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Back in October, Master Eli told you that Halfbrick Studios' Age of Zombies [$2.99] was a solid dual stick shooter, definitely worth its asking price. Eli doesn't lie; His words are worth their weight in Silver Dragoons. Now, we wouldn't normally throw disbelievers of Eli's Gospel bones, but today is as good of a day as any. Age of Zombies now has a Lite version on the App Store, which will allow you to play the game and evaluate it for free, if that review didn't do it for you for whatever reason.

Take note that this Lite version only showcases the first full chapter in the game, a prehistoric-themed romp. In it, you'll meet the "legendary" zombie T-Rex and even be able to unlock a level of the game's "Survival Mode," in addition to being able to upload your scores and earn Achievements.

In celebration of this release, creator Halfbrick Studios is handing out a little something special to owners of the actual game. Upon downloading the Lite version, you'll receive a bonus unlock code that, when used in the full version of the game, unlocks a "Hoverboard" similar to that one in those popular movies.

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Faithful followers of TouchArcade know this song and dance all too well by now. It seems that the cool thing to do is to set the release date of your game to a Thursday. This means that as soon as Thursday crosses the international date line, games become available in New Zealand. They then slowly filter out to the rest of the international App Store markets as it becomes Thursday for other people, until finally showing up in the US App Store at 11:00 PM EST Wednesday night. This creates a few awesome phenomenons such as everyone cluttering up every game thread with anticipation waiting for things to appear in their neck of the woods, and us having little to do on Monday and Tuesday, but I digress.

This week's haul of releases isn't anywhere near as huge as I was expecting, but we've heard from several developers that today was the last day to submit a game to have it approved before the end of the year. Next week will be insane with the release of Infinity Blade, and the first onslaught of pre-holiday approvals. We've already got a thread in our forum with some people estimating they'll be spending $100+ this month on iPhone games that's worth checking out if you want to get yourself hyped up for future releases.

Rockband Reloaded, $4.99 – Even more Rockband action. This time around you'll be able to sing along as well. Reloaded comes with 29 "free" songs, and additional songs available via in-app purchase.

Backbreaker 2: Vengeance, $2.99 – Similar to the previous Backbreaker, players run down the field attempting to avoid being tacked. A new game mode turns the tables and has you doing the tackling, and new obstacles have been implemented that you must jump over.

Hooga, 99¢ – A caveman platformer that reminds us a lot of Bonk's Adventure. It comes with a bunch of weapons, power-ups, and other goodies. If the controls work well, it should be really fun.

Miro: Color The World!, 99¢ – A physics-powered rolling game. From the looks of it, you're timed by how quickly you can roll around an object to color the world (as the title hints). 25 levels and online leaderboards are included.

Plant Tycoon, Free – I'm not really sure what to think about this game, as I dumped hours of my life in to it on my Palm Treo. It was a great game, with tons of history, which really has my scratching my head as to why it's free. Hopefully it's not laden with consumable DLC required for progression.

Kosmo Spin, 99¢ – The art style of this game is dripping with charm, and the game itself is packed with various objectives and achievements which hopefully will keep the seemingly basic gameplay fresh.

Scarlett and the Spark of Life: Scarlett Adventures Episode 1, $2.99 – A episodic point and click adventure game that's promising both an angry princess with a crowbar and a talking horse with a god complex. These types of games have worked very well on the platform, and I'm excited to play through this one.

All of the above links should begin working as soon as the games are available for download in your region except for Rockband Reloaded, as EA typically releases an international version and a US version of their games for some reason. We'll be taking a closer look at these games throughout the day.

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A couple of weeks ago we took a look at a teaser video for GameResort's Downhill Bowling 2 [Free], the sequel to the well-received Downhill Bowling [$2.99/Lite] that launched way back in January of '09. Earlier today, the game was released in the App Store as a free, ad-supported download. Downhill Bowling 2 has just about everything you would want from a sequel if you were a fan of the original game, but also has a few drawbacks that are hard to overlook. Still, it's a fun game that will keep you occupied for quite some time before conquering all it has to offer, and is worth a look.

The core gameplay in Downhill Bowling 2 remains the same as its predecessor. You steer a bowling ball using tilt or touch controls as it barrels down an outdoor course filled with all sorts of interesting obstacles and hazards. Throughout each course there are ten sets of bowling pins which you will need to knock down in between collecting coins, gems, and powerups. When you finally reach the end of the line, your score is tallied up based on how many pins you were able to knock down as well as how much loot you were able to collect.

