Star Warfare: Black Dawn [Freyr Games] - $2.99

Gamers always dream of their favorite console games being ported to the iOS. It’s just our nature. Being able to have our favorite games in our pockets is something that all of us want. Last year, when the official Borderlands iOS game was released, the hype that built was outstanding. Needless to say, once more and more information about the title became available, that hype dwindled and once the game finally hit the AppStore, there was quite a bit of backlash from both Borderlands fans and just curious parties. It was a major flop, to say the least. Well, now iOS gamers can rejoice yet again, because without warning, Freyr Games, developers of the 3rd person shooter Star Warfare, has just released the sequel, Star Warfare: Black Dawn. With little advertising, and almost no hype, especially considering what the game is, we finally have it; Borderlands on the iOS. 

Not to say that this is a direct clone. But just about everything that made Borderlands so incredibly great can be found in Black Dawn; The different skill trees, hundreds of random weapon drops, multiple characters, each with different pros and cons, warp gates, open environments, damage pop-ups all over the place, and even kill for second chance mechanics. Unfortunately, there are a couple of things missing; the spoken dialogue, massive injections of humor, vehicles, jump & sprint actions. Though it’s hard to hold that against Black Dawn when so much of the game is done right, and offered for a measly couple bucks. And as crazy as it is being able to play a game of this caliber on our phones and tablets, with as much as the game has taken from it’s console inspiration, it’s almost impossible not to compare the two, and judge Black Dawn based on what Borderlands is. 

Black Dawn lets you choose between 8 different characters and 4 different classes (one male, one female for each class); Prayer, the medic class, Engineer, the geek class, Soldier, the powerful class and Sniper, the ‘foxy class’. Prayer class characters can set up a healing station, Engineer’s can drop machine gun turrets while Soldiers can set up an Avatar to distract enemies and keep them busy and the Sniper can set traps. Each class has 3 different skill trees that they can build up and pick skills from. These extra buffs help immensely throughout the whole game for taking out higher level enemies to level up quicker, or if you just get in trouble and need a little extra boost to help you get out of a jam.

Now, a Borderlands clone wouldn’t be complete without an online feature; it’s definitely one of the things that made Borderlands so incredibly fun, and as you can guess if you’re familiar with Star Warfare, Freyr Games knows what it takes to support online gameplay. Black Dawn includes co-op gameplay with up to 4 players. Here, you can play through the game, completing missions, earning experience, gold, mythril, weapons and everything else you can get in the single player campaign, but while playing with others. Right now, there is only co-op gameplay, but in the future Freyr plans to include PvP gameplay with character decoration. 

If you’re not too keen on FPS games because of the iOS’s touch screen, I don’t blame you. I’ve got a hard time getting into FPS titles myself. But Black Dawn has done a great job of making the game comfortable to both veterans and new-comers alike. There’s an auto-lock option, making gaming a lot easier, but also not allowing for many headshots. For those of you who are badass FPS gamers on the touch screen, this option can be turned off so that you can headshot to your hearts content. Movement is done by dragging anywhere on the left side of the screen, while looking around is controlled by the right. The shoot button is placed where most FPS titles have it by default. 

Unfortunately, you’re unable to move any of the icons, and on the smaller iPhone/iPod screen, looking around and turning does block a bit of the screen because you’ll have to reach up and over the shot button. As with most FPS games, you can adjust your aim and look around while shooting by dragging your finger across the screen while pressing on the fire icon, but with so many console gamers coming to the iOS, and with games like NOVA and Modern Combat allowing for customizable control placement, it might be a little frustrating that it’s not included here. However, there are options in the settings menu for reversing the X and Y movement, and adjusting the sensitivity for looking around, which is a huge plus. On the iPad, the controls aren’t really an issue, as there’s enough room to the right and below the fire icon to drag around and look, so you won’t be reaching over or across anything on the bigger screen. 

Objects like gold, ammo and health are picked up automatically by walking over them but picking up weapons and shields as well as opening chests is done by tapping on the screen when a pop-up appears. As for the weapons and shields, it’s pretty similar to Borderlands; the pop up shows the weapon or shield along with it’s stats and how much you can sell it for. Chests are opened by tapping the ‘Open Chest’ icon that pops up when you’re near them. These options for picking up items and opening chests, however, can be kind of finicky. You’ll have to stop moving and look at the object just right for the pop up to appear, which can be kind of frustrating at first, but once you get the hang of it, it goes pretty smoothly. 

