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We've been following Dodonpachi Resurrection [$4.99] for a while now, from its first announcement, to the first gameplay trailer, and even the pricing and release date.  And after all this anticipation, developer Cave's follow up release to the excellent Espgaluda II [$8.99/Lite] actually lives up to the hype. In fact, I like it even more than Espgaluda II, though I'm not necessarily saying one is better than the other. They're very different beasts, and really it's worth owning both if you like top-down shooters. But Dodonpachi Resurrection feels like a more well rounded experience, and caters really well to both casual shooter fans and the most hardcore of them all. There's near endless replayability due to an ingenious scoring system, and Dodonpachi Resurrection deserves a spot on every shmup fan's home screen.

Visually, Dodonpachi is a very striking game. There is no fancy Retina Display support, as this is originally an arcade game running at an entirely different resolution, and it would be unrealistic for Cave to redraw all of the artwork to suit the iPhone 4. That said, the game still looks damn good. There are three different screen sizes to choose in the options. Small has a huge border area but makes the graphics look the sharpest. Large fills the iPhone screen with the game and a small border on the bottom, but the sprites and text look slightly blurry. Medium is the default and it's in-between the other two settings. I fancy the large setting, as I don't really like borders in my games and the blurriness honestly isn't that bad. The game is filled with tons of huge explosions, humongous transforming bosses, and dozens of enemies and bullets onscreen at any given time. No matter what screen size you play with, it all ends up looking really impressive.

There are two game modes in Dodonpachi, the original arcade mode and a new iPhone mode. Arcade has you choose from three different ships and three offensive styles. These styles can give you unlimited bomb use, a more powerful alternate cannon to switch to, or a combination of the two. They all can help you in different ways, and as such each ship and style combination has its own leaderboard in OpenFeint. The arcade mode is a lot of fun to be sure, but the iPhone mode with its unique scoring system and brand new Hyper Cannon weapon are what really stand out in the game.

In iPhone mode, there is no need to pick styles, just which ship type you want to use. A divided gauge in the upper right of the screen is used for the SM scoring system. A circular area surrounds your ship, and narrowly avoiding these bullets but letting them pass through this area (known as “scraping”) fills the gauge towards the M side while also building up a multiplier in the upper left of the screen. You can continue to do this all the way until your multiplier hits x1000, if you wish. When the M side of the gauge is full, you can hit the Hyper button to start your ship firing wildly, and control the direction of fire by touching the ship and turning it. If you touch the ship and spin it in circles during this time, you build up your Hyper Cannon which unleashes an enormous beam of destruction that obliterates everything on the screen.

Killing enemies in rapid succession is what fills up the S side of the gauge, and once it's completely full you will gain whatever your multiplier is at for every enemy you destroy. Essentially, you use this SM gauge in a yin-yang like harmony of avoidance and utter destruction in order to achieve incredibly high scores. It's really brilliantly designed, and it may sound complicated on paper but it's pretty easy to grasp onto after playing for a bit. Admittedly, I'm not a hardcore bullet hell shooter guy. I love me some shmup action, but more the typical brand of them, and I've always been apprehensive of the bullet hell type because they just seemed so difficult. Not so with Dodonpachi, and I really understand now how different a bullet hell shooter is and the different type of gameplay it brings to shmups.

And this brings me to what I really appreciate about Dodonpachi Resurrection, you don't have to play it any particular way. Yes, you can endlessly scrape bullets and build huge multipliers, then strategically destroy many enemies in search of massive scores and coveted leaderboard spots. Or you can play it much like a normal shooter, using the bombs and special weapons to destroy the many enemies and bosses in spectacular fashion as you progress through the levels to the end. Heck, I beat the game twice before I even fully understood the scoring system, and had a total blast doing it. This is one of the first games of this kind where I've felt like any type of gamer can get a lot out of the experience.

There's a lot more to Dodonpachi too, like the absolute spot-on relative control system, the excellent brand new music for the iPhone mode, many OpenFeint achievements to unlock, multiple options and difficulty levels, hidden modes, and more. But the bottom line is that if you're a fan of shooters in any way, you'll want to pick up Dodonpachi Resurrection. There's not currently a lite of the game (there's one on the way), but the introductory price of $4.99 will be going for the next few days before jumping to the regular price of $8.99. Also worth noting is that you'll need a 3^rd generation device or higher, or an iPad, to run the game due to the insane amount of sprites it pushes at any given time. A veritable love-fest is going on with players in our forums who are enjoying the game as much as I am, and as far as shooters go on the iPhone it doesn't get much better than Dodonpachi Resurrection.

