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With a new year upon us, we're bringing back our monthly best game listings. Our ratings for games we reviewed in January are now in place, and we now present to you the ones that are on the top of the heap. Each game reviewed receives a 1-5 star rating relative to the other games from that month. Generally, a 3 or higher is considered a "good" rating.

Our final scores are not the product of any traditionally objective measures such as graphics or sound, but simply reflect the games we would most recommend to others.

5 Stars

Dead Space™, $6.99 – [Review] – [Forum Thread] – "Console quality" is a phrase that's thrown around a lot to describe portable games, and really, it's a fitting title for this iOS-exclusive version of Dead Space. Sure, we're still irked that there aren't any control configuration options, but that shouldn't stop you from picking up this game, and it hasn't stopped us from playing through it multiple times. We tend to prefer Dead Space for iPad [$9.99] over its iPhone counterpart, but both are fantastic games that should be a part of your collection. EA started 2011 off with a bang by releasing Dead Space, and if this is setting the benchmark for the quality of games we're going to see out of them for the future, this is going to be one hell of a year.

Dungeon Raid, $2.99 – [Review] – [Forum Thread] – As mentioned in our review of the game, with the number of fish in the match three sea, it takes a lot to make one that's just as fun (if not more so) than the match three staples like Bejeweled 2 and other classics. Dungeon Raid accomplishes this by distilling the Puzzle Quest formula down to its basics, and providing match three gameplay that retains its simple nature while offering a shocking amount of depth via random equipment and character upgrades. Also, there's much more to matching than just high scoring, clearing each type of block has a purpose, and the order you clear them in can mean life or death. This game has stolen hours of my time, I can't recommend it enough.

4.5 Stars

Pocket HalfPipe, $0.99 – [Review] – [Forum Thread] – This incredibly awesome skateboarding game is highly reminiscent of the halfpipe in the classic NES series Skate or Die, but with much better graphics and crazy dual stick controls that allow you to pull off all kinds of moves. The game could easily be described as basic, but it's so much fun that we don't care. The tricks you'll be able to pull off after a bit of practice are cool, and stringing a massive chain together is hugely rewarding. We'd love to see some additional depth or customization thrown in, but as it is, Pocket Halfpipe is just so much fun to play that it doesn't seem to matter.

Bug Heroes, $1.99 – [Review] – [Forum Thread] – Much like how Dungeon Raid took typical match three gameplay and made it awesome, Bug Heroes takes the dual stick shooter to the next level. The core of the game is based around the typical dual stick shooter formula, but multiple playable characters (each with strengths and weaknesses) as well as elements of both castle and tower defense make this a game that everyone needs to check out. Just keep in mind, it will be very difficult to go back to your basic survival-mode dual stick shooter after this.

The rest of January game ratings can be seen in their respective rating categories (also found in the sidebar navigation): 5 Stars, 4.5 Stars, 4 Stars, 3.5 Stars, 3 Stars, and 2 Stars.

As always, we expect there will be some debate about relative scores, but keep in mind that everyone's personal ratings may vary based on individual tastes.

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Can the Nintendo 3DS succeed in a world where your typical handheld game now costs between one and ten dollars? That’s one of the questions we’re asking ourselves as we consider the new-fangled handheld and it’s one that Nintendo is certainly considering as it launches its device whose games will, probably, cost between 30-45 dollars.

In fact, here’s an answer to that from Nintendo president Reggie Fils-Aime. To him, it’s all about value. Obviously, he thinks 3DS games will be able to offer more at their price points than app developers can offer at theirs.

"I actually think that one of the biggest risks today in our industry are these inexpensive games that are candidly disposable from a consumer standpoint," he told GameTrailers in a recent interview. He was then asked if he thought Angry Birds was disposable.

"Angry Birds is a great piece of experience but that is one compared to thousands of other pieces of content that, for one or two dollars, I think actually create a mentality for the consumer that a piece of gaming content should only be two dollars,” he said.

"I actually think some of those games are overpriced at one or two dollars but that's a whole different story.”

As Eli mentioned to me earlier, it’s hard to argue with that logic. People are beginning to expect low prices, which is a bummer. Truly epic, expansive, big-budget games like Dragon Quest IX just straight up are never going to be made again if the developer is expected to sell it at .99 cents. But, on the other hand, smaller experiences like, say, The Rub Rabbits? We shouldn’t be paying top dollar for those, that’s for sure.

