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Perloo is a free physics-based puzzler that is clever and engaging
I'm not hooked on too many games, although the original Angry Birds did cost me many (happy) hours. Every so often something catches my attention, and Perloo has done that. Perloo is a free app that has no 'help' page, no screen of instructions. It starts in black, and then a man in a meadow ruminates philosophically. The screen goes black again and you see a round white-and-black shape. It soon becomes obvious that the white shape responds to movement of your iPhone. From there, I have no advice to give you. As you go deeper, the game gets more intensive and frustrating. Keep at it. There are worlds to discover and explore. I'm not sure how far I am into the game, and how far there is to go. That's one of the joys of how it all works. Even the game icon (see above) is puzzling. It looks like just black at first glance, but a closer look barely reveals a shape. I have seen some games, the 'Myst like' games that create a physical place you can explore. But Perloo is completely abstract, and yet physical rules apply. The sounds are excellent, and it is hard not to get involved. Perloo is not universal, so it's best played on an iPhone or an iPod touch. It requires iOS 6 or better. Although I didn't try, I'll bet headphones further enhance the game experience. Beware the prism level. Enough said.
New and notable apps for iOS and OSX
It's always busy in the App Store with a never-ending flood of new apps landing on iOS and OS X. Take a few minutes and check out our list of stand-out titles from the past few weeks! If that's not enough, you can also follow our ongoing coverage of new apps as they are released. New iOS Apps Astro Golf [iOS Universal; Category: Games; $1.99] What could be better than mini golf? Mini golf, with robots, in outer space. Golf with Orbit, the Robot and with his gal-pal, Tess. Hop [iOS Universal; Category: Social Networking; Free] Hop brings your email to life! It automagically turns your email messages into a natural chat conversation with the people you know. Wonders of Life [iOS Universal; Category: Reference; $5.99] Explore the majesty of nature in breath-taking 3D with Professor Brian Cox as your personal tour guide. Photofy [iOS Universal; Category: Photography & Video; Free] Photofy is a self-expression photo app that empowers people to be creative by adding their own unique touch to photos and sharing them with friends, family and social media. UpWord Notes [iPhone; Category: Productivity; $0.99] UpWord Notes makes your everyday notes more productive. We re-imagined powerful note-taking as an elegant experience. The Right Word [iPad; Category: Education; $1.99] Introducing The Right Word: The premier app for practicing English usage and learning how to properly use commonly confused words. World of Gibbets [iOS Universal; Category: Games; $0.99] 'World of Gibbets' invites you to a gruesome place where people are just moments away from..uhm..becoming angels. They hang on gibbets! Numerical: Calculator Without Equal [iPhone; Category: Utilities; $2.99] Numerical is a calculator without equal. Whether you're doing simple math, advanced brackets and exponentiation, or need a running history of your previous work, Numerical has the answer. Card Wars - Adventure Time [iOS Universal; Category: Games; $3.99] Floop the Pig! It's Adventure Time CARD WARS! Play the game inspired by the Adventure Time episode, "Card Wars"! Summon creatures and cast spells to battle your way to victory. CalCube - Quick, Slick & Easy Calendar [iOS Universal; Category: Utilities; $1.99] Calcube is the quickest calendar around. All you need to enter is the name and time of your event. Other details are already pre-set at the first startup of the app. That's what makes CalCube much faster than your default calendar. Monster Stacker [iOS Universal; Category: Games; $2.99] A fun new physics game for the Mac OSX. Test your balancing skills as you drop deliver crates of cute monsters onto your hiring bosses' dungeon floor. Bug Heroes 2 [iOS Universal; Category: Games; Free] Every day while you're gone, an epic battle of swords, guns, and armor rages on your counters, on your floors, and in your yard... Enter the world of the Bug Heroes! SECTOR [iPad; Category: Music; $6.99] Slice and sequence your loops with a matrix of markov-chain connections. Introduce order with the probability-based coin-flipping pattern sequencer. New OS X Apps VideoGif [OS X; Category: Utilities; $4.99] VideoGIF makes it easier than ever to create animated GIFs from videos/movies. To get started, you are free to add a video from video files or the Webcam. Monster Stacker [OS X; Category: Games; $2.99] A fun new physics game for the Mac OSX. Test your balancing skills as you drop deliver crates of cute monsters onto your hiring bosses' dungeon floor. Compare Folders [OS X; Category: Utilities; Free] Folder comparison for the rest of us: simple, fast and accurate. Compare at a glance two folders, even with thousands of files, taking into account file and subfolders content, creation & modification dates, permissions and more Keep Everything for Web [OS X; Category: Productivity; Free] Light & Fast Web Archiver for OS X, iOS. You can keep webpages and images by just "Drag & Drop" or "Select & Copy".
