TouchArcade.ru

A new studio founded by a duo of veterans responsible for titles like XCOM as well as a smattering of other originals like BioShock, Fallout: Tactics, and Freedom Force, have announced its first game, Epoch. It’s an arena-based, gesture-controlled cover shooter built with Unreal 3 for iOS devices. As you’d imagine, it looks beautiful — in that weird, post-apocalyptic desolate kind of way.

The premise of Epoch revolves around the mystery of civilization’s demise. You play as a robot soldier who reboots to find its world in shambles and, of course, patrolled by other robots who’d like nothing more than dig into your metallic innards. The official site for the game describes the combat as a mix of “intuitive finger swipes” and fast decision-making. I’m not sure how either of those things will translate to what we're seeing so far, so I’ve gotten in touch. Regardless, Epoch doesn’t appear as if it’ll come off as anymore casual than Infinity Blade [$5.99].

The game is set for a release later this year and, apparently, precise information on that is coming down the pipe. We’ll be keeping our eyes out for that information, as well the IP as a whole, as development continues.

[source]

Developer Cowboy Rodeo was kind enough to port the classic Amiga pinball game Pinball Dreams [$4.99/Lite] to the iPhone all the way back in February of 2009. The port was very good, with physics that accurately represented those of the original and ever so slightly enhanced graphics. In fact, Pinball Dreaming was almost better on the iPhone thanks to its elongated screen that didn’t need to scroll as much as the original did to show the entire table. Pinball Dreams was followed up shortly after by its sequel Pinball Fantasies [$5.99], which was given the same wonderful treatment in the transfer over to iOS as the first game.

Somewhat surprisingly, and nearly two and a half years later, Cowboy Rodeo is set to release a brand new remake of Pinball Dreams called simply Pinball Dreams HD. What differentiates this version from the original is that each of the game’s 4 pinball tables have been recreated using entirely 3D graphics. Fans of the original may cry foul at this notion, but the developer has clarified that the game logic is identical to the original game and should play exactly the same, and the new graphics are a cosmetic change only.

In the above images you can see the Steel Wheel table in the original iPhone version on the left next to a screen from the iPad version of the new Pinball Dreams HD on the right. Down below are 3 additional screens that show the new versions of the other tables in Pinball Dreams HD. Click any image to enlarge.

What prompted Cowboy Rodeo to remake Pinball Dreams after all this time? I really have no idea, but as a huge fan of both Pinball Dreams and Fantasies, I’m really interested to check out Pinball Dreams HD. Cowboy Rodeo has stated in our forums that Pinball Dreams HD is already submitted to Apple, so hopefully it won’t be too long before it’s released. If the new version turns out to be a success, I’d love to see the same treatment given to Pinball Fantasies down the line too. And hey, Cowboy Rodeo, can you please finally bring Pinball Illusions to the App Store while you’re at it?

[source]

Japanese mobile company DeNA has announced two new games for the Japanese market via its new-fangled social platform called “Mobage.” The names of the games should ring a bell: Infinity Blade X and Professor Layton Royale.

Professor Layton Royale is the product of an actual partnership with Level-5, the original creators of the series. Yet, I don’t think it’d be wise to expect Royale to be a full-fledged entry in the Nintendo DS franchise — it’s a crossover between Layton and Kaito Royale.

In a press conference the other afternoon, it was announced that users would be tasked with taking on the role of detective, as well as a thief and a citizen. That doesn’t sound too Layton-y to me, at least, but I suppose we’ll see for sure later this fall when it hits.

Infinity Blade X, on the other hand, is the Infinity Blade [$5.99 / HD] we all know and love — minus the whole “free to play” part. In a nutshell, on Mobage virtual items will serve as the way the game makes money; there will be no initial cost. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you won't be able to earn extravagant weapons and armor with in-game gold. You'll just be forced to buy them.

