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Last year we reviewed Spectre 3D [App Store] for the iPhone, Brilliant Bytes' remake of the classic, early '90s Macintosh 3D tank shooter Spectre from Peninsula Gameworks that oldschool Mac gamers likely remember as one of the most hardcore titles available at the time. Spectre 3D has recently received a major update that should notably broaden its appeal. What's more, its also on a limited time, 80%-off sale at a price of $0.99.

New features include:

• iPad support! A new HUD, control scheme, and interface
• All-new Arcade single-player mode
• High-definition Retina Display support
• Completely Re-balanced gameplay
• Game Center support

The original Spectre is a 3D, filled-vector tank battle game something akin to Battlezone. The simple objective was to drive your tank around various obstacle-filled battlefields collecting flags and dodging the fire of AI enemy vehicles. The game also supported local multiplayer over the Mac's integrated AppleTalk networking hardware. It was followed by Spectre VR, an overall enhanced, network-centric title. Both versions were highly rated at the time and were awesome to play on the Mac's relatively high resolution, color display.

Spectre 3D is a well-done remake featuring various single player modes and up to four players over local Bluetooth and up to 16 players over the Internet. It features an impressive degree of configuration options and stereo-3D via anaglyph stereographic glasses. It's an instant-buy title for anyone that enjoyed the game in decades past, and should be a lot of fun for those unfamiliar, as well.

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In celebration of the release of Final Fantasy III [$15.99], Square Enix is currently having a sale on just about every iOS game in their library. If you don’t fancy the 3D graphics in Final Fantasy III, now is a great time to pick up either of the first two Final Fantasy games or Secret of Mana for a more classic RPG experience. Of course if you do fancy 3D graphics and are in the mood for an iOS exclusive RPG, then Chaos Rings comes highly recommended. Check out the full list of links below:

iPhone and iPod touch games:

• Final Fantasy, $8.99 → $3.99
• Final Fantasy II, $8.99 → $3.99
• Chaos Rings, $12.99 → $5.99
• Secret of Mana, $8.99 → $3.99
• Hills and Rivers Remain, $4.99 → $1.99
• Crystal Defenders, $7.99 → $3.99
• Sliding Heroes, 99¢ → FREE
• Vanguard Storm, $3.99 → $1.99
• Voice Fantasy, $2.99 → 99¢
• Song Summoner, $9.99 → $4.99

iPad games:

• Chaos Rings for iPad, $15.99 → $7.99
• Crystal Defenders for iPad, $7.99 → $3.99
• Chocobo Panic, $3.99 → $1.99

There’s definitely some decent bargains to be had in this current sale on any of these Square Enix titles that you might not have picked up already. The sale will run until March 31st, so you have about a week to mull over your purchasing decisions before they bump back up to normal prices. And as always, you can use AppShopper.com, the universal AppShopper app [Free], or our price drops and freebies forum to stay up to date on all the best sales going on in the App Store.

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Right around this time last month, we learned that Final Fantasy III might be coming to iOS by way of a scanned image from Japanese gaming magazine V-Jump, and the very next day it was confirmed by a tweet on Square Enix’s Twitter account. Next we wondered which version of Final Fantasy III it would be, and this was also quickly discovered to be an enhanced remake of the 2006 Nintendo DS title, which itself was a remake of the original Japanese Famicom (NES) game from 1990.

Following along? Good, because it gets even more confusing. Most Americans fondly remember playing Final Fantasy III on their Super Nintendo, but due to Square skipping several Final Fantasy releases outside of Japan, what we know as Final Fantasy III on Super NIntendo is actually Final Fantasy VI chronologically. The 2006 DS remake marked the first time the true Final Fantasy III had been officially released in North America, and now an enhanced version of this game is available for download on the App Store.

Whew! Despite all the confusing backstory, Final Fantasy III is a highly regarded entry in the series. This new iOS version takes the 3D graphics from the DS and enhances them both with higher quality textures and support for Retina Displays. It doesn’t quite look as visually impressive as some games that have been built from the ground up for the power of iOS devices, but it looks far and away better than the DS version and the reworked controls for the touch screen work extremely well. A touch anywhere virtual analog stick handles character movement, and practically everything in the game from the menus to the battles themselves is tap friendly.