UpWord Notes is a useful new note-taking and task management app
UpWord Notes is a new note taking and reminders app from the Lau Brothers that focuses on convenience, allowing you to track important information easily and get things done quicker. UpWord is designed to make it easy for you to quickly jot down a note and get on with your business. When you launch the app, you are shown all your notes, which can be listed individually or nested in folders. At the bottom of the screen is a big "+" button that allows you to add a new note. There's also an option to create a new note automatically when you open the app, saving you the extra step of pressing the "+" button. The main notes list also provides quick access to your favorite notes and notes that have a due date. This latter option is useful for users who want to use UpWord as a task manager as it lets you quickly see the notes that need your attention today, tomorrow or next week. You can use a swipe left gesture on each note to reveal a menu that lets you favorite, move, delete or assign a due date to a note. Theme support allows you to change the color based on your preference as well as the time of day (day/night mode). UpWord has a handful of advanced features that make it more than just a place to store your static notes. The app supports tappable links, allowing you to open a URL, email address or phone number by simply tapping on it within your note. The app also supports third party services like Dropbox for backup, TextExpander for input and both Facebook and Twitter for sharing. Other handy features include multiple undo, custom note title, word count and an auto-bulleting option that automatically continues bulleting a list with bullets, numbers or roman numerals. You also can use a swiping left gesture to style a line of text so it is highlighted or bolded, while a swipe to the right will strikethrough your text and mark it for deletion. It takes a few moments to swipe through these style options, but it's a convenient way to markup a block of text. UpWord does not have a desktop companion app, but you can use it with any desktop text editor by installing Dropbox on your desktop and opening the text files found in the UpWord Notes folder. For a launch version, UpWord notes is a polished app. It's easy to use and has more than a handful of useful and time-saving features. It never crashed on me and was enjoyable to use. The only area I found that was lacking was organization. You can create individual notes and folders for notes, but it's not readily apparent how to move the notes around after you create them. I discovered I had several notes about an outside environmental project, and I couldn't just tap a note and then drag it to the folder I created. I had to swipe right, tap the move icon and then select the destination folder. It's a minor quibble to have to go through multiple steps to move an item, but I feel it's important to point out for an app that otherwise excels at efficiency. UpWord Notes debuted today in the iOS App Store and is available for US$0.99. It is an iPhone-only app that requires iOS 7. There are no ads and no in-app purchases.
Play+ for Netflix just doesn't deliver
A while back I reviewed a Mac app called Play+ for YouTube from developer It's About Time Products. I love and use the app, which provides a slick way to browse and discover YouTube videos, and then watch and comment on those videos without firing up a web browser. Today, It's About Time Products released a similar Mac app that is supposed to make browsing and discovery of Netflix videos and shows easier -- Play+ for Netflix (US$1.99 introductory price, $5.99 after February 23, 2014 ) To be blunt, I immediately found myself somewhat confused as to why a Netflix user would want to use the app. Play+ for Netflix doesn't actually allow you to view the Netflix videos inside the app. Instead, it opens a browser -- requiring a second login to Netflix -- and plays the video there. As with Netflix on any Mac or PC, that requires Microsoft Silverlight to be installed on your Mac. Of course, I'll be removing Silverlight as soon as I'm done with this review. So what's the selling point of the app? Well, clicking the bottom of a movie or TV thumbnail in Play+ for Netflix brings up a pop-up window that shows the movie or show's rating on Rotten Tomatoes and allows viewing of the trailer within that pop-up. Of course, if you wanted to watch Netflix movies on your Mac, you could just as easily have the Netflix site and Rotten Tomatoes open in a pair of browser tabs and switch quickly between them... Watching on your Apple TV? Just pull out the iPhone or iPad that you're probably playing with anyway and bring up the Rotten Tomatoes or IMDB sites to see viewer reviews. Many Netflix users pass on using their Macs to watch content anyway, instead using an Apple TV box connected to an HDTV or choosing to watch on an iOS device or another platform altogether. But if you want to watch Netflix content on your Mac, I can't really recommend Play+ for Netflix -- I just don't see the point. A closer look at the app's user interface makes it appear to me that it's just another web browser displaying the same page that you'd view if you went directly to the Netflix site in your favorite OS X browser -- the app just provides a different colored background. For example, here's what you see on the Netflix web page: Now here's the same information in Play+ for Netflix (located at the bottom of the "page" both in the browser and in the app): Hovering above the play button on each one of the thumbnails brings up the standard Netflix popup, so there's no difference there, either: The items across the top of the Play+ for Netflix interface (Home, New Arrivals, HD, Subs & Caps, Taste Profile), are the same as what you'd find in the "Watch Instantly" menu in Netflix in a web browser. The other web browser links -- My List, Genres, Kids, DVD, My Account -- are just moved down to a toolbar at the bottom of the Play+ window and given icons. If you're familiar with the Netflix menu structure in an OS X web browser, you're going to have to figure out where those commands are in the app -- hardly worth the effort. I've been impressed with offerings from It's About Time Products in the past, especially the company's incredibly good iBooks. I recommend 70 iOS 7 and Legacy Tips, Tricks and Secrets and its OS X Mavericks companion iBook to anyone who wants to learn more about either of Apple's operating systems. But I cannot recommend Play+ for Netflix to any Netflix customer as it simply doesn't provide any added value.