DeNA seeks to be a world leader in the mobile / social realm and it’s making huge strides by being aggressive and creative in the space. These two games are just the latest in a string of other moves that has made Mobage enticing in the East has us scratching our chins in the West.

[Via Pocket Gamer]

[source]

There are plenty of popular car racing games in the AppStore; Real Racing 2 [$6.99/HD], Death Rally [99¢] and Reckless Racing [99¢/Lite/HD] spring to mind, to name a few. However, moto-racing is less frequently represented, so it's nice to find a new game about Italian motorcycles which looks pretty sweet. Ducati Challenge [$3.99/HD] from Ducati and Digital Tales opens with a montage of Ducati motorcycles in action, complete with pumping music. If you're a motorcycle, Ducati or racing game enthusiast, check this out.

The game features three modes: Quick Challenge, Championship and Multiplayer. Quick Challenge allows you to practice before a race, to familiarize yourself with the bike and track. You choose the difficulty level and number of laps. Championship Modes include easy (4 races), medium (6 races) and hard (12 races), which must each be beaten in turn as they're locked initially. Each Championship begins with qualifying practice laps which determine who scores pole position, followed by the race itself. Multiplayer mode lets up to four petrol-heads race via a local wi-fi connection and works with a combination of iPhone and iPad devices.

Let's look at the bikes and tracks. You start with a 1100 Monster EVO , but can unlock other Ducati bikes by winning races, including a Hypermotard, Diavel, Multistrada, Streetfighter and Superbike model, which all feature in Ducati's actual product range for 2011. The roaring engine of each model was recorded live, giving each bike a unique and "true" engine sound. You can hear the gearbox changes. This all sounds better if you wear headphones, plus you'll also hear which side the opponents are approaching from. While you can unlock these bikes, there's no way to boost their attributes such as vehicle speed, acceleration, handling or damage, which makes sense given that you're actually racing real-world bikes. There are six tracks provided, including mountains, village, urban and desert settings. Each track can be raced backwards too, effectively making 12 tracks in total.

The retina graphics are excellent. During a race, you can see far into the distance, which creates a realistic landscape, but attention is also paid to little details. There's billboards, spectators, vehicles parked off-track, fences, stadiums, an ambulance and buildings and that's just the first track. When you mess up a corner (and you will) your wheel stains green from the grass. There are three settings for graphics: Low (no effects), Medium (anti-aliasing ie: smoothing) and High (adds motion blur). One minor issue with the graphics is that the wheel and bike shadow are indistinct, forming a black area beneath the bike. Camera angles can be set to first-person, behind-the-rider or rear-view perspective.

The controls include a combination of touch and tilt. Unobtrusive buttons are provided for brake and throttle and holding these down causes stronger braking or acceleration. Tilting the device leans the rider left or right. If you don't like tilt controls, smile, because touch controls are planned for integration in version 1.2, but it's not clear yet if this will be via buttons, screen touches or sliders. Two extra tilting moves are available: Accelerating and tilting forwards pulls a wheelie (you big show off!), while braking and tilting backward performs a "stoppie". The wheelies are an obvious highlight as they're easy to control, but you can still steer and it feels superb to pass between multiple opponents on one wheel. Yeah baby! Eat that.

How do the bikes handle? That's up to you. The amount of brake assistance provided is configurable (on, off or warning), so you can choose an arcade or simulation game style, to suit your taste. The hardest challenge is definitely the corners. Taking them at full throttle simply does not work, so it pays to brake early and accelerate when exiting the bend. Warning indicators appear on screen prior to each corner, which are color-coded to show the difficulty of the turn. You can ram other riders, of course, but that typically causes you to crash. And if you don't like the quality in-game music, simply play your own iPod tracks.

While this game has plenty of positives, there's a couple of issues. The menu keys are small and occassionally unresponsive, requiring multiple taps to register. The player profile name couldn't fit my full Game Centre name, so it was truncated by default. The circuits are quite long, which is fine when you're racing, but if you're half a lap behind – *ahem* – it can be a long and lonely circuit. A short and simple circuit would have been a better initial training ground. And some players have commented that the "feeling of speed" could be improved; although a motion blur update has recently been added. And lastly, bumping and grinding against other bikes currently feels and sounds clunky and repetitive.