It's a formula that worked well in the original Downhill Bowling, and comes with some enhancements in this sequel. The biggest addition is that you can now jump with your bowling ball, which allows for some more interesting level designs with various platforms and hazards which must be leapt over as you go. It almost feels like a third-person platformer at times, which is pretty cool. There's also some nice powerups you can grab which help you on your plight, like a rocket that boosts your speed or an item that turns you into a disco ball that doubles your collected points.

The game takes place in three distinct environments – Green Mountain, Wild West, and The Cave. There are 10 levels in Green Mountain, but unfortunately only one level each for the other two areas. It's obvious that GameResort will be adding additional levels to these environments, but it's still kind of a tease to only have one level in them currently. Levels are unlocked using coins that are collected during play, or if you are impatient, you can purchase packs of 1000 coins for a dollar each. The environments are much more lively and detailed than the original game, though sadly are not optimized for Retina Display. You also don't ever seem to gain as much speed in any of the levels as you did in the first game, which is unfortunate but just a minor gripe.

By far the thing I like least about Downhill Bowling 2 is the inability to disable the iAds. I'm all for the ad-supported model, but please give me a way to pay to get rid of them if I choose. GameResort has stated in our forums that they will consider this issue, as well as all other player feedback, for future updates. Aside from that quibble there is a lot to like about Downhill Bowling 2. Twelve well designed levels with Game Center integration for leaderboards and achievements, and more levels in the pipeline. As a free download, it's definitely worth checking out Downhill Bowling 2, especially if you enjoyed the first.

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Well here is a nice surprise. With Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and whatever other combinations of buzz words/days of the week you can concoct now come and gone, developer Halfbrick Studios still has a monster deal up their sleeve for thrifty shoppers. The iPad native version of their multi-million selling Fruit Ninja franchise has just dropped down to 99¢ for an extremely limited time. 24 hours limited, to be exact.

Most everyone is familiar with Fruit Ninja by now, as well as Halfbrick's penchant for releasing multiple updates that add new features to their games. Most recently, a brand new Arcade mode was added to both Fruit Ninja and Fruit Ninja HD earlier this month, and last September the iPhone version received head-to-head online multiplayer through Game Center. With the recent release of iOS 4.2, the iPad now has Game Center functionality and Halfbrick should be releasing a similar multiplayer update to Fruit Ninja HD soon.

If the recent holiday sale of Fruit Ninja HD for $2.99 still hadn't convinced you to pick up the title, then chances are that you will not be able to resist picking it up for 99¢. The price was just changed and is filtering throughout Apple's servers, so if you don't see 99¢ right away make sure to keep checking.

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EA recently made good on their promise made all the way back in July and finally implemented the iPad-exclusive "Vintage Voltage Football" mode in Madden NFL 11 for iPad [$12.99]. This new mode supplements the existing awesome football gameplay and all the cool new features (like Game Flow) that we loved in our review. The Vintage Voltage Football mode uses the existing football player models which stand in one position and look like figurines. The amount of effort that has gone in to this new game mode is incredibly apparent, as even the interface is dripping with retro charm.

In addition, Madden NFL 11 for iPad also had local multiplayer modes added. Now, two people with iPads and the game can play via either Bluetooth or WiFi. Even though this update did take quite a while to land, it's still cool to see EA releasing substantial updates to their games. Download this update right away.

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The onslaught of tower defense games seems as if it will never let up. Fortunately, when we're treated to something special like the recently reviewed Lord of the Rings or Guns'n’Glory, neither does our hankering for slaughtering wave after wave of enemies at the base of our towers. iBomber Defense [App Store] is Cobra Mobile's TD spin-off of their classic iBomber games on the iOS, taking you out of the cockpit and into the seat of Tower Master Extraordinaire.

Contrary to the abovementioned games, iBomber Defense is very true to the staple TD formula, on its face doing very little to toy with the basics. Instead, iBomber Defense concerns itself with tightening up the loose ends of games gone before it, by squeezing out a terrifically sharp look and interface, and really locking down a challenging campaign that will put your accumulated TD experience to the test. That's not to say that it doesn't innovate however, as iBomber Defense adds a few game-changing mechanics that you'll be wondering how you did without.