Black Dawn’s graphics look fairly similar to Borderlands, and you might even have a hard time distinguishing the two if you played BL on a lower end machine with all the special extra graphical effects turned off. But aside from that, the animations, character models, environments, and just about everything else is top notch and incredibly well designed. The layouts of the levels are also pretty impressive. While the first couple of areas aren’t too big, you’ll soon reach areas that are huge. Luckily, there’s different warp zones in each map, allowing you to enter the areas in different spots. 

There are IAPs included in the game. But before you go getting all upset about it, here’s the scoop. Mythril is used to play the game’s mini-games of Roulette. Here, you can spend Mythril to take a spin and get a random weapon or shield. You can also convert Mythril to coins. There are no items in the shops that I’ve come across that are Mythril only purchases, everything can be bought with the gold that you’ll collect while killing enemies and completing missions. The only thing Mythril might really come in handy for is for resetting all of your skill points, which will cost you 100 Mythril. Fortunately, if you buy the game, you’re given 100 Mythril for being an ‘early adopter’. You can also earn 140 Mythril for downloading Freyr’s previous games, Star Warfare: Alien Invasion and Amazing Runner, which are both FREE. On top of that, you’re able to watch video ads and check out TapJoy offers for more free Mythril, so there’s no real push towards dumping more cash into the game. Black Dawn is incredibly well balanced, and the only reason I could see to drop a couple bucks on more Mythril is to help support the developers. 

There are some things that will remain frustrating unless they’re fixed. Right now, it’s kind of hard to select “Mission” “Shop” or “Talk” after tapping on a character. Half of the time if you don’t tap at exactly the right spot, you’ll just exit the menu and have to tap on the character to enter it again. There’s also only 10 slots in your inventory, which means that if you like having options when in battle, like carrying around an SMG, Sniper Riffle and then having a Revolver, Pistol and Shotgun handy, you’re left with 7 inventory slots, and that doesn’t allow for many items to be taken with you when you exit the area. There’s also no option to increase your inventory slots, so inventory management is something that you’ll be doing consistently. While this may not bother some gamers, it will weigh heavily on others, and having the option to buy more inventory slots would be a great addition for the future. There are also some grammatical errors in the dialogue. Though it’s nothing that will make understanding what’s being said impossible, it is very noticeable. 

But all-n-all, Star Warfare: Black Dawn is a spot on Borderlands clone that’s well worth the $2.99 purchase and then some, even with the included IAPs. This is what the official Borderlands iOS game should have been but wasn’t. Even if you’re not a fan of Borderlands, Black Dawn offers up some very nice co-op gameplay which is only going to get better, and a huge open world environment to roam around in. I’m actually a little shocked that this launched for $3 when it could have easily came out the gate matching Modern Combat’s price point of $6.99, and still been well worth the purchase. Not only that, but the amazing support that Freyr Games gave to the first Star Warfare based on players feedback gives us loads of confidence that Black Dawn will only get better and smoother. Along with that, it's Universal and supports the iPhone/iPod 5's widescreen. Right now, this is TAS’s favorite FPS title on the iOS, and is a very easy recommendation. 

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Review Rewind: Fractal Combat

Alrighty, I'd like to welcome everyone to The App Shack's first ever Review Rewind, a new section of TAS that will spotlight reviews that were posted exactly one year ago, but only for games that are still on our devices today. Our very first Review Rewind is Newtype K.K.'s fantastic Aerial Combat title, Fractal Combat. One year ago today, I was first exposed to this amazing game. Since then, it's gone through 6 updates, and quite a few changes and tweaks, making the game better each time. It's made its way onto our Writer's Favorites list as my very own #10 favorite iOS game ever, and we also gave out 5 promo codes for it over the last week during our Big Ass Promo Code Giveaway, but if you don't have it yet, it's definitely one iOS title you need to own. Here it is; Fractal Combat. 

**Note: This review was written after playing Version 1.0.

--Click here to check out the original review--

Fractal Combat is a new aerial combat game from NewType K.K. It’s also their first offering to the AppStore, but it sure doesn’t show in their presentation. Fractal Combat is a very polished, top notch aerial combat game. The fractal graphics are wonderful, the music is great, and the controls are user interface are phenomenal. I really was not expecting what I got out of this game. The animations of the exploding enemies, along with the flaming bits of wreckage you see after the explosion is great. You rarely find this much attention to detail within games like this on the iOS, and seeing that it can be done, and done very well, might make you start to think less of all the other aerial combat games in the AppStore. 

