SecretExit
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Daily iPhone App: Eyelord has your fill of squishy orb matching
Eyelord is the latest title from the folks at Secret Exit, whose game Zen Bound and its sequel you probably know well. Zen Bound was a well-produced game with a really excellent design, and Eyelord follows that trend, with a simple mechanic held up by triple-A quality production. The game is essentially like PopCap's Zuma, where you throw little colored balls into a moving line and try to match them up and clear them out before they can reach the center of the screen. There are two big differences, however. One is that instead of matching balls, you're actually matching eyeballs, and the game's wild heavy metal aesthetic lines up perfectly with the gooey grossness of sending eyeballs flying around the screen. The other big difference is that while Zuma has lots of levels to play, Eyelord is fairly simple -- there's just one mode and it's just an arcade challenge rather than a score chase or anything else like that. But that simplicity works in the game's favor here: Just like Zen Bound, gameplay is relatively casual, letting you just focus on doing the matching without worrying too much about going quickly. Eyelord is a freemium title that's very generous, and it's available as a universal app for free right now. If you want to see the game in action, check out our video below (and let us know what you think of the new video features down in the comments).
From iPhone to iPad: Revisiting Zen Bound 2
How do old favorites hold up on the iPad? In our "From iPhone to iPad" series, TUAW revisits iPhone applications that have transitioned to the iPad. We look at their latest incarnation and see how the new measures up to the old. Today, TUAW looks at Zen Bound 2. It was just about a year ago when I first played the original Zen Bound game on the iPhone. Having been recommended to me by Dave Caolo after it was originally reviewed on TUAW by Mike Schramm, I loved the game's beautiful graphics and sound design. Starting its life as a physics emulation game called Zen Bondage, Zen Bound became be a huge breakout hit on the iPhone. You play the game by wrapping rope around objects until you've covered a certain percentage of the object in question, avoiding running out of rope in the process. You progress by ascending a "game tree," unlocking new puzzles as you succeed in wrapping each object. The iPad version of Zen Bound 2 brings the same high quality design and interaction as its predecessors, all nicely updated to the new screen size. I found it a great deal of fun to play, although the puzzles are much harder this time around -- much as you might expect with a sequel. The big question is this: does the bigger screen improve the playing experience? I'm going to say no. That's not a slam at the application. It's a great game family, regardless of whether you play on the iPhone or iPad, and that's where the "no" comes from. There's nothing particularly innovative in the iPad release beyond the revised levels and a new "paint bomb" mode, which I never actually got to test. But that's okay. Zen Bound 2 is still basically the same excellent game; the iPad version has been competently upsized and the results are good. Zen Bound 2 is a worthy successor to Zen Bound. If you loved the original, you're sure to enjoy this update. Zen Bound 2 for iPad costs US$7.99 at the App Store. It's a beautiful, fun-to-play application. If you're playing with kids, you may want to start with the $2.99 iPhone original version, which offers easier puzzles before moving on to the iPad version, which my children found far more challenging. TUAW is commonly provided with not-for-resale licenses or promo codes to permit product evaluations and reviews. For more details, see our policy page. Promo code requests are not guarantees of review.
Interview with Zen Bound creators on iPad and iPhone games
AppAdvice has an interview up with Secret Exit, the folks who made one of the best iPhone games of last year, Zen Bound. They spoke not only about that game and how the iPhone turned out to be the perfect platform for them to start out on, but also about the iPad and what they're planning to do with it in the future. Secret Exit echoes a lot of other developers in saying that it plans to make completely different apps for the iPad, not just upscaled or updated versions of iPhone apps. The hardware and the market, says Secret Exit, both call for completely separate releases. They also say, however, that they're worried about iPad pricing. A bigger screen and more complicated layouts mean that the investment for apps will be bigger, and if only the most recognized brands can hold down a $9.99 price point, Secret Exit says that they may not be able to build out their games to the point that they'd like. Interesting points all. Of course, much of the iPad thinking so far is speculation -- it's certainly possible that the $9.99 price point could become the default for new iPad apps, which would give developers a little more money to play with. But as with everything else iPad, we'll have to see. At least the wait's not that long.
Sneak Peek: Stair Dismount offers... broken bones, mostly
Remember Zen Bound? It's a gorgeous and fun-to-play little puzzle game. So when I heard that SecretExit, the makers of Zen Bound, were about to release a new app, I was excited to get a sneak preview. Stair Dismount is a very different game to Zen Bound. Although, as you can see in the above video, the audio and graphics quality are consistently high, it's not really fair to compare the two. According to SecretExit, Stair Dismount is more focused on "humor and social elements" rather than problem solving. The game basically involves pushing someone down the stairs and seeing how many bones they break. Playing this made me feel like the world's worst sadist. Hard to get game playing satisfaction other than tormenting the poor dude. With Stair Dismount, you can add the face of a Facebook friend and send screen shots of their broken body lying at the bottom of the staircase. Secret Exit dev Jani Kahrama notes, "It feels better with a friendly Facebook face on the guy :)." Your enjoyment of this will vary by your personal take but for me, I don't think Stair Dismount will be staying on my iPod or be exposed to my kids. Stair Dismount is due to hit the App Store within the week. About the video: At this time, TUAW can only create preview videos for applications compiled for 3.1 or earlier using a development (not distribution or ad hoc) build and review videos for distribution-compiled apps that are 3.1 or earlier. TUAW is commonly provided with not-for-resale licenses or promo codes to permit product evaluations and reviews. For more details, see our policy page.
