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John Kooistra and his development studio Cat in a Box Games have just dropped the price of their excellent real-time strategy title Red Conquest! [Link] to free for a limited time. Red Conquest! ties the stories of Kooistra's previous Blue Defense! [$1.99] and Blue Attack! [$1.99] titles together, and is one of the more full-featured RTS titles available on the App Store. We originally reviewed Red Conquest! last December when it was released, and while we thought it was easily one of the most robust RTS experiences we had seen, it was mired by a confusing tutorial and frustrating difficulty curve. Those who stuck with it and learned the intricacies of the game, however, were rewarded with a superb game.

Thankfully this past year has been kind to Red Conquest! in the way of substantial updates. Practically any problem we had with the original release has since been addressed, and then some. A new tutorial offered a much easier way for RTS newbies to grasp the controls and gameplay, and the difficulty was balanced more appropriately. Beyond these tweaks to the existing content, an entirely new faction, the green faction, was added in addition to the red and blue factions. Also, internet multiplayer with a chat functionality was added, and most recently the game was updated with Retina Display support.

Red Conquest! saw a 50% price drop during this past Summer, but it has never been available for free. It goes without question that everyone should download and give the game a try during this promotion. If you aren't really an RTS expert and find yourself having trouble grasping onto the play mechanics, a very dedicated group of players in our forums have put together some excellent resources for you: a visual diagram of all the unit types, an in-depth tutorial on all aspects of the game interface, a level walkthrough video from John Kooistra himself, and an additional thread where players can swap strategies or ask for assistance.

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Early this year we got word that Cyan's Riven: The Sequel to Myst, would be making its way to the iPhone. An update came in a Myst online forum post by Cyan's Mark DeForest ('Chogon') back in August, including a few screenshots and an indication that an iPad version, Riven HD, would follow the iPhone release into the App Store.

This past Saturday, DeForest announced that Riven has finally been submitted to Apple and that we can expect to see it in 10 days to two weeks.

A number of specifics concerning this release have been revealed in Cyan's Riven for iOS forum thread.

• The version that was submitted is the iPhone / iPod touch release — Riven HD that specifically supports the iPad will come later. (Of course, like all iPhone games, it can be played on the iPad in the shrunken fashion.)
• The iPhone version was not written to specifically take advantage of the iPhone 4's Retina display, but the source images that make up the game are 608×392 pixels in size, which iOS scales down to 480×320 on older displays. The iPhone 4, thanks to the way iOS handles the scaling, will take advantage of the image's source resolution to render them more clearly on the Retina display.
• This initial release contains Game Center support, but in a limited fashion. There is one achievement and a score leaderboard for the fastest time getting to the end of the game. "Tons" of achievements and OpenFeint integration will come in a future update.
• The game features an integrated Shake-A-Hint system, with various settings, that highlights action points to help stuck players along.
• The game is huge — it will require 2GB free to install (though some of that will be freed up once the install process is complete).
• Riven will launch at a price of US $5.99

We'll be sure to let readers know when Riven: The Sequel to Myst goes live in the App Store.

Cyan's classic Myst [link] arrived in the App Store in the Spring of 2009 and is currently priced at $4.99.

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Back in July, we brought you word that Seaman developer Yutaka "Yoot" Saito and Digi Toys had plans to bring its simulation game The Tower for iPad to the US App Store after a Japanese release. Due in part to the language barrier, it's been hard to keep tabs on the international project, but we've received new intel via Digi Toys' official Twitter account that The Tower is slated to come "soon" to the US.

But how soon is soon? On Twitter, Digi Toys is refusing to pin down a date. Instead, it has said release is hinging on "Apple's intention." There's a couple of ways to interpret this, but we think this means that the title has been recently submitted to cert, so unless there's a "Christmas miracle" as my brother-from-another-mother Eli said to me this afternoon, we probably won't see The Tower until next year. (We've heard from many developers that Apple's cut-off for pre-holiday approvals was over a week ago.)

But we'll never see "The Tower" on the US App Store anyway. One big mention in the Digi Toys' reveal of the game's impending release is that it's been renamed to "Yoot Tower." Your guess is as good as ours on this one, we're thinking it might have to do with licensing, but we welcome flashier names.

