are chosen. The music is your typical pumping electronica music, but, like most games, it fits in very well with the action.
Now, with the power-ups, they are all the same for each of the 3 ships, there’s two types of bombs, once regular, and one electrical. The regular bomb blows up everything within it’s radius, and can cause a chain reaction, but generally not a big one. The electrical bomb shocks everything in it’s radius, and jumps from ship to ship if they’re close enough, so you could, in theory, clear out an entire screen of enemies if you time running into this electrical bomb just right. The clock power-up slows down all the enemies on the screen for a short period of time, making it easier to escape large groups of enemies that are the opposite color of your ship, helping you build your combo score even higher. There’s also a power up that boosts your ship in the tilted direction, flying through, and destroying, any ships in it’s way, a seeker bomb, which sends out 6 different missiles, seeking out any enemies on the screen. Then, of course, there’s a shield power-up, and a power-up that refills your ability icon.
As for the abilities; they are different for each ship. There is a slow, average, and fast ship, each also having different firing attributes. The slow ship, called the “Steinway”, fires long projectiles out of a narrow section of the front of the ship, and it’s special ability is sending out 4 drones, 2 of each color. These drones don’t last long, but they can clear out quite a large group of enemies if used right. The average ship, called “Deadeye” shoots a short projectile out of a wide area of the front of the ship, and it’s special ability is called “Starburst”, which sends out a burst of colorless material in 8 directions, destroying everything in it’s path. The 3rd ship is the fast ship, and it’s called the “Preacher”. It’s able to shot in all directions, but it only shoots enemies that are close to it. It’s special ability is being able to change every ship on screen into the current color of the ship, making it pretty easy to build up a huge combo pretty quickly.
There is only one mode within FlipShip, but you are given 6 different difficulties; Very Easy, Easy, Medium, Hard, Very Hard and Insane. All of the different difficulties are on the same difficulty scale, but starting on the harder difficulties starts the game off harder, stays harder, and increases the difficulty quicker. Each different difficulty effects the enemy spawning rate, their speed, what enemy patterns you will see, and how difficult those patterns will be. So really, if you start a game on Very Easy, and you’re good enough, you can make it to the Insane difficulty gameplay. It will just take you longer than if you start out on any difficulty above Very Easy. Insane difficulty throws you right into the hardest difficulty the game will be. This growth of difficulty makes the game accessible to all gamers, and also gives hardcore gamers quite the challenge. However, making it so that less power-ups were present in harder difficulties, and the players abilities charged slower the harder you started the game off at, would be a nice addition to really separate the difficulty modes a bit more. It would also be great to see more gameplay modes in the future. There’s also the feeling that one death is enough to re-start the whole game. If you’re playing, and rack up a score of 1 million points with your first life, and end up loosing it before changing colors and banking that score, it really makes more sense to restart the game than to play through your last 2 lives. Some gamers might also find that 6 difficulties is just too many, especially when they’re all basically the same. There are also some color combinations that don’t mix together too well. For instance, Green and Yellow are a little too much alike, and do not have much contrast. However, Red and Blue, or Blue and Yellow, go together very well, and being able to choose these colors would be great, and would also be a good idea for our color-blind gamers out there.
But FlipShip, as it is now, with GameCenter support, leader boards for each of the difficulties, 50 achievements, 3 ships, accessibility to casual and hardcore gamers, and an exceedingly well done addictive risk/reward combo scoring system, $1.99 for the game is a great price, made even better because right now it‘s on sale for $0.99. It’s got tons of style, and some very intense action. ByteSize Games have proven that the Tilt To Live genre is still alive and thriving, and can still be expanded on. If you’re a fan of the genre, want a challenge, or are a high-score monger, like myself, FlipShip is a no-brainer must buy. I’m definitely looking forward to future updates, and seeing what ByteSize brings to the table with future games.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Most tower defense games really feel like they fit perfectly with touch screen devices. For many people, their iPod gave them their first experience with tower defense games, and have sense become hooked. But over the last year or so, it’s been pretty hard to find originality within the genre. Thankfully, there have been a couple of tower defense games that have really added something new, or expanded on previous ideas, instead of just re-packaging the same formula with a different skin. Infinite Dreams has shown, with previous iOS releases, that they know what it takes to put together a game that has substance, and with the release of Jelly Defense, they’ve proven once again that they know exactly what it takes to create an awesome game.
