Monthly Archive: January 2012

The App Store is finally starting to pick up speed and tonight the flood gates are opening as tons of quality titles are launching simultaneously. Check out the fine selection below.

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Soul Calibur for iOS has just been approved by Apple and will be released on the 19th of January. The publisher Namco Bandai, claims that the graphics will be on par with the 1999 Dreamcast version of Soul Calibur. While we’re sure that the graphics will be good, ports of classic games are easy to mess up.  That’s because the virtual controls sometimes ruin the feel the game used to have on the console version.  As soon as we have a pre-release copy we will be sure to inform you the state of the port and what you can expect.  The game will work on any device with the 4.3 update currently installed. 


Apparently there are 6 game modes which work hand in hand with the GameCenter leaderboard system. 
Those modes are:

I’ve been anxious all week for news on the upcoming platformer from Crescent Moon Games and Robots vs Wizards, Paper Monsters. As you know, Paper Monsters was submitted this past week. The waiting game is always tough so any new info shines a light at the end of the tunnel.  A few days ago, we got more than just new info.  A fully playable, web mini-game called “Drag ‘n Dash” along with a new trailer for Paper Monsters surfaced on the game’s official website. Before you jump over to PaperMonsterLand and give the mini-game a spin, stick around and check out the new trailer here.  We’ll be here with a review of Paper Monsters as soon as we get our hands on it, and that shouldn’t be too far away. Until then enjoy the dragon dashing!

Dungeon Crawlers, an upcoming tactical RPG from Ayopa Games and Drowning Monkeys, shows quite a bit of promise. From what we’ve seen so far, this game is just as much about dungeon crawling as it is about laughs.

The cast of characters consists of an alchemist, a priest, a barbarian, and a drunken dwarf warrior. It’s a strange party, but it goes well with the quirky personality of the game.  If you think about the style of the game for a bit, it seems somewhat reminiscent of “The Ghostbusters”.  This makes sense, since you are clearing out dungeons of ghouls, gunges, goblins and more.  The humor in the story is what really makes the game a blast to play, and you definitely shouldn’t find yourself playing this game stone-faced.

From what I’ve seen so far, gameplay is standard turn-based dungeon crawling.  There are two modes, exploration mode and combat mode. In exploration mode, you are free to “explore” the level without any limitation on the number of moves you can make. Movement is simple, tap where you want to go and a path will be drawn. Tap again to confirm the path and you are on your way. When you run into a mob, you automatically enter combat mode. This works just as any other turn based game would.  Move your characters around and choose an attack. You can only make one move/attack per turn, so some thought will be required.

There are also some RPG elements implemented such as character leveling, and different unlockable skills. As you kill mobs you eventually level up, earning points to spend on upgrades. This gives the game depth that can’t be found in many dungeon crawlers.

If you’re looking for a dungeon crawler that will make you laugh while you loot, you don’t have long to wait. Dungeon Crawlers will be launching January 26th for $1.99 as a universal game. Here’s the nitty gritty details about the game along with the awesome trailer.

Tactical turn-based combat. Deliberate and exciting turn-based combat. Consider your moveand then leap into action with your characters, letting lose sword and spell to down your dungeon-dwelling prey.
Four unique playable characters. Control an egg-headed alchemist, portly priest, burlybarbarian, and drunken dwarf warrior.
Five chapters of dungeon crawling goodness: Each chapter is a unique multi-level dungeonwith distinct environments, deadly enemies, and shiny loot.
Did we mention loot? Laden your Dungeon Crawlers team with gold and gear. You’ll makethem obnoxiously wealthier and obscenely deadlier.
A multitude of monsters to massacre. Battle goblins, skeletons, mummies, slimes (Aegon callsthem “gunges”), oozes, banshees, and more.
Challenging and rewarding boss battles. Throw down against the deadliest of bosses in eachchapter, including the wily Goblin King, terrifying Banshee Queen, and the dreaded Death KnightShyamalan.
Trophies and Achievements: Supports Game Center with over a dozen achievements and alsoboasts in-game collectible trophies (more loot) to show off your dungeon crawling prowess.
Unity-powered stylized graphics: Adds fully rotatable, full-blown 3D with a cartoony style to thetactics RPG genre.
iOS 5 Support, including iCloud syncing and AirPlay mirroring

Coming off the success of Super Stickman Golf, everyone had high expectations of Lunar Racer. I think those expectations were met, but it didn’t go much farther than meet them, unforunately. Those who are not fans of racing will still enjoy this, much like the non-fans of golf (me) enjoyed Super Stickman Golf.