The big feature from this Final Fantasy that set it apart from most other RPGs at the time is the job system. You control a party of 4 members and have the ability to switch up each of their jobs, or classes, at any time. More than 20 jobs become available as you progress in the game, and each job will level up independently from the character itself, adding an interesting layer of strategy and variation to the combat. Also your character's appearance changes with the job you choose for them, and part of the fun is decking out your party with new digs, of which there are many different combinations.

Apart from the job system and shiny new graphics, Final Fantasy III is a fairly typical RPG. Not that this is a bad thing, as Square is a master of this genre, but it’s important to note that much of the gameplay retains the shortcomings of a game that was designed over 20 years ago. The story is the typical tale of a ragtag group of youngsters out to save the world from certain doom, but at the time of the original game it was pretty epic. Now it's fairly cliché and largely forgettable, but not terrible. Random battle encounters are abundant, and cannot be turned off. This is fine since there are points in the game where grinding is necessary, but it does really slow down the pace of the game.

Battles take place in true turn-based fashion, meaning you will preselect the actions of your characters and then watch them play out in front of you, followed by the actions of your enemies. It’s fun and very tactical, but again the whole process is slow and prevents the game from flowing well. It would be handy to be able to skip through some of the battle animations or the victory sequences if you wanted to, since battling is so frequent that these extra bits grow tiresome during the course of the game.

Another thing to consider is that Final Fantasy III is a brutally difficult game. You can save to a save slot when in the world map, which can be loaded at any time, or use a quick save while in dungeons which can't be loaded repeatedly and only serves to continue one time right from where you left off. So should you die at a boss after making it all the way through a dungeon, your only option is to load from your save slot and start the dungeon over from the beginning.

This sort of save system isn't as friendly as some more modern games, but it's how games were back in the day and it does prevent people cheesing the system and saving right before a particularly hard part. It's also worth pointing out that your exact state is saved upon exiting the game or receiving a call or text, which is an incredibly important feature to have in a game like this.

It might sound like I'm being pretty negative, but the truth is that I like Final Fantasy III a whole lot, as do many players in our forums, and the iOS version is definitely the premiere edition of the game. More than anything, I point out these shortcomings just so you're fully aware of what you're getting into. If you’re prepared to deal with some of the old-school RPG trappings contained in Final Fantasy III, then you’ll likely find it one of the best role-playing experiences in the App Store. But if you’re mostly used to newer RPGs and the advancements that have come with them over the years, then Final Fantasy III may be too retro for your taste.

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We've made several posts covering the games that we were shown at the EA Mobile / Chillingo media event that took place during GDC 2011. The last title we've got to share from that event is an ambitious twist on the tower defense formula called Anomaly Warzone Earth, coming from Polish group 11 Bit Studios, to be published by Chillingo for both iPhone and iPad

In 2018, the world stood in terror and watched as a giant comet flung from the heavens entered our atmosphere and slammed into the Earth. Impact point: Baghdad. Only, it wasn't a comet. Upon impact, the alien craft erected a gigantic dome, concealing the invaders' activities from all the world. It's up to you to command waves of Earth forces in order to penetrate the alien defenses and confront the otherworldly intruders.

Anomaly Warzone Earth is tower defense, but in reverse. Your forces, consisting of both ground and air vehicles, must battle their way through harsh batteries of alien defenses to ensure that our planet doesn't fall under alien control.

The game starts off by presenting a tactical planning screen where attack routes and equipment are chosen. From there, it's off to the battlefield where the real action takes place, rendered out in striking graphical detail, with positional 3D audio adding depth to the firefight. As your forces proceed through the Baghdad streets, a number of actions can be invoked, such as heal units, smoke screen, decoys, air attack, etc. And, at any time, your route can be altered back at the tactical map screen.

During the EA event, the game was demonstrated to me on both the iPad and the iPhone and I found the visuals and overall sense of destruction and mayhem that the game delivers to be quite impressive. And, while the above trailer video is for the Mac and PC version of the game, the iOS visuals are not far behind.