Unread is a beautiful and very capable RSS reader for your iPhone
Unread is a new RSS reader for the iPhone that promises to deliver "quiet, careful reading" of your RSS feed. It does so with a simple UI that stays out of your way and places the focus on the words in an article. As a result, Unread provides a surprisingly pleasant reading experience. Many apps adopt a gesture-based, minimal interface because its is trendy, but Unread uses a minimal UI because it works well within the framework of the app. You use a tap to move from your list of accounts (Feedly, Feedbin, etc) to your RSS feeds and then to individual articles. A swiping motion from right to left is used to access a menu for each screen, while a swipe from left to right takes you back from an article to your RSS feeds and then to your account page. It's easy and natural to use once you get used to it. Unlike other news reading apps like Flipboard, Unread is text-heavy, but that is a good thing. The layout is just perfect, -- the app manages to use the canvas efficiently, with just enough breaks that everything is not cluttered. The typography is appealing and easy to read. The RSS feed itself is text-only with simple formatting that makes it easy to distinguish the title from the publication name and the text of the article. Links in articles are easily spotted as they are underlined and colored to stand out from the rest of the text. You can turn on thumbnail images, though, it you prefer to add some color to your feed. The app does not modify truncated feeds. So if a feed is shortened, you only can view the snippet until you click on the title and open the article in the app's built-in web browser. The built-in web browser is also minimal with a refresh button and a a forward/backward button for navigation. The developer did not overlook accessibility and added in support for Voice Over and adjustable font sizes that range from tiny to epic. Unread supports Feedwrangler, Feedbin and Feedly accounts and you can use more than one service if needed. Syncing is reliable and quick, especially when you use the manual refresh by pulling down and letting go in the familiar bounce back gesture. The app has a variety of settings that you can use to customize the app to your reading preferences. It also supports third party services for sharing and storing articles, including Facebook, Instapaper, Readability, Pocket and others. Unread is available from the iOS App Store for US$4.99. It is worth every penny for users who want to
Peek is a very pretty calendar for iPhone
If Peek Calendar by Square Mountains (US$1.99) were a camera it'd be a Holga. If it were jeans they'd be raw and if the app were a beer, you'd find a blue ribbon on the label. Peek is so hipster it hurts. But we're taking about a calendar, not jeans or beer. Calendars are the workhorses of the productivity world. I depend on my calendar, as many of you do. I'm happy to use a pretty one, but when form supersedes function, you've got a problem. Arguably, Peek's marquee feature is its look. The app uses big, bold colors and three main views: list, month and event specific. To move from week to month view, scroll down. Keep going to move through previous months. Once there, tap any day to review its events. Unfortunately the only way to return to the present day is to scroll back in the opposite direction. It would be nice to tap the top of the screen to jump back. Week view has its own quirks, including some I really like. The app uses one color for the current day, and another for all the others. Additionally, each quarter, or block of three months, is colored consistently. There's also a sort of "status bar" on the right-hand side of each day. The longer it is, the more you've got scheduled. Tap any day and its events "unfold" from beneath it. Day-long events are listed first, then time-specific appointments. Tap any day view specifics, like start and stop time. There's a very nice alarm feature that lets you simply tap one of several clock faces, each displaying a unit of time (5 minutes, 15 minutes, one day and so on). Below that you'll find any location information, repeat options and a list of available calendars (you can assign it to any with a tap). Another nice feature lets you "peek" at an event's details. Swipe it slightly to the right and its details are revealed from behind it. That's nice too, but Peek leaves me unsatisfied. As you can see, there's a lot of tapping involved. Compare Peek's default look with that of Fantastical, which I use daily. There's so much more information available at a glance, that typically one look tells me all I need to know. Peek is pretty and bold, but there's so much swiping and tapping to be done before my day is fully revealed. Many of you will love it, especially those in favor of progressive design. While I think Peek is beautiful, it's less functional than I need a mission-critical app to be.