Primarily amongst these, is the ability to Rewind the current wave of creeps. This allows you to re-do your recent tower placement and upgrades and hopefully try to minimize your losses suffered by taking a fresh approach. Of course, this would be easily abused each wave, so the game restricts the amount of Rewinds you are allowed through a cooldown system. Secondly, is the impact that height has on the placement of towers. Towers placed on high ground are afforded a large range advantage, which is an essential tactical consideration to beat the more challenging missions.

The other major feature shows off its iBomber roots. All towers placed have their own life bar, and are attacked by enemies whenever they are within range. As expected, larger enemies pack more of a punch– such as when a fleet of battleships passes by– requiring you to micromanage your damaged assets and repair them lest they be destroyed completely. In another throwback to iBomber, aircraft are particularly devestating against towers and will take a more direct route to bombard your base. Other small additions purely functional, such as the ability to place and upgrade towers when pausing and the ability to zoom right out and easily pan the large maps and scan the multiple attack paths.

Of course, the highlight of TDs are the towers themselves. The iBomber Defense list of towers doesn't read long, but is definitely just as focused as the rest of the game. Machine guns are your standard fast firing towers, Cannons are the slower, AOE, anti-vehicle big-guns, AA launch flak at enemy aircraft, Sabotage towers fire mortar round that slows creeps, Comms increase the battle effectiveness of nearby towers and two specialist towers unlocked later in the game, the Firestorm and X-Weapon each have additional weapon effects that augment the damage of other towers. A victory point is rewarded for completing each mission, and an additional point is up for grabs for doing so perfectly. These can then be spent upgrading overall tower effectiveness between levels, augmenting the in-game upgrade system.

There are 22 levels all-up stretching across the Axis and Allied campaigns of Africa, Europe and Russia, each with their own iconic settings. The backdrops and graphics in iBomber are simply stunning (with some really meaty explosion effects), and thankfully textures are at their intended resolution when fully zoomed in. Another neat addition that spices up the level offerings come by way of routine Counter Attacks, which appear on the map over levels already played and offer bonus victory points. These depict offensive pushes by the enemy as they swarm over part of your already established defenses, and force you to defend a newly opened path on the map. In addition to the Campaign, there is a Quick Play mode with its own separate achievements to obtain per level, and 3 variable difficulties to play through.

iBomber Defense is undoubtedly the man's man of tower defense games. It doesn't overextend itself with a multitude of new fandangled features, but instead builds upon nearly every aspect of the existing TD foundation and just does it better. It's tough as nails even on the regular difficulty level, requires good forward thinking and strategic placement of gun embattlements, and also forces you to react quickly to multiple attacks happening simultaneously. It also has Game Center and Crystal support and is thoughtfully a Universal app which will definitely please iPad owners. In short, if you absolutely love tower defense games, then iBomber Defense is a tribute made just for you.

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Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays, and has been all my life. What's there not to love about an entire day revolving around eating massive amounts of turkey, stuffing, and all the other fixings? Sure, I could do without needing to feign interest in football, but thankfully tryptophan overload usually allows me to sleep through all of that. If you're looking for something to do this year while you do your best to either pretend to be interested in football or anxiously wait for the food to be done, there are a ton of sales on the App Store to consider.

The basis of this post comes from SirAwesome's awesome thread in our new price drops, freebies, and deals forum. He put together an extremely exhaustive listing of everything that's on sale, and the thread is good to stop by just to make sure you're not missing anything that might have since gone on sale since the writing of this post.

First off, here are some of what we consider must-have games that are on sale. We've positively reviewed all of these, and really recommend picking them up if you're going to grab anything from this price drop extravaganza-

Need for Speed Shift, $0.99 This is an absolutely fantastic arcade style racer that actually manages to capture almost everything that made the console version of the game fun. A must-have at 99¢.

ChuChu Rocket!, $0.99 A classic Dreamcast puzzle game that I paid full console game price for that I don’t regret one bit. A recent updated added a ton more content, making this a no-brainer for a buck.

Ravensword: The Fallen King, $2.99 This is the cheapest that this open-world RPG has ever been. It hasn’t exactly aged well compared to more recent 3D games (especially looking forward to Aralon) but it’s still a ton of fun and probably your best bang for the buck with hours upon hours of gameplay.

Defender Chronicles – Legend of The Desert King, $2.99 A cool twist on tower defense that has been updated a ton with all kinds of new content since its initial release. If you like tower defense and earning experience points, this is the game for you.

