9th Dawn [Valorware + Made With Marmalade] - $2.99

It’s kind of surprising that as popular and loved as Ultima is, that there’s not more iOS games influenced by this genre defining old-school RPG. However this does make finding one all the more special. This is something we’ve just recently had the pleasure of experiencing while diving into Valorware’s 9th Dawn, published by Made With Marmalade. And while some players have already completed the game, others are finding out that taking your time and exploring every single nook and cranny within the game is an incredibly rewarding experience. Especially since the world is so vast and is a complete joy to roam around in.

9th Dawn gives you the option of playing with 1 of 3 classes; Knight, Archer or Mage, each having drastically different ways of playing as well as different quests, different NPC interactions and loads of loot for all 3. The knight has heavy armor and strong attacks but is pretty slow and pretty inept when it comes to magic. The archer is great for quick movement and medium range attacks while the mage is pretty week when it comes to defense but can dish out a whole slew of magical spells and abilities and is probably the one character with the most depth when it comes to the customization of spells and stats, as well as the most difficult to complete the game with. 

Starting off, you awake on the continent of Montelorne with no idea how you got there or where to go. Luckily, there’s an NPC right outside of where you wake up and he gives you some basic directions as well as warnings. Then off you go to explore the world, learn about the lay of the land, the empires, the characters, what makes everyone tick, ect. The one thing that wasn’t really explained too well in the beginning was how to interact with objects. When it comes to characters, a hand icon usually appears right above your attack stick which you can tap to talk to them but, as you’ll soon find out, this icon does not always appear. Going into the first shops, you can’t get close enough to the shopkeepers to trigger the hand icon from appearing and here is where you’ll either figure out on your own, or just avoid the shops for now, that you can tap directly on the NPCs to interact with them. The same goes for everything else in the world of 9th Dawn. Tapping on barrels, enemy’s dropped items/silver, buckets, chests, ect, all of these can be tapped on while some of these things, like dropped items and silver, will trigger the hand icon above your attack button, but that’s about it. I wound up dying 4 times before finding out that I could search through barrels for loot and items because of this. 

But once all of that becomes apparent, the gameplay really opens up and 9th Dawn turns into the huge, exciting, exploration RPG beast that it’s meant to be. The controls are flawless, using dual sticks for movement and attacking in 360 degree fashion is a huge plus, giving you great control over what your character does and how he does it. The attacking stick can take a little fiddling around to get comfortable with if you’re using the Mage or Archer, as you’ll need to pull the stick in the opposite direction of your enemy. After getting use to it, it does play very nicely but if you’re still having troubles with it, you can switch this in the options menu so that your character fires in the same direction of your stick movement as well. You can also enable aim assist if you’re still having troubles, which is a nice little addition. There are also options for ‘tablet mode’, ‘large thumb pads’, ‘floating stick’ and you can re-position the sticks as well, which makes the gameplay comfortable on any device no matter how you might hold it. 

This, combined with the depth of customization makes for one hell of a gameplay experience. Leveling up, like most RPGs, is done by defeating enemies. Once you level up, you're awarded 5 stat points which you can distribute how you see fit to either Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence or Wisdom. You'll also unlock more skills and spells as you level up and progress throughout the game. Being able to assign these to hotslots at either the bottom of the screen, or 'fold-out' slots above the attack stick allows for quick integration of skills and items to the heat of the action while in the midst of gameplay. It all really comes together quite nicely with a fluid and easy to navigate user interface. Quests can also be called up from your Quest Log, found in your inventory, which can also be assigned to a quick-slot for easy reference. 

Aside from the slight tutorial issue, 9th Dawn has been a pure joy to play. There’s always a new place to explore and the graphics and gameplay will take you back to the days of playing Ultima while reminding you how much gaming has grown with the super smooth animations, gameplay and huge open world. Priced at $2.99, 9th Dawn is a steal, especially considering how much gameplay you’ll get out of it and how enjoyable your gameplay experience will be. The few issues I might have with the game are extremely easy to overlook when presented with so much greatness. And considering this is only version 1.0.0, there’s plenty of hope that the game will only get better. If you’re a fan of the genre, I really can’t recommend this one enough, and even if you’re not, 9th Dawn might just make you a fan. 

**EDIT**

We did originally state that there was no quest log. Thankfully, PSJ3809 over at TouchArcade clued us in as to where the Questlog could be found. We apologize for any mis-understanding. 