Jelly Defense sticks with the jelly graphics that Infinite Dreams have made popular with the past releases of Jelly Invaders, Jelly Clock, and Jelly Chronicles. Black and white backgrounds with colored characters giving the game quite a bit of personality, while keeping a very vivid yet minimal look and feel to the whole jelly universe. The animations and use of shadows give the world tons of life, and it really has turned out to be a graphic style that stands out and will soon be the first thing that will come to gamers minds when they hear “Infinite Dreams” from now on. Alright, enough gushing over the graphics, let’s get on with the gameplay and mechanics.
To start the game off, you’ll see the jelly’s home planet being invaded by another race of jellies who are bent on stealing the precious gems of the residing species. Thankfully, you are pretty well prepared, and have exactly what you need in order to defeat these wild and crazy beings. Each of the 22 levels has different paths that the enemy can take in order to snag the green crystals, and make it out of the level alive. So you will need to place your attacking jellies on the sides of multiple pathways to try and minimize the amount of gems that get stolen throughout each of the levels. You’ll have 10 gems available, and once all 10 are stolen, or you defeat all waves of the enemy, the level is over.
There are two types of enemies; Red and Blue. Like Jelly Invaders, you’ll need to match the attacking jelly with the color of the enemy in order to take them out. You’ll start off with one red attacking jelly, one blue attacking jelly, and one red/blue attacking jelly that can take out both types of enemies. As you progress through the game, you’ll be able to use more types of jellies to take out your enemies, but the invading jellies also get upgraded enemies, so there’s never really a point in the game where you can just kick the crap out of the enemy with new and more powerful jellies. In order to use your newer and more powerful attacking jellies, you’ll need to grow them in a tree, first paying for the tree to grow them, and then paying again to place them on the paths. This usually takes about 2 or 3 waves to grow the characters before they are made available for use, which adds a bit of strategy as to when you start to grow them, and when you decide to use them.
As you kill each of the enemies, gold will appear; to collect it, you need to tap on it before it disappears. This gold is accumulated in the center of your green gem collection, and is used to buy attacking jellies, and to upgrade your planted characters. I say “planted”, because when you select a spot to place your jelly character, they will quickly grow from a small ball to the jelly that can attack the onslaught of enemies. You’ll need to keep this in mind while placing them around the levels, as deciding where to put them a little late can result in an entire wave of enemies passing by it before it’s ready to attack. This also adds quite a bit of strategy to the game, aside from the obvious strategy of Jelly Defense being a tower defense game. You can most likely count on restarting a level more than once before you beat it with all 10 gems remaining, learning what jellies to plant, and where, to start everything off right. One wrong move in the beginning can ruin the rest of the level. The game is also built around buying and selling a lot of your towers. To make it through almost all of the levels, you will need to constantly be buying and selling jellies in order to take on the current wave that’s making it’s way through the paths at that moment.
On top of all of this, there are power-ups thrown into the game. They are all pretty nifty, and require pretty good planning for when exactly to use them. There’s power-ups that upgrade all of your towers, drop gold from the sky, produce an earthquake harming all of the enemies on screen at the time, sending meteors down in a specific spot that you decide, and more. All of these need to be used at just the right time to make sure they are used effectively. If not, you could end up wasting a pretty powerful power-up, and risking your gems.
Infinite Dreams has, once again, given gamers a quality title with Jelly Defense. The graphics, animations, game mechanics, level design, it all screams professional, and well thought out. Even the soundtrack is great, and you’ll probably end up pausing the game just to listen to the catchy tunes Infinite Dreams have thrown into it. The launch price is $0.99, but the price after will be $2.99. It is Universal, and will provide you with plenty of gameplay. However, it is missing an Endless or Survival Mode, like most TD games have, which could have taken quite a bit away from the replay value; but there are GameCenter leader boards for each level, along with boards for how many coins you’ve collected, how many jellies you’ve killed, and a total global ranking leader board, along with 25 achievements, all filling that replay void that leaving an Endless Mode out of the game left. If you’re a fan of tower defense games, Jelly Defense is a must buy. Hours upon hours of your life will be sucked away, and the feeling you get when making it through a level, keeping all 10 of your gems, is great, especially in the mid and later levels of the game. Infinity Dreams has definitely helped raise the bar within the TD gaming genre.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011Dave ForesterNo comments
Tweet In a world of crime, genocide, and developers that integrate in app purchases there is little room to relax. Even our gaming experiences are stressful like Gears of War 3 or RAGE. Idyllic by Fatcow Games fills that hole with relaxing tilt-based gameplay that is easy on the eye and aesthetically pleasing to boot.