Harbor Master, $0.99 Harbor Master has been selling for $1.99 for quite a while now, if you missed the initial 99¢ launch price of this fun little content-packed line drawing game, here’s your chance to snag it again.

Jet Car Stunts, $0.99 Half racing game, half puzzle platformer. Pilot your jet car through a series of ridiculous jumps, twists, turns, and other obstacles. Retina Display graphics looks awesome, and the game runs fantastic on every device I’ve ever played it on.

Chopper 2, $2.99 This awesome sequel is loaded with all kinds of cool options, such as being able to control the game running on your iPad with your iPhone. Chopper had a huge fan following, and Chopper 2 doesn’t disappoint.

Game Dev Story, $3.99 If you’re looking for a game that will quite literally suck up your entire day (and battery in the process) look no further than Game Dev Story. Create your own game company, and even release your own game console eventually. It’s awesome.

And here's everything else we consider noteworthy that's on sale-

Namco

99¢
BIT.TRIP BEAT
BIT.TRIP BEAT HD
Dug Dug Remix
Galaga Remix
Garters & Ghouls
Gator Panic
Inspector Gadget
Isaac Newton's Gravity
Lt. Fly Rise of the Arachnids
Mr. Driller
Ms. PAC-MAN
Noby Noby Boy
PAC-Attack
PAC-Chain
PAC-Chain Compact
PAC-MAN
PAC-MAN for iPad
PAC-MAN Championship Edition
PAC-Match Party
PAC-Match Party HD
PAC-MAN Remix
Pole Position: Remix
Pool Pro Online 3
Pool Pro Online 3 for iPad
Star Trigon
Tamagotchi: Round the World
Time Crisis Strike
Tinseltown Dreams: The 50s

$2.99
Ace Combat Xi
i Love Katamari
Ridge Racer Accelerated

$4.99
Time Crisis 2nd Strike

Gamevil

99¢
Zenonia
Hybrid: Eternal Whisper
Soccer Superstars

$2.99
Zenonia 2
Hybrid 2
Baseball Superstars 2010

EA

99¢
Need For Speed Undercover
The Sims 3 Ambitions
Tetris
RISK : The Official Game
Monopoly
Monopoly Here & Now: The World Edition
SimCity Deluxe
Need for Speed Shift
The Sims 3 World Adventures
Scrabble
The Game of Life Classic Edition
The Simpsons Arcade
Reckless Racing HD
Yahtzee HD

$4.99
Rock Band
Mirrors Edge for iPad
Scrabble for iPad
Madden NFL 11 for iPad

Gameloft

99¢
Let's Golf!® 2
NFL 2011
Hero of Sparta II
Iron Man 2
Brothers In Arms® 2: Global Front
UNO™
The Settlers HD
Splinter Cell Conviction™ HD
GT Racing: Motor Academy HD
Brothers In Arms® 2: Global Front HD
Iron Man 2 for iPad
Let's Golf! 2 HD
Hero of Sparta 2 HD
Prince of Persia: Warrior Within HD

$4.99
Real Golf 2011

Big Pixel Studios

99¢
Meow Meow Happy Fight
Meow Meow Happy Fight HD
Piyo Blocks
Piyo Blocks 2

Glu

99¢
Deer Hunter 3D
Paperboy: Special Delivery
Build-a-Lot 2: Town of the Year
Build-a-Lot 2: Town of the Year HD
World Series of Poker Hold'em Legends
World Series of Poker Hold’em Legend for iPad

Sega

99¢
Chu Chu Rocket
Phantasy Star II
Golden Axe

$2.99
Super Monkey Ball 2: Sakura Edition
ChuChu Rocket HD

$4.99
Sonic The Hedgehog 4™ Episode I

Bootant

99¢
Victory Day
Crazy Tanks
Pirate Waters
BeeCells HD

$1.99
Victory Day HD
uBoot HD
Crazy Choppers HD

99 Games

99¢
Wordsworth
Mystic Emporium
Christmas Sudoku
Create a Mall
Wordulous
Create a Mall HD
Mystic Emproium HD
Christmas Sudoku HD

Chillingo

99¢
Billabong Surf Trip
Radio Flare REDUX
Radio Flare REDUX HD
Ravensword: The Fallen King
Parking Mania HD
Defender Chronicles – Legend of the Desert King
Master of Alchemy
Master of Alchemy HD
Fiona’s Flowers