You’re given 10 missions throughout each of the 7 different landscapes, that‘s a whopping 70 missions. Each of the missions it’s your job to take out the targets, highlighted in red on the map. While you’re going after the targets, you’ll be bombarded by enemies that show up on the radar as yellow triangles. Each time you blow an enemy up, they leave behind some energy which if collected, gives you some shield. If you have no shield power, your armor, which is pretty much health, gets knocked down with each hit. Once you have no armor, you’re dead, and need to start at the beginning of the mission. If you happen to succeed in the mission, you’re awarded with a rating of 1 to 3 stars, along with credits which you can use to buy better weapons, generators, radars and even new ships in the garage. There’s 5 ships total that you can unlock by progressing through the game, and then buy. Each has stronger armor, more shield capacity, and a different flight mode, or way of flying. For instance, you start off with a ship that has thrusters for flight, and the next ship up that you can buy uses magnetic rotors. There’s 7 different weapons, each with different speed, range, damage, and other attributes. 3 different radars, and 5 different generators. There’s slots in the game to have 6 profiles, so you can play the game on a device that’s shared between friends or family, and not end up playing each others games, or you can just start from scratch, and re-organize how you set up your weapons and which ships you buy.

You are given two choices of control options, a joystick which you can have on the left or right hand side of the screen, or you can use your devices accelerometer, and tilt while you play. You can also set the sensitivity, angle of accelerometer, and put the throttle on the left or right side of the screen. Fire buttons are on both the left and right hand sides of the bottom of the screen if you decide to use tilt controls, and on the opposite side of the screen of the joystick, if you decide to use that control method. However, you are not able to change the Y direction, so pressing up on the control pad makes you go down, and pressing down makes you go up. Which is not the case for tilt controls, tilting the top of your iPod towards you makes the ship go up, and away from you to go down. This set up is a tad weird, but manageable if you’re use to default settings in most aerial combat games. You can also change the music and fx volume, which is always a nice option, and there is, of course, a reset to default option, just in case you end up screwing everything up and want to start from scratch. All-n-all, there’s quite a bit of customization going on in the options menu. But I think an option to turn the HUD display on or off would have been a good idea too, as it can seem kind of crowded on the screen, but not in a way that distracts from the gameplay.

The only real thing I think this game is missing is another mode, or a story. I know it’s not easy to create a story for a game, and it’s pretty much pointless to just cram a story into a game just for the hell of it, but if Fractal Combat had a story to go along with the missions, like why you’re fighting these ships, why they’re you’re enemies, something so that you know WHY, it would make this game a lot better. That, along with a survival mode, where you could take your fully equipped ship into a battle that only ended when you got shot down, would make this an even more amazing game. But with what it has now, Fractal Combat is still worthy of 4.5 out of 5 stars, and comes along with a strong recommendation from me. Anyone who’s into aerial combat, flight sims, or just action and arcade games in general should check this out one, it’s a game that you will never regret buying. It’s universal, and only $1.99.

**Note: Fractal Combat is now priced at $0.99

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Combombo [Wales Interactive] - FREE

This review has been removed because on March 18, 2013, the "Game Center support" update that was also supposed to add widescreen support only added ads to the game, and made the first loading screen widescreen, not the menus, or actual game. We do not support this type of updating, and have therefor removed our review.

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Running With Ninjas [Justin Hogie] - $0.99

Shoot-em-ups. They’ve grown in popularity quite a bit since the introduction of the AppStore and iDevice. The touch controls make pin-point accuracy and quick movements that would otherwise be impossible as easy as dragging your thumb across a 3.5 inch glass screen. However, the 3D, 3rd Person/On-Rails shooter genre has been basically left out of this Shmup Revolution, with only a couple of titles available for the platform; Wizard Ops, Denizen, Dark Break, ExZeus, TheMars, Battle 3D 2: Iron Punch, and the more open-world type game, Battle 3D: Robots Sky. These titles have provided iOS gamers with countless Space Harrier type entertainment. But sadly, aside from these titles, there’s not others for fans of the genre to sink their teeth into. One-man, Australia-based Justin Hogie obviously knows this, but has still taken a wild chance with his first original iOS title, and created another game we can all add to that extremely short list; Running With Ninjas. 

