SpellSword
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New and updated on the App Store: Skype, Kartrider Pit, King's Bounty: Legions, Spell Sword and more
This Tuesday has for some reason brought a bevy of new apps and updates to the App Store, so if you're looking for something to download (or wondering what that little red circled number on your App Store icon means), here's what's new right now. Both Skype for iPhone and Skype for iPad have a big new update the improves performance, and adds a few features into the mix as well. You can now share photos directly with the app, for example, so that should save on MMS charges. King's Bounty: Legions is a popular turn-based strategy game on Facebook that has arrived on the iPad. It looks good, though I haven't tried it out just yet. Nexon, fresh of its success on iOS with KartRider, has introduced a spinoff called Kartrider Pit, that takes the cartoony racing gameplay of the first title and adds a time management layer to it. A big success here would mean lots more Nexon on the App Store, I think -- the game is free to play right now. Spell Sword is a really excellent arcade platformer title that's gotten a big update, most notably changing the game into a free-to-play app. There's lots of new content as well, including new enemies to fight, new Spell Cards to collect, new missions to play, and lots of new items to equip for various stats and upgrades. And finally, Organ Trail, the zombie-themed homage to the old Oregon Trail simulation, has received a big update as well, with lots of bugfixes and lots and lots of gameplay balance changes. It's practically a whole new game, and you can grab it for $2.99 right now. We'll expect more releases later on this week on Thursday, but for some reason Apple slipped these in right away. If you've got these installed or want to try the new ones out, they're all available in an App Store app near you.
Daily iPhone App: Spellsword is a tiny bite of RPG action
The iPhone's always been a great device for small flavorful bites of gameplay -- Canabalt's one-button jumping game probably set the course for this early on, but recently there's been a bevy of titles like these. Super Crate Box, Hookshot Escape, and Ziggurat have all offered up well-polished, simple, but endlessly deep bits of gameplay. And now here comes Spellsword, another great title in the same vein that cuts a specific genre (in this case, the action RPG) down to its core, and polishes it until it shines. There are two things for Spellsword's unnamed hero to do: Move around, and slash. But those two actions are made complex by collecting spellcards as you move, very similar to Super Crate Box's crates. Not only do they power up your sword, but they send out spells against waves of oncoming enemies, so your goal becomes to move around, dodging all of the various baddies and collecting cards as needed. One place where Spellsword really does innovate is in its missions mode. There is an endless mode, of course, and that's probably the ideal way to play the game. But Spellsword also has 60 missions to play through, which cut the endless gameplay down into a series of goals, like collect 5 cards, or survive 3 waves of enemies. Finishing missions earns rewards, which then get used in a nicely complex RPG system, allowing your hero to power up as you play. Spellsword is an excellent game. It definitely borrows a lot from other games (not the least of which are the endless references to all sorts of geek media), but it does innovate with that missions idea, and the RPG elements lend a nice addictive curve to the proceedings. iCade compatibility is a nice bonus, too. Spellsword is available in a universal version for 99 cents right now.