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Scurvy Scallywags [Beep Games] - $0.99

Match-3 RPG’s have gained quite a bit of ground in the AppStore. Games like Puzzle Quest, Puzzle & Dragons, Tower Of Saviors and many more put you in control of adventures or a warrior and have you match tiles to attack, defend, cast spells, ect. While there are plenty of fantasy games within this genre, developers rarely break from this mold. Here’s where Beep Games comes in. Their new title, Scurvy Scallywags, has you playing as a pirate. Not only are you playing as a pirate, but you’re playing as a pirate in an on stage play. Within this, there’s quite a few more branching off that Beep Games has done from the typical ‘tried-n-true’ mechanics that can be found within this fledgling genre. 

Scurvy Scallywags starts off with the director telling you that the house is packed and that the future of the theatre is riding on your performance and the play being a huge hit. From here, you get to pick the look of your character. As you progress throughout the game you’ll unlock more costume pieces, some of which have extra stats to boost your character’s strength. You’ll be able to choose different hats, faces, shirts, shoes and weapons and once you unlock a few of the costume pieces with stats attached the customization becomes something that you’ll be messing with quite a bit. 

After you choose your initial clothing items, the play will begin and you’ll face off against the evil pirate captain who has stolen treasure and hid it around the world. Sailing from island to island you’ll start to do battle with enemies on the laid out tiles. Making matches of 3 or more can earn you gold, attack points or other various items which you can also sell once you complete the stage, helping you to earn more and more cash to put towards power-ups and other items. As you make matches, the board will shift depending on which way you swipe the matching piece into place. If you swipe from right to left, the empty spaces will fill in from the far right side of the screen, swipe top to bottom, and pieces will fall from the top and so on. Enemies will randomly appear on the board as you get further into each stage, and it’s up to you to try and match enough sword tiles that you can fight the enemies without taking damage yourself. Each enemy has a number above their character showing their attack strength. With your attack strength shown in the upper part of the screen, as well as your hit points, experience and earned gold. 

Defeating an enemy will give you a special treasure. Collect it and you’re given the chance to spin a wheel which can either get you pieces for your ships or bits of gold. While you’re moving the pieces of the board around, as well as yourself while trying to either move towards enemies or away from them, you’ll be able to collect special items like presents which give you another spin on the wheel, band aids which restore HP, or items which are needed to complete objectives. Point being there’s a whole lot going on, and it’s great having this much depth alongside the story and RPG elements. 

Once you get enough ship pieces, you’re able to build a ship which will give you some extra stats and generally help make life a little easier. Stronger ships are unlocked as you level up. Leveling up also unlocks special abilities which you can use mid-battle, like having an extra fighter to help you take out the enemies, turning all of the most common piece on the board into gold, extra turns that do not effect the movement or attack of the enemy and much, much more. 

If you don’t manage to make it through the game, no worries. Dying does put you back at the beginning, but you’ll keep all of your items, gold, upgrades and clothing, making it easier to get further each time you play. Even after completing the game, each of the game’s island’s produce randomly generated levels giving you pretty much endless replay value. On top of that there’s also a whopping 52 GameCenter achievements to try and unlock. 

With Scurvy Scallywags priced at $0.99, it’s an incredible deal. While the game’s mechanics aren’t incredibly original, there are a lot of them and quite a few do make the game feel very fresh and new. It’s like Beep Games took every Match-3/RPG and meshed all of their mechanics together and wrapped a great story around them, giving the game loads of depth while making it insanely fun. Even if you’re not a fan of the genre, or have lost interest because of all of the ‘clones’ hitting the AppStore over the last year or so, this is one title that might just get you into, or back into, the genre. If you are still a fan of the genre, Scurvy Scallywags is a must own, and easily one of the best within the Match-3/RPG genre. I really can not recommend it enough.

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Warhammer Quest [Rodeo Games] - $4.99

The first quarter of this year’s releases on the iOS was surprisingly strong. Our GOTY contender list grew fairly quickly, and we actually questioned if we were being too lenient with our standards. Fortunately, the waves of forgettable games came in, and made our GOTY picks stand out even more. Over the last couple of months there hasn’t been much to talk about in the iOS gaming world. Hyped up games failed to live up to expectations, and IAP driven paidmium titles seemed to flood the AppStore every Wednesday night. Thankfully, there have been a few titles that have stood out, and a couple of those are definitely strong Game Of The Year material. The most recent addition to our GOTY list should be no surprise, especially considering the team behind it; Rodeo Game’s Warhammer Quest. 

