Appletell review - Spore Origins for iPod

Section: Software + Apps, Games, iPod + iTunes, iTunes, iPod, iPod nano, Features, Review Genre: RPG, Strategy Format: iPod Game Developer: Maxis Mac Port: Electronic Arts System Requirements: 3G iPod nano, 5G iPod classic, 28.7MB free space Price: $4.99 It may be hard to believe, but the release date of one of the most anticipated video games in a long time is nearing. In recent months, starting with the Spore Creature Creator, we have been teased and taunted with little samples of the game, intended to keep our breath bated until the 12th of September. Now, the latest appetizer for the entree that is Spore has been released. The newest installment, titled Spore Origins, has been released for game-compatible iPods in the US. Through the 18 levels of Primordial Tide Pool goodness, EA hopes to give a taste of what the full version will present itself to be. Before I even downloaded the game, I was very excited to take a look-see at the latest Spore teaser. The second I caught wind of its release, I went straight to iTunes to get myself a copy. I subsequently installed the game on my iPod, and the excitement ended there. My first try to play the game ended in my iPod crashing at the title screen. Granted, this is just an iPod and Spore’s a formidable game, but I wasn’t expecting any crashing, let alone before the gameplay even started. After reseting my iPod, I went for another go. The second attempt ended almost as badly, with the game freezing while loading the first level. Once more, I reset my iPod and tried again. Third time was not the charm. Not knowing what else to do, I went into iTunes, removed the game from my iPod, re-downloaded it, and re-installed it. That seemed to have done the trick, as I was up and running after that. All things ran smoothly until the end of the 17 level. While loading the 18th and final level, the game again froze. I thought that it was just my luck, but it turns out many initial downloaders experienced similar issues.  As for gameplay, I didn’t expect much, and that’s what I got. Initially, there are no predators, and you are free to pig out in the first level of the primordial soup. After five levels of play, you are offered a chance to upgrade your “Spore.” Upgrades range from coloring to body shape to body parts, the latter of which provides you with everything from mouths and tails to shells and flippers. Within each category of body part (Perception, Offensive, Defensive and Movement), there are three levels, each with more benefit then the last.  The 18 levels get progressively harder, but none of them impossibly so. They also get very repetitive, with the only changes coming from the upgrades obtained every 5 levels and the increasing difficulty from stronger foes. The levels took me around 2-5 minutes each to beat, and I got to the 17th level (before it froze) in around 45 minutes of straight playing. If you can overlook the critical freezing and crashing, this game isn’t much in the way of entertainment, as it gets quite boring and makes your hand hurt like crazy. Unless you are a crazed Spore fan like me who can’t stand waiting for another two weeks for the actual game, I wouldn’t suggest spending your money on Spore Origins, but rather a worthwhile iPod game such as Monopoly or Mini Golf, both of which haven’t gotten old after extensive play. Or, if you’re feeling quite miserly, you could just stick to Vortex, which its quite the game given its free nature. For those of you who roll with a different mobile device, the game is planned for its iPhone, iPod touch, Nintendo DS and other platform release on September 7th. Appletell Rating: See other iPod game reviews. Buy Spore Origins Full Story » | Written by Mark Rowland for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Will the iPhone kill iPod Click Wheel gaming?