Daily App: Stackables allows you to enhance a photo in layers
Stackables is a new image editing tool from Samer Azzam, the developer behind ProCam, that allows you to apply filters and other effects in layers. It's the layering and high quality filters that set Stackables apart from its competition. When you open Stackables, you are greeted with a launch screen that allows you to open an existing photo or take a new one for your canvas. Once you import a photo, you are brought to the editor, where you can add filters, shapes, blends, effects as well as adjust common settings like hue, contrast and more. The app ships with 23 presets for quick editing and you can create your own as well. The filters and effects are high-quality and enhance your photos with making them tawdry. It is the layering feature that makes all the difference in Stackables. You can add one effect or filter per layer, and there are settings that allow to change the intensity or size of the effect. The layers allow you to add effects incrementally in a way that is easy to modify. The layers can be easily turned off and moved to change the look of your photo. When you are done editing, you can export your creation to the camera roll or for further editing in antother app. You also can share the image on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or via email. Stackables is available for the iPhone and costs 99-cents. It requires iOS 7.
Daily App: PicCard helps you send a quick greeting to your loved one
Forget about Valentine's Day and want to send a last-minute greeting to a loved one? Then you should check out PicCard from SoftEase. The iPhone card-making software recently debuted in the App Store and is a quick and easy way to create a delightful greeting card. To get started with your card, you must first chose a template, which are organized by theme like birthday, Valentine's Day and more. The app includes two or three free templates per theme. You can buy additional templates for US$1.99 via in-app purchase. Each template includes a placeholder for your photos, some text and stickers. PicCard allows you to take photos from your camera or your camera roll and import them into the frame of the card. The app automatically aligns your photo, but you can adjust it by double-tapping on your photo. Each element in the card -- text, stickers, background image-- can be changed as needed in the card editor. When you are done with the photo, you can share the card via Facebook, Twitter or email. You can save it to the iOS photo roll or send it to another app for further editing. PicCard is quick and easy, allowing you to create a stylish card in just a few minutes. My only critique of the app is the template library, which is small. Even after paying $1.99 for the template pack, you only have five or six choices of template per theme. If you are not particular about your theme and want a rapid way to create a cute card, then PicCard is worth the download. PicCard is available for free from the iOS App Store.
You won't want to walk away from Any Landing
The saying goes: "Any landing you walk away from is a good one," and that mindset is the backbone of Any Landing, a new action game from Strange Flavour. Your only goals are to get as far as possible without crashing your plane, and when you do eventually fall out of the sky, to crash as gently as possible. You are given only a button for throttle, a button for the brake and a prayer. Any Landing starts you out with a simple aircraft and gives you a brief tutorial on the game's tilt-based controls and item gathering. From there, you're on your own, and the first few solo flights are definitely going to be shorter than you would expect. In my own experience, the first endeavor came to a close with a poorly timed dive to gain some speed, at which point my plane stalled and burst into flames. This is not unusual in Any Landing. You see, the planes in Any Landing aren't exactly built with care -- or at least it would seem that way, given their tendency to belch fire. Using the engine button to boost your speed damages the engine, and once your engine is completely ruined, you have no way of preventing an eventual crash unless you pick up some in-air repair items. Of course, not everything you find in your path is there to benefit you; there are flocks of birds and other obstacles, as well as bombs and planes from the nefarious "Evil Air" corporation. And whether it's on the first or last of the game's 32 levels, you're going to eventually succumb to the damage the world inflicts and have to hit the dirt. Crashing in Any Landing is an art of its own, and there are many ways to approach it. Slamming into the ground at a steep angle will typically end in a Game Over, but if you can manage to slow your aircraft and slide into the terrain in a less-destructive manner, your crew and passengers will walk away unscathed. It's also worth mentioning Any Landing's in-app purchase system, which I detailed in a separate article. The game allows you to purchase in-app currency called "Wings," which can be used to purchase upgrades and repairs. The twist is that each purchase you make pushes you closer to the US$9.99 "All You Can Eat" tier where you are given unlimited Wings permanently. It's a fantastic compromise for gamers who normally shy away from "pay to win" games, and I'm really hoping other developers adopt similar models. Any Landing is free to play, and it's both a refreshing alternative to the "runner" genre and an example of a fantastic microtransaction model. Give it a shot.