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Warhammer Quest, it’s originally a board game set in the Warhammer Universe and is the successor to the HeroQuest and Advanced HeroQuest games. While Quest was originally released in 1995 and while it was, and still is, very popular with multiple magazines helping to build upon the universe and receiving a number of expansions, Warhammer 40,000 is most likely the game that most fans of the series are familiar with. Since it’s been released and re-released with multiple ‘Edition’s (starting in 1987 with the First Edition, and most recently receiving it’s Sixth Edition in 2012), getting various expansions and even spawned it’s own movie, there’s almost no way to avoid WH40K if you’re into the Warhammer Universe. However, WH: Fantasy Battle, where it all started, is where you should look if you’re most interested in most of the background lore for the games. 

Now that we’re done with that little history lesson, Warhammer Quest is set in the ‘Old World’, focusing on a group of adventures who have joined together in order to battle demons and monsters with the hopes of becoming famous, highly respected warriors. Throughout the game, you’ll be given quests and objectives to complete, progressing throughout the story while collecting a massive amount of loot and leveling up your characters with a pretty depthy upgrade system. But at it’s core, it’s a Dungeon Crawler that focuses on loot and rare items, branching out into some great RPG and Adventure gameplay. 

If you’re familiar with Rodeo Game’s previous Hunters titles, you should feel right at home with the graphics, animations and UI. The movement has been more streamlined, as you can select movements for your characters before others are finished moving to their selected spots and zooming in/out + maneuvering the camera is a lot tighter, giving you the feeling of having more control over everything. Now aside from the tweaked user interface the first thing that really grabbed my attention when starting Warhammer Quest up was the way that the in-level inventory system is handled. While you’re playing the game in landscape mode, to enter your inventory/equip screen all you need to do is turn your device to portrait mode. Here, you can easily select your characters and change out equipment and items quickly and get back to gameplay in a flash. The whole system is really quite impressive. 

As for the gameplay; You’re given a multitude of side-quests that run alongside your ‘main’ quests that progress the story forward. While making your way through the game, you’ll come across various villages, each having their own quests associated with them. These quests are shown on the map in red while white sections are quests that will move you forward and open up more villages and settlements to visit. Each of the dungeons are split up into areas, with each area having a set number of enemies to defeat. The only way to progress through the dungeon is to clear out one area at a time. Once you complete an area, you’ll be able to collect all of the loot you’ve earned. 

Some dungeons have multiple paths to explore, giving you more chances to earn some awesome loot and equipment which is a great addition to the game. With the amount of depth in the equipment and spell systems as well as the massive amount of loot available and top notch story-telling; it’s very easy to see that an insane amount of work has gone into making Warhammer Quest a true and faithful adaptation of the board game while streamlining it, taking out all of the tedious card and piece management that slows down the physical version. There’s not one negative thing I can say about WHQ, and Rodeo Games has set a new standard, not only for themselves, but for iOS gaming in general. 

With Warhammer Quest being a true ‘console-like’ gameplay experience on the iOS as well as how expensive the Warhammer board games can get, the price tag of $4.99 is incredibly cheap. For those of you who know how pricy the board games can get, you might even feel inclined to purchase a couple of the IAP characters or Gold Packs right off the bat just to show your support to these amazingly talented developers. This is an easy 5 star game; one that each and every iOS gamer should experience, and is also a very strong contender for iOS Game Of The Year. There’s really not much more that I can say about it other than you shouldn’t think twice about picking Warhammer Quest up. Get it. You won’t regret it one little bit.

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Symphony Of The Origin [Kemco + WorldWideSoftware] - $10.99

As you probably already know if you’re even an occasional reader here at The App Shack, one of our favorite iOS RPG publishers is Kemco. The previous releases of Alphadia 1+2, Dark Gate, Grinsia, Aeon Avenger, Eve of the Genesis and Fantasy Chronicle are some of our top favorites within the Turn-Based RPG genre. But the game that got all of our love started, Symphony of Eternity, has finally gotten a sequel. Well, prequel if you want to get technical. Symphony of the Origin went live in English language AppStores last week and after spending about 7 hours with it I can easily say that SotO is my second favorite Kemco title, right after Dark Gate. 