You, the racer, start off in a transport ship, along with three opponents. When the light turns green, you are all dropped out of the ship and onto a planet, to which you are pulled by gravity. The difficulty of the opponent racers is just right for what it should be, and even on your first race you don’t feel left behind. Each race lasts about 60-90 seconds and is hectic all the way through. There are powerups to be had throughout the track, which randomly give the player or opponent more nitro, a space car seeking rocket, a spike that can be dropped behind you, a bubble shield, or a space car seeking rocket that hits everyone in front of the shooter. Each time a victim is hit, it gets stopped, whether it be mid air or on ground, and resumes after 1-2 seconds.

The controls are extremely simple and easy to pick up. Nitro is used by tapping the right side of the screen, and to be pulled back to the planet faster, when in the air, tap the left side of the screen. Any game focused on tilt controls isn’t generally asked for, or wanted on an iPad because of the size; but the devs have made the default sensitivity just right. The tilting sensitivity is high, but perfectly done, I had no want to adjust them, whatsoever. Which is a good thing, because, unforunately, there are no customization options, spare the ability to mute the sound and/or music.

Lunar Racer has a total of twelve tracks to unlock, all spread out into different planets/environments. To unlock said tracks you must get a certain total amount of stars. Stars are earned by gettings first (three stars) second (two stars) or third (one star) on any given track. Sadly, two of the tracks can only be unlocked by gettting five or ten wins in multiplayer, which is only local at the moment. So if you don’t have a friend who would help you out, or another device, you’re out of luck. Each track varies greatly by terrain and environment, and gives the racer a whole new experience each race.

If you’re good enough to get three stars on a track in Amateur Tour, you unlock Pro Tour which has much smarter and seemingly faster opponents. The challenge presented in Pro Tour is highly welcomed since the opponents in Amateur Tour get easy to beat after playing for a couple of hours.

Multiplayer is included in the game, but unfortunately its only local multiplayer at the moment. The developers have said, on twitter, that they are working on global, online multiplayer; however. If done right, much like Super Stickman Golf, online multiplayer would make this game just so much more fun, not that it even needs it.

At the start of every race you are given a set amount of nitro, this nitro is a key element to winning a race so you, as the racer, must put it to good use to earn more nitro by doing flips, or by doing perfect landings.

One of the many things that make this game good, is the insanely extensive garage. From what I’ve seen so far, there are at least ten body types, five different colors, and ten different wheels. Comsetic upgrades are bought with coins and go up in price for each successive one you buy. Here is a list of things that you can change with your space car – all cosmetic.

– Body Type
– Body Color
– Canopy Color
– Wheel Type
– Nitro Animation

In order to buy things from this garage, you collect coins which float around in the track, in each race there are 50-200 coins, depending on the track. If you complete at least one of three unique challenges in each track, you get a multiplier which can potentially give you 4X the coins you collected. 2X for completing one challenge, 3X for completing two, and 4X for completing all three. The first time you manage to complete all three challenges, whether it be in seperate races or all in one race, you are rewarded with a bonus round. Bonus rounds put you on a planet with stars all round, and unlimited nitro. An average bonus round can get you around 600 stars. The game also features (although some may not call it a feature) an in-app purchase store with which you can buy more cosmetic stuff, although obviously not needed.

Achievements and leaderboards are done through both GameCenter and OpenFeint, a feature most devs today are putting in their games. Leaderboards show who have the fastest time for each level. Lunar Racer has a total of 22 achievements which can be obtained by doing a specific number of spins, firing a number of rockets, and other feats that can be accomplished by simply playing the game normally.

Varying tracks, a crazy amount of cosmetic stuff to do to your car, and gameplay that will have you wanting for more, are very good reasons to pick Lunar Racer up – now!

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Land Air Sea Warfare or LASW for short is a RTS game that allows you to command hundreds of units in your quest to outwit your strategically thinking AI opponent.  Real Time Strategy games like Starcraft and others have always left me in the dust as there were so many complex features and buildings availble to build. Luckily LASW simplifies the formula and makes moving and building units easy to understand and fast to execute.  Within a good 5 minutes of experimenting I was slowly starting to understand the way the game worked. Instead of writing a good five paragraphs lamenting about what you have to do and can do in this game I have decided to make the review a First Person view on how the game works and what beginners can expect. Let me know in the comments if we should start writing reviews this way.

Round 1- Noob Difficulty: 1 Opposing Force
Total time: 35 minutes

• You start off with one building, your HQ. From there you can build powerplants, defenses, and factories for land, sea and air vehicles.
• Powerplants are necessary because they provide you with  power which you need for your units and to build buildings. 
• It is generally a good idea to build up your defenses early lest the enemy catch you with your pants down. This literallly happened to me because I figured I would leave my iPad alone and let my vehicles be built while I went to use the bathroom. Lo and behold the enemy showed up and messed up a few of my buildings and powerplants. Primary lesson: Defense is the best offense
• Resources accumulate automatically from your HQ which is a mining station.
• You can set a specific units to a group so it is easier to select. Comes in handy during battle.
• Great user interface, works perfectly on the iPad. I can imagine it would be way more difficult to play on the smaller screen of the iPhone.
• Lots of power units makes for faster advancement in the game.
• Died by foolishly attacking enemy base whithout any back up units.

Overall if you are a fan of RTS or thinking critcally then this is the perfect game for you. LASW is hands-down the finest RTS experience on the iOS gaming platform. Though the price may be a bit steep at a whopping $7.99(while sale lasts) it’s truly worth every penny. 5/5 stars.

Download on iTunes

Zombie games run wild on the App Store, but that’s not to say that they are growing old. Combat Arms: Zombies, by Nexon Mobile, is the newest addition to the zombie genre.  Expanding on the PC version of Combat Arms, Nexon Mobile comes close to rivaling the thrilling action of the CoD Zombies series but falls short in the end.
For those of you familiar with Combat Arms, the biggest thing to note is that this is built somewhat like a free-to-play game. The biggest difference is that it does not include all of the annoying aspects of a free-to-play game. No ads, no forced IAPs, none of that. Instead you get a wide arsenal of weapons to unlock/buy and various other equipment to help you survive against the horde. What do I mean by “wide arsenal”? I mean 300+ authentic weapons. BOOM.

Since this is a First Person Shooter with Zombies, it is a given that the gameplay is wave-based. Obviously, zombies like to play fair and give you a little break after you get done killing their friends. They would never mob you incessantly (sarcasm?). The wave-based gameplay that drives most zombie games is wonderful in practice, but in Combat Arms it can be a bit of a fun-block. The thing about the waves in Combat Arms: Zombies is that the early rounds are just plain boring. Even if you have never played a game before they are boring. To make matters worse, the difficulty settings don’t affect the number of zombies, only the toughness of the zombies and the number of waves. No matter how you look at it, every time you play the game you will have to play through the early rounds before you actually get to the good part. Fortunately, the good part is really GOOD. Access new areas, kill new zombies (the boss zombies look really freaky), and have a jolly good rampage.

Unfortunately, there is no multiplayer support at the moment, and we can only hope that this will be added in the future. As a game built on the Unreal Engine 3 (which is relatively new on iOS), Combat Arms: Zombies plays far better than several others of its kind. The graphics are amazing and the 5 control schemes allow for anyone to play comfortably. Of course, improvements are always welcome and in particular I would love to see more maps, more zombie types, more guns, multiplayer, and a way to skip right to the action. If you want to shoot some zombies, grab Combat Arms while it is still available at the Holiday Price ($4.99)