You, me, the rest of us here, and perhaps your tech savvy grandmother are excited about this game for good reason. Yoot Tower is a simulation joint that plays like a vertical take on Sim City. In the game, you'll play as a building manager with a mission to build a massive tower. This tower, however, won't just be filled with bricks, iron, and cement. No, it'll also house people — residents and workers and the like — who all have individual stress levels and needs. Negotiating these needs, while continuing to build your tower and placing desire facilities, composes the core of a game. So, like a good sim, Yoot Tower appears to have quite the interesting juggling act between you and outside forces.

Here's a video, released long ago, featuring the game in action. You'll see the similarities between Yoot Tower for iPad and Saito's first major release SimTower for the Macintosh and PC.

We'll continue, obviously, our watch on Yoot Tower's progress and will fill you in on anything we possibly can. You'll have to excuse the ticky-tacky nature of this post, but this is an exciting game, for sure, that also presents an interesting challenge on the coverage side of things.

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Last December we reported that legendary, long-time game developer Jeff Minter of Llamasoft had fixed his sights on the iPhone, adding it to the extensive list of platforms for which he has developed games over the past 30+ years. We recently checked back in with Jeff to see how things are coming along and were pleased to hear that his first App Store release is just weeks away.

In our earlier story, Jeff shared his feelings about working with the iPhone platform.

I enjoy working on the iPhone because it's capable and interesting and the ergonomics make you rethink things a bit. I really don't like games that just try to replicate analog thumbpads on the touch screen – although some of those controls are very well done nonetheless I always feel a bit awkward sliding my thumbs around with no accompanying tactile feedback. Plus there's the added and inevitable disadvantage of having to obscure the screen you're trying to play on. I'm interested in developing stuff that's playable with the accelerometers and uses touches appropriately but sparingly and in a way that doesn't upset the view too much.

At the time, Jeff was working on a Time Pilot-style multidirectional shooter which was serving as a testbed for the general iPhone game engine he was in the process of putting together. Since that time, he has taken his impressive Neon "light synthesizer" engine, which powers the XBOX 360's music visualizer and excellent Space Giraffe title, and taken it to the next level in the form of the new Neon 2 engine for iOS.

According to Jeff, Neon 2 is much improved as compared to the original, featuring a much cleaner framework and a lot more bang-for-the-buck in terms of shader usage. (Neon 2 exists for the PC and soon the Mac as well, so let's cross our fingers for Mac App Store goodness from Llamasoft.) And, it is upon this new engine that Solar Minotaur Rescue Frenzy, Llamasoft's first iPhone game release, has been built.

Solar Minotaur Rescue Frenzy can be succinctly and quite accurately described as: Asteroids meets Spacewar! on an Atari VCS. With minotaurs. While seeing trails. I could really stop there, as far as the game's description. Of course, the drippy trails part is pretty standard for Llamasoft games, but the minotaur element — that's a new twist. (It's usually llamas or giraffes.) But, I'll share a bit more detail in the interest of thoroughness.
The game, which is a Universal app that natively supports both the iPhone and the iPad, consists of an active starfield play area with a sun at the center. In its core gameplay mode, you control an ever-firing ship that can fly about this starfield (wrapping at the edges) and is affected by the intense gravitational pull of the aforementioned sun. And so, too, are the asteroids closing in from the edges. Your job is to blast apart these asteroids (as opposed to slamming into them), some of which contain minotaurs that must be rescued before they drift into the sun. If too many asteroids drift into the sun, it will turn into a black hole…which is bad. The closer to the sun a minotaur gets before you rescue him, the more points you gain for said rescue. The more minotaurs you rescue and the closer you are to the sun, the faster your auto-fire tosses out rounds. The occasional enemy saucer passes through, shooting at you and dropping mines, to mix things up. A touch-anywhere control pad puts you in the pilot's seat.

In addition to the core gameplay mode, Minotaur Rescue features three other playmodes, as well. There's Deep Space Minotaur Madness which is like the above, but with only the Asteroids elements in place (plus minotaurs) — no sun and associated gravity. And, perhaps oddly, there's also the Tanks! and Jets! modes, which are like the simple, core playmodes of the pack-in Atari VCS cartridge Combat. But, of course, with minotaurs to pick up along the way.

I've spent quite a bit of time with the ad hoc build Jeff provided us and have been loving it. But that's in solo play. The iPhone version also offers a two-player mode (on the same device) while the iPad version allows four people to get in on the action at once. If only I had four friends.