Right off the bat, there are some things that stand out; Symphony of the Origin, like Kemco’s last release Aeon Avengers, is Universal. It also supports the new hardware’s 4 inch widescreen. Now, it’s not too apparent by looking at the screenshots in iTunes, but SotO also has some of the best graphics for a Kemco title to date, that combined with the depth of the equip system, all make this stand out as a step closer for Kemco being on the same level as Square in the RPG world.

The equip/item system is definitely one of the many highlights here. Instead of going from town to town purchasing stronger weapons, you’re given the option to upgrade your current weapons. You can also purchase new weapons and trade them out, but skills are locked to them until you reach a 100% mastered portion, at which time the skill be then be available no matter what weapon you have equipped. There are also 3 parts to every weapon; The main weapon (sword, hammer, bow, ect), hilt/arrows and grip/string/guard, each having different perks and stats and with the ability to interchange them all with one another so long as your character uses that type of weapon (for instance, you can not equip a bow string to a sword or hammer, or a sword guard or hilt to a bow, for obvious reasons). 

Another aspect of the game that stands out are the voice samples. During battles, your characters will spit out exclamations as they fight, and a phrase at the end of each battle. For some, this might become annoying, and there is an option to adjust the music, fx and voice volumes individually if that’s the case, but personally, I think it adds to the whole aesthetic of the game. 

Last thing, before we get into more of the gameplay; SOP Currency. SOP Currency can be purchased through IAPs. It is not required to purchase items, as all shop items can be purchased with the gold that you’ll earn from battles and treasure chests, but instead, is used as a sort of ‘cheat’ currency. With SOP, you’re able to purchase useful quest items like gold in clumps of 10,000, special herbs, potions, gems, elixirs and more that can all be used to cure and strengthen your team, as well as damage enemies. There are also special locations on the map which you can unlock with SOP Currency, giving you access to a sorcerer’s house who helps you master all of the finishing moves you have yet to learn, and 3 separate dungeon areas, each with their own boss. You can also purchase some special training and characters. In the game, two characters will join up with you for short periods of time. You can unlock them and have them available to you at any point in the game if you purchase them with SOP. You can also get special training and boost up your Merit Points max level limit. We’ll get into what more of this means as we get further on in the review, but the thing that is most important is that you do not need to spend another dime after the original purchase of the game in order to complete it. In fact, as you complete battles, you can convert those won battles to SOP Currency. By the end of the game, even without grinding, you should have enough battles won to convert to SOP Currency to unlock some of the cooler areas and ‘cheats’, which also carry over to a New Game+ if you decide to play through the game a second time. 

Now, starting off the game, you’ll be able to choose between Normal and Hard Difficulties. If you’re familiar with RPG titles, I’d recommend just going head in on the Hard Difficulty, as ‘Normal’ is more for new-comers to the genre. There’s an NPC in one of the early towns that will let you change from Hard Difficulty to Normal if you’re finding the game too hard. But you can not change from Normal to Hard, so keep that in mind going in to the game. 

Story-wise, the game is about humans, elves and dwarves, all living on Earth together, though still separated by geography because of their skills and habits. Humans on the plains, elves in the forests and dwarves in the mountains. Still, their lives are peaceful, and there is no war between the races. Inhuman creatures called ‘Evils of the Earth-depths’, as they reside in the bowels of the Earth, have attacked, trying to take over the Earth’s surface. Your main character, Ryle, is a young knight in training at the time that the human’s castle is attacked. During the attack, Ryle falls through the floor and into a secret area of the castle where a golem is hidden. Once coming within range of the golem, it is activated. Since no one knows exactly why the golem is activated by Ryle, the king decides to keep the two paired together, and sends them to the other races to show the human made golem to them, in search of answers. As you start your journey, more members will join your team while you look for information and try to find out why the evils are attacking and try to force them back into the depths of Earth. 

It’s not too original in terms of the plot, but like Kemco’s other published titles, Symphony of the Origin is very well written and translated. There are a few grammatical errors, but you’ll never be stuck wondering what is actually going on within the game. But, like their previous releases, the plot and writing is also one of the biggest things that holds it back from being on the same level as Square’s Final Fantasy, or any of their other RPG, titles. Personally, I love Kemco’s stories, and feel that they are very well written. But I will also admit that they’re lacking when compared to Square’s writing. This shouldn’t deter you from purchasing this wonderful title, but if you go into the game expecting it to match up to the level of FF titles, you might very well be disappointed. 

