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TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Two Worlds II Castle Defense
Two Worlds is an RPG series for consoles that's had a few releases already, but this game for iOS only uses the same setting and assets as those titles. As you can tell from the title itself, it plays very differently from the third-person RPG. It's a castle defense game of a sort, but rather than building towers, you build out your army and forces, tasking your little soldiers with fighting incoming waves of bad guys. The game plays sort of like the very popular Battleheart, though instead of directly controlling your troops, you're only placing them on the field in various spots available. You might put two melee fighters up front, for example, a priest behind them, and then two archers in the back to pump out ranged damage. As you fight, you win gold, and then can spend that gold to build more troops, upgrade the ones you've got, or even cast spells to heal your troops or attack the enemies. The game is simple but really fun, and the polish is actually really impressive. Controls are not explained well, but the icons are clear enough that after a few rounds with the title, you will know what does what. And pitting two powered up soldiers and a hardcore fire mage against a wave of incoming baddies is very rewarding, once you've gotten to that point. A recent upgrade added a few much needed tweaks, including Game Center integration and some various difficulty levels, and it also dropped the price of the game to just US $4.99. And that's not a bad price at all -- it's a little more expensive than most iOS games, but this is a quality experience. There is a lite version, though, if you doubt the price, but for castle defense fans, those who enjoy the Two Worlds series, or just anyone who enjoys a good fantasy-based tower defense game, this one's definitely worth checking out.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Battle Slugs
Battle Slugs is essentially a stylized version of the old Chinese game Go. You start with two different colors of playing pieces which jump around the board in different ways. Jump one space to produce a cloned slug or two spaces to move the slug you're controlling. When you land next to a piece of the opposite color, it changes color. Those are basically the only rules, but like Go, the strategy gets complicated quickly. You want to try and claim space on the board (the one you're playing at least -- there are 25 different levels in the game), but you have to do so carefully, because overextending can make trouble quickly. The game's actually pretty hard -- I had trouble mastering even the first level consistently. Battle Slugs was originally a Flash game, but you can't tell from the presentation on iOS. While the graphics can be somewhat crude, they are colorful, and bring a lot of personality to the title. Loading times are a little long (though that's of course between matches, not during), and the iTunes reviews have some complaints about the game's performance on older phones, so beware of that. But there's a lite version to try out first if you want to make sure you like it, and the full version (which is Game Center enabled as well) is only 99 cents for a universal build anyway. If you like the strategy of Go and don't mind some cartoony characters, Battle Slugs could tease your mind for a while.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Ionocraft Racing
Ionocraft Racing is a racing title for iOS unlike any other -- in both good and bad ways. The good side of it is that you're essentially building your own car in this one. The game's set in a steampunk universe, and the general gameplay loop has you building a car out of various parts (that affect steering, thrust, or the car's armor and mass), and then racing it around a track as fast as you can. Race faster, win medals, get more money ("Cogs" is what the currency is called), and then build a better car. That's fun, but the bad part is that you're really just racing against yourself -- there are no other cars on the track with you. You can still technically race -- the game is Game Center enabled, and there is a certain thrill in trying to grab the best lap on a certain track. But the game is all about how to get the most out of the car you've built, not racing alongside colorful steampunk enemies as you might expect. The game's fun, as long as you realize that it's all about the time trials, not a full racing experience like the vaunted Real Racing series. But the customization for your car is really impressive, and it's fun to see how a car changes after you've tweaked its parts or added new ones. Iconocraft Racing is now available on the App Store for iPhone for US $1.99, or on the iPad in HD for $4.99.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Gravity Guy