Musx is a handy music sharing app for iPhone
Musx (free) is an interesting music sharing/discovery app for iPhone with a heavy emphasis on social. In a way, it feels like Instagram for music. You find a track you like, add a blurb and share it with other users (or Facebook and Twitter). Others can then comment on it, "like" it or re-share to their followers. The more followers you have, the more Musx becomes a community of music lovers. Here's my look at Musx. Right off the bat I've got to mention that Musx pulls music from YouTube. Last month we pointed out several music apps that use YouTube as a source, as well as the pitfalls of each. Musx does a great job of finding what you're looking for (the predictive search is speedy and works well), but you also get the odd stuff. For example, I searched for Van Halen (surprise!) and found classic albums and live performances, but also interviews of the band and a documentary. I guess you could look at that as a bonus -- the music plus this other stuff -- but I just wanted to hear music. Let's get back to the app. When you first launch Musx, you see the timeline. Scroll through it just as you would in Instagram, for example. Each "post" contains a song, the artist and album information, any comments left by the original poster and buttons to "like," comment, re-share (within the app) or share elsewhere (text, mail, Twitter of Facebook). There's also a button to jump right to YouTube. It looks good and within a minute you've figured out what's going on. The search icon is in the upper right and the Home button is on the left. Give it a tap to reveal a slide-down sheet with buttons for the queue, playlists, notifications and your profile. The queue is pretty nice. As you browse what your friends have shared, tap the "+" on any post to add it to your queue. Once you're done, jump to the queue via the home button and play the songs you've added in order. When you're done, hit "clear" and start over. Playlists are great too, and more permanent. There are two default playlists: "Recent Favorites," which features songs you've marked as favorites, and "Shared by Friends," which is a running list of titles shared by those you follow. To make a custom playlist, just hit "New Playlist," give it a title and you're off. Whenever you find a song, just add it to the appropriate list. I made one for my workday which I'm enjoying. A playlist can be played in order or in shuffle mode. Finally, Notifications lists activity on your account, like new followers. At the end of the day, it's a nice little app. I do worry about music I've fav'd being pulled from YouTube, but I haven't had it long enough to be able to watch for that. The app itself looks very nice and does just what it says on the tin. Musx's emphasis on social is something that Pandora, Rdio and Beats Music can't match. That's its real strength. In the short time I've used it, I've already discovered a new band whose music I'm enjoying. Check out Musx and get social with your tunes. It's a fun and effective little app.
Radiohead release free experimental iOS app called PolyFauna
Radiohead has released a free, universal app for iOS, and no it's not called Ok Cell Phone. The app is an interactive experimental art project called PolyFauna, born out of the sessions from the band's latest record, King of Limbs. Using imagery and audio inspired by the song "Bloom," the app is more of a meditative experience than a game. Vocalist Thom Yorke wrote the following on the band's blog: We have made an app called PolyFauna. PolyFauna is an experimental collaboration between us (Radiohead) & Universal Everything, born out of The King of Limbs sessions and using the imagery and the sounds from the song Bloom. It comes from an interest in early computer life-experiments and the imagined creatures of our subconscious. Your screen is the window into an evolving world. Move around to look around. You can follow the red dot. You can wear headphones. The app's iTunes description credits Radiohead, Nigel Godrich, Stanley Donwood and Universal Everything with contributing to the creative process. You can download PolyFauna for free here.
Daily App: Rookie is a camera app and photo editor rolled into one
Rookie is a new photo app from JellyBus, the makers of PicsPlay and Moldiv. The developers have experience with creating photography apps and it shows in Rookie. Rookie launches as a camera app, allowing you to capture photos using the iPhone camera. Unlike the stock camera app, which is barebones, Rookie has a few handy settings that'll improve the overall quality of your photo. First and foremost is the ability to easily toggle on/off settings such as a grid, a level and a timer. You can also turn on an anti-shake feature that'll minimize blur when your subject or your hand is not so steady. Rookie also supports live filters, allowing you to apply a filter as you take a shot. The app ships with a handful of filters and you can use an in-app purchase to upgrade to a premium pack for US$1.99. Though you can't manually change the values, Rookie does show you the ISO and shutter speed of your shot. You can use these values as a guide to adjust your environment by adding or removing light to get the shot you want. Two other useful features in Rookie are the ability to set the flash and to lock the white balance. When you are done shooting, Rookie moves you automatically from the camera app to the photo editor, allowing you to prettify your picture in just a few simple steps. Though its controls are different from sister app PicsPlay Pro, the developers obviously know how to build a photo editor. Rookie is very easy to use with both editing and design tools available at your fingertips. Rookie has all the standard editing tools, like Contrast, Hue & Saturation, Vibrance, Color Temperature and Tint that you need to correct flaws in photos. You can also crop and rotate as needed. On the design side, Rookie allows you to overlay text and tweak the look of your letters with a variety of fonts, outline options and color choices. There's also a handful of stickers and shapes that you can add to a photo. If you want additional choices for decorating your photo, you can purchase a sticker pack ($2.99) or a shape pack ($0.99). Rookie is a wonderful photo editor that turns into a photographer's must-have utility with the addition of a capable camera app. It doesn't seem important on paper, but I really appreciated the combination of camera app and photo editor. I was able to go from capturing a photo to photo editing without fussing with opening multiple apps and importing photos. Rookie definitely improved my productivity as I could take a photo and immediately start editing it, instead of my usual workflow of taking a photo and then saying I will edit it when I get a chance to open Photogene. Of course, I never get around to opening Photogene and my photos sit in my camera roll untouched. If you enjoy taking photos with your iPhone, then you should check out Rookie. It's available for free in the iOS App Store, so you can give it a spin and see if you like it. Even though it is free, all the basic functionality you need to capture and edit a photo is included in the app. In-app purchases are included if you want to add to the number of filters, sticks and shapes at your disposal
Later for iOS reminds you to send those texts, tweets and emails at the right time
Later for iOS (free) is one of those apps I thought about inventing myself. It's a simple app that sends you a notification reminding you to send a text, email or tweet at the appropriate time. You may have thought of something you want to message someone about, but it's after midnight, and you want to be reminded to send it in the morning. That's what this app does. The app is easy to use. Just choose a recipient and set a time for the reminder to appear. When it does, just tap it and you'll get a pre-addressed tweet, text message or mail message. Fill in the message and off it goes. Of course even better would be the ability to actually write the message and have it go at a preset time. According to the developer, that is coming. You could use Apple's built-in Reminders to accomplish something similar, but the message wouldn't be pre-adresssed. Later has been useful to me, and it is simple and elegant. When it adds the ability to actually send off the message, it will be a killer app, and the sort of thing Apple should build into iOS 7. Later is not a universal app, and it requires iOS 7. It is optimized for the iPhone 5.