It’s still very clear that a lot of time, effort, love and care has gone into creating the world for Symphony of the Origin. And it’s definitely worth it’s original asking price of $10.99 (though it is on sale ATM for $3.99). SotO is also the second Kemco title that’s Universal, and the third that supports the 5th Generation’s wider screens. With the jump up in quality all around, it’s incredibly easy to recommend this title to RPG fans, especially fans of old-school RPGs. If you’re a new-comer to the Kemco world, Symphony of the Origin just might be the perfect title to start out with. It definitely has secured it’s place on our list of favorite Turn-Based RPG titles on the iOS, and comes with a heavy recommendation. As always, we can’t wait to see what Kemco releases next. 

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Slayin [Pixel Licker Games + FDG] - $0.99

The iDevice is home to many bite sized games that are surprisingly incredibly addictive. It’s also a refuge for retro graphics trying to find their core audience. Mixing these two aspects together, Pixel Licker Game’s new title, Slayin, published by the very respectable FDG Entertainment, has already risen to the top of the iTunes paid charts, sharing the company of Bad Piggies, Minecraft, Temple Run, Angry Birds and others. If that’s not enough for you to check it out, there’s also a flash version of the game which was released in late 2011, and can be played on Pixel Licker’s homepage. But still, here’s (hopefully) all the info you’ll need about the iOS version.

Slayin, on the surface, is a simple endless retro RPG title. Each stage is screen sized, meaning that there is no side-scrolling involved. Enemies either drop down from the sky or come up from the ground, and you’re job is to kill them, collect the items they leave behind, purchase upgrades, defeat bosses and get the highest score you can, earning Fame Points which can be used to permanently unlock more features like extra characters and gameplay modes, among other things like cosmetic skins and designs/items for your graveyard. However, the more you play, the deeper the game gets with some very nice mechanics.

Control wise, you’re given two directional buttons and an action button. Depending on your character, the action button is either used for jumping, or attacking. With your default character that is unlocked at the very beginning of the game, it’s used for jumping. Now, the directional buttons might not work exactly how you might think. Your character will always be moving, never coming to a complete stop unless running against the side of the screens. The directional buttons are used to simply change the direction that your character constantly moves in. This means that if you want your character to stay in one place, you’ll need to quickly slide your finger back and forth between the left and right buttons. Luckily, staying in one place isn’t really something that you’ll be trying to do too often. 

Two of the three characters will always be attacking, at least in one direction. Your first unlocked character, the Knight, will be able to attack in the direction that he’s facing with his sword. Even though he is holding a shield in his other hand, it’s only cosmetic, and anything that runs into his shield will actually harm him. However, each of the characters do have different attack, defense and luck stats, and the Knight’s defense is the strongest of the three. The second character is the Wizard. She is the only character that, instead of jumping with the action button, attacks with it. When the action button is pressed, she will quickly spin around for a few seconds, killing anything she comes into contact with. There is a short cooling off period after attacks so that you can not just spam the action button and never be harmed, but her attack is also the strongest of the three. The last character you can choose is the Knave. This dual-knife wielding character can attack characters from both sides, meaning that any characters that run into his back will be instantly killed. However, he has the least amount of defense, but the best luck, which does come in handy after the first couple of levels. 

Now, you are able to purchase health from the NPC shop character that drops down midway through stages as well as right after every boss battle. But sometimes things just get so hectic that that’s not going to be enough. This is where one of the cooler gameplay mechanics comes into play; silver, gold and all of the little trinkets and diamonds that enemies drop do restore some health. The more rare an item is, the more health it restores. As you build up your hit combo, you’ll eventually hit 30, which starts enemies dropping gold. Build up your combo even more, and they’ll start dropping gold chains, goblets, diamonds and more. Not only are these used to restore a little bit of health, but also help add to your score. Tied in with all of this is your combo’s no-damage multiplier. Kill enemies and keep that combo up, and your multiplier will grow and grow until you do get hit. One hit though, and it’s back to 0x, however, your combo that builds up for gold and item drops keeps building until you do not kill an enemy quickly enough, and the meter empties. It all adds quite a bit of depth and a heavy risk/reward aspect to the gameplay. You’re also able to purchase stronger weapons and special skills from the shop in-game. Though they are not permanent, they will definitely be something you’ll be tossing in-game currency into left and right if you’re a high-score chaser or just want to get further into the game. 