Running With Ninjas is an Endless 3rd Person On-Rails Shooter that puts you in control of a ninja running through the jungle and mountains while being attacked by, and attacking, other ninjas who are bound and determined to take you out. RWN contains one gameplay mode which has you defeating as many ninjas as you can before your health completely runs out. When you start out, you’ll only see 2 different enemies; Red and Green. Red enemies will throw Shurikens straight forward and once defeated, add to your special meter; displayed as writing under your health bar. Green enemies do not attack you, instead, once defeated, they will slightly refill your health bar. As you progress through the world, you’ll soon realize that these are not the only types of enemies. Bosses with strange turtle like shields on their backs, purple enemies that throw Shurikens directly at you, yellow enemies that toss bombs and more will all be after your head, and when all of these different types of enemies are on the screen at the same time, things can get a little hairy. 

Once you defeat a boss, a scroll appears. These scrolls, once collected, give your ninja special powers, and this is where the special meter comes into play. After you collect a scroll, a special power is unlocked. To use this special power, you’ll need to draw a shape in the middle of the screen. This does take some getting use to, and I still think that buttons up the sides of the screen, or easier swipe gestures, like just swiping left to right, or up and down would have been a better fit, especially since the gestures are a little hard to remember, and can take more than a second or two to pull off, that is, if you can pull it off correctly. Each special power requires a certain amount of power from your special gauge. Once you have enough power, you can draw a certain symbol on the screen, and POW, enemies are in for some trouble. 

The controls are fairly simple; you’re given a button for jumping, and a button for throwing your own Shuriken. Moving left and right is controlled by tilting your device. Normally, I don’t think I would have checked out a 3rd Person On-Rails Shooter that was tilt controlled, but the controls in Running With Ninjas fit the game extremely well. Also making it feel even better is the great camera control. When you tilt your device, your character moves, but so does the environment. This makes it a lot easier to focus on the gameplay, and not worry so much about where your character is located in the gameplay area. However, if you’re not comfortable with the tilting environment, you can always turn this option off in the settings menu, making the environment stay level as you tilt. I have experienced some issues with the controls, like an occasionally unresponsive jump button, some jitteriness while moving in the air, sometimes resulting in taking damage when I should have avoided a bomb, and some slight sticking of the character while on the edges of the gameplay area. However, these were all occasional, and not game-breaking by any means. 

The graphics are pretty minimal, with very little details in the environments and characters, however, this does help to make the bright enemies stick out like a sore thumb, making it easier to focus on them while running at full speed through the environments. The animations are well done, with nice enemy appearance and death animations, cool looking special powers, and nice running animations also add to the feel and polish of the game. 

With only one gameplay mode, and some needed tweaks that could make the gameplay a little smoother, not everyone is going to jump on the Running With Ninjas bandwagon. However, if you’re a fan of the genre, and willing to take a chance on a game that has some very solid core gameplay mechanics, for $0.99, you just might be very surprised. In the near future, Justin Hogie has said that GameCenter leaderboards and achievements, as well as possibly another gameplay mode that would revolve around preset challenges and levels, along with some additions to the enemies, stages, and special power scrolls. Hopefully RWN sells well and gets enough attention that these things can be added, because right now, Running With Ninjas shows an extreme amount of promise, and provides some great endless gameplay.

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Shellrazer [Slick Entertainment] - $0.99

The AppStore is a place where, with all the clones of clones and ‘safe’ titles hitting the ‘shelves’,  finding new, original, unique, and interesting games is getting harder and harder. However, they’re still being released, and can still be found. If you’re willing to look. With all of the great releases this week, one of the titles that almost got shoved under the rug, and missed out on is Slick Entertainment’s Shellrazer, a side-scrolling action shooter with great graphics, addictive gameplay and plenty of special power-ups and equipable items to keep you glued to your device for hours. 

Shellrazer contains one gameplay mode, a single player campaign., but even though games like this generally include multiple game modes, once you dive in and take a look at the map, it becomes pretty clear that completing the game will take quite a few hours. There’s 50+ levels to make your way through, all found along a path that twists and winds through pastures, hills, mountains, jungles, beaches and more, and includes quite a few branching paths. Here, on the map, you’ll get your first real idea of how much time and effort has gone into making Shellrazer an extremely polished iOS title. The vibrant graphics and great animations stand out, making this one of my favorite level select screens I’ve ever seen. And it only gets better from here. 

