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This afternoon I met with the guys from Taito outside of the west hall of E3. Unsurprisingly, they have quite a bit on their plate right now both between updating their existing games, releasing new ones, and promoting an odd array of Space Invader themed utilities. Originally I was rather confused, both wondering why Taito would release these utilities and who would download them… Then I realized exactly who would download them– The army of people with severe Space Invader fetishes like our own Blake Patterson.

These utilities all have been done before, but never with a Space Invaders theme. They're all free, and the calculator is actually pretty cool with various easter eggs if whatever you're calculating results in certain special numbers such as 1978, 41, and 10 others. They all include various advertisements for Taito games, and there is a 99¢ version of the calculator that strips these ads.

• Space Invaders Clock
• Space Invaders Battery Meter
• Space Invaders Business Card
• Space Invaders Calculator (Ad-Free Calculator, 99¢)
• Space Invaders Timer
• Space Invaders Flashlight
• Space Invaders Timer

Gardening Mama is in the works, an iPhone port of an existing Nintendo DS game. Just like Cooking Mama [$6.99 / Free], Gardening Mama will use the touch and tilt interfaces of the device to plant and cultivate various plant life instead of cooking. All we need now is a way to hook the two games together so you can cook in Cooking Mama with the ingredients you grow in Gardening Mama. Gardening Mama is still in development, but they expect it to be released later this summer.

Space Invaders HD is scheduled for release in July, and is going to be the classic game of Space Invaders redone for the iPad. It's a little hard to not roll your eyes at a "HD" version of a retro game like this, but they've actually done quite a bit to make the game really cool. Most notably is a single device two-player mode that works just like the cocktail table arcade machines, with players taking turns and the screen orientation switching just like back in the day.

Taito is using Space Invaders HD to test the waters before determining what else to do with the iPad, but not having "HD" versions of their existing games shouldn't dissuade you from checking them out on your iPad. The pixel art used in their iPhone games all look great with the iPad's scaling.

The next retro classic Taito is bringing to the App Store is Bubble Bobble, and I doubt I'm alone in hoping this game gets the same amazing treatment as Space Invaders did in Space Invaders Infinity Gene [$4.99]. Today all they were able to show is a basic demo of the game running with touch controls, but they assured me that Bubble Bobble for the iPhone would feature both a "retro" mode, and a new game mode they weren't willing to talk any specifics beyond telling me to not "expect something just like the original."

Moving on to game updates, Taito is committed to updating their popular games, both either through free updates or via in-app purchases. Cooking Mama has already had a few updates with new recipes, and there are even more coming. Taito is even debating recipe packs, potentially with seasonal or holiday themes.

Space Invaders Infinity Gene is getting a huge update, with both free and paid components. Everyone who owns the game will get access to a new ship, and the ability to turn the game sideways to shift the perspective in to a horizontal shooter. In-app purchases will be available to unlock different themes for the game.

These themes include Darius, Metal Black, and Night Striker. Each theme comes with their own unique ships, bosses, and remixed music that any fans of the original games should instantly recognize. Taito hopes the update will land on the App Store sometime next month.

As I mentioned before, they've got quite a bit in the works at Taito, and it's hard to not look forward to their future efforts on the platform especially with how great some of their recent releases have been– Especially Space Invaders Infinity Gene.

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Originally released in late 2008, Pangea Software's Enigmo [$1.99] is about as close as you get to a classic App Store puzzle game, even though it started its life as a Mac and PC game all the way back in 2003. The original Enigmo has won numerous awards including "Best iPhone Game" at Apple's WWDC in 2008 as well as winning the 2008 Austin GDC Independent Games Festival Showcase. In other words, Enigmo for the iPhone is great, and its sequel, Enigmo 2 [$1.99] is just as good if not better. So, it stands to reason that their iPad game, Enigmo Deluxe [$6.99] is also in line with what we've seen in the past from Pangea.

If this is the first you've heard of the Enigmo games, the basic gameplay mechanic involves placing different things in the game world to route liquid from the origin dropper to the jar of the same color. This can mean placing a platform to change the angle the liquid is falling, then placing a bumper to bounce the liquid higher, then placing a sponge to collect the liquid and drip it in to the jar.

The farther you get in to the game the more and more elaborate these puzzles become, until you eventually just get stuck and find yourself hopelessly pouring over Google search results for hints if you're anything like me. As I already mentioned, I liked the original Enigmo a lot, but levels that required tons of different items to solve almost always involved some frustration with the controls as you're always zooming in and out to accurately grab and maneuver things around the game world.