First things first, this is by no means a vertical jumper like DoodleJump and its millions of clones. You jump horizontal in Idyllic which can be a bit trickier as more precision is needed but is a welcome change. Similar to its predecessors the gameplay is in fact infinite so you are getting your moneys worth by investing 1.99 in it. But where it differs is in the character upgrades, upgradeable powers, mini bosses and coin collecting.
When you first start off the gameplay is a little slow and it takes awhile to get to where you feel comfortably challenged by the gameplay. In fact, most of my main deaths occurred early in the game because I tend to over tilt. The reason why I say early in the game is because there are checkpoints in the shape of houses placed randomly along the course of the game. The game saves your progress there and whenever you die or accidentally lose battery power you always restart at that particular part. That means no drudging through the same platforms over and over again to get back to the point you were before. I haven't got far enough to really test the infinite gameplay aspect of the game but rather than spending all of my life playing Idyllic I'm going to take the developers word on this one. After you bounce on a platform it changes from evil to good. Apparently you are on a quest after you find your world in pain to restore your planet to the way it used to be. Later in the game it of course speeds up and gets harder to be sure you'll land your jumps successfully.
At each checkpoint you can buy upgrades with the coins you find randomly strewn about the level. These upgrades vary between increasing the value of your coins and allowing you to double jump in the game. This adds a extra element of replayability to the game as you will have a extra objective rather than just jumping around aimlessly. Your two basic abilities are power smash and flap. With Power Smash you can come crashing down on a platform or enemy to procure coins reminiscent of Mario. Flap allows you to grow wings and float over to a platform in case you misjump. These abilities recharge over time and one of the upgrades is in fact to reduce the time it takes to recharge.
The music is fantastic and has a deep relaxing melodic feel to it that draws you into the game. The graphics are good particularly the backgrounds which feel like they had a lot of work put into them. Overall this is a great casual endless jumping game that really drew me in and had me playing for quite some time. If you have some spare change on your account there is no better place to spend it than on Idyllic. I give it 9/10
Link:http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/idyllic!/id445869482
Tuesday, September 27, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Platformers have been my favorite genre of games ever since I was 5 and introduced to the original Super Mario Brothers. That love affair carried on throughout the years with the rest of the Mario series, the Metroid series, Sonic, and really, too many more to name, but I can’t tell you how many hours I put into Super Mario Land and Metroid II on my GameBoy. Until recently, I figured those types of memories were long gone, never to be relived again. Enter - the AppStore.
Retro styled plat formers on the iOS totally take me back to childhood gaming, spending hours upon hours of my life staring at a black and yellow screen. 1-Bit Ninja almost totally nailed it, but after about 4 hours, I found myself tired of it. Meganoid respawned something in me that had long been forgotten, and I really couldn’t thank Orange Pixel enough, but now they’ve released Stardash, and I feel like I owe them even more. They have captured the look of old-school GameBoy games, and modernized it in just the perfect way. The difficulty level is also pretty high, though not as high as Meganoid, coupled with the graphics, it takes me back to a time before I was a pimply, full of rage, teenager, when life was good, and all that mattered was getting home from school and playing video games with my friends.
Stardash is an awesome plat former game, and will most likely end up in my top 3 favorites for the year, if not snagging the number 1 spot completely. The controls are great. Not perfect, like, say, League Of Evil, or Mos Speedrun, but they work very well. You don’t need to pick up your finger to change direction, which is a big issue with some iOS platform games, as dragging your finger back and forth on the directional buttons is a huge part of platform gaming, and the jump button responds to how long you hold it down. You’re also able to save your jump, and use it in the air, for instance; I’m running, and fall off of a cliff, barely missing the next platform, but op, it’s okay because I can use my jump while in the air to make it onto that platform I would have otherwise missed. This is not to be confused with a double jump, because if you decide to jump off of a platform into the air, you can not jump again until you touch the ground. This approach to movement mechanics has helped Orange Pixel come up with some pretty sweet, and challenging, level designs.
Within each level, there is a hidden “temple key”. Collecting these in each world’s nine levels will open up a 10th, and extra challenging “temple” level. Each of these keys are hidden pretty well, usually in platforms that you would usually jump over or pass up. Yes, that’s right, Stardash has the same kind of “hidden opening” sections that those who are familiar with Meganoid will be pretty familiar with. Along with the keys, there are two stars available for each level, one for getting all of the coins in the level, and another for getting to the end of the level before a timer runs out. You can take as long as you like getting through each level, but if you take longer than the timer, you will not get the “Dash” Star. To get these “Dash” Stars, you will need to find the best route through each of the levels, pretty much having a perfect run.