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Just a couple of weeks ago we brought you the first screens and info from the upcoming sequel to early App Store classic Blue Defense! titled Blue Defense: Second Wave. Since then, we've been able to spend some time with a work-in-progress build of the game and check out how Second Wave plays compared to the original. So far, it's shaping up really nicely. It takes the core gameplay of the first game and adds some interesting new features and a lot more content, retaining the simplicity that made the original such a joy to play but adding just enough depth to offer a really different experience.

The basics of Second Wave remain the same. You'll fight off waves of enemies with a perpetually shooting cannon firing from the center of the planet which you're trying to protect. A population of about 7 billion people act as the life of your planet, with that number dwindling with every enemy that penetrates your defense. If the population hits zero, the planet is lost and it's game over.

One of the biggest changes this time around is the ability to fire multiple cannons at once. Touching the screen at any time brings up an aiming reticule and a new stream of fire, with multitouch support for adding up to five additional streams along with the first cannon. A quick double tap on the screen locks an aiming reticule in place at that point on the screen, which can be dragged around and set anywhere you want to direct more firepower. You can set up to ten of these locked streams in addition to the five you can add by touching. Coupled with the normal cannon, that's a whopping sixteen streams of fire at your disposal.  These screens were taken from an iPhone 4 and showcase the Retina Display support in Second Wave (click to enlarge):

While this may seem like an unfair advantage, the game intelligently balances this out by making every stream share from the same pool of firepower. For example, one stream of fire will rapidly spray many bullets in one direction. Adding a stream cuts this in half, with less bullets firing more slowly out of each stream. This gets divided with each stream added, and by the time you get to the full sixteen, each stream is very slowly shooting just one bullet out at a time.

The ability to add streams adds a tremendous amount of strategy in how you choose to play the game. It's such a big help to be able to quickly direct additional fire towards incoming enemies from any direction, or lock a stream of fire towards a dense group of enemies. Besides the ability to add streams of fire, you also get a new weapon in the form of the planet cannon. Touching your planet and swiping in the direction you want to fire launches a humongous beam of destruction that's as wide as the planet itself. The planet cannon vaporizes anything in it's path, but comes with limited uses.

Here's a short video of the preview build (no sound in this build):

These additional offensive options take Second Wave to a new level, and I haven't even gone into the gauntlet mode yet. Gauntlet mode is essentially a campaign that has you defeating set levels with predetermined numbers of waves and various difficulties, but we'll leave some of this for when the game is released. The major stuff is done and it's just entering the polishing phases now, so it shouldn't be too much longer before we'll be taking a look at the final version of Blue Defense: Second Wave.

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I recently had the chance to visit the Telltale Games San Rafael studio and spend some time with their upcoming story-based puzzle game Puzzle Agent. In the game, you'll play the role of Nelson Tethers, the country's preeminent (and only) agent of the FBI Puzzle Research Division. An incident at the eraser factory in Scoggins, Minnesota has brought production of erasers to a halt. Since this particular factory supplies erasers to the White House, the foundations of democracy hang in the balance until they are able to replenish their supply. All inquiries about the factory's closing have resulted in responses in the form of puzzles, so Nelson is sent to investigate the incident and unearths a twisted tale of what's really happening in Scoggins, Minnesota.

The art style in Puzzle Agent is directly inspired by the work of Graham Annable, who is responsible for creating the Grickle comics and animated shorts (which can be seen at his YouTube channel). Puzzle Agent isn't exactly a Grickle video game, but it does use the same type of characters, animation, and dark humor that the series is known for. Telltale Games producer and designer of Puzzle Agent Mark Darin engrossed himself in the world of Grickle before writing the story for the game, and Graham did the storyboards for characters and locations. For fans of Grickle, it's very much a Grickle game, but is not directly branded as such and doesn't require any previous knowledge of that series to enjoy the minimalist style and twisted sense of humor in Puzzle Agent.

Puzzle Agent can be compared to games like Professor Layton or The Jim and Frank Mysteries in that you're on an adventure and must use solving puzzles to unravel the story and progress through the game, but it makes some smart changes to the formula that sets it apart from similar games. Most notable is that all of the dialogue in the game is voiced, which gives the characters a ton of personality that couldn't be conveyed through text alone. Also, whereas adventure games are traditionally set against 2D backgrounds, Puzzle Agent renders the backgrounds in 3D. The game still has that 2D animated look that it sets out to achieve, but the 3D backgrounds allow for more dramatic camera movements and transitions between scenes.