Gravity Guy is a fun one. It doesn't really do anything we haven't seen before -- the basic idea is a running-style game where you simply tap the screen to switch gravity (very similar to the terrific indie game VVVVVV). You can play it right now online as a Flash game, and you only need to get into it for a second before you see the whole premise. But what's really sent this one to the top of the App Store charts is all the extras and bonus modes that come with it. Not only is there a full story mode to play through, there are also practice and endless modes to play, and even a local or online multiplayer mode. There are Game Center leaderboards and achievements, and both the graphics and music look and sound terrific. So yes, this is just a Flash game port (and a simple one at that), but it's a Flash game port done very right. Plus, as of this writing, Gravity Guy is on sale today for the low price of absolutely free. Grab it and check it out if it seems like your thing.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: 1-bit Ninja
Lots of games on the iPhone skew more casual, both because the touchscreen doesn't exactly make for precise controls all the time, and also because a lot of developers are aiming for the iPhone's much wider audience than most gaming platforms. But 1-bit Ninja is obstinately the exception to this -- it's unapologetically retro and decidedly hardcore. The nearest reference is Super Mario Bros, but not Super Mario Galaxy or the more recent 3D interations. Nope, this one goes back to Super Mario Land on the GameBoy, when Mario could only move forward, and had to make some spectacularly timed jumps to explore the land and fully discover its secrets. 1-bit Ninja isn't just a 2D platformer -- it does have a really wild 3D angle (accessed by swiping the top of the screen) that will show off some new heights or extra secrets to find. But especially early on, that mode's somewhat underused, with most of the gameplay sticking with the 2D realm. Still, with over 20 levels to play, challenges to beat (too bad Game Center isn't included -- seems like it should have been), and lots and lots of secrets to find, along with a great stylistic design and some cool chiptunes to play with, 1-bit Ninja is an excellent title. It's available for US $1.99 in the App Store right now.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Legacy: Mystery Mansion
It's been a while since we've covered a solid match-three game in this space, and Legacy: Mystery Mansion is exactly that. It's similar to Puzzle Quest in that it puts an overarching storyline in the form of a match-three puzzle title, but it's a little tougher than the more casual entries in the genre, putting a hard time limit on each of 25 stages and taking you through recovering missing antiques in a haunted mansion. I was a big fan of Call of Atlantis' match-three mayhem, and Legacy seems very much in that vein, if just a little more difficult. At any rate, it seems like an excellent match-three puzzler, and at US 99 cents, the price is just right. It'd be nice to have Game Center integration for leaderboards and achievements, but a free zen mode will have to do for now. Legacy: Mystery Mansion is well worth a try for fans of this very traditional puzzle genre.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Dragon's Lair 2: Time Warp
This one is, of course, the sequel to the Don Bluth classic, Dragon's Lair, now presented on the small iOS screen in all of its (let's be honest, somewhat aged) glory. Dragon's Lair 2 is subtitled Time Warp, and sends Dirk the Daring off through time in the hopes of saving the fair Princess Daphne. Just like the first title, originally made popular on Laserdisc, this one offers branching paths that make up a pretty compelling adventure game, and just like the first iteration of the series on iOS, moves are made by pressing various virtual buttons on the screen. If you played the first Dragon's Lair and didn't get into it (like a fine wine, it does require a little appreciation for the age it was created in), you probably won't find much here to keep your interest. But if you look back on the Dragon's Lair series with fondness and have been waiting for the sequel to drop, well, here you go. Dragon's Lair 2: Time Warp is now available on the App Store for US$2.99.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Haunted Manor: Lord of Mirrors
We've posted about Big Fish Games before. It's a casual gaming company that has produced a ton of titles for the PC already, and it's in the process of both bringing those over to iOS and creating an original library of titles for Apple's mobile devices. This weekend, Big Fish is having a sale on the App Store, with nearly all of its titles dropping down to just 99 cents on the iPhone and US$1.99 on the iPad. So now's the time to pick any of these up if you haven't yet. If you're not sure which one to get, Haunted Manor is a good choice. Like a lot of the games, it's sort of a puzzle/adventure title, using casual interactions like hidden item and mix and match puzzles to move through a very well-rendered environment. The game's never too tough, but if you get stuck, there's a forgiving hint system to help push you along. Game Center integration is a nice bonus as well. If you haven't heard of these games or haven't wanted to jump in and try them just yet, here's your chance.