Among the other improvements of the iPad version, having the extra screen real estate to never really need to fiddle with the zoom level too much while always being able to manage the pieces in game has made playing Enigmo a lot less frustrating. Fat-fingering the wrong item and breaking your wacky Rube Goldberg machine of liquid redirection was always a little irritating, and this seems to be a thing of the past on the iPad.

Other improvements include an impressive level editor that allows you to share your creations with any other version of Enigmo via the File Sharing functionality in iTunes. These level packs are even cross-platform, so you can send your levels to a friend who has the PC version or vice versa. A number of third party level packs are already included, and if you're the kind of person who gets in to creating and trading custom created levels, I could see really getting sucked in to Enigmo Deluxe.

If you loved the iPhone version of Enigmo and see yourself getting involved with the custom level packs, Enigmo Deluxe is worth the upgrade. However, if you missed Enigmo the first time around, and enjoy challenging physics puzzles, look no further than Enigmo Deluxe for the iPad.

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Disney Interactive's arcade racing collaboration with Black Rock Studios, Split/Second [$6.99], hit the App Store tonight and so far seems remarkably similar to the version we previewed last week:

Developed in house utilizing scaled down versions of the assets from the XBOX 360 and PS3 version of the game, Split/Second for the iPhone is a fun racing game with a great sense of speed and a cool gameplay mechanic that involves blowing up portions of the track to change the layout of the course and sabotage opponents.

In Split/Second, you compete in a fictional reality television show where you compete for fame and fortune. Included are three gameplay modes: Season mode where you play through the TV show, quick race where you can play any unlocked track, and multiplayer mode which not only can be played locally via bluetooth and WiFi but also online.

The main gimmick of Split/Second is the powerplay system. Racing through the game, a gauge near the back of your car slowly fills up in three segments. Doing things like drifting, drafting opponents, and just generally racing as aggressive as possible increases your powerplay meter. You can then spend this powerplay energy to initiate various explosions throughout the track to take out enemy racers as well as significantly altering the track itself. This can result in debris and track damage that you must dodge and avoid in subsequent laps. The game offers 3 types of modes throughout: Detonator, Elimination, and Race. Detonator pits you against the track itself in which all possible explosions occur during your run. You just need to finish in the time allotted. Elimination is an aggressive quick-elimination mode where the trailing car is eliminated at regular intervals. Finally, Race is self explanatory. Controls are limited to auto-acceleration, tilt control and manual braking with multiple button layout options.

As some commenters mentioned in the preview post, the powerplay gauge increased very slowly in the preview build. This seems to have been tweaked to be more in line with the console version of the game and it seems rare that I'm ever really starved for powerplays.

Unfortunately, the other issues mentioned in the preview still remain. While the game itself is a fast arcade racer with a neat gimmick, it almost seems like too much was sacrificed when compressing the game down from the XBOX 360 or PS3 to the iPhone. So many of the visual effects are missing, and even the biggest explosions aren't nearly as exciting.

In comparison, when playing the full console version of the game, you're constantly dodging explosions and other environmental obstacles launching themselves in the middle of the raceway. On the iPhone, this explosion mechanic isn't anywhere near as prevalent as it should be in a game that tries to be based around adrenaline-pumping explosions around every turn.

Split/Second for iPhone does come with online multiplayer, but since it just launched this evening, it's too early to say whether or not this will become popular enough to sustain itself.

While Split/Second for iPhone can be a fun arcade racer, App Store racing staples like Real Racing [$4.99 / Free] and Need for Speed Shift [$6.99] are just flat out better technical racers. As such, Split/Second isn't a must have but may appeal to those looking for a different and far more arcade-y racing experience.

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The sequel to arguably the best soccer game on the iPhone is now available, and it's even better. X2 Soccer 2010 [$6.99] brings improvements to graphics, controls, computer AI, new game modes and more teams.

X2 Soccer 2010 has over 150 club teams to choose from in 10 different leagues, plus international teams from all over the world. This includes U.S. Major League Soccer, Spanish, English, French, Italian, German leagues and more. There are a vast amount of more teams than last years version to play with.

The six game modes are Quick Match, Penalty Shootout, Training, Tournament, Dream Team, and Multiplayer. In Tournament mode, there are 30 tournaments to compete in to win and collect the cups to keep in your trophy room. In the all new Dream Team mode, players must use their skills to create the ultimate team of their own. You start out with poor quality players and work at improving them by competing in Multiplayer, Tournament and Quick Match modes for tokens. These tokens can then be used to scout and recruit quality players from across the globe, to help create the ultimate Dream Team. And Multiplayer mode is where you can play against a friend on local wifi, bluetooth connection, or in a new online option to play against people all over the world. The online option works surprisingly well, but obviously depends on your internet connect for best results. Playing online does not work over 3G or EDGE networks, so you must be connected to a wifi network to play.