There are IAPs included with a currency called Fame Points. But I was able to unlock all three characters, the Advanced Mode (which starts you out at level 80 instead of level 1) and the extra life item (which allows you to keep playing once you’ve lost all of your HP, but resets everything except your current stage progress back to 0) after playing for about 2 hours, which makes it not seem like so much of a grind. My best advice would be to unlock the Knave first, because you can earn more Fame Points with him and his high luck stat. But if you’d rather unlock everything straight away, you can get 5,000 FP for $0.99, 20,000 for $2.99 and 50,000 FP for $5.99. The Wizard is 3,000 FP, Knave is 5,000, Advanced Mode is 8,000, Boss Rush Mode (which is exactly what it sounds like, take on boss after boss until you die) for 10,000 FP and the extra life is 5,000 FP. 

Like most other iOS games, Slayin also has a massive amount of quests, or objectives that, once completed, will help you earn some extra currency. Things like ‘Defeat xBOSSx Perfectly’ ‘Get a combo of XX’ ‘Kill XX enemies with XX weapon’ and others. There are 3 different difficulties to the objectives, with the easy ones giving out 50 coins upon completion, the medium ones giving out 150 coins and the hard quests giving you 300 coins. On top of the extra characters and gameplay modes, there are skins for the controls which cost 500-600 FP, and items that you can decorate your fallen hero’s gravestone with, ranging from 500 FP to 5,000 FP per item. These gravestones are visible to your GameCenter friends who also have the game. There are also options for changing the movement buttons to the left side of the screen as well as adding scanlines to the game to give it that ‘official’ old-school vibe. There are 5 leaderboards in GameCenter, one for your highest score, one for each individual character and another for Boss Rush Mode. There are also 23 achievements to help add to the replay value and challenge of the game ranging from ‘Unlock the Knave’ or ‘Unlock the Wizard’ to ‘Finish all quests with the Knight’ ‘Reach Level 100’ ‘Get a combo of 222’ and more. 

Slayin, like many iOS games that started out as flash games, is a perfect fit for the iDevice. Games last around 5 minutes, the more you play, the more the game opens up and there’s always going to be a score to chase. Pixel Licker Games has done a fantastic job with Slayin, as well as with porting it over to the touch-screen. The controls are spot on, and the gameplay is incredibly addictive and reminiscent of old-school gaming. I really can not recommend this one enough, as it’s going to be a game that never leaves my phone. Slayin is also Universal, and plays great on the larger iPad screen with it’s very generous touch-spots for the controls. Priced at a buck, it’s definitely a game that every iOS gamer should have in their collection.

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Nameless: The Hackers [BoxCat] - $3.99

It’s pretty surprising that in a store filled with freemium/paidmium IAP pushing games, there’s still a few developers out there that are willing to release games without any in-app-purchases at all. Unfortunately, a lot of these games go pretty much un-noticed, and it really is a shame, especially with so many gamers clamoring for IAP free titles. Well, the most recent ZERO IAP title to hit our devices here at The App Shack? Nameless: The Hackers, developed by BoxCat. Not only is it completely devoid of IAPs, it’s also an incredibly well made game. I was a little skeptical at first, judging by the screenshots, it didn’t look as though the game had what it needed to grab my attention, but after about 5 minutes with the game, it was clear that this was something special, and definitely deserving of every bit of attention and support it could get. 

Nameless: The Hackers is an RPG that focuses on a group of 2 hackers who have been contracted to help find a missing programmer. As you progress through the game, 2 more members will join your squad, and you’ll start to unravel a conspiracy of mass proportions and wind up on a list you definitely don’t want to be on. While you’re following along the main story, you’ll be able to help out people around the globe by carrying out side-quests as well as take down some pretty formidable opponents. While you’re taking out other hacking groups and completing side-quests, you’ll be earning the game’s dual currencies; ByteCredits and Research Points. ByteCredits are used to purchase just about everything in the game from new skills to HP upgrades, Boosters (Defense, Attack, HP, Energy; up by 10% for 15 minutes) and Items (HP refills, energy refills, virus cleaners, ect), while Research Points are used primarily for upgrading (researching) skills. 