[Via GameTrailers and Eurogamer]

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Crescent Moon Games, creators of the hit RPGs Aralon: Sword and Shadow [$9.99] and Ravensword: The Fallen King [$2.99 / Free] provided us a trailer today with one of their upcoming games, which oddly enough, isn't an RPG at all. Gears is a steampunk themed ball roller that also happens to have an oddly intriguing premise behind it.

Check out the trailer:

Per the trailer, Crescent Moon plans to "redefine the ball-rolling genre"– A lofty goal. Either way, ball rolling games have worked great on the iPhone, especially when crossed with an adventure theme. Dark Nebula – Episode One [99¢] and Dark Nebula – Episode Two [$1.99] are great examples of this.

We'll have to wait until the vague release date of "Spring 2011" to see how Gears stacks up, but we haven't been disappointed by a game from Crescent Moon yet.

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Last week at Macworld I had the chance to chat with Josh Michaels from Jetson Creative to discuss the latest update for their testicular impact simulator Ow My Balls! [Free]. If you aren’t familiar with Ow My Balls!, you play as Joe the Juggler who is minding his own business juggling balls on the roof of a building until someone comes along and mercilessly boots him off. Using a meter you set the power of the initial boot and once airborne tilt the device to change the angle of Joe as you utilize the power of flatulence to move about the environment. The goal is to rack your family jewels on as many objects as possible that are spread throughout the level before finally collapsing in a heap of pain on the ground and collecting a score for your efforts.

The lowbrow humor won’t be for everyone, but the game is fun, and Ow My Balls! has led an interesting journey in its time on the App Store. Originally released in April of 2009 amidst a sea of fart and joke apps that were the App Store trend at the time, Ow My Balls! failed to garner much attention. Most people at that point had been burned at least once before by downloading some ridiculous app only to realize that it offered a terrible experience, and a game called Ow My Balls! doesn't exactly evoke confidence in this type of customer. The funny thing is, the gameplay in Ow My Balls! is actually really solid. It’s balanced really well in regards to item and hazard placement, and reaching high scores is a valiant test of skill.

So despite this, Ow My Balls! languished in the App Store for more than a year before Jetson Creative decided to throw in the towel, so to speak, and dropped the price of the game to free. Then, through the power of magic (and probably word of mouth), Ow My Balls! began to spread like wildfire and was being downloaded left and right across the globe. It did over a million downloads in a week, and 230k in a single day at its peak. This phenomenon caught Josh and company completely by surprise, and as excited as they were to see hundreds of thousands of new players playing their game they were also frustrated that they had not built in any kind of way to monetize all of this new exposure. Despite being downloaded more than a million times, Ow My Balls! hasn’t really made any money in its nearly two years on the App Store.

Which brings us to today, where version 2.0 of Ow My Balls! has gone live and the game has once again dropped to free. What’s new in this version are graphics that have been redrawn in high resolution for the Retina Display as well as 6 brand new characters to play as in addition to Joe the Juggler. One character, Lil’ Baller (who may or may not be based on a certain mainstream rapper who has a tendency to interrupt award acceptance speeches) is included in the game for free, while the other 5 are available as a 99¢ in-app purchase. The redone graphics look fantastic on Retina Display devices, and the new characters add a lot of additional humor to the game.

Check out the latest trailer for Ow My Balls!,which shows all of the new characters, or peep this additional hands-on video that I shot at Macworld that shows a few of them in action (including Lil’ Baller’s epic auto-tuned voice samples):

Jetson Creative is being realistic about Ow My Balls!’ latest stint as a freebie. They don’t expect the meteoric rise in popularity that struck previously, but they do hope people will be more apt to check out the new 2.0 features since it’s currently free to do so. The way Josh puts it, there are 3 kinds of Ow My Balls! players: those who try the game, are appalled, and delete it within 10 seconds; those that think it’s funny and play a few times to show their friends, but ultimately never come back to it; and finally the small subset of hardcore players that are competing for high scores. If enough people from groups 2 and 3 like the game enough to buy the IAP character pack, then Jetson Creative has a chance to at least make some money off the game being free.

The plan is to gauge the popularity of version 2.0, and if there’s a demand for it create an iPad native version of Ow My Balls! Then if Jetson Creative can hit a certain profit goal, work can begin on an Ow My Balls! sequel, which Josh has many insanely amazing ideas for but I wouldn’t dare divulge them here. So definitely give Ow My Balls! a spin if you haven’t yet as it costs you nothing to do so. And if you already own the game make sure to update it and check out the latest additions in version 2.0, and we’ll hopefully be hearing more from Ow My Balls! and Jetson Creative in the near future.