Section: iPod + iTunes, iPod touch, iPod Family, iTunes, iPod, iPod nano, iPhone + Communications, iPhone, iPhone SDK & Apps, OriginalsYes, and it’s about time we put it out of its misery. Even before the iPhone, the iPod never stood a chance as a legitimate gaming device. This saddens me somewhat, too, because I really wanted it to be. I viewed gaming on the iPod much as I do on my Macintosh, in that I didn’t buy a Mac to play games, but if there are games available, I’ll certainly play them. Unfortunately, developers just never put much thought into iPod games, and Apple didn’t seem interested in helping out. The main problem, of course, is the scroll wheel. There are very few games that can be effectively controlled with a wheel, and developers just haven’t been able to work around that. Games such as Mini Golf, Vortex and Peggle are workable, but only because of the simple control schemes that mainly involve spinning in a circle. Okay. But why is Sonic the Hedgehog on the iPod? Bomberman? Pac Man? These are big name titles, sure, but trying to control them with a click wheel is an exercise in frustration and futility that only turns gamers away from the iPod. Games for the iPhone are being developed specifically for the iPhone. Developers are excited about the touch screen and accelerometer, and are already putting them to good use. Obviously, developers didn’t have that excitement about the iPod’s click wheel. As a result, we got a mess of games with titles we recognize—Scrabble, Yahtzee, Pole Position, Pirates of the Caribberan(?!)—because that’s the only way people would buy them. Even EA, apparently recognizing no one wants to play pool on an iPod, threw their popular Sims franchise label on top of it in an effort to move some copies. They did the same with The Sims Bowling and The Sims DJ. Actually, The Sims DJ goes in a direction that more games should have, in that it puts your music collection into the game. It’s not just background music while you play; rather, the gameplay is built around your music. It’s an original concept that could only work on the iPod. The same goes for iQuiz, which creates trivia games based on your own music. This is what more developers needed to do, instead of just throwing unplayable ports of cell phone games at us. Or, someone could’ve given us an iPod game pad. I imagine if the market had been there, someone would have. I’m not a developer and know little of design, but I can’t imagine it would’ve been hard to put together a cradle in which the iPod classic and 3G nano would sit, placing a D-pad to the left of the click wheel and a few buttons to the right. The D-pad would take over the touch commands of the click wheel, and the buttons would take over the wheel and center button clicking functions. With that device, the games would be able to be played as they’re meant to, and the entire catalog would open to all iPod owners on a device combo no larger than a Nintendo DS. Of course, the problem with such a device is that Apple updates the form factor of the iPod so frequently that it would have to be a wide open design to avoid becoming obsolete within a year or two. Plus, as I mentioned at the top of the article, people aren’t buying iPods for the games. The Nintendo DS and Sony PSP have that market covered, so it’s unlikely the type of person looking to play Sonic the Hedgehog would look to do so on an iPod. And so, we’re back to game design. Developers need to put games on the iPod that work on the iPod, which is why I’m thrilled to see a company as huge as Square Enix getting into the mix with Song Summoner: The Unsung Heroes. Here’s a game that not only works with the click wheel (it’s not a perfect fit, but the turn-based strategy gameplay doesn’t require quick, precise control, and is therefore more forgiving), but that takes full advantage of the your music collection; the songs on your iPod actually become ”Tune Troopers.” How cool is that...building an army based on your music. I just added this game to my collection, and can’t wait to see what type of soldiers songs such as Queen’s “Ogre Battle” and “Vultan’s Theme (Attack of the Hawk Men)” give me. Or, for that matter, “Particle Man” from They Might Be Giants. So, is there hope for iPod gaming, or is this too little, too late? I fear it’s the latter, but I hope Song Summoner does well enough to convince Square Enix to embrace the iPhone and iPod touch platforms. Support from big name developers and publishers will improve public perception within the gaming community, and that can only be good for sales. After all, showing friends Vortex on the iPod never convinced anyone to run out and buy one, but Super Monkey Ball could certainly have that effect. Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Appletell review - Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab for iPhone/iPod touch

Section: iPod + iTunes, iPod touch, iPhone + Communications, iPhone, iPhone SDK & Apps, Features, ReviewGenre: Arcade Developer: Freeverse File Size: 5.6MB Version Reviewed: 1.1 Requirements: iPhone 2.0 software Compatibility: iPhone and iPod touch Age Rating: 4+ Price $2.99 I don’t pretend to know much about the inner workings of Freeverse, but I can say this; they like their labs puzzling, and their monkeys burning. Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab came out for the Macintosh back in 2000, and it was pretty good. Although it featured various single player games (most notable of which was “Zen” mode, in which the tone settled down and the blocks never sped up), it really shined in multiplayer versus mode. Here, it was no longer enough to just align the descending balls; you needed to line then up in a certain way so you could send “bad” balls to your opponent. The games were more intense, more fun, and (thank heavens) shorter. It’s not at all surprising, then, that Freeverse selected Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab (BMPL) as one of their first Mac to iPhone ports. The iPhone screen orientation is perfect for falling blocks and balls and what have you, and the graphics are well suited to the iPhone’s capabilities. It’s just a great match. And yet, BMPL for the iPhone/iPod touch left me wanting. This dissatisfaction stems almost entirely from the lack of multiplayer. There is a versus mode included, but it’s you against a monkey. And not even your monkey; a computer monkey. And not even your computer monkey, the iPhone’s computer monkey. Now, obviously, two people playing BMPL on the same phone would lead to fights (and arrests in some areas of the south). However, the ability to do it over WiFi or the 3G network would kill. I can’t say how difficult it would be to set that up with Apple’s iPhone SDK, so it’s quite possible such a feature simply wouldn’t be worth the programming time. Still, that doesn’t mean I’m not saddened by the loss of multiplayer here. That aside, BMPL for the iPhone is a faithful adaptation of the Mac version. Five modes are included here: Color Reaction – Match colored balls by placing them next to each other Hex Bonding – Assemble rows of falling pieces (ala Tetris) Test Tube – Rotate balls in-line to create matches Mission Mode – Mixing all modes, with a new goal presented at each level Zen Mode – Calming graphics, music and gameplay...and haikus! Different modes will appeal to different gamers. My wife, who’s an ace with Tetris, prefers Hex Bonding. I tend to do better matching colors than aligning funky shapes into rows, so I have more fun with Color Reaction. When we feel like exercising our brain without inducing stress, we both go for Zen Mode. The different modes add some life to the game, ensuring you won’t get bored with BMPL as quickly as you would with a simple Tetris clone. No matter which mode you play, you will be asked to deal with over 15 various power-ups and the “bad” blocks that aren’t disposed of easily. These will quickly clog up your tube and force you to alter your constantly strategy if you want to survive. Sometimes, luck is the only way past them. You’ve just got to get the right power-up or pattern at the right time. Now, we also have to talk about the controls. To place your blocks, you simply slide your finger across the iPhone/iPod touch’s screen. The falling balls slide with you, and a shadow at the bottom of the playfield indicates where they’ll be landing. This is no problem. Spinning the balls can be, though. To do this, you touch in area surrounding the falling pattern. No worries, until things really start to speed up. Quite often, I accidentally made the balls fall or slide when I wanted them to spin. In a frantic game like this, control is key, and you hate to see a strong session ruined because your proximity tapping is off just a little bit (and one mistake can quickly lead to doom). I can’t offer a better control method than what Freeverse provided, but the only option available will prove frustrating to many players. The game sure looks great, though. It’s as colorful as ever, and cleaner than the Mac version. A wide variety of ball styles and backgrounds give the game “pop” and keep it looking fresh. It’s fun to look at it, and that helps make the game fun to play. Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab is only $2.99. You’ll get more than $2.99’s worth of satisfaction out of the game. Still, I have to drop it a rating point because of the lack of human to human multiplayer in versus mode (you can’t even share your high scores online) and because the controls can be frustrating. I instead suggest you pick up Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab for your Mac, and look elsewhere for your Freeverse iPhone fun. Appletell Rating: Purchase Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Macintosh/iPhone software update round-up - October 6, 2008

Section: Software + Apps, Miscellaneous, Third-Party, iPod + iTunes, iPod touch, iPhone + Communications, iPhone, iPhone SDK & Apps, Mac + Computers, SoftwareMacintosh and iPhone software updates and announcements for October 6, 2008: Freeverse has announced they will be temporarily be reducing the price of their popular iPhone racing game, Moto Chaser. Moto Chaser will be available for $0.99, less than the price of a gallon of gas. Developed exclusively for the iPhone and iPod touch, Moto Chaser provides a unique racing experience in the palm of your hand. Utilizing the device’s built-in accelerometer, Moto Chaser features intuitive motion sensitive control, which allows you to steer your vehicle by physically tilting the device either to the left or to the right, giving you the extra precision that you need to make it to the checkered flag in one piece. Berbie Software has announced an update for TrailRunner 1.8, the outdoor oriented route-planning and journaling software for Mac OS X. Among other improvements, the latest update has a full integration with GPSies—a community web site to store, view and share outdoor activities and routes. With this new release, TrailRunner users can easily find routes in their neighborhood and share their own with other hikers, runners and mountain bikers. Subatomic Studios has announced the release of Fieldrunners, an action-based strategy game in the much-loved tower defense genre. In Fieldrunners, you defend and control a field under heavy attack by enemy forces. At your disposal lies a wide array of devastating upgradeable towers, each providing their own unique advantages. You