Ducati Challenge proves that two-wheeled gameplay can be as good as the four-wheeled variety and the developers are still making improvements. This game is an easy recommendation for moto-racing fans, who will strive to unlock the latest official Ducati models and circuits while climbing the leader-boards. Personally, i'm playing to unlock the rest of the backgrounds, which look so good in the (above) trailer and along the way i'll probably pull some massive wheelies.

[source]

The Apple Design Awards are an annual event hosted at WWDC that seeks to recognize the best of the best applications and games across whatever Apple platforms Apple wants to elevate. In 2010 the Mac was snubbed, but in 2011 Apple flipped the script and gave it a place amongst the other two relevant platforms: the iPad and the iPhone.

The results of 2011’s awards show are now public. In the interest of our interests, we’ll be highlighting just the games that took the fancy little trophy Apple gave to winners. A few listing can be seen at sites like, say, TUAW.

iPhone

Cut the Rope [$.99 / HD] – Chillingo
Infinity Blade [$5.99] – Chair Entertainment

Mac

Anomaly: Warzone Earth [$6.99], – 11-Bit Studios

iPad

Osmos [$2.99 / HD], – Hemisphere Games

Infinity Blade and Cut the Rope are two fantastic titles that really stress the strengths of the platform. Both feel native and original and benefit from the unique platform. These are well-deserved winners, for sure.

Anomaly: Warzone Earth is a firm example of what you can do with a limited budget and a great idea. It’s a gorgeous “in reverse” tower defense title in which you’re charged with taking down towers with a small group of minions. Warzone Earth is geeked out with all sorts of fun sub-systems and unique points of design. This was a solid choice, too.

Osmos, on the other hand, is a laid-back experience that doesn’t require much from the owner. It’s an ambient game that looks beautiful and plays just as well on the iPad as it does on the PC and the Mac. Good one on Apple for recognizing this.

According to TUAW, the winners in these categories have are receiving a Macbook Air, an iPad 2, and an iPod Touch in addition to their trophy. I wonder if anyone at Chair is in a position to need free tech. From the sound of it, Apple should have given them flippers to swim through the pool of cash below the office.

[via TUAW]

[source]

We all had a suspicion that Infinity Blade [$5.99] was continuing to sell well at this point in its life, but we haven’t had a number to back us up. Now, we do. According to Epic Games and creator Chair Entertainment, the hack and slash third-person action game has raked in around 10 million dollars in earnings. That’s… a lot of games and in-game gold sold.

What gives, asks the indie developer with a good game that hasn’t accrued this kind of landmark dough? While Infinity Blade is a good game and a technical marvel to boot, it’s also had a heck of a lot of external support from two well-known entities: Epic and Chair. I think that helps to explain why it’s sold so much in so little time. It was also a flagship game for the UDK, which certainly drew some a lot of extra eyes to the project.

Epic released this number for a reason: it wants me, you, and every developer out there to know that there’s a market for core, Unreal Engine 3-powered titles out there. Mark Rein, Epic VP and co-founder, says in statement that Epic is “looking forward to our licensees achieving spectacular results of their own,” as if this perfect storm isn’t so perfect.

I suppose we’ll see.

[source]

Ever since the inception of the App Store, gamers have been crying out for an iOS entry in the ridiculously popular Monster Hunter franchise from Capcom. Indeed, the elements of exploring a huge world, hunting and fighting tons of different monsters, and crafting and collecting an assortment of loot to build up your character would be a great fit for an iOS game. Well, Capcom has officially announced that the series is appearing on iOS in the form of Monster Hunter Dynamic Hunting, reports Andriasang via Famitsu.