As mentioned previously, graphically, everything looks (and sounds) like an Atari VCS game. And that's by design. In fact, Jeff has rather strong feelings about the modern-retro aesthetic, and had this (and a lot more, actually) to say about it in the game's About screens.

The goal of the Minotaur project is to make new games in the style of the old hardware, but with none of the limitations of the original platforms and a thoroughly modern heart inside giving gameplay sufficiently rewarding and involving for today's players.

We've begun in the VCS-era and this first game is presented on the entirely fictional 'Ataurus TVC 2605' which uses primitive graphics shapes but allows for an effectively unlimited number of them on screen, and also for some fullscreen feedback effects. Things that would have been entirely impossible back in the day.

The fact that so many games try to look like Geometry Wars, a game whose look was designed specifically to evoke the sparsely abstract games of old vector systems, shows that there is still a desire of players to play once more in that pure, symbolic space, deliberately far from any though of realism.

As suggested, Llamasoft's intention is to develop and release numerous titles featuring retro gameplay, progressing forward from the Atari VCS aesthetic to the VIC 20, Commodore 64, and beyond. Future games would be based on the Neon 2 engine, as well, but offer perhaps more dynamic graphical effects, as Jeff indicates that they took it fairly easy on the eye-candy in this first iOS release out the gate. A forthcoming iPhone 4-specific, Neon 2-based "toy" that Llamasoft will shortly be releasing will go a long way towards showing us what this new visualization engine is capable of. It's all basically a dream come true for retro junkies like myself.

Have a look at Jeff demonstrating Solar Minotaur Rescue Frenzy on an iPad, an iPhone, and a big-screen PC in an interview with Retro Gamer magazine's Darran Jones.

The developer indicates that there's about a week of work left before Minotaur Rescue gets submitted to Apple. In that time, online leaderboards will be added and there's a chance that a one-ship survival mode will make its way into the game. Minotaur Rescue should be available for download just about at the turn of the year.

Now, while what I've presented here is a somewhat longwinded song of praise for Llamasoft's first iPhone release, it's true that it will certainly hold the most appeal to those who can appreciate the retro aesthetic. And that's well worth noting. But, I would encourage causal gamers who may be curious as to why I would run on so about a game that looks 30 years old to try and appreciate what the developer was going for in designing this title. There is a purity and a distillation of enjoyable gameplay to be found here and I expect to find the same in the forthcoming iOS titles we should be seeing from Jeff Minter in the coming months.

And, as for the Time Pilot-like game we saw demoed a year ago? A Neon 2-based rework of it should be among the coming Llamasoft titles. Stay tuned.

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Here's something that'll make you say, "Uh, what?" It's the teaser trailer for Perfect Cell, the next iOS title from Edge [$1.99] and Cross Fingers' [$1.99] developer Mobigames. At first glance, you might think it's Shadow Complex sans Nolan North. We did, at least. But after a bit of digging, we've discovered that Perfect Cell is nothing of the sort.

The IGF 2011 listing for Perfect Cell fills in some of the gaps. That pink octopus-alien-thing is a cell, the "most advanced creature ever discovered on Earth." In the game, you'll control up to three of these unusual creatures in an attempt to escape a submarine. You'll run into puzzles, enraged guards, and need to keep a low-profile at times by exploring the game's infiltration mechanics.

Here's the full listing, which while helpful, is still pretty abstract:

"Play as the most advanced creature ever discovered on Earth. You are trapped in a high security submarine base and you must use your superpowers to escape from this hostile environment; dodge lasers and AK-47 bullets, solve puzzles to progress and try to survive the many other dangerous and deadly traps.

Play through an original story that uniquely combines the best of action and infiltration games. Use intuitive, multi-touch gameplay; play as up to 3 Cells on the same screen, dash through the air with a swipe gesture or cut off your enemies’ heads with a ‘draw and dash’! Use your mind to find your way out covertly or, if you prefer, use fast-paced action gameplay to kill every scientist and soldier in your path. You are the Perfect Cell!"

What's with the lack of info? Our guess is that Mobi wants to build up a significant amount of pre-release hype, which makes sense consider how fast the App Store moves. The good news is that the wait to see what Perfect Cell is won't be too long — at the end of the teaser, Mobi notes that the game is coming "soon" to the iPad and iPhone. We'll get our hands on it as soon as we can, that's for sure.