TUAW's Daily App: Tiny Tower
I actually played Tiny Tower for the first time back at GDC this year -- the guys at NimbleBit kindly showed me an early version of it while they were in the middle of designing the game. The title itself is now out and finished on the App Store, and after having played it for about a week already (thanks to a press preview), I can say it's an amazing title that's made even better by the fact that it's completely free to install and play. It's very much like the old SimTower game in that you create and run a tower filled with little characters called Bitizens. You can build residential floors to move Bitizens into, and then you can put them to work on other floors that fill out certain categories, like retail floors and services and recreation areas. You can assign three Bitizens to work on a certain floor, and then you pay money to stock goods in those stores and sell them to various visitors. In addition to the time-based management side of the game, there are a few games to play, like getting Bitizens to the right floor in a working elevator or playing find-the-Bitizen. These games are more integrated into the overall game than, say, the pond was in NimbleBit's Pocket Frogs, but I'm still a little disappointed that they don't have too much of an effect. You can make a few bucks at a time, and there are VIPs that show up every once in a while, but the floors you deliver people to don't seem to really have a direct effect. Nevertheless, it's fun building up your tower, and while the push notifications (if you keep them on) threaten to get annoying after a while, the amount of detail and care put into the art and strategy is excellent. There are even little extras, like a "BitBook" social network page and a fun screen to compare your friends' towers via Game Center. Tiny Tower is yet another great title from NimbleBit. It's a freemium download (and like Pocket Frogs, you can buy "convenience currency" with an in-app purchase, but I haven't needed it yet) that's available right now.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Twirdie
Twirdie is an interesting game that's got one of the most fascinating premises I've ever heard, but it unfortunately gets bogged down in an implementation that's quite a bit less than fun. The basic idea (which you may have heard before -- the game's already been around the Web once) is that you're playing golf, and you use Twitter search results to hit the ball. The more times a word you punch into the game has been mentioned live on Twitter in the past 60 seconds, the farther your ball goes. The idea is interesting, and it works (though I was playing on a Wi-Fi connection -- I assume 3G or even Edge Twitter searches would be much slower). But the problem is that it's not actually fun. You don't line up an angle or anything to actually "play" the golf course; it's all about just getting distance. And not only is the distance random, based on your search, but if you go too short or too far, you just plain lose the shot. In other words, the backend "live" functionality is neat, but the game attached to it is sadly disappointing. If you want to see the app in action (and maybe you're better at guessing Twitter results than I am), it's only US 99 cents on the App Store right now. Here's hoping that some other developers pick up on using this "live data" from Twitter or elsewhere, and we get a more substantial game out of it.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Diversion
Diversion may not look like much, but it makes up for any shortage in graphical quality (yes, the characters do look that goofy) with a solid bunch of gameplay that's surprisingly fun despite the simple premise. The pitch here is "a platformer on rails," so you play as a 3D character who's always running forward through a world, and it's just up to you to jump at the right times. Again, that sounds simple, but it's surprisingly interesting with lots of strange jumps to make and figure out across over 100 levels. There's also an amazing amount of content to unlock -- there are over 150 different characters to play with and plenty of secrets to find across the game's 3D worlds. Normally I'd say it's unfortunate that there's no Game Center involved, but in this case, it's not really needed as the challenge is simply just passing the levels rather than racing through them. Diversion does an excellent job of providing just that, and especially at its current price of just US 99 cents.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: iQuarterback 2 Pocket Edition
iQuarterback 2 is an excellent little football throwing game from FuzzyCube Software that has you tossing a little pigskin around a football field through multiple game modes. The game recently came out on the iPad, but the iPhone version is brand new. It's just as fun on the small screen, with plenty of targets to go after, and a "Fame" currency that you can use to collect new outfits, accessories, and more. Full Game Center integration lets you check scores and achievements between you and your friends as well. Plus, the price is right -- the game is a free download, and right now this weekend, the in-app purchase to remove ads is just US 99 cents. The iPad version is a little more expensive, but that's what you get for having a bigger screen, right?