While this is definitely great news, die-hard Monster Hunter fans shouldn’t get too excited just yet. Monster Hunter Dynamic Hunting appears to be a fairly stripped-down version of what you would typically expect from the series. It focuses on one-on-one battles against the many popular monsters that have appeared in the game over the years, but based on the hands-on video from Famitsu it doesn’t look like it contains much of the exploration and RPG elements that the series is known for. Have a look:

At the end of the day, I can’t be mad to see that Monster Hunter is coming to the App Store, but it seems strange that Capcom is taking a watered-down approach to the game seeing as it’s been proven time and time again that a full-blown experience would be completely possible on iOS devices. Still, limited exploration one-on-one battling proved to be a great combination for Infinity Blade [$5.99], which Monster Hunter Dynamic Hunting looks very similar to. If it’s well done, then it may be a fun way to give fans a taste of the franchise while on the go.

Monster Hunter Dynamic Hunting is set to launch in Japan in June, and while there's no official word of a US release I'd imagine it will make its way here sooner or later. The lack of some of the fundamental elements of a Monster Hunter game is disappointing, but we’ll reserve full judgment until we’re actually able to play the game ourselves. Until then you can stop by the upcoming thread in our forums to voice your own opinion about the game.

[Via Andriasang]

[source]

Grab your whet stone app and find a virtual squire — you’ll need them, no doubt, to best the hordes of Infinity Blade [$5.99] slaves waiting for this bit of news. On this Thursday, May 19, the oft-promised competitive multiplayer update to Infinity Blade goes live alongside some new, though traditional content additions all for the generous price of $0.

The competitive online component has been dubbed “Infinity Blade: Arena,” but aside from its monster-versus-dude twist, point, usage of Game Center, and its titling, we still know almost next to nothing about it.

No worries if you can find the time to spare this afternoon, though. Game creator Chair Entertainment will be doing a special Facebook Q&A session this afternoon at 4:30 EST to answer these lingering pre-launch questions.

Back to those other content additions I mentioned: in addition to “Arena,” this content update will see the release of “two dozen” new rings, swords, shields, and helmets, as well as Facebook integration, and new achievements. Also, Chair will be dropping in a new Boss Rush mode called “Survivor Mode,” that’ll have you fighting against Titan after Titan in an attempt to get a high score. Oh, and holiday helms! Everyone loves those.

That’s one hell of a free content drop for any kind of game, right? I can't wait to hack you dudes up this Thursday.

[source]

Traditionally speaking, Ankama Games' Dofus series is best known for two iterations: the Flash-based MMORPG that was launched in 2004 and the Wakfu series of games which has seen iterations on Xbox 360 and an upcoming version for browsers. Dofus: Battles [$2.99 / HD] takes the pre-existing world and art style from the browser games and drops it onto iOS as a curious little tower, uh, dragon defense game with a set of RPG elements.

Despite the pedigree, you don't actually have to be familiar with Dofus to enjoy Dofus: Battles. Nor do you have to like MMORPGs, because this isn't one. It probably helps a bit to understand the character classes and items, but the uninitiated can pick it up quickly and without too much trouble.

Right out of the gate, after touching the horrendously designed icon, you'll be rewarded with a lavish visual style. The game takes the same three-quarters perspective, grid-based combat as its MMO lineage and despite a curious lack of retina support, character animations, menus and the interface are all well crafted, simple to use and nice to look at.

The game itself operates similar to Plants vs. Zombies, but the added RPG layer and the manner of unit variety means there is a different kind of strategy at play here. Instead of having a system where each unit counters the enemy evenly, you have a collection of twelve different heroes, half of which are support, the other offensive and you can choose any of them any time you want. Each has their own strengths and weaknesses, level up over time, can be fully armored and outfitted, have gender options and varying areas of effect.

It's a bit complex, especially when you toss in an entire economy system where you can buy and upgrade armor, weapons and other trinkets. None of the units are remotely similar either — so choosing a unit type to use and when is integral to setting up your strategy.