Daily App: Slice Fractions helps your child visualize fractions in a puzzling way
Slice Fractions is a new learning game from Ululab that was designed in collaboration with a team of learning experts from the University of Quebec in Montreal. As its name implies, the app focuses on fractions and presents the math concept in a series of slicing puzzles that are part Cut the Rope, part Fruit Ninja. The goal of Slice Fractions is to break up chunks of ice and lava as you clear a path for a wooly mammoth that is walking in the forest. Slicing up the chunks is not as easy as it first appears. You must use hanging blocks that are suspended on ropes to blow up the ice and lava on the ground. The challenge is to figure out which ropes you need to cut in order to get the blocks to fall so they demolish the obstacles in your mammoth's path. The puzzles start off easy and gradually increase in difficulty. As the mammoth meanders in the forest, he encounters new creatures and collects wild-looking hats that he wears on his walk. The animation is top-notch -- each character is incredibly adorable and the background music is delightfully catchy. Even as an adult, I found the game to be endearing and enjoyed playing myself. Slice Fractions is a great puzzler, but you may be wondering how the concept of fractions fits into the game. For better or worse, the teaching of fractions within the app is subtle. There are no lessons on fractions or any concrete explanation on how fractions fit into the breaking up of ice and lava. In fact, most of the early stages of the game are meant to introduce your child to solving the puzzles. It's only in the middle to latter stages that you see any mention of fractions, and even then it's up to the child to figure out (or the parent to point out) how the chunks on the ground represent a small part of a whole. For example, the game may show four blocks of lava on the ground that are contained in a box with six parts, as shown above. Your child would have to notice that the blocks represent four out of six or 4/6. In my experience, my children focused on the puzzle part and completely missed the learning part, even when the fractions were written on the blocks. Slice Fractions would work well if you had a parent or teacher who used the app as part of a formal lesson on fractions. The instructor could point out the math concepts to the child as he or she progressed through the game. The app is suitable for guided instruction, but it is not an independent learning app that you hand to your children with the expectation they will become a fraction whiz by the time they are done with all the levels. Slice Fractions is an enjoyable game that challenges your child to solve complex puzzles, while teaching fractions on the side. It's a universal app that'll work on the iPad and iPhone and is available for US$2.99 from the iOS App Store. There are no ads and no in-app purchases.
Daily App: LuckyPennie lets you discover and chat about your favorite music
LuckyPennie is a social music app where you can share your favorite music and discover new songs, artists and even concert events in your area. It's all about connecting with others who share your passion for music. LuckyPennie is social like Facebook and visual like Pinterest, but it has a distinct music flavor. Users can share the music they are enjoying at the moment and others can comment back. The main screen of the app, "The Wall," is a running feed filled with album covers and user's concert photos. Each status update can include text allowing you to share your thoughts about a song or explain the concert photo you just uploaded. If you find someone who has a musical taste you find intriguing, you can add them to your crew and follow their song shares. You can give or get cred by clicking on the lightning bolt in a post. The more cred you have, the more influence you will have in the network. You can also favorite a post and view it later. The app ties into your Spotify or Rdio account, allowing you to listen to full tracks through those third-party services. LuckyPennie has a local flair ("the scene") that isolates content from people who are nearby. Not only can you find friends who enjoy the same music as you, but you can also discover information about local bands and nearby concerts before they happen. If you need more friends to populate "the scene", then you can use the "Add Friends" button that lets you invite friends & connect with your Facebook friends already on the app. LuckyPennie is available for free from the iOS App Store. It's compatible with the iPhone and requires iOS 7.0 or later. You need a LuckyPennie account to use the app, but it is easy to create one when the app first launches.