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Hercules - Curse of the Hydra
Hercules - Curse of the Hydra isn't exactly the most polished game I've seen on the iPhone -- it's a little clumsy, in fact, with some awkwardly placed controls and graphics that aren't quite as smooth as they could be. But it's still an interesting title and a solid effort from an indie studio, and I like its ambitious nature. There are 16 different levels of platforming and 3D action to fight through here, and while the game is still a little rough, it's cool to see a small studio take on a full title like this on iOS. Unfortunately, there's no Game Center integration, but there's a nice progression scheme to explore, which should keep you charging through the action and the storyline. There's a free version of the game to try out (and I actually recommend you give it a shot before you buy the full game, just to see if it's your thing). The full version is US$3.99 on the App Store right now, and I think it's worth supporting this studio, called Smerc. There are a lot of little pick-up-and-play puzzle games out on the store, but I like to see someone trying to tackle an experience that's a little bigger than that.
TUAW's Daily iOS App: The Incredible Machine
A little while back, we spotlighted the great game Casey's Contraptions in this space, and the credit was well-deserved at the time (and still is). But that game was inspired in large part by an older game called The Incredible Machine, worked on by programmer Jeff Tunnell. Tunnell recently went to work for Playdom, and that company is now owned by Disney's interactive arm. So when Tunnell also decided recently that he wanted to bring The Incredible Machine to iOS, Disney gladly helped out with publishing. If I had to choose one, I'd say Casey's Contraptions is the more full-featured title, and my recommendation for that one is as strong as ever. But I also spent some time with Incredible Machine in Disney's booth at E3 this week, and it's a pretty solid title as well. The game comes with 60 levels, with more available in extra packs, and if you're a fan of the old game, most of your favorite items are back in play here. If you shot through Casey's and want another Rube Goldberg game to play, you can give this one a look as well. Incredible Machine is currently available on the App Store as a universal version for iPad, and costs US$2.99.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Office Jerk
I'm at the E3 video gaming conference, this week, where I've been asking the staff of our gaming-obsessed sister site, Joystiq, for some of their favorite apps. Managing Editor Justin McElroy told me he's gotten no end of amusement from Office Jerk, a free (ad-supported, though ads can be removed with a 99-cent purchase) download from the App Store. It's more than a little goofy -- the idea is that you have a boring office mate on the screen, and it's your job to playfully annoy him by throwing various objects his way, Paper Toss-style. Part of the game is lining up your various shots and trying to get longer and longer combos (despite the fan that seems bent on blowing your throws off course), and the other part is just laughing at your calmly irate office mate who only throws you a look of disdain, which you can then try to hit for extra points. It's simple fun, especially if you've got a wicked sense of humor. There's no Game Center integration or extras, unfortunately, but for a free download, Office Jerk does what it says on the box. I just can't recommend you become a real office jerk -- better to take out your workplace frustrations on this virtual co-worker.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Traveler's Quest
Traveler's Quest is an oldie but a goodie in the App Store -- it's a GPS-based treasure hunting map that will send you searching around your own area for virtual treasure with a game layer on top of it. It's simple to play and learn, but there's an addictive quality to hunting down and finding a certain location with your iPhone's GPS that will keep you playing while out and about, whether you're wandering around a vacation spot this summer or just exploring your own neighborhood. The app just got updated to version 3.0 as well, and the new version adds a whole list of interface improvements, along with a "Message in a Bottle" feature (allowing you to leave virtual messages along with any treasure you happen to claim -- kind of like virtual geocaching, and very fun) and some new Game Center achievements to chase after. Great app -- Traveler's Quest is a free download on the App Store, with various features available for an extra in-app purchase price.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Bumpy Road