At the beginning of each turn, you'll place your units on a grid. Enemies walk down the grid toward your side of the screen, where a dragon is hanging out — if they get there, it's game over. To stop the massive bestiary selection from infiltrating your personal space, your twelve heroes each have different abilities — from the grunt with a one-block range to chop with his sword, to the magician who can call down giant-teethed sheep, you'll have a huge diversity of tactical options and combos to choose from.

After you place your team on the grid, you'll push play and the first wave of enemies will come down for some automated real-time combat. There are two different modes, wave defense and timed defense. As your heroes kill off enemy units, you'll be rewarded with soul fragments — collect five and you can add another hero to the field.

There are 28 different levels in the game and before each match you can decide which of three difficulties you'd like tackle it on. Each difficulty will yield different amounts of experience points, monsters, soul points and rewards. It might seem like a cop-out, but the fact you can drop it down to an easier level in order to progress is incredibly helpful considering the game does seem to retain one facet from RPGs that people are likely going to love to hate: grinding.

It's not as bad as a traditional, fully-fledged adventure-RPG, but there are certain levels that are near impossible to get through without going back and cleaning up some of the earlier ones for a second or third time. That's not to say fans of knuckle biting strategy can't get through certain stages on lower levels, but for those looking to strategize less and use brute force instead, you can grind your characters up instead of overclocking your brain to get the strategy right. The difficulty levels change the gameplay enough to warrant these repeated attempts and you won't be able to use the same strategy on easy as you would on normal or high.

For fans of weird, tacked on mini-games, you won't be disappointed either. Almost without explanation the game also features an odd accelerometer mini-game where you dodge enemies and a rhythm/music game ala Simon Says. Thankfully you can skip those.

The only major complaint I have comes from the equipment screen. Throughout the game, you'll pick up weapons and items and you can buy them if you choose — but this is the only part of the game where the interface feels unhelpful. It's hard to properly compare items and their statistical difference is usually so slight it's hard to justify spending you money on a weapon that only adds one point to your attack score. To be blunt, it would be nice to have an auto-equip function for lazy people who don't feel like comparing stats for a hundred different items.

The high production values and ridiculously in-depth history, bestiary and other reading material alone is enough to make Dofus: Battles an easy recommendation, so it's nice the game itself is actually enjoyable. The difficulty spike can be frustrating at times, but as long as you enjoy experimenting with different strategies or grinding for XP, it won't be much of a bother. It's doesn't have the entry-level appeal of something like Plants vs. Zombies, but if you're looking for a bit more depth in strategy or slightly more open gameplay, you'll certainly get it here, even if it comes at the cost of a high bar of entry.

[source]

Earlier this week Epic Games reported that LucasArts signed a multi-year studio-wide licensing agreement to utilize Epic's awesome Unreal Engine 3 across multiple platforms. According to Epic Vice President Mark Rein, “LucasArts is now primed to capitalize on Unreal Engine 3’s ability to scale across platforms, from mobile, through PC and console all the way up to the next generation of games.”

Now, I'm not entirely sure just how excited to get about all of this. Epic Citadel [Free] and Infinity Blade [$5.99] have done a great job showing just what the Unreal Engine 3 can do on the iOS platform. Technically speaking, if games are developed in UE3 with multiple platforms in mind, targeting iOS devices could all be part of the same development process that would result in Xbox 360, PS3, and PC games. Rein does specifically mention mobile gaming too, and there's no disputing the fact that iOS is a main mobile platform currently.

However, LucasArts really has yet to get that involved in the world of iOS. Their App Store catalog is fairly barren, and only consists of Monkey Island remakes. I'd love to think that we're about to get a bucket of amazing LucasArts Unreal Engine 3-powered games dumped on the App Store, but if this is just being announced now, it will likely be quite a while before we see any of the projects utilizing this engine.

Keep your fingers crossed, iOS-owning LucasArts fans!

[source]