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Flight Control [.99 / Free / HD] creator Firemint makes a fantastic argument with its Real Racing franchise for the iPad and iPod Touch: it says, “Hey, portable racing games can be good, too” and then proves it with sleek visuals and solid racing mechanics and design.

If you’re a fan of fast things that go fast or racing with a fast thing against other fast things that go fast, Real Racing games are definite must-haves in your App Store collection. And now you can grab them all on the cheap.

Over on its blog, Firemint has announced that it’s putting three of its racing games — Real Racing, Real Racing HD, and Real Racing 2 — on sale. For your convenience, here’s the original prices and what will become the new ones:

• Real Racing – $4.99 –> $1.99
• Real Racing HD – $9.99 –> $4.99
• Real Racing 2 – $9.99 –> $4.99

As Firemint notes in its post, the dev doesn’t often play the App Store “game” and screw with its prices in order to get temporary bumps on the charts, so don’t expect these games to hit rock bottom prices next month and then the next month after that, too. In other words, if you have had your eye on these pups, it might be best to grab them now because who knows when this'll happen again.

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Today Taito released a new entry to their Bust-A-Move series (known as Puzzle Bobble outside the US) into the App Store called New Bust-A-Move [$4.99]. It’s a sequel of sorts to their original iOS version of Bust-A-Move that was released in 2009, and features a host of new gameplay mechanics that warrant the “new” in its title. It’s a game that’s filled with content and fun ideas, and despite several drawbacks New Bust-A-Move is a welcome addition for fans of the series.

In New Bust-A-Move the core gameplay remains the same as it always has – shoot colored bubbles from a cannon at the bottom of the screen towards a group of multicolored bubbles at the top of the screen that are slowly moving towards the bottom. Match 3 or more of any color bubble and they will disappear, but let the group of bubbles reach the bottom of the screen and it’s game over. Play continues like this until the entire field of bubbles is cleared.

New Bust-A-Move takes this formula and uses it in some clever ways. Some levels have you rescuing a bird by popping all the bubbles that are chained to its feet in order to set it free, or trying to clear the field as a monster is constantly swooping in adding random bubbles into the fray. These level types mix up the gameplay nicely, and each sub-section of the game’s campaign ends with an interesting boss fight. This is all complemented with numerous types of bubbles with special properties, like exploding bubbles or ones that clear all bubbles of a certain color when matched, further adding to the strategy and variation.

One big new addition to New Bust-A-Move is the Jump Shot. Holding down on the launcher for a few seconds will produce a target that moves back and forth along the path of the launcher. Launching the bubble arcs it up and over into the play field where the target was placed, allowing you to plop a bubble down into a spot that would normally be inaccessible with a regular shot. This mechanic is pretty interesting and adds a brand new strategy to the tried and true Bust-A-Move gameplay, though it’s difficult to use in an effective way consistently.

Two minor issues that stuck out about New Bust-A-Move are that the game is not optimized for Retina Display or fast-app switching. Not a huge deal, but annoying nonetheless. The far greater problem is the imprecise controls. Bust-A-Move games rely on pinpoint accuracy and the touch screen just does not afford this. This is compounded by a horrid guide arrow that stems from your cannon that is too thick and not an accurate representation of where your bubble will go. An option to adjust the sensitivity of tilting your cannon or an alternate guide arrow (or the ability to turn it off completely) would do a lot to improve the experience, but sadly no such options exist.

These control issues don’t render the game unplayable, but they create more frustrating mistakes than you may be able to deal with. If you can look past this, there is a lot to like about New Bust-A-Move. There’s a full campaign mode with hidden unlockable levels and boss battles, and endless survival mode, and Game Center integration with online leaderboards and plenty of achievements. If an update ever comes down the pipe that offers Retina Display and multitasking support, along with options to adjust control and UI aspects, then this could be one of the best versions of Bust-A-Move available.

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For a limited time, Rockstar Games is offering their iOS versions of Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars at a 50% discount from the regular price of $9.99 to celebrate the Chinese New Year. GTA: Chinatown Wars was originally released for the Nintendo DS in March of 2009, and featured all of the essential components of a full-blown console GTA game but with toned down visuals and presented from a bird’s-eye view rather than the traditional third-person view. The title was a critical success, and later that year was ported over to the Sony PSP with greatly enhanced visuals.