Bumpy Road is a cute title for iOS and Mac. It's sort of a reverse platformer, where you control the platforms that a cute little couple in a car are running along and not the actual car itself. There are two modes to play. One is basically a Canabalt-style running game, with the goal being to get as far along the road as you can, grabbing some items for fuel along the way. The other is called "Sunday Trip" and has you traveling a fixed-length road in the fastest time, with items that can help your score at the end. Both are fun, allowing you place bumps and jumps in the road to push the car along. Another collecting meta-game, in which you grab pictures out on the road, helps build out a fun backstory to complement the great graphics and music. Game Center integration provides scoreboards and achievements, and the stylistic graphics look great on a Retina Display or the iPad's bigger screen thanks to universal compatibility. Bumpy Road is a simple game, but its simplicity is put to great effect by a lot of artistry and polish, making for a really solid, fun, and even emotional experience. The game's available right now for US$2.99 in the App Store.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Monster Hunter Dynamic Hunting
The Monster Hunter series of games is crazy popular in Japan -- when a new version comes out, many workers and students will take the day off, just like when a new Halo or Call of Duty title comes out here in the US. And now the series has arrived on iOS thanks to Capcom's new Monster Hunter Dynamic Hunting, available on the App Store now for US$4.99. This version is surprisingly full-featured -- while it doesn't have any RPG leveling elements, it does feature the "kill, loot, and craft" cycle that's made the series so popular. You can hunt down various monsters in the game, loot items of increasing quality from them, and then use those items to make better and better weapons and armor, allowing you to chase and fight more dangerous monsters. Unfortunately, the controls have been tuned for the iPhone, and they're not quite as precise as a controller. The swiping scheme is reminiscent of games like Fruit Ninja and Infinity Blade, but nowhere near as responsive. Still, especially if you're a fan of the series, Monster Hunter is a nice take on the game, and Dynamic Hunting is a pretty good adaptation made just for the iPhone (Game Center and co-op play are even included). If you know what you're getting into, you can probably decide whether you want it at full price or not. If you're not sure, maybe wait for a sale -- it might be a bit too expensive to jump into a long-running series with this iteration.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Shadow Cities
Shadow Cities is an interesting title from Finnish developer Gray Area. It's a location-based MMO, in that you level up a character while fighting with other players and claiming territory, all of which is based on the real world around you and your iPhone. The game allows you to cast spells with special gestures, which are resource driven and set up to play long campaigns in small bursts of time -- it's designed perfectly for the iPhone and its various interfaces. I found the game a little confusing when I saw it at GDC, but that was an earlier version. Even if the game is a little complicated, it's rewarding when you figure out exactly what's going on. And it's even more rewarding when you have fellow players around you -- if you're in a city such as New York or San Francisco, you'll probably be in luck finding some competition in the local area. Everyone else will still have neutral forces to fight against, but the game's more fun when you participate in the overall PvP campaigns. You can "beacon jump" to other cities, but things are much more fun when you're fighting for a home base. At any rate, Shadow Cities is currently free in the App Store, and at that price, I can't help but recommend you check it out. A lot of people have tried location-based MMOs already (and I bet we'll see even more of these in the future), and while Shadow Cities isn't exactly the easiest game to get into, it does offer some good innovation in the quickly growing genre.
TUAW's Daily iPhone App: Duke Nukem Forever Soundboard
Bad news if you got your hopes up about that Duke Nukem on iOS rumor a little while back. The game is indeed spreading to our platform of choice, but not in the form you wanted. Instead of a port or a separate game title, we've got a free soundboard app designed to kick up a little excitement for the release of (finally!) Duke Nukem Forever. There are over 25 included audio catchphrases from Duke himself, featuring tamely offensive gems like "Anybody mind if I take off my pants?" and "I've got balls of steel." If you're a Duke Nukem fan, this kind of humor probably appeals to you more than others, and the low price of free should make it easy to pick up. Still, it's too bad we didn't get a real port of Duke Nukem Forever for iOS. The game's gone gold master, but maybe there's still a chance we'll see an actual game (or related tie-in) for this big title coming later this year.