The control layout is essentially the same as X2's previous game, with a little refinement. You'll find the virtual floating joystick on the left and the three 'X2 S.M.A.R.T.' buttons in the bottom right corner. The three buttons are slightly adjusted and re-positioned, but offer the same great control system. Of all the soccer games, this layout is my favorite, rather than the traditional "A" and "B" buttons offered in the others. Each button has its own ability depending on if your attacking or defending, with options of pass, lob, cross, one-two, through ball, and shoot on attack and pressure, slide tackle, switch player, and goal keeper charge on defense. The buttons can be tapped, double tapped, or held down for the more advanced controls. When a button is pressed, a power bar appears above the player signifying the level of strength to be used. I don't find the controls to be confusing at all. They are both easy to use for beginners yet fully functional for skilled players.

The game also has enhanced defensive and offensive AI players. The AI players are much smarter now, forcing you to play smarter. If you are finding the game a little easy as you get better, you can ramp up the difficulty in the settings to easy, good, hard, or expert. You have full customization on the settings from what is displayed on the screen while playing, weather, rules, stadium, commentary, replays, favorite team, team/player names and more. There is also a crawl on the bottom of the screen with real life information coming from an RSS feed that you can edit, the default one gives you lots of great soccer information that is going on in the world.

The full 3D graphics are much improved and even more impressive than X2 Soccer 2009, which were already top notch. X2 Soccer 2010 runs super smooth while playing on my iPhone 3GS and there are also 3GS-specific optimizations that were made to accommodate the faster hardware. Some 3GS users are reporting that they are experiencing some lag in their games, but I haven't experienced any. Meanwhile, reports from other device users seem to be fine.

Overall, X2 Soccer 2010 is one of the top soccer game experiences right now on the App Store. Konami will have a tough time out doing X2 with their upcoming Pro Evolution Soccer 2010 game. You will not be disappointed with X2 Soccer 2010, if you are holding out for an enjoyable soccer game, look no further.

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X2 Games, makers of X2 Snowboarding [$1.99 / Free] and last year's X2 Soccer 2009 [$4.99 / Free] just released this year's version of their amazing full 3D soccer game, X2 Soccer 2010 [$6.99].

Soccer fans on our forums are going crazy over this year's iteration of X2 Soccer, and I've got to agree with the positive reactions forum members are having playing the game. X2 Games took everything that was great about the original X2 Soccer 2009 and added new game modes, even more teams and competitions, further refined controls, better graphics across the board as well as 3GS-specific optimizations, and even smarter AI.

On top of all that, X2 Soccer 2010 comes with a full suite of multiplayer options covering local WiFi or Bluetooth as well as online multiplayer which actually works shockingly well for a fast paced sports game. The in-game commentary is decent, there are different weather effects, and if something cool happens in your game you can even save the replay.

We'll have a full review up shortly, but in the meantime, it would be difficult for our initial impressions of X2 Soccer 2010 to be more positive.

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Released last month, Scarface: Last Stand [App Store] is an on-rails third-person shooting game themed after the final scene of the 1983 cult classic movie Scarface. With slightly clunky controls, middling graphics, and fairly repetitive gameplay it was hard to recommend at the initial $6.99 price point unless you were a diehard fan of Scarface. Well for today only, the game is available for free as part of FreeAppADay.com. Despite it's drawbacks, there's plenty of content in Last Stand and it has some fun moments, and is definitely worth taking the time to download while free.

The game takes place during the end of the movie's plot when main character Tony Montana has an army of assassins sent to his mansion to kill him after double crossing his Bolivian drug lord boss. Not the best situation to be in. You control the aim and firing of Tony as he fends off attacks from every direction. An analog nub in the left corner controls an onscreen cross-hair and a button on the right fires your weapon. Tony automatically moves to different points in the mansion as you aim and fire at oncoming waves of enemies. It works decently, but the aiming is too imprecise to be very effective. An auto-aim option alleviates this, but takes away much of the challenge. The gameplay can be entertaining for a while, but eventually becomes monotonous as you play in the same parts of the mansion with the same enemies over and over.

Although the play experience is not stellar, there are a lot of standout features to Last Stand, especially for fans of the movie. While the graphics are none too special, the little details of the mansion interiors and Tony's extravagant office are fairly accurate to the film. Voice samples are taken directly from the movie and feature many of the popular profanity laden quotes from Tony. There's a nice arsenal of different weapons to unlock and use that somewhat spice up the gameplay and, as a nice touch, the gun firing sound effects seem to be sampled directly from the film as well.