In January of 2010, the entire game made its way onto the App Store for the iPhone and iPod touch. The iOS version falls somewhere in the middle of its portable console cousins, with visuals that are markedly improved over the DS version but fall a bit short when compared to the PSP version. It retains all of the content, however, and the virtual touch screen controls actually work much better than I ever could have expected, which we noted in our full review. Last September, a native iPad version was released with visual improvements that brought it nearly to the level of the PSP version and UI enhancements that catered to the larger screen.

GTA: Chinatown Wars has previously been on sale a few times during its lifespan, but it doesn’t happen terribly often. With a huge influx of new iOS device owners from the holidays, this is their first chance to grab the title at a discount in 2011. GTA: Chinatown Wars offers dozens upon dozens of hours of playtime given the lengthy story missions, numerous side quests and collectibles, and of course the endless hours you can spend aimlessly goofing around in the humongous sandbox world of Liberty City. If you own an iOS device and don’t yet have GTA: Chinatown Wars, it comes highly recommended, especially during this half-price sale that runs through this Sunday.

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In the interest of making your day even that much more awesome, I bring you this bit of delightful news. Adult Swim has slashed the price of every game in its App Store library to a mere 99 cents. That means, for a “limited time,” you can download all four Robot Unicorn Attacks, My Li’l Bastard, Floater Pro, Spell My Finger, and several other games for about what you'd pay for a nice big sack of tacos from Taco Bell.

Here’s a list of what’s available:

• Robot Unicorn Attack
• Robot Unicorn Attack HD
• Robot Unicorn Attack Christmas
• Robot Unicorn Attack Heavy Metal
• Floater Pro
• My Li’l Bastard
• Spell My Finger
• Meowcenaries
• Amateur Surgeon
• Amateur Surgeon iPad
• Amateur Surgeon 2
• 5 Minutes To Kill

People think I’m crazy, but I’m pretty sure Robot Unicorn Attack is the greatest game ever made. I wasn't a huge fan of the Heavy Metal or the Christmas version, but they both feature the same old "run until you die" mechanic that I still get a kick out of. There are some great games in the above list, so make sure you grab whatever ones you've had your eye on before they return to regular price.

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If you've been following TouchArcade, you've seen that we've been closely keeping up on Gameloft's Sacred Odyssey: Rise of Ayden [Free] since before it even had a title. Early on we suspected it to be an action oriented game with Zelda-like mechanics, and that turned out to be true. I also mentioned that I'll play any Zelda game and any game that vaguely resembles a Zelda game without issue, regardless of how good or bad it is. So, I've fulfilled that blood oath by spending a ridiculous amount of time yesterday and today powering through Sacred Odyssey: Rise of Ayden.

Before I get carried away, it's probably a good idea to discuss Gameloft's new approach to how they're selling their games now. They're labeling it "freemium", which seems to differ from everyone else's definition of the word. Instead, it seems more along the lines of a demoware, with the rest of the game available via a single in-app purchase. Basically, now instead of a paid and lite version of the game, there's a single version. In Sacred Odyssey, you're able to play through the first few missions (which more or less amounts to the tutorial) and get a good handle on what's coming in the rest of the game. This takes about 15 minutes. After that, a screen comes up asking you to make a one-time in-app purchase of $6.99 to continue.

Reactions on our forums have varied wildly from people who think this is an interesting approach to people frothing with rage. Personally, this kind of thing is what I always hoped for when I first heard about in-app purchasing coming to the App Store. The benefits of this are massive. Instead of downloading a lite version, getting 15 minutes in, hitting the end of it, and downloading the full version only to do that 15 minutes over again you can just keep on truckin' after making your IAP. It also helps to remove clutter from the App Store since separate lite and paid versions of Sacred Odyssey aren't needed. Sure, the download size may be a little bigger than your average lite version, but you're actually saving time and bandwidth by not needing to download a second game if you decide you like it.

The opening of Sacred Odyssey: Rise of Ayden takes a cue from many other RPG's and begins with a dream sequence where a mysterious princess is calling out to you. After doing some dirty work around your village, you start off on your adventure, and believe it or not actually end up meeting this mysterious princess inside the first 15 minutes of playing the game. She sends you off on your first task which involves visiting the first dungeon, snagging your first piece of loot, fighting the first boss, and discovering that you're not just some mild-mannered townsperson– You're a grail seeker. You then return back to your home town only to find it ravaged by orcs and burnt to the ground. From here, the plot takes a curious turn down Star Wars street, and if this cut scene doesn't remind you of Luke returning to Uncle Owen's farm on Tatooine, nothing will.