must plan out your strategy wisely in order to stop the oncoming fieldrunners from infiltrating your base. With multiple levels of difficulty, Fieldrunners offers both casual and hardcore players alike a challenging and enjoyable experience. Code Line has a great reputation for outfitting designers with software applications to make their jobs easier. Now, artists on the go can turn to their iPhone or iPod touch for Code Line’s newest creation, Color Expert. Color Expert contains powerful tools to help artists and designers identify, translate, capture and showcase color. And now they can do that anywhere. Opcoders has announced Toolbox 0.8.2 for advanced editing tasks involving bitmap and vector graphics. Toolbox can be used as a texture generator, as a logo editor and more. Focus for this release has been to make Toolbox user friendly. A new Light block has been added that has 12 parameters. The new Light block accepts up to 4 inputs allowing for fine grained control of ambient, diffuse and specular. The Dream Apps has announced Dream Capture 2.2, an update to their video recording utility for Mac OS X. Dream Capture is a simple and intuitive utility to record videos that are perfect for uploading to various video sharing websites, importing into iMovie or GarageBand for the creation of Podcasts or burned to DVD. This makes Dream Capture a great compliment to Apple’s iLife Suite. Dare to be Creative today announced the release of Dragoman 1.4, a universal batch file conversion utility for Mac OS X Tiger and Leopard. Dragoman is a utility application that batch converts images, photos, PDFs, music and archive files with a lightweight drag and drop interface. Big Stone Phone’s audio and photo recorder TalkingPics 1.2 is now available. Create projects with many audio, photos, maps and notes, and make slideshows. Upload files to Mac or Windows via browser. New MP3 compression option. This version adds a new preference to choose either the ultra high quality lossless format or the WAV compressed format. Big Stone Phone’s compelling painting and public art sharing app iGraffiti has been enhanced and is now available at the AppStore. New features include a pick any color from photo option and view the Public Art right from within iGraffiti. Key features include the use Library photos, take snapshots, or use a simple colored canvas. iGraffiti offers unique paint brush controls, choose color from crayons or pick a color from anywhere in the photo and more. Freeverse today announced the release of their acclaimed puzzle game, Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab, for the iPhone and iPod touch. Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab combines multiple game modes that have been enjoyed by millions, all in one great game, and priced at only $0.99. Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Appletell review - Bomberman Touch for iPhone/iPod touch

Section: iPhone + Communications, iPhone, iPhone SDK & Apps, Features, Review Genre: Arcade action Developer: Hudson Soft File Size: 9.3MB Version Reviewed: 1.0.1 Requirements: iPhone 2.0 software Compatibility: iPhone and iPod touch Rating: 4+ Price $7.99 Throughout gaming history, there have been many popular men: Pac Man, Mega Man, Ms. Pac Man, Mega Man 2, Pac Man, Jr., Mega Man 3, and so on. Another of these is Bomberman; a little man who may actually be a robot with a white helmet who runs around mazes and blows stuff up. The franchise has been around forever, gracing pretty much every gaming system you can remember, and many you cannot (ZX Spectrum? Sharp MZ-700?). Recently, Bomberman could be found blasting himself free from the confines of your iPod. Now, he’s found his way to the iPhone/iPod touch. I guess when you’re Hudson Soft and you don’t have a lot of franchises to milk, you gotta milk the ones you do have for all they’re worth. And so… Man and Bomberman I’m not well-versed in the Bomberman lore. The iTunes App Store says the series has over 60 titles, of which I’ve played one. Well...two, now, if you include Bomberman Touch: The Legend of the Mystic Bomb. In the iPod version, you ran around the maze and dropped bombs, occasionally playing a mini-game to break up the action. Here on the iPhone, there’s a story. There are little cut scenes to watch and characters to meet and choices to make. I’m not sure how these enhance the gaming experience, or how much they’ve been used in the past. In this version, the story isn’t very interesting, or well-told, for that matter, and pretty much just gets in the way. In fact, everything you really need to know about what’s going on is already in the title. You’re a man, you have bombs, and there’s a legend about a mystic bomb. I think you’re smart enough to take it from there. Arms and the Bomberman Once the gameplay gets going, though, it’s old-school arcade action all the way. The point of Bomberman is to work your way through a maze in an effort to find the hidden exit. You do this by planting bombs, which explode in plus shapes to knock out the walls of the maze. Power-ups are often revealed, granting you larger explosions and such, which you’ll need to protect yourself from the myriad enemies along the way. In typical arcade fashion, they only have to touch you to kill you, while you have to blow them up. Plus, they are many, and you are one (or three, I guess). So, you’ll have to worry about avoiding/killing a good number of enemies as you develop your strategy for finding the exit and moving on to the next level. It’s not easy, and the task is exacerbated by a confounded timer that prevents you from just loitering about the maze. Major Bombera The design of Bomberman Touch is quite nice. The graphics are vivid and colorful, the