Getting the Dash Stars, and finding all of the hidden keys should prove to be quite the difficult task, but that’s not the only challenging part of the game. As you progress, each level gets slightly harder than the last, usually taking more than a couple tries to make it through. You are given an unlimited number of lives, so you can die as much as your little heart desires. To top off the great graphics, and perfect difficulty level, the developers have thrown in an awesome Mario-esque soundtrack to make sure you’re completely immersed in childhood memories.
Orange Pixel has proven that they know exactly what it takes to make a top notch plat former with the release of Meganoid, but they have taken it a step further here, and proven that they know exactly what top not plat former fans need to feel challenged and comfortable all at the same time. GameCenter and OpenFeint are also supported, giving players a global leader board, and 13 pretty tough achievements to try and grab. There are a couple bugs and issues that you might encounter while playing, like issues with the iCade controls, menus not responding 100% all of the time, and leaving a level you‘ve just reached while on the pause menu will re-lock that level, and some might find the game a little too difficult, but $1.99 for this Universal game is a great price considering you’ll be buying back a piece of your childhood. If you aren’t old enough to remember original GameBoy gaming, this would be the new title to grab if you’re interested in wondering what made a lot of us fall in love with gaming. It is hard, and with 40 levels, each requiring multiple plays in order to 100% complete them, Stardash should keep you busy for a while. Hopefully, like Meganoid, it will get a couple updates adding even more levels and gameplay to the mix, but even if it doesn’t, Stardash is a plat former all old-school, plat former, and challenging game fans should get as soon as possible.
Great news for everyone who's been wanting to play Hungribles by Futuremark Games Studio! There's now a free (lite) version avaible. The free version has 15 levels from the paid version that you can try out first before you decide to buy the game. The free version is also universal just like the paid version. Even though there's a free version, I say skip it. Just go download the full version today! You definitely won't regret it for just $1.99.
If you read the title then you may have noticed that we're having a giveaway! We have a couple of codes to giveaway for the full version. The first two codes are directly below this post. So if you're lucky enough to snag a code then kudos to you! The rest of the codes will be given out on our Twitter account. So follow us @TheAppShack for your chance to win more codes if you missed out here! If you do get a code make sure to leave the developer a review on iTunes!
Monday, September 26, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Last month, I was lucky enough to get my hands on, and review, Blast Zone Mega, a retro styled arcade game where you maneuver a bomb through rings in the sky, upgrading the bomb with each ring you go through, and causing massive destruction when the bomb hits the ground. Unfortunately, the game, which is centered around blowing up as much as you can, and in turn, getting the highest score you can, was released without any online leaderboard support, leaving your hard earned scores trapped on your device, and your device only.
Thankfully, Maximilian Bode was paying close attention to what players wanted, and has just released an update that incorporates GameCenter leaderboards and achievements. Now, you can compete with your friends, and other players around the world, for top scores. This update adds quite a bit of replay value to the game, so get ready to sink quite a bit of time into this retro action title.
Monday, September 26, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Infinite Dreams is giving away Jelly Invaders to celebrate the release of their highly anticipated game, Jelly Defense, to be released this Thursday, September 29th. In the game, you press down on your little defender jelly on the bottom of the screen in order to make him shoot. There are two modes - Tactical; which is sort of a mixture of bubble shooter and arcade defense shooter. You have a bar at the top of the screen which lets you know what color shot you'll have, and you'll need to match the colored shot with the different colored enemies. Once they make it to the bottom of the screen, taking your crystals, it's game over.
There's also a Survival Mode, which lets you fire constantly at falling enemies, no matter their color. However, different colored enemies require different amounts of firepower to take them out. As in Tactical Mode, once the jellies hit the bottom of the screen, taking your crystals, the game is over.
Both modes include power-ups and multipliers to help you get the best score possible. Jelly Invaders was actually the very first Infinite Dreams game I ever got, and ever since, I've been hooked on their releases. So while it's free, I highly recommend you check it out. There's also other Jelly apps by Infinite Dreams that are available for free - including the Talking Jelly Clock (click to download) - and Jelly Chronicles (click to download) which is a "find the difference" game. Also, remember to keep an eye open for Jelly Defense, the new jelly Tower Defense game, coming out on the 29th!