A roundup of last week's TUAW app reviews
Last week was a busy one for app news and announcements, giving your favorite TUAW writers a chance to post some great reviews of the apps that grace their home screens. Here's a quick roundup of our recent reviews -- and a few app roundups -- you may have missed: New and notable apps for iOS and OS X Toad Rider is a shameless Battletoads ripoff, and a poor one at that Tranquility lets you work on your laptop in the dark without blinding yourself or everyone around you Daily App: Threes! is a tiny puzzler that'll convince you math is cool Trover updates its travel/photo app Light Pad HD turns your iPad into a light box Mnemonizer uses one weird trick to obscure passwords CARROT Fit uses the stick to whip you into shape Moves is taking M7 motion data to the next level with latest update Daily App: digiDoc Pulse Oximeter tries to measure your heart rate and oxygen levels Localscope for iOS gets an update and continues to provide great location based info Daily App: Pedometer++ is a step logger for people who prefer things simple HAL 9000 wants to be your Mac screensaver Five apps to help you follow the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi TrussMe! Learning a bit of structural engineering while having fun airadio pro is a full-featured radio app for iOS that lets you listen and record Daily App: Friend Check lets you monitor your followers as they come and go PhotoScope: Explore your iPhoto and Aperture libraries from your iPhone or iPad Altitude - View & Share for iOS reports your current altitude Quick Fit is a seven-minute workout app with room for expansion VideoBite from Adobe is a quick and simple video editor Daily App: Yearly ensures you won't be in the dog house on your anniversary TUAW will be back next week with another round of app reviews, so be sure to drop by to see what's new and what's cool.
Toad Rider is a shameless Battletoads ripoff, and a poor one at that
When a developer decides to completely rip off another game, they usually at least attempt to give it a fresh spin. Sure, games take inspiration from each other all the time, and to be fair, it's oftentimes difficult to pin the word "ripoff" on a game at all. It's not difficult with Toad Rider. The game's iTunes description notes that it's "Inspired by the classic Battletoads game." Though I'd say that it's less "inspired" and more "lifted." For reference, here's one of the insanely difficult hoverbike levels from the NES classic Battletoads, which was released in 1991: And here's some gameplay footage of Toad Rider: Yikes. For starters, taking your inspiration from one of the most rage-inducing levels in the history of gaming probably isn't a fantastic place to start, but Toad Rider also doesn't add anything to make its version worth playing. The game is US$0.99, and it also features in-app purchases (ew) that allow you to skip deaths and otherwise take advantage of your willingness to shell out cash in exchange for bragging rights. Don't bother with this one.
Tranquility lets you work on your laptop in the dark without blinding yourself or everyone around you
Macs have simply beautiful displays, but still there's no getting around how tired your eyes can get while staring at a screen. Even beyond your own personal comfort, there are other people to consider. How many nights have you kept a significant other up because the glare from your screen was making it hard to sleep? Tranquility is here for you. Developed by Pixio, the Mac app offers a quick way to switch to a darkened, night vision-optimized screen view. It's free, easy to use and customizable. Do you prefer a monochromatic view to a dark color palette? You can select that. Want to disable shadows or hide the desktop to free you from distractions? Tranquility understands and wants to help you. You can even set it to dim your menu bar when you're working, day or night, to help keep you focused. It's a wonderful little app. When you first activate the app, it will present you with an optimization menu to mark your settings. From then on, the app will live in your menu bar, ready to be turned on at a moment's notice when you find yourself in need of low-light display options. Some readers may remember a similar app called Nocturne, which ceased updating. Tranquility is a spiritual sibling of that app, built from its source code after Nocturne's developer abandoned it. If you enjoyed Nocturne, jumping into Tranquility will be like putting on old shoes. You can find Tranquility as a free download directly at Pixio's website.
Daily App: Threes! is a tiny puzzler that'll convince you math is cool
Threes! is a game of threes that, appropriately, was made by three people -- Asher Vollmer, Greg Wohlwend and Jimmy Hinson. It's a sliding puzzle game that'll have you doing math and loving every minute of it. Threes! challenges you to slide numbers together in order to add them, but there is a catch -- the sum has to be a multiple of three. Lower numbers can be added together to equal three or six -- you can add 2 + 1 and 3 + 3, for example. Higher numbers can only be added in pairs -- you cannot add 6 + 3, but you can add 6 + 6 or 12 + 12. This is a sliding puzzle game, so the tiles shift when numbers are added together and combined into one tile. New numbers are also randomly added to the board and an indicator at the top of the screen shows you which number is coming up next. Your goal is to add as many numbers together as possible and keep the board from filling up. Once you can no longer add any numbers, the game is over. There's a twist in Threes! that makes it a bit more challenging than most puzzle games that I've played -- instead of sliding one square at a time, the squares slide in groups. When you try to add 3 + 3 at the bottom, you may also be adding a 2 + 1 at the top. It makes the strategy that much more difficult when your moves have multiple effects on the board. The trailer above shows the gameplay, but you really have to play it yourself to get the feel of it. Threes! is one of those games that is easy to pick up and addictively fun. The graphics are appropriate for the game and the music in the background is just perfect -- it's catchy enough that you hear it, but subtle enough that you don't focus on it. There are also voiceovers that provide the tiles with some character -- literally. Each block has a personality with a small face and a tiny voice that responds when you touch it. Threes! is available in the App Store for US$1.99 and is worth every penny. Puzzle fans should just go and buy it now. You won't regret it. A quick note for parents who are buying it for kids. Threes! would be an enjoyable game, but it's not meant for the younger set. The app has a prominent tweet button, an easily accessible credit screen with links to the developer's Twitter accounts and an App Store link for the developer's other game.