Anomaly Warzone Earth was an IMGA 2011 nominee for Most Innovative Game and is set to impact sometime next month.

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Last week we showed you the new trailer for Gameprom’s latest iOS pinball title War Pinball, and over the weekend the game went live in the App Store. It comes in two flavors, War Pinball [99¢] for iPhone and iPod touch and War Pinball HD [$2.99] for iPad. If you’ve been a fan of Gameprom’s iOS pinball titles over the past couple of years, you should be instantly familiar with the basic mechanics and layout of War Pinball. But this new game is easily their best effort yet, and besides containing 3 solid pinball tables within one app it’s also a great showpiece for owners of Retina Display devices or the new iPad 2.

The 3 tables in War Pinball are all based on MGM action movies from the 80s and 90s – Platoon, Navy Seals, and Missing in Action. Gameprom has done an excellent job putting these licenses to good use, and each table features visual elements, music, and sound bites that are appropriate to the movie it’s representing. Even the table missions follow along with the movies really well, and if you’re familiar with the basic plot elements from the movies you’ll get a kick out of seeing nods to them as you play through each table. As a quick note, there are several curse words contained in the voice samples taken from the movies, but there is an option to turn these off or set a password lock to restrict access to certain tables if you’re concerned about younger players being exposed to them.

Each table in War Pinball is rendered in full 3D and contains more complex designs than any of the previous Gameprom titles. The visuals are crisp and colorful, and look especially great on Retina Display devices. War Pinball HD is also optimized for the iPad 2, and it not only looks razor sharp on the larger screen but it runs at an absolutely insane frame rate, running fast and smooth without so much as a single hitch. I’ve always loved having an assortment of pinball apps on my iPhone in my pocket at all times, but in the case of War Pinball HD the performance is so impressive on the iPad 2 that it’s my preferred platform for playing the game.

One important factor in video game pinball games is the physics, and War Pinball feels very in line with previous Gameprom games in this regard. That is, the physics are very good for a video game simulation, but they don’t feel exactly like a real life pinball table. If you’re an absolute pinball purist you may not find them completely accurate, but they’re consistent and easy to adjust to, and are far better than many of the other video pinballs out there.

If you don’t have any experience with a Gameprom pinball game, you can download their first 3 games Wild West [Link], The Deep [Link], or Jungle Style [Link] for free during the next several days to get a good idea of what to expect from War Pinball. These games are all a lot of fun and worth owning anyway, and they can even be purchased as a single app called Pinball HD [99¢/HD] which contains all 3 games and the ability to unlock their fourth game Slayer Pinball Rocks HD [$2.99] as an in-app purchase.

While all of Gameprom’s pinball games are very good, War Pinball is definitely the cream of the crop. If you’re already of fan of their previous work, this latest game is an easy purchase decision as it contains 3 fun new tables that make great use of their movie licenses. If you need a bit of convincing, try any of their games currently being offered for free, and if you like them then War Pinball is an easy recommendation for an upgrade.

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There's been a shocking amount of crossover between the iOS world and the mainstream world lately. Both Doodle Jump and Angry Birds have tie-ins with major motion pictures, Angry Birds was (vaguely) featured during the Super Bowl and Cut The Rope even took home a BAFTA. When this is discussed on our forums, I've seen a few people seemingly jokingly mention that it won't be long before a game on the App Store has its own dedicated TV commercial. Well, that day is today.

The following commercial is now running on Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, MTV, Comedy Central, G4, and more:

We thought Pocket Legends was great in our review nearly a year ago. I had no idea that the game was big enough or successful enough for TV commercials until I met with the developers during GDC. Since our initial review, the game has seen several updates to add even more content and functionality. Now is as good of a time as ever to give Pocket Legends a spin, especially if you're looking to get a jump on the inevitable influx of players from this TV advertising campaign.

While the existence of this commercial itself might not seem like that big of a deal, this is a major step in legitimizing smartphone gaming as a mainstream gaming platform in the USA.