Starting off, you’ll just have a couple of basic hacking skills. But fairly quickly, you’ll be given access to the Mt. Fox store where more skills will become available once you hit certain points in the story. Not only will you be able to purchase skills, but you’ll also be able to upgrade them. Upgrades unlock as you collect cards. Cards are collected by taking out various groups of hackers across the world, and by completing certain tasks. A very cool aspect of the cards is that they’re randomly generated. While the type of cards that you get may be pre-destined, the stats that accompany these cards are all left up to luck. 

Each card has 4 segments attached, get a card with 1 segment unlocked, and the card will be a 25% card, 2 segments, 50%, ect. With each percentage increase, the stats that are locked to the card will increase. For instance, a 25% card might tack on 2 to your attack strength, while a 50% card could increase your attack by  or 5. Not only are there random card generations, but there’s also different rarities of cards. A rare 25% card could very well be more powerful than a 50% or even 75% card. 

On top of all this, you’re also able to re-roll cards. In the menu, you can view the cards that you’ve unlocked so far. From this menu, you can select to re-roll cards for a cost. Even cooler? You can pay for a re-roll with either of the two currencies, though re-rolling with Research Points instead of ByteCredits will give you a slightly better chance of rolling a better card. 

As far as the user interface goes; everything can be done while using one hand/finger. Taps to execute moves and navigate the game while swiping to move about the world and select targets has been set up perfectly. The menus are very well designed and uncluttered, while everything else is simple to navigate and very responsive. To access your inventory, you simply tap on your health/energy numbers that are next to the character icons. To access your characters skills, you tap on the character. Underneath the character icons is the menu where you can quickly access the Mt. Fox shop, your inventory, view your collected cards or enter the options menu where you can save your game and adjust the music and sound effects (separately). 

If you ever get stuck, or need a refresher, there is a help/tutorial section in the Mt. Fox shop area. However, with everything being shown to you in a very simple and straightforward manor at the beginning of the game, chances are you won’t need to use this help section. But it is there, and easy to access, if you ever need it. Unfortunately, right now the game is only designed for the iPhone/iPod, and you’ll have to play in 2X mode on the iPad. Luckily, it doesn’t look too pixilated on the bigger screen, and fans of the RPG genre (as much as it sucks) should be use to playing games in 2X mode, considering most RPGs in the AppStore are designed for the iPhone and not made Universal. Nameless: The Hackers is, however, supported by the iPhone/iPod 5’s widescreen, and it looks fantastic on the smaller screen. 

The only negative thing I can say about Nameless is that the choices that you make don’t really effect the outcome of the game. There are some multiple choice decisions thrown into the mix, but the only thing they really effect is whether or not you get a couple of items or a few bonus ByteCredits. It would have been amazing if the developers threw in multiple story arcs depending on choices that you made. But with basically no RPGs featuring mechanics like this, it’s hard to hold this against BoxCat, especially with the amount of polish and how well Nameless plays, and even how great the story is minus decision based effects. 

With an incredibly supportive development team, great artwork and animations, a well thought out and engaging story and surprisingly deep customization systems, Nameless: The Hackers is a steal at it’s current price of $1.99. It is on sale for launch, and the price will rise to $3.99 soon, which does feel like a very appropriate price for a game of this caliber. BoxCat has done an outstanding job creating a fresh and original RPG for the iOS, and better yet, even with the dual-currencies, there are NO IAPs! It’s hard not to get excited about that these days. I’m hoping that Nameless sells well and that we can see more games from BoxCat. As their first outing, they’ve definitely hit the ball out of the park and are a dev team that I will be keeping a very close eye on in the future. 

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Aeon Avenger [Kemco + World Wide Software] - $8.99

A couple weeks ago one of our favorite Turn-Based RPG publishers, Kemco, released a new title in the English AppStore. Ever since we got our hands on Symphony Of Eternity, we’ve been hooked on Kemco’s releases, and even though they all look like very well made retro-RPG games done  with something like RPG Maker, there’s no way we can overlook the crazy amount of work, effort and love thrown into each and every title that Kemco has published. This time, WorldWide Software has brought us the awesome Chrono Trigger-esque title, Aeon Avenger. 