CARROT Fit uses the stick to whip you into shape
I've long been a fan of CARROT To-Do for keeping me motivated with my daily list of "things I must do today." Our review of To-Do is here, but the basic idea is that the app's "AI construct" gets mad when you don't check in or accomplish tasks. While being berated, overall, isn't a good thing, sometimes you need a kick in the butt to stay on task. That same mentality was infused in CARROT Alarm, and you can read our review here. Now comes CARROT Fit (US$1.99) to help you lose weight by tracking the ups and downs, and reacting accordingly. As someone who juggles a lot of responsibilities, the CARROT To-Do app been a lifesaver in keeping me focused by reminding me in humorous but angry ways that I still have tasks to complete. Fit is a weight loss app based on this same premise: that fun, funny, grumpy programs might motivate us to achieve our goals. As Erica noted in our review of To-Do, these methodologies aren't for everyone. While I find them funny and motivating, some may find them off-putting. Also, while weight tracking is one way to track health, it is by no means the only way. This review won't go into all that, as I'll just focus on what Fit does. Design Overall, CARROT Fit is clean and simple, offering only what you need when you need it. During setup you're treated to some cute animation and, frankly, somewhat teased a bit, not unlike the promo video below. Carrot's distinctive blue color scheme and "ocular sensor" (the large circular eye over your avatar) continues in Fit. The simple "infographic" style illustrations and animations throughout are brilliant little touches that will amuse you. If you leave the app open for a bit, your little avatar will start doing pushups! When you open the app you'll have three options: Record your weight, check your logs, or access a menu with settings. The basic design makes the utility easy to understand. Yet there are little surprises in the design, like the About CARROT section, which makes a joke with a winking robot. These give the app a true sense of character, which I think helps the psychological buy-in to using CARROT to keep you motivated. Functionality Carrot's daily weigh in time can be set to your liking, and it will remind you. If you miss a day, Carrot will get mad at you, perhaps even turning red. But entering your weight is as simple as my former go-to weight tracking app, Weightbot. Unfortunately, Weightbot has no character. Carrot has kept me in check, however. To record your weight you simply tap the large logo and type it in -- decimals included. You can, in settings, input your height and gender to get a BMI, and thus see how over/under you are. Now here's where CARROT's personality comes into play. If you gain weight, it will get mad at you. It may blow steam, "shock" your avatar, but either way the displeasure is made known. The animations are funny, and sometimes make me want to gain a little just to see it get mad. When you meet your goal, however, you are treated to a shower of confetti and a ribbon! The Log of your weight is simple but useful. A chart up top tracks your progress, including weight goals. Below that you can see current weight, losses/gains, goals, BMI and how many days you've been tracking. You can also dive into the raw data for a day by day accounting. All of this looks great and is easy to understand. There's no tilting your device to see your data differently, it's just there. Conclusion, and a note on fat-shaming Unfortunately, in a Good Morning America appearance this week, the creator of CARROT, Brian Mueller (who I interviewed here), had to defend his clever drawings and animations, which some have called "fat shaming." The developer has created a fun, motivational app. It's not for everyone, but I think it hits on some of the motivators needed to keep you in shape. That said, if you have body issues or take offense easily, or if you have had an eating disorder it's likely best to try another tool that is more neutral and clinical. If this offends you, CARROT Fit is not for you. As for me, I'm overweight. For my height, my BMI is basically in the danger zone. If something "shames" me in the privacy of my own home to motivate me to get healthier, then guess what? I'm happy to use it. That means it is doing the job it was designed to do. But then, I haven't struggled with this my entire life. Again, if you think this could be problematic for you, Fit isn't the app for you. Anyway, if you are just looking to track your weight and need a reminder and some motivation, CARROT Fit is a lot of fun. It's a lot more fun than pretty much every other weight tracker out there. It is much harder to level up than other CARROT apps, however, as at day 6 (since it launched), I'm still on level one. I'll report back in about a month to see if the longer I use it, the more I'm able to change my habits. Because that's what this is: A habit-changing app. And it's a great one. Buy it here and get healthy!