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Back in November, we reviewed a game called iTrials which we enjoyed quite a bit. It was a dirt bike stunt driving game with 2D gameplay and 3D graphics where the goal was to complete each of the 27 levels as quickly as possible while traversing the insane jumps, loops, and hazards of each. The physics were a bit crazy (but in a good way), the controls were solid, and iTrials offered an extremely fun experience that was akin to the Trials games by RedLynx on PC and consoles.

Well apparently iTrials was a bit too much like Trials, and RedLynx asked iTrials developer Tooko to remove the game from the App Store for fear that players might be confused and think iTrials was an official version of Trials that was endorsed by RedLynx. While Tooko seemingly used Trials as an inspiration for their game, they never set out to mislead anybody and really just aimed to make a great physics-based side-scrolling motocross game for iOS devices.

Tooko agreed to take the game down however, and worked amicably with RedLynx to make changes to iTrials that would differentiate it enough from Trials so as to avoid any confusion to customers. The result is the just-released MotoTrialz [99¢], a free update to previous owners of iTrials. The biggest changes are to the name and the location of the game, as MotoTrialz now takes place in an outdoor stadium rather than an indoor warehouse.

The 27 levels themselves are unchanged from the original version, but Tooko did take this opportunity to add a couple of nice enhancements to MotoTrialz. The game now features anti-aliasing that does wonders for the visuals, which we though were kind of jaggy in the original iTrials. Also, Agon has been replaced with OpenFeint as the online platform for the game. Unfortunately this means that none of your previous Agon scores or achievements will transfer over, but the reliability of OpenFeint is much more solid and Tooko is planning on taking advantage of the OpenFeint Challenge feature sometime in the future.

If you missed iTrials when it was available initially, now is your chance to jump all over this gem of a game now called MotoTrialz. The fact that Tooko had to spend time to make all of these changes is unfortunate, but the new MotoTrialz is an overall better game because of it. Now that the game is available again, Tooko will get back to focusing on new levels and enhancements for future versions of MotoTrialz. Players have really loved the game in our forums before, and there is a renewed buzz going since it has been rereleased in the App Store.

If you were a previous owner of iTrials, grab the update in iTunes to check out this new version (you can back up the .ipa file of the original iTrials on your computer to preserve it, as the update will overwrite that version). If this is the first you’re hearing of the game, MotoTrialz is highly recommended for fans of action-packed side-scrolling stunt racers, and yes, even fans of the Trials series of games who are looking for their fix on the go.

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All the way back in January of 2010, Ryan Mitchell Games released Necromancer Rising [Free], an RPG of impressive scale. Utilizing their own in-house developed "Soul Engine", the game comes packed with tons of content and customization while still being capable of running well on ancient iOS devices. The graphics look a little dated, but if you can get beyond that you'll be in for 60 hours of gameplay across 50 in-game dungeons with 49 different bosses.

Check out the trailer which shows a bunch of bosses, dungeons, and gameplay:

Anyway, the whole reason that this game is free is because of the launch of Mission Europa, a Sci-Fi themed title based on the same engine which has an additional year of development under its belt. Again, the graphics in Mission Europa are definitely rough around the edges compared to modern video games, but the amount of content and customization is crazy. The 50 hours of gameplay is comprised of 50 different levels over 5 episodes and 170 missions. Also included are 180 different enemies, 50 bosses, and 30 unique armor sets.

Give the trailer a look:

One odd thing about Mission Europa is that it comes in two different editions. First off, there's Mission Europa Collector's Edition HD [$9.99] and Mission Europa Standard Edition HD [$3.99] they seem to be the same game, but the Collector's Edition comes with all of the content while the Standard Edition has it for sale in-game via IAP.

It sounds weird, but people on our forums are absolutely in love with the game. It had a ridiculously huge thread in our upcoming games forum, and now that it's out there's an equally massive thread in our games forum. In addition, there's even a FAQ thread filled with forum members helping others with the game.

I'd definitely give Necromancer Rising a try first, as the game mechanics are similar enough that you'll easily be able to get a feel for whether or not you can deal with how the game feels before getting involved in Mission Europa. Either way, it's impressive seeing indie developers like this releasing games of this scope and scale, so swing by the forums and see what others are saying about the games.