In Shellrazer, you’ll be guiding a War Turtle through swarm after swarm of goblins on the ground, in the air, and in well designed fortresses as he makes his way on his annual march across the land. You’ll start off with a machine gunner who sits on top of the War Turtle, and is able to blast through the enemies. As you progress across the map, you’ll come across many captured creatures that will be able to sit on-top of the turtle as well, and help him out on his journey. 

You’ll soon find out that there’s way more characters than you can equip, and that figuring out which three characters best fit your style of play is something you should figure out quickly. The faster you figure this out, the better, as the coins that you earn by destroying enemies, and making your way through the levels will be required to upgrade your characters, and spending the time to upgrade one character which after a couple of levels doesn’t end up working out can cost you big time. 

Along with upgrading your characters, you’ll also be able to spend coins on power-ups and special stat add-ons. One time use items like ice blocks that slow down the enemies, and electric charges that take out all of the airborne enemies, as well as stat additions like 10% more damage against ground troops, and slow health regeneration are available, and cheap, in the shop. You’ll also pick up tons of them as you make your way through the levels, so purchasing them isn’t required. You’ll even be able to sell quite a few of them to help you upgrade your characters. 

The controls take a little getting use to, as you can either tap the gunners to fire in one constant direction, or you can tap on a character and then drag your finger across the screen, with the gun following your finger. With up to 3 gunners available at once, figuring this out does take some practice, but once you get it, it flows very well, and definitely fits the game perfectly. I couldn’t picture any other control scheme that would work better. 

Shellrazer is one of the best side-scrolling arcade titles I’ve played in a while. The gameplay, graphics, controls, the whole package is extremely polished, and well developed. Priced at $0.99 for launch, it’s a steal, and anyone even remotely interested in the genre should pick it up. Being Universal really helps out as well, as do the 16 GameCenter achievements. However, having no leader boards, and only one gameplay mode kind of takes away from the replay value, but that’s partially redeemable by the 3 separate difficulty levels which could cause you to loose more than just a few hours on the game. Slick Entertainment is definitely a development team you’ll want to keep your eyes on. If Shellrazer is any sort of taste of what’s to come, iOS gamers are in for some awesome gaming. 

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Major Mayhem [Adult Swim + Rocket Jump] - FREE

Adult Swim has published some fantastic games over the last year. Monsters Ate My Condo, Bring Me Sandwiches!!, Snoticles, and more. But recently, a little title that really just seemed to really slide by a lot of gamers, Rocket Jump’s Major Mayhem got a huge, and I mean HUGE update. 3 new gameplay modes, a crazy amount of weapons and equip items and one of the most requested features, GameCenter achievements (100 of them!) have all been added to the game. Major Mayhem has also gone free, following the freemium trends with the hopes of recouping some of the costs of development. Not to worry though, as this has got to be one of the best paid to freemium conversions to ever happen within the AppStore.

Back in November of 2011, Rocket Jump released Major Mayhem. Being published by Adult Swim, and having a bunch of advertising done on late-night TV, and across the net, it was pretty surprising that the game didn’t really sell too well. Maybe it was because gamers were hoping for some more strange and goofy games after Monsters Ate My Condo and Bring Me Sandwiches!, maybe they were let down by Shadowngun and EPOCH, and didn’t really want to take another chance on the cover-based shooter, but whatever it was, Rocket Jump dove back into the game to try and make it stand out in the AppStore, and recoup some of their losses at the same time. 

One week ago, the Version 2.0 update went live, and I, along with others, were thoroughly impressed with the new game. 3 new gameplay modes, TimeBomb, which has you trying to get the best score you can in 60 seconds, Arcade, which has you go through the levels in random order trying to get the best score you can, without getting any health drops throughout the game, and Survival Mode, which has you trying to survive a whole world without any continues. Not only were new modes added, but a whole gang of power-ups, weapons, and cosmetic equip items were thrown into the mix as well. 