Monday, September 26, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Another World is a re-release of the old Amiga game by Eric Chahi, released this time by Bulkypix. Bulkypix has put out a lot of great games over the last couple years, but with this release of Another World, their uber cool status pretty much just shot through the roof. Another World is a classic game from the 90’s where you guide a physicist, who has been sucked into a strange world, through various puzzles and action sequences.
Most gamers who are familiar with the game will probably, first off, want to know how it controls on the touch screen. We’re given two options for control, a d-pad with an action button, or swipe/tap controls. The swipe/tap controls seem to work the best, as they feel more natural for the game on a touch screen. You’ll tap on either side of the screen to move in that direction, while swiping up or down to jump and duck, and then have two action buttons, one in each bottom corner.
The graphics have also been updated to fit the current devices perfectly, getting a very nice make-over. The environments are now a lot more detailed, as well as all the enemies and cut-scenes. You can, however, drag two fingers down on the screen at any point in the game to switch back to the classic graphics. It’s interesting seeing how much they’ve improved in certain spots by switching back and forth between the graphics, a lot of the environments look totally re-done.
Now for the game. Those of you who have played through, and beat, Another World, know that it’s a very short game, but only if you know exactly what to do to get through all the puzzles. This is definitely one of those games that if you look up a play through on YouTube, it will take, pretty much, all the fun and discovery out of the game. For first timers, or people who have never played all the way through the game, it could take 5 or 6 hours, maybe even longer, depending on how much you die, to complete it.
The puzzles and gameplay are mixed in with cinematic elements, so it’s sometimes hard to know exactly when the gameplay starts. The first time I played I died in the first 10 seconds because I didn’t know you were supposed to make your character swim out from the water. I’ve also sat there wondering if I was controlling the characters, or if I was watching another cut scene. So it’s a real story based adventure game, with tons of puzzles, and platform elements. Most of the puzzles will require multiple deaths while checking out the “wrong ways” to accomplish something, while other times, you might just end up stumbling onto the solution without even knowing it. Luckily, there’s a nice checkpoint system, so you’ll only need to start back a couple of screens if you die. There’s also 3 different difficulty levels, one easier than the original, the original, and a harder difficulty, for those of you who have made it through the game already, and consider yourselves pros.
Another World was an amazing game when it was released back in 1991, and with the amount of old-school gamers that play games on iPods, I don’t think Buklypix will have any problem selling this masterpiece. It’s still as great now as it was then, but because it was so original and ground-breaking at the time of release, causing even old-school gamers to want to pull their hair out, a lot of younger gamers will probably not enjoy this one too much. But if you’re serious about playing a game that’s still like no other, and ready to experience a game rather than play it, Another World is a great choice. It will stick with you, possibly forever. I can still remember playing this on my neighbors Mac about 17 years ago, and still consider it to be one of the most interesting, and engrossing games of my childhood. I feel lucky to be able to play it all over again on my iPod with controls that fit the system very well, with re-done graphics and sounds, and at a fraction of the cost of the original. $4.99, and being Universal, Another World does have an AppStore “premium” price, but it’s a premium game, even with it’s low re-playability, high difficulty, and chances that you’ll get stuck on one or two screens of the game for a day or two at a time, it’s a game that will make it’s mark on you. If you remember the game from your childhood, love old-school games, or are looking for something to totally blow you away, this is definitely a game to snag.
Get ready to go back into the wild wild west in Chillingo's latest adventure game Cowboy Guns [$0.99]. In Cowboy Guns you play as a lonely cowboy who has to fight his way through towns, deserts, and canyons with bandits in the way. Your main goal is to defeat The Crimson Jackals to bring peace to the land. There's 3 exciting modes to play through: Adventure mode, Bounty Hunter mode, and Survival mode. In Adventure mode you play through a story line facing enemies. In the Bounty Hunter mode you get rewards for defeating the 20 wanted criminals. In Survival mode you erm... basically survive. There'll be a bunch of enemies coming all over and your goal is to stay alive as long as possible. There's two controls in the game. The left analog stick allows you to move around and the right analog stick allows you to shoot your current weapon. Between the two analog sticks, your current weapons can be found there. You can only hold up to 3 weapons at once. On the top left side of the screen you have your health meter which indicates the amount of health you still have left. On the top right side of the screen there's a little icon that looks like a bag. Once you click on that you can find your map and travel to different lands. You can also read about your current mission
that you have going on and upgrade your cowboy. The following upgrades that you can currently purchase are handguns, shotguns, heavy guns, explosives, armors, boots, and new costumes. Items can be purchased by using money that you've earned from missions or from the stars that you can collect that are hidden around each area. I'm really digging the game's graphics and the western style music. The adventure mode is extremely fun and has a great story line. Overall, Cowboy Guns provided a fun cowboy experience and is
perfect for people who are into dual-stick games. I've found no issues with the game at all, except it crashed about twice. My final rating is 4.5 out of 5 stars. You can pick up Cowboys Guns from Chillingo for a mere [$0.99]. There's also a universal version that'll run on your iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad that you can pick up for just $2.99 by clicking here.