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"The alien forces have arrived, but why are they dancing?"

It's to do with all the pixellated collaborative gaming goodness they're bringing to iOS gamers, I'm guessing.

During the mid-week TouchArcade party we hosted out at GDC 2011, Cole Krumbholz of Koduco Games walked up with his iPad and challenged me to a match of his then-upcoming PongVaders Max [App Store], a follow-up to PongVaders: Episode One, his studio's two-player, face-to-face, collaborative mashup of Pong and Space Invaders that sports a lovely retro aesthetic for both the eye and ear. The sad thing is, for one reason or another, we never covered the game. It was released back in August — and it's awesome.

The game presents a playfield filled with Space Invaders-style aliens bent on pummeling the cities that you and your playmate are defending with swipe-controlled Pong-style paddles at the far edges of the screen. Said playmate is ideally a human friend, but in-game AI can take on the task for the lonely gamer. But whatever the case, it's cooperative play — both players try to help each other destroy the alien horde.

The field of invaders in the center of the screen fire outwards, towards both players, and those shots can be repelled back upon them to turn their attacks into yours. Asteroid obstacles here and there make things especially challenging. An alien bolt deflected directly to the other player's paddle supercharges the volley and, along the way, various power-ups can be collected to gain special abilities. When the aliens dwindle, shots can be directed in slow-motion by tilting the device, making for some wonderfully animated (in the physical sense) two-player fun.

As mentioned earlier, the original PongVaders: Episode One [$.99] is an iPad-only release that hit the App Store back in August. The big news from Koduco is the release of PongVaders Max [App Store], which landed since our demo at GDC.

The original PongVaders: Episode One featured 10 levels plus a boss fight. After listening to feedback from users, Koduco created a remastered Universal version of the game that runs natively on both the iPhone and iPad, available for free with 10 bundled levels, with 20 more available as an in-app purchase (for $.99). PongVaders Max features tuned physics, power-ups, sound, and visual effects — still retro — along with rebalanced levels and a tutorial for beginners. The game includes new invaders, two more boss fights, and new music from Nullsleep.

If all we were talking about here was the original release, we'd be talking about an awesome game. But the new PongVaders Max takes it to the next level. As a free download with 10 included levels, there's no excuse for not grabbing this one for your iPhone or iPad right now — even if you have no friends.

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Let’s be real, here: Chair Entertainment could toss out a fart app on the App Store and make millions upon millions of dollars. Its previous game, Infinity Blade [$5.99] , is hot and people tend to flock to follow-up titles — regardless if they’re good or not. Chair wouldn’t sink that kind of money grabbing, though. That’s not how the studio rolls. Good design is tops, which is why we probably won’t see a Shadow Complex for iOS.

"I still cannot think of a way that we'd be able to bring over the precision controls [to touch screen devices] that Shadow Complex needs to be amazing," Mustard told Euro publication Eurogamer in a recent chat. "If you or any of your readers have some amazing control scheme idea that would work on a touch screen, let me know.

A few months back, Mustard kept the idea of Shadow Complex for the iOS open as a possibility in a conversation with us. If you read between the lines in the above, the man is still doing that. But, I think he’s becoming at least a little more frigid on the idea of a touch version of the Metroid-style action title, as he still hasn't figured out a way to translate the game to iOS.

"Shadow Complex is designed for a controller,” he told Eurogamer. “I'm not a fan of trying to shoehorn console controls onto touch screens. They don't feel right. You just lose so much precision." In his conversation with us, Mustard elaborated, “For me — this is what it comes down to, if it can't be amazing, then I don't want to do it. I don't want to shoehorn controls in. I don't want to force it.”

So, will we see Shadow Complex on iOS? No, probably not. It was a game made for the controller and the iPad and iPoud Touch, as miraculous as they are, do not have on-board, physical means of tactile control. That doesn’t mean we won’t see a Shadow Complex runner or a turn-based RPG, though… Oh, crap, I just got myself excited!

[Via Eurogamer]

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