sound is fantastic, and the mazes are vast. I guess that when you’ve been developing a franchise as long as Hudson has with Bomberman, you learn what works and what doesn’t. Unfortunately, the one thing that doesn’t work here is the one item that’s new to the iPhone: the controls. You drop a bomb by tapping the bomb button in the lower right corner of screen, so that’s simple enough. But you move Bomberman by placing a finger or thumb anywhere on the screen and dragging it in the direction you want to move. This seems simple enough, but is harder to execute that you’d think. The system isn’t that precise, and you’ll often find yourself overshooting the opening through which you want to run. When being chased by a bad guy or trying to avoid a bomb explosion, that can prove terribly frustrating. Also, you’ll find yourself constantly having to move and reset your control finger/thumb to either get to the bomb button or to see what’s going on beneath your hand. Constantly picking up and resetting your control finger is roughly the equivalent of dropping your gamepad every few seconds. Although the widescreen display makes for some big and elaborate puzzles, I’d prefer to see this extra retail space sacrificed for the placement of a virtual d-pad that remains in the same spot throughout the game. Bomberman Touch is already difficult enough without the faulty control system, so it can become terribly frustrating when you know what to do, but can’t seem to do it. And don’t even get me started on the Options menu, the button for which is placed so close to the gaming area that you’ll suddenly find yourself staring at the options screen three or four times per level. Almost as bad, when you finally complete a level, you know it’s only to move ahead to more of the same. The screens may look different, but the action is quite repetitious. This probably won’t bother fans of the franchise—this is what you want out of a Bomberman game, after all—but those coming in fresh will probably wonder how such a game managed to reach over 60 incarnations. The Bomberman of Destiny Bomberman Touch: The Legend of the Mystic Bomb is selling for $7.99. I think this price is a premium because of the name alone, and should actually go for $4.99. Most iPhone owners won’t actually finish all of the levels (even though there aren’t that many), but could still get their $5’s worth out of it. $8, and you’re pushing the cost/reward ratio. In fact, I think it’s more useful for simply showing off the iPhone as a gaming device for a few minutes than it is for sitting down to a prolonged gaming session. Maybe by Bomberman 70, they’ll have this all worked out. Appletell Rating: Purchase Bomberman Touch - The Legend of the Mystic Bomb Full Story » | Written by Kirk Hiner for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

So Hot Right Now: Top 10 Appletell posts for the week of August 24, 2008

Section: Haven’t caught all of the Appletell news this week? Here’s your chance to catch up on this week’s top 10 articles! Reasons why Verizon thinks they are better than the iPhone“Gizmodo has posted an interesting list supposedly from Verizon about their talking points regarding the iPhone 3G.  Some of the more noteworthy points on this list include:  The new 3G iPhone will be twice as fast only where…” MORE »Appletell review - Spore Origins for iPod“ Genre: RPG, Strategy Format: iPod Game Developer: Maxis Mac Port: Electronic Arts System Requirements: 3G iPod nano, 5G iPod classic, 28.7MB free space Price: $4.99 …” MORE »Leaked MacBook Pro ad not from Apple, but still probably spot-on“ The “leaked” MacBook Pro ad that’s been circulating the internet is a fake, it’s been confirmed. A MacRumors forum member with the handle mciarlo posted the mockup to the forums on Friday, in the thread “Macbook Pro…” MORE »Up close and personal with the $853 iPhone 3G from Globe Telecoms“ After announcing its price range for the iPhone 3G a couple of weeks ago at around $1000 for the prepaid units, Globe Telecoms decided to bring down the price…” MORE »Apple Special Event planned for September 9th? [Update]“MacRumors is collecting some rumors in one article about a possible date for Apple’s next new product announcement. All sources seem to converge on September 9th.  Originally, MacRumors had listed this event as an unverified rumor and…” MORE »3G iPhones Already Outnumber 2.5G units?“When Steve Jobs set some lofty iPhone 3G sales goals, some said it couldn’t be done. Well, to the naysayers dismay, it looks as though Apple is well on its way to its goals, and…” MORE »iPhone 3G antennas are fine says GP“Western Sweden’s largest newspaper, Göteborgs-Posten (or The Gothenburg Post for us American’s who have no idea how to pronounce words with dots above them), says there is nothing wrong with the antenna inside of the iPhone 3G. They were…” MORE »Lockdown: anti-theft system for Mac“To secure our valuable belongings is always important. It doesn’t really come to just price; what makes an object valuable to his owner varies from one person to another.  There’s a wide range of solutions to secure everything we have, and…” MORE »Goodbye, Tris, we miss you already [Update]“ You may remember my favorite Tetris clone, Tris, that was released in the App Store in the second week of August. In my opinion, it is the best Tetris clone available, and quite possibly…” MORE »More evidence for the Kevin Rose iPod nano rumors“Last week, we reported on some rumors via Digg’s Kevin Rose about a possible iPod Nano redesign. MacRumors is providing some more evidence for that rumor with some pics and details from a semi-reliable Chinese…” MORE » Full Story » | Written by NEWS for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »