Archive for August 4th, 2010
‘Tapic’ Review – Tap Along to Your Own Music Library
Ever since a slew of new APIs found their way into the latest version of Apple's iOS, the one that we've been waiting for somebody to really take advantage of is the ability for applications to finally be able to tap into the music library of the device itself. We even dreamed of the classic Audiosurf making its way to iPhone in a post from early last month. With the success of rhythm games in the past few years, and especially the on iPhone, gamers have been clamoring for a similar game that they can play using their own music. Enter Tapic [99¢], the first game (that I know of) that creates a tapping chart directly from a song in your music library for you to play with. Tapic attains various levels of success in what it sets out to do, but it's far from perfect. Still, it's a novel use of the new API and is pretty fun in its own right.
The interface used in Tapic is simple to use. Choosing Play from the main menu brings up all the songs from your music library. After selecting a song Tapic will create a note chart for it, which takes about 10-20 seconds, and next you'll choose which difficulty to play it on. The harder the difficulty, the faster the notes come barreling towards you down the lanes. Choosing More Songs from the menu allows you to select a bunch of songs at once and have them prepared in advance for playing. Depending on how many songs you choose this can take a quite a few minutes, but allows you to play from songs in your playlist in succession without waiting for each one to create a chart in between.
The game can be played in portrait or landscape mode, although landscape must be purchased and unlocked using collected in-game coins (or by buying them with real money as IAP). Portrait uses three lanes of notes to tap along with, and landscape uses five. The game is at its best in landscape mode, and it's annoying that this must be unlocked rather than available from the start. Portrait is still ok, and it's a good way to get acclimated with playing Tapic, but landscape is where I spend most of the time playing. Different themes can also be bought using the game currency for both portrait and landscape mode, adding some graphical variety to the backgrounds.
The presentation and functionality of tapping the notes all work extremely well in Tapic, but it's the actual chart generation that fails to really impress. It doesn't ever feel like the notes jive with the song in a meaningful way as they rarely sync up properly, and when they do it mostly just feels like a coincidence. Some songs fared better than others while testing out the game, but overall you really feel like you're just playing an unrelated tapping game while listening to your favorite tunes. In my experience, and the general consensus of gamers , is that hip-hop and techno music gives the best results, while rock and metal generally don't.
The funny thing about the chart generator is that even though it's somewhat lacking, Tapic is still a lot of fun. I found myself continually wanting to keep playing, even though it didn't really feel like my performance had any impact on the song that was being used. I just can't help but feel like if the developer can improve this aspect of the game, which they have stated they are working on, then Tapic could really be something special. My other biggest point of contention is having to play for an extensive period of time (or spend real life money) before being able to unlock the landscape mode. It just feels like a cheap aspect to an otherwise excellently presented game. Perhaps the game will be taken to the next level over the course of its lifespan, but even right now Tapic is an interesting and fun way to experience your music.
[]
‘Osmos’ For iPhone Gameplay Video, Releases Tomorrow
The award winning Mac/PC game Osmos from developer made its way onto the iPad last month to overwhelmingly positive reviews from just about every media outlet that laid their hands on it. Osmos is the kind of experience that blurs the line between art and game, and we really enjoyed the game in our own review as well. As great of an impression as Osmos left on iPad owners, those who are without that device were left asking “where is an iPhone version?” Hemisphere had hinted during the development of the iPad game that an iPhone version would be forthcoming, and they have since with a gameplay video and release date.
One concern that always seems to come up when talking about Osmos for iPhone is how the game will play on the smaller screen as opposed to that of the iPad. It appears the answer is that it will play just fine, as demonstrated in this video:
The iPhone version of Osmos will contain all the same content as it's iPad older brother. The developer explains that some of the levels have been slightly reworked to accommodate the smaller screen space, and due to this the game can require different strategies to complete some levels, offering a somewhat different experience than the iPad version. The iPhone version will also have full iOS4 and Retina Display support. If you've been green with envy over iPad owners getting to experience such a phenomenal game, rest assured that the wait for Osmos on iPhone is almost over, as the game will be available August 5th for $2.99.
[]
‘Archetype’, ‘Bejeweled 2′ and ‘Doodle God’ Receive Significant Updates, ‘Aqua Moto Racing 2′ Updates on the Way
Freebie Alert: ‘Truckers Delight: Episode 1′ and ‘Luxor’
Freebies are universally awesome, whether they're free samples of pizza bagels at the grocery store or great iPhone games. We've favorably reviewed both of these games, but you might as well just download both of these and give them a try for yourself while they're free.
Truckers Delight: Episode 1 – While is likely best known for the controversy surrounding Edge [$2.99], they've also brought both Cross Fingers [$1.99 / Free] and Truckers Delight: Episode 1 [Free] to the App Store as well. Truckers Delight is an episodic iPhone game based on the of the same name. In the game, you play as a trucker driving down a highway pursuing a blonde girl in a red corvette. Your truck is controlled by tilting, and along the way you'll need to run police, motorcycles, and many other vehicles off the road with the help of an array of increasingly odd and vulgar power-ups.
We liked Truckers Delight: Episode 1 quite a bit in our review, and really can't wait for the rest of the episodes in the series. The game does a great job of preserving the feel of retro racing games while providing a good difficulty curve that gets really exciting as you're just barely making it to the next checkpoint with one second to spare. Don't miss this game while it's free.
Luxor – Initially released in 2005, Luxor has lived a long life on many platforms including the Mac, PC, and several game consoles both through its initial release and subsequent sequels. The iPhone port is done well, and features gameplay similar to Puzzloop [$7.99 / Free] and many other marble shooting color matching games. Luxor has a bit of a notorious reputation on our forums due to the role that developer played in StoneLoops! of Jurassica's removal from the App Store, which explains the tsunami of negative reviews in iTunes despite the fact that the game is quite fun.
As mentioned when we first took a look at the game, Luxor is host to a heap of levels, power-ups, and achievements to inflate your Plus+ score. If you've been looking for a marble shooter, grab this one while it's free.
[]