On top of all of this, the game was converted to a freemium title, with the hopes that more players would pick it up for free, see how much content the game has, and how incredibly fun it is, and want to support Rocket Jump by purchasing the game’s new currency. Those who still had the game on their device when the update hit also got 20,000 coins, which would have cost them about $1.99 with the new IAPs, as a little thank you. However, not many people did still have the game on their device, but luckily, the IAPs are very unobtrusive, and are not required to unlock or purchase anything new in the game. You’re able to unlock every game mode, and purchase every new weapon and cosmetic item just by playing and progressing through the game. 

Back when the game was originally released, a lot of players were upset that there weren’t any GameCenter achievements. These have also been added to the game, and not just a couple, a whole mass of achievements and objectives were included. Now, you can try and unlock the 100 GameCenter achievements, as well as try and grab all 150 and the game’s objectives. Set up like Jetpack Joyride’s objectives, every time you earn 3 or 4 of them, you gain a new rank. You’re also awarded with a random prize for every rank you reach, as well as 50 coins for each objective you complete. With the GameCenter achievements, you’re given even more coins, depending on how many GC points the achievement is worth. 

Major Mayhem’s move to freemium is easily the best I’ve seen happen with any game in the AppStore. It’s obvious that an incredible amount of time, effort, and work has gone into making Major Mayhem one of the best cover-based shooters available on the iOS, and it’s incredibly surprising that all of this was done for free, with the hopes that people would purchase IAPs. If you haven’t checked it out yet, now would be the perfect time. Rocket Jump has definitely proven that they are in it for the long-haul, and know exactly what it takes to go above and beyond to create an outstanding video game. 

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Bio Crisis [Sphinx Entertainment] - $2.99

Sphinx Entertainment has released some awesome games in the past; Carrot War, VR Mission, Mole Dash, League of Extraordinary Birds, and more. Their newest title, however, is easily their best yet. Bio Crisis, a title that’s won numerous Indie Game Design Awards, has been polished up and released for the iOS, and takes it’s place next to the small, but growing list, of cover based shooters. 

Bio Crisis throws you into the roll of Night Hawk, a marine who’s guided by Claire, the operator of the Missions, who is pretty much your tutorial master. It’s 2035, and Earth’s resources are depleted. Thankfully, a meteor that wound up landing somewhere near the jungle that use to be the South Pole has been found. It’s said to contain a mysterious crystal which could be a source of great power. Your mission is to find Bull Dog, another operative who hasn’t been able to be reached since finding Crystal Samples. 

Like other cover-based shooters, you’re outfitted with various weapons, and will need to fight your way through loads of enemies in order to complete your objective. But with Bio Crisis being a top-down type shooter, it allows for some great strategic additions. This is amplified by the great level design, and positioning of barriers which you’re able to take cover behind.
All of this would be pretty much meaningless if it weren’t for the great control system. You’re given a virtual joystick, roll, fire and reload buttons. Once you get close to a barrier, Night Hawk automatically takes cover behind it, blocking all of the projectiles coming your way, and in order to make it through the game without running out of ammo, you’ll need to figure out what weapon best serves the situation. You’re outfitted with an auto riffle, shotgun, missile launcher, grenades, and a laser gun, and switching between all of them throughout each level is basically mandatory. Your shotgun is great for taking out enemies close-by, while your riffle is better for enemies further away. If you’ve got enemies back to back, the laser is able to shoot through them, hitting all of them at once, and the missile launcher and grenades take care of bigger enemies or groups of enemies. You’re also equipped with a knife, which you’ll be able to use when you’re close to an enemy. You automatically use it by pressing the ‘fire’ button, no matter what weapon is equipped. 

There are 24 Missions, and every 6th Mission you’ll come across a boss battle. Here, you’ll need to figure out how to use the environment and your heavy weapons to best serve you. The first boss battle is fairly easy, requiring you to roll out of the way when the boss comes charging at you, and then shoot missiles and throw grenades at him once he hit’s the wall and is dazed. However, the second boss has some great armor, and in order to take him out you’ll need to figure out where to stand in order to make him damage himself. 

There are goals which you’ll need to complete in order to unlock the other gameplay modes; Brutal, Insane and Hell. To unlock Brutal Mode, you need to kill 100 enemies with grenades, for Insane, you need to kill 999 enemies, and for Hell Mode, you’ll need to kill 500 enemies with your knife. 