Aeon Avenger follows the story of Lake, a young, jobless slacker type who’s more obsessed with gunism than anything else. At the beginning of the game, Lake’s entire town, as well as his family, is killed by a mysterious man in black. This drives Lake to seek revenge. As his journey becomes more and more ‘complicated’ (as Lake likes to say), a woman named Rean who has the power to travel through time joins him in a quest to stop the man in black by going into the past and changing the sequence of events that led to the destruction of Lake’s village. Other party members also join up for short periods of time helping Lake and Rean figure out a way to stop the man in black from ever possessing the power to control monsters by going back in time and finding out how the monsters are able to be controlled. Toss in some Gods, a secret War and quite a bit of time travel in order to progress through certain areas of the story, and it does get a little ‘complicated’. 

Probably the biggest thing that fans of Kemco, and RPG gamers in general, are wondering about is the game’s equipment, leveling up and battle mechanics, as these are different in each and every one of Kemco’s titles (minus Alphadia and Alphadia 2). First off, there are 8 different weapons (Gun, Rod, Bow, Knuckles, Sword, Staff, Flail and a Whip) that you can choose from and each character, though proficient in one weapon, is able to equip them all. You can also equip clothing/armor with some able to be equipped with every character, while others are only for male or female characters. Along with your weapon and armor, you’re also able to equip two accessories. These range from slight perks, like a bump in stats, HP or MP, to preventing the wearer from suffering from various magical effects like confusion, sleep, poison and more. Now, most likely the biggest thing you’ll be worried about are bits. Bits are gems which you can attach to weapons adding on special perks, stats, spells and attacks. This is how your character uses skills and spells. Each weapon has a certain number of bit slots which you can equip bits into. These bits can also evolve, which we’ll talk about in a second, but how many slots a bit takes up is dependant on it’s strength. Unfortunately, you are not able to learn spells or skills, which means that you will not be able to use things like ‘Heal’ unless you have the bit that allows for the healing spell equipped on your current weapon. Because of this, switching out bits and finding out which ones are best against what monsters and bosses will be something you’ll be doing fairly often. This isn’t so much of a hassle, as in most weapon shops, there’s usually another NPC that will let you know what weapons are best for the monsters that can be found in the next dungeon area. 

Another mechanic that’s definitely worth bringing up is the time travel aspect of the game. A lot like Chrono Trigger, Aeon Avenger will have you traveling from the present back to the past and into the future, all to learn more about the world around you, solve puzzles, open areas and generally just progress through the story. One of the features that takes advantage of the time traveling mechanic, making it more than just a nifty part of the story and progression, is that you can evolve bits by placing them in a special area in the past, along with a magic evolution stone, and then traveling to the future to retrieve and equip them. Not all bits can be evolved, but most of the ones that can will play a huge roll in how you battle enemies. 

Graphically, Aeon Avenger looks like your typical retro RPG that Kemco has become known for publishing. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, unless you’re just sick to death of the style. Growing up exposed to the NES, SNES and SEGA, I personally love ‘retro’ graphics. Also, after spending hours upon hours messing around with RPG Maker, I have a newfound respect for how much work actually does go into the making of an RPG, even when given pre-rendered assets (which I’m not saying is what has been done here, as far as I know, World Wide Software placed every single pixel within the game themselves), it’s one hell of a task to take on. Along with the retro graphics, the animations are smooth, and the BGM adds to the retro feeling of the game as well. 

The user interface is reminiscent of Eve of the Genesis, which is no surprise considering EotG was developed by WWS as well. You’re given a menu button in the top left of the gameplay screen which will take you to a menu where you can access your tools (inventory), skills, status (equipment), map, help, settings, title, save and guide. All of the interaction with the menus is pretty straight-forward. It’s not cluttered, and is very easy to navigate. In the settings menu, you’re able to adjust the sound, battle rendering speed, movement speed, text speed, turn the mini map on or off and adjust the virtual control settings. You aren’t able to move the controls anywhere on the screen, but you are able to move them from the bottom corners to the middle of the screen. 

Now, not only are we incredibly excited that we have another Kemco title to add to our collection, but also, this is the first Kemco title that has been released as a Universal app. That’s right, no more 2X mode on the iPad! Along with being Universal, Aeon Avenger also supports the iPhone 5’s widescreen (even though it is not stated as optimized for the iPhone 5 in the game‘s description on iTunes). Priced at $8.99, it’s another great Final Fantasy-esque retro Turn-Based RPG at a fraction of the price of Square’s FF titles. If you’re a fan of the genre, Kemco’s releases are definitely worth checking out and we can’t wait until their next publication hits the AppStore. 

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