Sunday, September 25, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Gyro13 is a physics based helicopter arcade game developed by Cinemax. Within the game, you’ll pilot a steam powered helicopter through South American gyroxide mines while picking up stranded miners, and avoiding hazards, obstacles, and navigating through wind-gusts and sometimes extremely narrow paths. Gyro13 builds on old-school gameplay while using extremely polished graphics, and top notch physics.
Cinemax used the Unreal Engine to develop Gyro13, and it quickly joins the ranks of Dungeon Defenders and Infinity Blade in terms of amazingly beautiful graphics right at first glance. The environments are awe-inspiring, making it hard to go through the levels quickly. But since the atmosphere is toxic, you must get the miners to the safe-zone before they run out of air, and die.
Each of the 24 levels are designed brilliantly. The amount of thought that has gone into the path you will take while making it through level after level is insane. The hazards and objects that will make it harder for you to make it quickly through the mines are also very intelligently, and thoughtfully added, being placed and positioned with immense care. Big active windmills, huge pendulums quickly swinging, mechanical hammers, doors that require you to open them, mines that follow you along with mindfields to navigate through and gusts of wind that can send you directly into the side of the mines are just some of the objects you’ll need to maneuver our helicopter through.
Luckily, Gyro13 has great controls that make flying through even the more narrow corridors a task that can be accomplished even while rushing to the end of the level. You’re given a boost button, which, of course, boosts the rotation of your blades, sending you in the direction that you’re angled at, a slider bar that controls left and right movement, and a gun that gets rid of pockets of toxic gas, and mines, that‘s activated by touching anywhere else on the screen. These controls are, by default, boost on the left, slider bar on the right, but you’re able to flip these in the options menu. This set-up works exceedingly well, and actually gives players more control than you would think. Rushing through levels, you’ll end up narrowly escaping death hundreds of times, most of the time by almost running into an un-seen object. With the control set-up, you’re able to graze the sides of the mine, along with other objects, by flying at a tilted angle, using the objects to push you in the other direction by using the air pushed off of the propellers. Summed up, the controls work exceedingly well because of the top notch physics.
To top it all off, the soundtrack is astounding. I actually paused the game on levels 15 and 16 this morning, plugged my iPod into my stereo, and listened to the tracks on repeat for about an hour. The music adds so much to the feel of the game, it’s a shame I know a couple of people that are going to turn it off while they play just because they refuse to listen to any game music while playing games, but this is yet another game that will be added to my “I seriously hope they release the soundtrack on bandcamp or iTunes” list. The effects fit in with the music as well, the sound of the helicopter and the sounds for running into walls, machines, or picking up miners all fits in with the atmosphere that the music brings.
So by now, you probably think that Cinemax has paid me to write up this review, and might have blown me off as another sold soul, but I assure you, that is not the case. This truly is one of the best iOS games I have ever had the pleasure of playing. It’s incredibly immersive, has amazing graphics, superb animations, intelligent level design, great music, top notch physics matched with outstanding controls, and, of course, awesome gameplay. It’s no surprise that the game is $5.99. I really hope that more developers start putting this amount of work into their games, and bring us more console-like experiences on our handheld devices. The pricing doesn’t bother me at all when the game could be sold on Steam for double the price. Gyro13 is also universal, so you’ll be able to see all the amazing graphics the way they were meant to be seen on your iPad as well. Cinemax has definitely raised the bar for immersive iOS arcade gaming with this release. I really can not recommend it enough.
Saturday, September 24, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Invasion Earth: 1953 is an endless shoot-em-up developed by 285 Digital. This is their first real game that’s been released for the iOS, and boy is it a great one. The AppStore has desperately needed a quality endless shmup for a long time now. We do have Gunrazor, but really, after about Wave 5, it’s just not very interesting. Invasion Earth: 1953 has filled a void on our devices, and really, we couldn’t be more grateful for it.
