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Warhol-inspired mystery app reveals clues in real-life events
Absolut's as famous for its vodka as its marketing campaigns. The Swedish company often ties up with some of the biggest names for its iconic bottles and artsy events. This year, in time for their limited edition Andy Warhol bottle, they brought Punchdrunk (a British theatre company) on board for an experimental game app called Silverpoint. While the theatre specialists are known for creating unconventional shows like Sleep No More -- an interactive adaptation of Macbeth that opened its doors in New York five years ago -- this is their first digital creation. It celebrates Warhol's legacy with visual elements that take after his rarely seen "silverpoint" sketches, instead of his instantly recognizable pop art images.
TUAW Review: Reiner Knizia's Monumental turns puzzle apps upside down
The basic gist of Reiner Knizia's Monumental [$1.99] is that it's a thinking man's Tetris. This isn't to say that Tetris is a game for dummies – it's not – it's just that the never-ending rain of blocks means it's part puzzle, part twitch-fest. In Monumental, on the other hand, blocks fall constantly, but they do so at a rate you define. You still want to form complete lines and make them disappear, something old Tetris hands will feel right at home doing, but now you're placing each block carefully instead of in a frentic rush. The game is the brainchild of prolific board game designer Reiner Knizia, and you can feel the math Knizia is known for (he has a PhD in mathematics, after all) in his games poking its head. Read on to find out if a slow-paced but tense puzzle game is worth your time. %Gallery-91650%
Review: Bananagrams is addicting without the clicking
Perhaps you've seen them, in Word Wars or another Scrabble movie; people who are a wee bit obsessive about their word games. For the iPhone-carrying among them, there is the official Scrabble app or Words With Friends. For people who like a little more variety in their word game apps, there are a hundred other options. Today, we look at one of the better ones, Bananagrams [$.99], which is quickly developing a fanatic player base similar to the Scrabble fans. In bookstores, libraries, and cafes around the world, people are playing Bananagrams face to face. There is also an online version through Facebook. While Bananagrams shares a lot of gameplay with Scrabble, it's really much more similar to a less famous game called Pick Two!, which was released in 1993, and to the homebrew game of Speed Scrabble. Since Bananagrams hit it big a few years ago, Parker Brothers has responded with the Scrabble Apple, and the Bananagrams company also released Pairs in Pears. There was also an official Bananagrams tie-in book. As we said, there are a lot of word game freaks fans who like to build crosswords competitively. If you're interested in ways to play a quick game like this on the iPhone, read on to see what all the fuss is about. %Gallery-90908%
TUAW Faceoff: Skat vs. ProSkat on the iPhone
We've covered quite a few board and card games in this ongoing series of iPhone / iPad app reviews, but I haven't been as excited about any of them as I was when I saw that there was not just one but two Skat apps available for the iDevices. Considering that Skat is my absolute favorite card game of all time (in second place: SWCCG, an entirely different beast), I knew I'd need to download them both (at US$4.99 each, sadly) and see if either one offered an experience that is in any way similar to playing against real humans. The answer: as much as a touch-screen interface can replace your friends, they do. The first of the two apps is called Skat and its icon looks like this . The other is called ProSkat and has this icon . Skat's icon is much better-looking and does a better job of instantly identifying the app as Skat, but in almost every other aspect, ProSkat is the winner. Read on to see why both of these apps have their place and how they allow you to cleverly bid and take tricks in style on your iPhone. %Gallery-90381% %Gallery-90380%
Review: here's hoping the Kachina board game app gets some serious kinks worked out
The tile game Kachina came to the iPhone/iPod touch platform in waves. First, the app appeared as a single-player puzzle game using the Kachina rules. Then, an upgrade with in-app purchase allowed you to spend US$2.99 to get multiplayer functionality. Now, the Kachina app [$2.99] that you can find in the App Store is the full-featured version that includes both the puzzle and multiplayer modes. The developer, Gourami Games, has posted a mea culpa of sorts, saying: The in-app upgrade has been removed and all copies are now enabled to play 2,3,4,5 player games. Now with an option to chose the computers difficulty level. Those of you that have made the in-app upgrade purchase, Thank you for your support, and we will make it up to you in a future update that will automatically detect the sale. We like the idea behind the Kachina game, which uses Hopi spirit imagery and tests your math skills as you race for the high score, but this is a situation where too many serious bugs destroy what's really an elegant game. Read on to see what we mean. %Gallery-90109%
Review: Hey, That's My Fish Honey, That's Mine!
Board gamers looking for ported game apps on the iPhone (and now, finally, the iPad) might overlook the just-released offering Honey, That's Mine [$1.99]. The game uses little honeybee characters that fly across a board of hexagons to collect drops of honey. As they leave a location, that hex is removed from the board. Even though the bees fly, they can't cross an open space; this rule sets up a game that is much, much more than meets the eye. Honey, That's Mine can be played in three flavors: simple, normal, and advanced. The simple game is almost an exact clone of Hey, That's My Fish, a 2003 game designed by Günter Cornett and Alvydas Jakeliunas that used penguins jumping around ice floes. Honey, which claims to be the design of Jeffery Vanneste, does have a few alternative rules for different bees, but the fact that it fails to mention its penguin roots makes us suspect it won't be available in the App Store for long. Hey, That's My Fish was ported to some mobile platforms and the Wii, but not (yet) to the iPhone Why? No one knows. However, the fact that this is at least the second version for the iPhone – a short-lived clone called Mining Bots is no longer available – proves that the original game designers should look into licensing the game for Apple's iDevice line. There's a hunger for a game like this out there, whether it's using bees, penguins, or robots. Read on to find out if you'd be interested as well. %Gallery-89783%