There is a shop, with IAPs included in the game. In the shop, you can upgrade your weapons, as well as purchase ammo if you happen to run out. The IAP is for coins. You also earn these coins by playing through the game. With each enemy you kill, you’re given coins, and are given lump sums after completing boss stages. While progressing through the game, you’ll also come across ammo containers which help out with the ammo. You will run out of ammunition if you blast away emptying clip after clip into an enemy after their dead, or just decide to only use one gun the entire time you’re playing. But the game is centered around strategically figuring out what weapon best suit’s the situation, and carefully planning out your attacks. It isn’t a blast everything to smithereens while not keeping an eye on your ammo type of game. Your health is also pretty limited, but does regenerate. 

You can automatically refill your health for 300 coins if you don’t want to wait, but again, you will be dying and loosing a lot of health if you just decide to run into a group of enemies and start blasting away. Players that don’t use some strategy and don’t use each weapon as it’s meant to be used will probably wind up feeling like they’re being pushed towards buying coins through the in-app-purchases. However, you can also go back and replay missions that you’ve already beat if you wound up loosing all of your ammo by being careless. You’ll earn the same amount of coins as you did the first time you played through the level, so this can help out a lot. 

With Bio Crisis priced at $2.99, and being Universal, it’s a great buy for gamers looking for another cover-based shooter, or a shooter that requires thought rather than mindless killing. Sphinx Entertainment has definitely raised their own bar, as well as created a fantastic cover-based shooter that can hold it’s own within the genre. The game could use GameCenter support, with achievements, and possibly leader boards, but with the amount of content, there’s already quite a bit that’ll keep you coming back to the game, even after you beat the Campaign Mode. Bio Crisis is highly recommended for fans of the genre, especially if you’re sick of the mindless shooters found throughout the AppStore. 

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Buster Spirits [Iskandar Inc.] - $1.99

Every time a new shmup hits the AppStore, I get extremely excited, especially when it’s from a well known developer. Iskandar, developer of Bit-1, Brutal Fantasy, Cut Him Up, and the ever popular shmup, Buster Red, has just released a follow-up to Buster Red called Buster Spirits. This time around, Iskandar has created a shmup more directed towards fans of the genre than another casual shooter. 

The first thing that stands out about Buster Spirits are the new graphics. Even though they’re retro-inspired, and look old-school, they’re a huge change from Buster Red, which had a more cartoony look to it. But aside from the graphics, like most sequels, Buster Spirits is a lot like it’s predecessor. The game is level based, containing 20 separate stages spread across 4 different worlds, and having 4 huge boss battles. There are also tons of enemies with randomized power-up drops, but in Buster Spirits, the enemies also drop coins, which you’ll need to collect to build up your score. 

Now, unlike Buster Red, Buster Spirits contains a new scoring mechanic which definitely adds to the hardcore feeling of the game. Grazing. Just mentioning the word gets shmup fans charged up. Buster Spirits gives you bonus firepower for grazing bullets and enemies, which can result in clearing out screens after screens full of enemies in a flash, and adds a ton to the difficulty, as well as the fun, factors. 

Unfortunately, it’s not all great. There is no main menu, and no options for the game. Considering the controls are more like a Minter game (think Gridrunner) and there’s no option for 1:1 relative touch controls, it’s a pain to get into. Constantly re-adjusting your finger, and under/overcompensating for the extra space your ship will move while trying to dodge huge amounts of bullets of enemies gets very frustrating, very fast. This is kind of a shock, because Buster Red’s controls are fantastic 1:1 relative touch, so it’s strange that this was left out of the sequel. 

Also, there’s only one Mode in the game, whereas Buster Red has a Boss Rush Mode, and an Elite Mode. This doesn’t really take away from the replay value, because there’s always a high replay value when it comes to shmups, and GameCenter leaderboards, but it does take away from the feeling of a complete game. Almost every shmup in the AppStore either has Arcade and iPhone Modes, Boss Rush Modes, Practice Modes, or more, and not having this included in Buster Spirits does make it seem kind of incomplete. 

There’s also no difficulty settings, and only one ship to choose from, which, when it comes to shoot-em-ups, is a very big deal. Considering almost all of these things were included in Buster Red, I can’t help but wonder why they were left out of it’s sequel. But priced at $1.99, and being Universal, if you’re a shmup fanatic, it’s hard to pass up another Buster title. Unfortunately, you might not be too pleased with the product. Hopefully Iskandar Inc. adds to the game in future updates, but as it is now, it’s a hard recommendation, even with some great Buster titles under their belt. 

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