The game takes place in 1953, after World War 2, when tensions were still high, and the threat of invasion, both from other countries, and from space, were on the minds of everyone in the world. You’ll take the reigns of a UFO going up against the military, blasting them all to pieces. And better yet, it’s endless, so the difficulty just increases as you progress. This makes it a great game for casual and hardcore shmup gamers.
The game’s upgrade system is given to us in the Tiny Wings style. You will need to complete 3 different objectives in order to gain a power-up that will help you go further in the game, and get higher and higher scores. There are 31 objectives, and 12 different power-ups. Sometimes giving you a stronger magnet that will pull items to you from further away, other times giving you stronger abilities, or a permanent additional life to sacrifice in-game.
While you’re flying through the city, destroying helicopters, planes, and various aircraft bosses, each of the enemies will give you stars when destroyed. These stars add to your score multiplier, and fill up your ability gauge. There’s also random enemies that will drop weapon upgrades, and these are always highlighted by a little arrow that says “pickup” hovering next to it. When they’re destroyed, they’ll drop a hexagon shaped orb, when picked up, your weapon will get stronger.
You will always have 3 abilities that you can use when your ability gauge fills up. You’ll be able to choose between Magnet Power, which automatically draws all stars straight to you when enemies are destroyed, Shield, which absorbs enemies projectiles, and Laser, which lets you drag your finger on the right side of the screen to control a large powerful laser, each lasting a short period of time.
While you’re traveling through the city, you’ll be able to go through bonus rounds. These sort of signify the end of a wave, and start the next one when completed. Each bonus round has a certain amount of stars that you’ll need to try and collect. There’s also a health pick-up somewhere in the bonus level, which will take some quick maneuvering in order to snag. Collecting all the stars in a bonus round will give you a special perfect bonus round bonus score, which also helps with climbing the leader boards.
The graphics in Invasion Earth are extremely polished, and presented very well. The planes are graphically made to look the time period, and the animations are awesome, especially the animations for enemies blowing up, and the UFO being shot down. The music also adds quite a bit to the edge of your seat feeling you’ll have when playing through the game. The controls are also done extremely well, giving a 1:1 relative touch control that works perfectly, along with a little hit box on the UFO that’s easy to see, and great to use while dodging through enemy fire. However, your ship does cover up enemies projectiles when going over them, so perfectly maneuvering through enemy fire can be difficult, though not impossible.
285 Digital has presented an extremely well made, and very polished, professional shmup. One that is endless, with the difficulty rising perfectly. Casual gamers, as well as hardcore players will find Invasion Earth: 1953 extremely entertaining, and very easy to pick up and play. Right now, later in the game, there is some slowdown. After you hit around 200,000 points, you’ll notice that the frame-rate gets a little out of hand, and there’s some noticeable lag and jitteriness. The developers have commented on this, and have said that they are working on a solution to the problem by staying in contact with the #1 score holder on GameCenter, so hopefully this issue will be addressed soon. Aside from that one issue, and the UFO covering up enemies projectiles when going over them, I can not find anything else wrong with the game. It’s got loads of style, an awesome scoring system, fantastic gameplay, 3 GameCenter leader boards, endless replayabilty, and personality out the kazoo. Being $1.99, it’s an awesome buy, and one that every shmup fan should get as soon as possible.
Saturday, September 24, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
Dodo Fly is a new arcade game from Silver Delta. In the game, you play as Dodo, a toy dolphin who has big dreams of reaching the real ocean, and becoming a real dolphin. Along the way, he’ll encounter loads of different toy enemies, along with a deadly shark that is hell-bent on making sure Dodo doesn’t get to become a real dolphin.
There are 8 levels in Dodo Fly, but each of them will take numerous play-throughs in order to beat. Each of the levels has a different environment, different enemies, and is set up so that you can memorize the level, and make it through getting the best score you can. It’s set up as a one-touch game, very accessible to casual players, but has enough challenge to keep even hardcore gamers interested and glued to the game til the end.