$1.99
Cogs HD

Everyone Else

Free
Chop Chop Runner
Depict

99¢
Harbor Master
Mr. Bill
Jet Car Stunts
Cabela's Dangerous Hunts 2011
Rapala Pro Bass Fishing
MovieCat!
Fantastic Contraption

$1.99
The Secret of Monkey Island Special Edition for iPad
Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: LeChuck's Revenge for iPad

$2.99
Chopper 2
Game Dev Story
Fruit Ninja HD
Fantastic Contraption 2
Ragdoll Blaster 2 HD

$4.99
Crimision Gem Saga
UFC Undisputed 2010

• All popular games on sale.
• All games on sale.
• All popular games that dropped to free.
• All games that dropped to free.

Also, to see iPhone, iPad, or Universal games just click the respective buttons on the top left of the AppShopper listing. Oh, and if you haven't yet, be sure to check out the AppShopper App [Free] itself. It's got push alerts and all kinds of other slick features so if what you want isn't on sale this time around, you will get a push alert as soon as it is.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

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Adult Swim is getting in to the holiday season by releasing two Christmas-themed games, Robot Unicorn Attack Christmas Edition [99¢ and Amateur Surgeon Christmas Edition [Free]. Following in the footsteps of previous games, Robot Unicorn Attack Christmas Edition plays nearly identical to Robot Unicorn Attack [$1.99], Robot Unicorn Attack Heavy Metal Edition [$1.99], and Robot Unicorn Attack HD [$2.99]. The main difference with this game is the inclusion of Game Center support as well as holiday themed graphics and music by The Darkness.

Similarly, Amateur Surgeon Christmas Edition plays just like Amateur Surgeon [99¢ / Lite / HD] and Amateur Surgeon 2 [99¢], only with holiday themed tools and surgeries. If you've never played an Amateur Surgeon game before, you should really snag this as it's an excellent Christmasy introduction to the dark humor of the rest of the games.

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Now this is a press release that I didn't think I'd ever see, as both Sonic the Hedgehog 2 [$5.99] and Streets of Rage [$2.99] were just updated to support full multiplayer co-op modes via Bluetooth. To play, you'll obviously need two devices, each equipped with Bluetooth and their own copy of the game. In Sonic, players will be able to play through the game together with one person controlling Sonic and the other controlling Tails. In Streets of Rage, players will fight together through the game as they purge the streets of bad guys.

It's incredibly cool to see both of these games updated, as it means that Sega has been working on improving their Genesis emulator, which as we've mentioned several times in the past leaves much to be desired. With Bluetooth multiplayer working, my imagination is running wild with two player games I'd love to see Sega bring to the App Store. If you own either Sonic 2 or Streets of Rage and know a friend who does too, snatch up these updates as soon as possible.

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Last month we came across some interesting news about an iOS version of the upcoming Dungeon Defenders game that will be launching for PC/Xbox Live/Playstation Network early next year. Dungeon Defenders is a tower defense game with a healthy dose of action/RPG elements thrown into the mix, though at the time of our preview there were scant details available about the looming iOS version of the game. Late last night, developer Trendy Entertainment released a brand new video of the mobile version of Dungeon Defenders, which will be called Dungeon Defenders: First Wave.

While the core gameplay of Dungeon Defenders: First Wave appears to be rooted in the tower defense genre, players will seemingly have a ton of freedom to roam around the battlefield using their created character, giving it an added action/RPG element. The characters you create will also be able to transfer to the PC version of the game for cross-platform play, though this feature won't make it to the more closed Xbox or PS3 versions. Also included in the description of the video is that Dungeon Defenders: First Wave will be powered by Unreal Engine 3, which explains why this video looks so gorgeous and very near to its console counterparts:

Other tidbits of information that can be found in the upcoming games thread in our forums is that Dungeon Defenders: First Wave will launch around the middle of December for $2.99 with an accompanying lite version. The game will support Game Center for achievements and multiplayer between iOS devices, and will support Retina Display. Like many of the more advanced titles coming out as of late, Dungeon Defenders: First Wave will only be available for 3rd generation devices and above, including the iPad. This definitely looks like one of the more interesting titles to be hitting the App Store this year, and we'll be looking forward to bringing you more information on Dungeon Defenders: First Wave when it releases next month.

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