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Indie sandbox building game Minecraft has become something of a phenomenon since the Mac / Windows / Linux release of Minecraft Alpha back in June. And, for a rather brief moment, iOS gamers had the chance to get in on the Minecraft experience as well, thanks to Trevor Wilkin's Minecrafted, basically an iPhone Minecraft client (which could connect to Minecraft servers) that was pulled shortly after landing in the App Store.

Those bereft Minecraft fans out there who lament the iOS Minecraft experience having been but a brief flirtation may be pleased to see Kingly Games' new release, Eden – World Builder [App Store]. The game, according to the developer, was inspired by various members of the block building genre, including Minecraft, Infiniminer, and Blockland. And it's apparent.

The game features "a vast pristine world of infinite possibility," dozens of block types, integrated community tools for sharing and, perhaps most important of all, fire and explosives. To the eye, it's pretty much Minecraft, with gameplay more akin to the earlier Classic version than the current favorite and more complex, Alpha release.

Movement through the game world is controlled via an onscreen D-pad with swipe-based view controls. Along the right edge of the screen are buttons for digging, selecting building blocks, lighting fires, jumping, and the like. Happily, the onscreen action is very smooth and fluid, moreso than the Java-based Minecraft on some Mac and PC setups. Eden is optimized for the iPhone 3GS / 3G iPod touch and newer, with iOS 3.2 or better required.

And while there's much similarity to Mojang's indie smash, Eden – World Builder is indeed it's own game and does not connect in any way to the world of Minecraft. I've enjoyed the brief time I've spent with the title so far and expect fans of the block-based world building genre would do likewise.

UPDATE:  Developer Ari Ronen contacted us early this morning to give us a heads-up on a price drop for Eden – World Builder. "Just a heads up — I've decided to lower the price for Eden to 99c so that everyone can check it out."

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Indie sandbox building game Minecraft has become something of a phenomenon since the Mac / Windows / Linux release of Minecraft Alpha back in June. And, for a rather brief moment, iOS gamers had the chance to get in on the Minecraft experience as well, thanks to Trevor Wilkin's Minecrafted, basically an iPhone Minecraft client (which could connect to Minecraft servers) that was pulled shortly after landing in the App Store.

Those bereft Minecraft fans out there who lament the iOS Minecraft experience having been but a brief flirtation may be pleased to see Kingly Games' new release, Eden – World Builder [App Store]. The game, according to the developer, was inspired by various members of the block building genre, including Minecraft, Infiniminer, and Blockland. And it's apparent.

The game features "a vast pristine world of infinite possibility," dozens of block types, integrated community tools for sharing and, perhaps most important of all, fire and explosives. To the eye, it's pretty much Minecraft, with gameplay more akin to the earlier Classic version than the current favorite and more complex, Alpha release.

Movement through the game world is controlled via an onscreen D-pad with swipe-based view controls. Along the right edge of the screen are buttons for digging, selecting building blocks, lighting fires, jumping, and the like. Happily, the onscreen action is very smooth and fluid, moreso than the Java-based Minecraft on some Mac and PC setups. Eden is optimized for the iPhone 3GS / 3G iPod touch and newer, with iOS 3.2 or better required.

And while there's much similarity to Mojang's indie smash, Eden – World Builder is indeed it's own game and does not connect in any way to the world of Minecraft. I've enjoyed the brief time I've spent with the title so far and expect fans of the block-based world building genre would do likewise.

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Remember the ad that Sony released a few months ago starring their new PSP spokesman Marcus promoting the PSP's lineup of various $9.99 games? If you were too busy texting your grandma, as the ad suggests, here's what you missed:

Following this video, Be Rad Entertainmen sprang to action and began working on Lame Castle [99¢], the game that Marcus mocks. The game is a typical see how far you can run to the right survival game like Robot Unicorn Attack [$1.99] with both pre-made levels, endless mode, a host of unlockables, and Game Center support. It's packed with cute-looking graphics, a scoring system that involves ramming in to things, and promises of more levels and game modes to come.

If you're the kind of person who gets involved in heated console arguments with friends, Lame Castle is something you should probably have on your device to fuel the fire.

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Ever since it was announced that Battlefield Bad Company 2 would be coming to iOS, our forums have run rampant with speculation and anticipation. While the Halos and Call of Dutys of the world get most of the spotlight, the Battlefield franchise has had its own dedicated following of hardcore players for years. This same group of players is very keen on not having their beloved franchise butchered in the transition to iOS. At a recent EA Mobile event, I finally got the chance to actually play Battlefield Bad Company 2. While my overall impression of the game is positive, the good news also comes with some bad.