You’ll go through each level, slightly bouncing on top of the water, tapping the screen to jump and avoid enemies. There’s stars that are spread out through each level, and collecting these add to your score, and skill gauge. There’s also rockets, shields, and skill gauge booster pick-ups. There are 3 different skills that you can unlock and choose from in the main menu. One is a booster that lets you boost forward a little bit, knocking out enemies that are in the way. This skill is given to you at the beginning of the game. The second skill that you’ll unlock, when you reach 50,000 total points, is a submarine type power-up. When activated, you’ll end up in a large mechanical fish, able to plow through enemies, and jump in the air. The last skill you’ll unlock is given to you at 100,000 total points, and is an airplane. This sends you to the top of the level for a short period of time, making sure you will not come in contact will any enemies while it’s active.
The rockets are the most important items in the levels. They are set up and spread out so that you can stay on them, going from one to the next, with very well timed jumps. If you can manage to make it from one to the next without going back to the water, it will give you a score multiplier. The longer you stay jumping from one rocket to the next, the larger your multiplier will get. This is essential for scoring big. Once you’ve stayed in the air for a certain amount of time, hitting one or two rockets, you’ll get a burning type shield in front of you, which makes it so that you’ll knock out any enemies you come in contact with when hitting the water again. This is a very nice addition, because most of your deaths will be from coming back down after jumps, and hitting un-seen enemies.
Right now, the game is not supported by GameCenter or OpenFeint, and there are no in-game achievements. However, this doesn’t take away much from the replay value. The sheer amount of challenge in memorizing the levels well enough to beat all 8 of them will keep you going for quite some time. With the game being $0.99, it’s a great buy, and has a lot of potential. I really think an endless mode would add quite a bit to the game, as would online support, but as it is now, it’s definitely worth buying. Silver Delta has proven that they know exactly what it takes to make a casual game that will drive hardcore gamers crazy.
Saturday, September 24, 2011SyntheticvoidNo comments
ThingSOUP is a climber/distance game developed by Sherpa Reynolds. When it first came out, there was a lot of great feedback on the pretty basic game in the Touch Arcade Forums, and since then, Sherpa has released the 1.0.1 update, giving the game more content, and more polish.
In the game, you’ll control the “thing”. A mysterious little creature that has been captured and taken down a large hole while he was out looking for food. Now he must try and make his way back up to the top, or else be trapped in the “soup” forever. To control “thing”, you’ll need to tap on the screen and hold down to stretch out his tongue, which he can attach to the mysterious balls floating in the air, then use them to fling himself up, then tilt your device to move him left and right. The longer his tongue gets before hooking onto an orb, the higher he will fling himself.
There are bits of orange putty throughout the environment, and when you pick up 5 of them, you activate a power up that lets you fly a good distance upward. There are also little orange putty flies that when eaten will let you use your arms to fly up about 3 or 4 times by pressing on the screen. Along the way there are also lizards on the sides of the hole’s wall that stick out their tongues. If you land on them, they give you a big boost upward. But there are also exploding orbs that leave pieces of themselves behind. If you get these pieces on you, it will slow you down, and make it so that you can not fling yourself up as high. Once you get about 3 or 4 of these pieces on you, you’re pretty screwed, especially after about a distance of 10,000, when the orbs are more spread out, and you need bigger flicks to keep progressing.
The graphics in thingSOUP are pretty nice. They look more like clay than anything else. You can tell that it’s not made by a big name developer, but it’s got loads of personality. I really like the graphics quite a bit. The animations, as well, don’t look like they’re done by a big name company, but they fit the graphical style. They’re not choppy, or poor in any way, and they do add life to the game, but this whole “armature” style of graphics might turn some people off. It is, however, something I’m pretty drawn to.
The music and effects play a bigger part in the game than you would think. Aside from adding loads of feeling to the atmosphere, they give you hints as to when enemies and helpers are coming up. Listening to the music can help you get further in the game. This addition, and use, of music, is awesome. I really do wish that more developers would do things like this.
GameCenter has also been added, giving players 2 different leader boards, one for Distance, and another for how much Orange Putty you’ve collected. There are also 16 achievements, most of which will give you a decent challenge. This addition of GameCenter has added quite a bit of replay value to the game. ThingSOUP is only $0.99, and has more content coming in future updates. The developer has said that more levels, along with more characters will be coming soon. This addition of new characters and levels will add a lot to the aesthetic, and gameplay, and I’m pretty excited about it. This is definitely one game that has left it’s mark on me, and I can’t wait for more content to be added, and am also very excited to see what Sherpa Reynolds will come up with for future games.
Sherpa Reynolds was also kind enough to give us 4 promo codes to post with this review - so we hope that you guys who do redeem these codes after reading the review enjoy the game!
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