This brings me to my first issue with Sacred Odyssey– It's like the writers couldn't really decide if this is supposed to be a serious fantasy game, a pop culture parody game, or a comedy game. Dialog varies wildly from heavy-handed RPG cliches of foretold prophecies, to your fairy companion telling you that a mythical sword of the gods is "uber-sharp" and "begging to slice and dice". Meanwhile, you've got two horses, "Maya" and "Moto." It feels incredibly disjointed. The good news is, Gameloft's voice acting seems significantly better than previous offerings, so even though dialog is cringe-worthy at times, at least it's voiced well.

Solid dialog and plot lines have never been Gameloft's strong points, but thankfully, the actual gameplay in Sacred Odyssey is awesome. The game is controlled using a virtual joystick and variety of virtual buttons. Like most Gameloft games, these are all completely configurable, although I've had no issue with the defaults. Fighting works well, and unsurprisingly has a Hero of Sparta feel to it, with virtual buttons for swinging your sword as well as blocking or dodging if you hit the block button while holding the virtual joystick in the direction you'd like to roll. Combat is actually really fun, and you'll often find yourself in situations where you'll need to be evasive and defensive instead of just mindlessly mashing your attack as if it were an "I Win!" button.

Progressing through the main storyline involves taking various quests, which inevitably lead you to people who have other quests, and then eventually a dungeon. These dungeons often have puzzles which much like other Zelda-esque games involve sliding blocks around or using whatever item you just received to overcome obstacles. Of course no dungeon would be complete without loads of bad guys, and a massive boss at the end, two things you'll also find in Sacred Odyssey. Boss battles are a lot of fun, even though they can sometimes feel like going through the motions of "Oh hey, I just got this ability, time to use it over and over on this dude until he dies," but that seems to be the case for any game following this formula.

Aside from the main quest line, there are an ample amount of side quests too, although none of them that I've come across have been particularly engaging or offer good rewards. Still, it's cool that they're there, as they provide a bit of a distraction from just running from dungeon to dungeon. Along the way you'll also collect blue orbs, as seemingly everything spews them. These are used to purchase things from a vendor who follows you around. You can buy everything from simple potions, to potions that heal a larger amount of life, to extremely expensive power-ups.

While Gameloft isn't treading on any kind of new or original territory (as at times, Sacred Odyssey feels like a direct carbon copy of Zelda, Darksiders, or both) but there just isn't anything else like this on the App Store. We'll likely never see a real Zelda game either, so I suppose I don't really mind playing Gameloft's "highly inspired" version of it. If you love Zelda-style games, this isn't one you should pass up, especially to see what you think of Gameloft's new payment method.

What's going to be fun to watch is where Gameloft goes from here, as although I had a bunch of fun with Sacred Odyssey, it's hard to dispute the fact that the graphics do look a bit dated compared to more recent releases– Especially those utilizing the Unreal Engine. Also, it will be curious to see whether or not Gameloft sticks with this payment method for several reasons: They're now competing on the free charts, which is substantially more competitive than the paid charts. Sites like AppShopper don't (and can't) track sales of items purchased via IAP, as Apple doesn't offer this data as part of their third party App Store API. This means that all the people who save Gameloft games to a wishlist and wait for sales aren't going to get any notification. Last, but certainly not least, the IAP transaction requires an active internet connection on your device, which may be an issue for iPod touch users.

Regardless, I had a ton of fun with Sacred Odyssey: Rise of Ayden, and highly recommend any Zelda fan give it a try. You'll have a great idea of whether or not you want to continue by the time you hit the pay wall, and hopefully you're somewhere with connectivity so you can proceed past it.

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Free games make me happy on the inside, and I imagine they do the same for you. So, it’s with pleasure that I get to announce this: Pocket Frog developer Nimble Bit’s entire App Store catalogue is now available for the price of zero dollars. That’s right, from now until an “indeterminate time," you can download every iOS game that Nimble Bit has to offer for free.

We’re talking about over a dozen titles here, so I’ll be general with the following: our readers and ourselves pretty much have a universal love for everything Nimble Bit has to offer, so yeah, you should probably get on these ridiculous deals. I should note that, yeah, most of these games are free or have gone free before, but we’ve yet to see price-slashing on this scale from the studio.

That said, here’s the list:

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