In addition to the 30 level Arcade mode, there's a Survival mode, a number of achievements and wallpapers to unlock, online leaderboards, Facebook connectivity, and statistics for every level. In other words, there's a lot of stuff to do. If you're a fan of the movie Scarface, or just looking for some simplistic shooting gallery-type action, Scarface: Last Stand is worth a download during today's free promotion.

App Store Link: Scarface: Last Stand, Free (today only, regular $6.99)

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Gameloft's take on the Resident Evil series hit the App Store moments ago. We first got a look at Zombie Infection [$6.99] back at GDC where we got a brief hands-on session with the game. Zombie Infection will have players rampaging through South America slaying zombies of all kinds (even zombie zoo animals) across 12 levels which come packed with everything you'd expect out of a Resident Evil-inspired game including a pair of characters to play as, giant bosses, and plenty of gore.

The recently released trailer sets the scene and shows several brief clips of gameplay footage:

See our discussion thread.

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Originally released on the Nintendo DS in late 2008, Skate It by EA Games is something of a portable semi-sequel to the original Skate game for Xbox 360 and PS3. It utilized the DS's touch screen to mimic the unique gesture based Flick-it controls of it's console brethren, and delivered a relatively robust experience for such a small package. Now, coinciding with the console release of Skate 3 this week, the iPhone version of Skate It is now available. It's an experience that's virtually identical to its DS counterpart in content, but vastly superior in graphics, ease of use, and overall presentation. A relatively difficult learning curve will likely turn off many players initially, but those who persist will be rewarded with one of the finest portable skateboarding games available.

The bulk of the game takes place in a Career mode that spans 20 separate levels, 13 taken straight from San Vanelona (the fictional city featured in Skate) and 7 levels based on real life locations that are exclusive to the Skate It series. It's not one big open world like the console games, but each level is fairly large and filled with plenty of challenges and skateable terrain. New goals are constantly unlocking as you progress, and the Career challenges are all interesting and varied. You'll perform specific tricks for photos, play S.K.A.T.E. against AI skaters, enter high score contests, and more. There's even challenges that have you participating in checkpoint races against other skaters across the map, which proved to be especially fun. The graphics of the iPhone version utilize much higher resolution textures and a smoother framerate than that of the DS. It's much more visually appealing now, but oddly the actual skater animations when performing tricks seem a lot more fluid on the DS.

While there's certainly a great deal of content in Skate It, whether you'll be able to enjoy it or not ultimately depends on if you can get behind the control scheme. Tilting the device left or right steers your skater in either direction, tilting the screen away from you crouches the skater, and tilting towards you slows down. There's no option for touch controls to perform any of these actions. I'm not generally one that likes tilt controls in games like this, and it took me a good hour of practice before I started to really feel comfortable with it. Some may pick it up much quicker, others may never quite take to it. Once you get it down though, it's a far more immersive experience than a virtual analog stick and actually quite enjoyable.

As for the onscreen Flick-it controls, they have been implemented fairly well here and are far easier to utilize than they are on the DS. Holding that system with one hand while awkwardly trying to wield a stylus to perform touch screen gestures was an exercise in frustration. On the iPhone however, it feels very natural to draw the various trick motions using your thumb or index finger while comfortably holding the device. The amount of different maneuvers you're able to perform with this system is incredible, and although touch recognition is a little spotty sometimes, pulling off tricks in Skate It is a blast. One welcome addition in the iPhone version is Trick Mode, the ability to slow down time while doing a trick. Placing your finger on the screen slows everything down (how slow can be configured in the options), affording you more time to draw the correct gesture. It works really well and helps ease new players into the Flick-it system if you're not familiar with the Skate series.

A huge advantage Skate It has over it's competitors, namely Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, is a large focus on customization. Your avatar for Career mode can be personalized with different faces, clothing, and skateboards. An editor allows you to draw your own logos or board graphics simply by drawing on the screen, and then apply them to your character. There's the option to listen to your own iPod music while playing, although the included soundtrack of licensed songs is very good. Also, there's a fairly robust park editor that let's you set up many different obstacles to your liking in a large warehouse. You can save up to three different created parks, but due to a lack of any online component, you're unfortunately not able to share these parks with other people as in the DS version. Still, creating parks adds an infinite amount of replayability and potential for experimentation. Different park objects and items for your character are unlocked as you progress through the Career, giving you incentive to complete the game's challenges.