Let's start with the good. Bad Company 2 will feature a single player campaign comprised of 14 missions spread across the typical environments, such as snow, desert, jungle, etc. The missions can be quite lengthy and are full of a variety of different goals. You'll be able to drive several different vehicles during certain missions, including a tank, a turret-mounted armored truck, and a helicopter. The controls are spot-on, both on foot and while driving vehicles. They utilize the familiar "touch anywhere" virtual analog setup, with icons for throwing grenades, crouching, and aiming down your sights. It's all very minimalist and unobtrusive, letting you get a good view of the action taking place.

The graphics in Bad Company 2 have been largely criticized in our forums ever since EA released screenshots of the game. After seeing the game in person though, the criticism is unwarranted. Bad Company 2 looks great and runs smoothly, and while it doesn't quite approach the visuals of something like Modern Combat 2 [$6.99], it's certainly far from a bad looking game. It runs in high resolution with detailed weapon models and environments. It won't blow your mind, but it exceeded my expectations.

So, are you ready for the bad news? First of all, the trademark destructible environments that Battlefield is known for will not be making it to this portable outing. That's not entirely surprising given that this is game running on a mobile device and the technology to offer something like that would be quite taxing. Still, I did have my fingers crossed that they would find a way to pull it off, but it just wasn't meant to be. At least not in this release. You'll come across vehicles that can be blown up and explosive barrels and the like, but the majority of structures and objects will not be affected by the carnage.

The other somewhat disappointing aspect to Bad Company 2 is the multiplayer. It's online over WiFi or 3G, or local over Bluetooth, but will only support 2-4 players in regular deathmatch and team deathmatch game types. Again, this is a far cry from the competition, but that doesn't mean it won't end up being fun. Also, as of this writing vehicles will not be a part of the multiplayer, which is another trademark of the Battlefield franchise. I'm told that it's something that is under consideration and could change in the future, but the game will most likely ship without this feature. Another thing that was unclear during the preview was whether there is any sort of class structure to choose from, but my gut feeling is that there isn't.

A rep from EA was kind enough to let me film her as she demonstrated a bit of the single player campaign in Battlefield. While a noisy, dimly lit bar isn't the ideal recording location this video should give you and idea of some of the game mechanics:

Even with these negative points there is a saving grace with Battlefield Bad Company 2, and that is that the game is a blast to play. It's easy to get wrapped up in bullet points and feature sets when talking about a game, and it would be hard for anything to measure up to the current high-water mark in iOS FPS games that is Modern Combat 2. But the bottom line is that even in the short amount of time I spent with Bad Company 2 it was a lot of fun. The multiplayer seems a bit basic, but I'm really looking forward to the single player campaign. Plus this is EA's first attempt at an FPS for the iPhone, so there's the possibility that the experience will be improved over time with updates or in future releases.

Bad Company 2 is slated for release sometime this month, so it won't be long before we can put the final version through the wringer. Until then you can join in on the active discussion in our forums, and we'll bring you more of Battlefield Bad Company 2 when it hits in the coming weeks.

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Earlier this week Zynga sent out some curious invitations to a conference call to various members of the media, including TouchArcade. That left us scratching our heads to see what exactly it was that Zynga was up to that could possibly interest us. I was half expecting them to reveal plans to bring more games to iOS following the success of Farmville [Free] on the App Store, but this took me completely by surprise.

Zynga has acquired NewToy, the developers behind both Words with Friends [$2.99 / Free] and Chess with Friends [$2.99 / Free]. Where things really get interesting is when you consider that NewToy collaborated with ngmoco to release We Rule [Free] back in March, which has since been reskinned several times in various themes. Ngmoco has since been bought by Japanese social gaming conglomerate DeNA, which currently is one of Zynga's biggest competitors in the social gaming realm.

While many of our readers are (understandably) getting tired of freemium time sinks, it is incredibly interesting watching the international business battle unfold between all of these companies making untold millions on microtransactions and ad impressions. We're not sure yet what this will mean for NewToy other than a shiny new titles for the higher-ups at NewToy as well as the rebranding of NewToy to "Zynga With Friends." Like all these previous high-dollar dealings, it will be fun to see what happens once the dust of the acquisition settles.

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