In the end, Skate It for iPhone greatly improves upon the already impressive game that was found on the DS a year and a half ago. A lot of care has gone into suiting the entire experience to this platform, and the simple fact of not needing a stylus goes a long way in making it more accessible. Whether or not it takes the current skateboarding crown from THPS2 will largely be a matter of personal preference. Skate It wins in content, graphics, and customization but has a steep learning curve with the controls that may never feel comfortable to some. THPS2 is slightly smaller in scope, but has familiar controls and ten years worth of nostalgia on its side. Honestly, they're both fantastic games that are worth your time. If you're looking for a more realistic portrayal of skateboarding and are up to the challenge of learning the controls, Skate It delivers a wealth of content with style, and is easily recommended for skateboarding fans.

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Just like Freeverse's recently released Warpgate [$4.99 / $6.99 (HD)], Flick Baseball [$2.99] has had a development cycle that borders on legendary for an iPhone game. We first heard of the game in a guest article by Freeverse developer Mark Andersson, and didn't actually see it in motion until a few months later when we played a very basic (and different looking) build of the game at WWDC. Later, we posted a preview trailer that had such an impact on Baseball fans around here that it seemed to slightly overshadow the release of Gameloft's Derek Jeter Real Baseball that popped up on the App Store in the following weeks.

After our preview from last week, I've spent a considerable amount of time with the game. Essentially, if you're looking for an in-depth 3D baseball simulation game, you're going to need to keep waiting– But if you're like me and prefer sports games that have an arcade feel to them, then you'll enjoy Flick Baseball.

Each of the different actions that make up the baseball game has a mini-game feel to it. Batting works just like Com2Us's Homerun Battle 3D [$4.99 / Free / $4.99 (HD)] where you tilt your device to move around a transparent crosshair of sorts to line up your bat. Tapping the screen swings, and you can advance bases by tapping on them in the corner of the screen.

Pitching is a guessing game of sorts that you play with the AI controlled batter. You select a pitch, then tilt the device to aim where you're going to throw and tap the screen to let it fly. If you choose the same pitch as the AI batter, they get a power bonus if they hit the ball. When your pitching luck runs out and the batter lands a hit, Flick Baseball automatically has your team field the ball. While most fielding is automatic, for fly balls, you contribute by playing a timing-based mini-game where four baseball gloves come flying out of each corner of the screen. In this instance, catching the ball requires you to tap the gloves as they intersect.

Once one of your fielders have the ball, using the same interface as running bases you can tap to throw the ball. While none of these areas of the game feel particularly technical, they are still fun. Also, if you don't like batting (or fielding), you can skip entire innings to only play the portions of the game you enjoy.

Skipped innings are calculated based on the statistics of your players, which serves as a fairly in-depth subsystem that controls the entire game. As you go through a game your pitcher's stamina decreases and it becomes harder to aim your pitches. Each batter's accuracy controls the size of their tilt-controlled hit zone. Many other player stats run the rest of the game.

If you're serious enough about baseball to want to play through entire seasons, you can do that as well, and skip as many games as you'd like just like skipping innings. And if you really get in to the game, you can build entire customized teams where you can tweak, modify, and fiddle around with nearly everything imaginable to create your own team filled with players that have silly names and ugly uniforms.

As I mentioned before, if you're the kind of person who wants a highly detailed in-depth baseball game, Flick Baseball isn't the game for you. Everything in Flick Baseball seems to be optimized for quick pick up and play sessions that focuses more on being fun than overly technical or difficult.

Eventually, Flick Baseball will be available in two flavors: The "Pro" version that is available today, and a free version sponsored by Chevy that is being put together by Small Planet which is still waiting to be approved by Apple. It will retain all the core gameplay elements, but you'll be missing out on things like season mode and team customization.

App Store Link: Flick Baseball Pro, $2.99

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Last week we posted about Iron Man 2 [$6.99] suddenly appearing on several foreign App Store markets with no sign of it in the US App Store. With the release of the movie approaching, Iron Man 2 finally appeared for American iPhone owners to download.

We took a look at Iron Man 2 when it was first released in other countries, and were not that impressed:

Iron Man 2 seems to be just about everything you'd expect from a movie tie-in iPhone game made by Gameloft. The dialog isn't great, gameplay seems surprisingly linear, and while flying around as Iron Man is pretty cool, the whole thing just feels like your typical movie game.

Unfortunately, I'm not alone in not really enjoying the Iron Man 2 iPhone game. The Iron Man 2 thread on our forums seems to be in agreement, filled with people who have spent the day playing the New Zealand version. Forum member Der-Kleine was able to play through the game in 2 hours and Ziotoo4 comments on the plot, voice acting, and bugs.

After spending more time with the international release over the last week, it seems safe to take a pass on this game.

App Store Link: Iron Man 2, $6.99

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