Another smart design choice is in the way you interact with the environments. Tapping on the screen causes a ring to emanate from the point where you touch, and if there is anything interactive within that radius a small icon will show up. This allows you to inspect large areas without scouring every inch of the screen, or as Mark Darin calls it, “pixel hunting”. As someone who hates to miss anything in an adventure game, and who tirelessly hunt-and-pecked for every coin in Professor Layton, I really appreciate this mechanic. Despite being a multiplatform release, Mark has said that Puzzle Agent was designed from the onset with touch interface in mind, and it really shows.

Puzzle Agent was released for Mac and PC last month, but is shaping up very nicely for its iPhone and iPad release. It looks and plays like a dream on the iPad, and even makes the transition to the smaller screen of the iPhone rather well. Some textures need to be cleaned up a bit on the iPhone version due to being shrunk down to a smaller size, but overall both versions are nearly complete. Telltale expects to be submitting any day now, and hopes to have the game released before the end of August, although that can largely depend on Apple's approval length.

After trying out the game at their offices, I picked up the game for my Mac and have been enjoying it a lot so far. If you're as impatient as I am, you can get Puzzle Agent right now from the Telltale Games webstore or pick it up on Steam. Otherwise be on the lookout for Puzzle Agent on your iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch in the next couple of weeks and expect a full review then as well.

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We haven't done a roundup of recently released lite versions to try in quite some time now, which means there is more than a heaping helping of them to download. I'm only going back through the past month or so of releases, and cherry picking the more interesting lite versions of games we've already mentioned in one way or another, but to see everything that has come out that is free, swing on over to AppShopper. Anyway, here is an alphabetical list of lite versions that you should try as all of these games are pretty awesome:

A PHYSICS GAMEBOX FREE, Free We thought Physics Gamebox was a great fit for the iPhone in our review, and now not only is this pair of physics puzzlers free to play on NewGrounds, but there’s also a lite version on the App Store. If you liked Ragdoll Blaster at all, make sure you try Physics Gamebox.

Cubed Rally Racer Lite, Free The full version of Cubed Rally Racer is one of my favorite racing games, as it combines RC Pro-Am style retro racing with a fantastic random track generator and OpenFeint to send and receive ghost challenges between your friends. To see me gushing over the game even more, check out our review.

Daredevil Dave: Motorcycle Stuntman! FREE 2, Free There’s already one free version of Daredevil Dave, but this one adds another two jumps to try. This is basically a trial and error based trajectory game, but you hardly even notice because it has so much personality. Take a look at the trailer in our review to see exactly what kind of punishment is in store for poor ol’ Daredevil Dave.

Flick Fishing HD FREE, Free If you own an iPad and you’ve been looking to try Flick Fishing HD, here is your chance. The iPhone version has been downloaded millions of times and is almost constantly being featured in various “best of” and “most downloaded” listings on the App Store. The iPad version features high resolution graphics and slightly modified controls like most HD-ized games.

Giant Moto Lite, Free If you have fond memories of Excite Bike for the NES, you should give Giant Moto a try. It’s a little basic, and desperately needs some kind of randomized track and/or track builder mode since even the full version is a little light on content… But as we mentioned in our original post on the game, it’s hard to not see the potential for this game to be really rad with some updates.

iHook Lite, Free I thought the full iHook was cool when it was first released, but the unconventional control scheme was a little hard to describe, and since that’s such a main part of the game I’m glad they finally released a lite version. Gameplay involves shooting out grappling hooks, attaching to pylons of sorts, and releasing once your trajectory has been altered enough.

Infect Them All Lite, Free Previously known as Infection:Zombies, Infect Them All is a cool tilt based game where instead of killing zombies, you play as a zombie trying to convert as many humans as… humanly possible. I thought the premise of the game was neat when it first came out, but the lite version might just be enough for the novelty factor of turning humans to wear off.

Max Vector LITE, Free As mentioned in our mini-review, Max Vector is fairly basic like most Game Salad games, but the developers more than make up for this with heaps upon heaps of old school retro charm and fantastic chiptune music by 8 Bit Weapon. If huge pixels are your cup of tea, you should at least try the lite version of Max Vector.

Meowcenaries Lite, Free Yet another crazy game from Adult Swim, this time you play as a platoon of cats much like the classic game Cannon Fodder. Meowcenaries is loaded with tired memes and lolcat jokes, which will either amuse you or annoy you. We posted it when it first came out with a few other weird games if you like this one.

MrOnionsLite, Free If you’ve ever enjoyed one of the many physics-powered bike jumping games on the App Store (of which there are many), you really need to give Mr. Onions a try. The art is cute, the gameplay is fun, and the odd twist of needing to not only make it to the finish, but make it there with your basket full of groceries is awesome. For more details, read our review.

NAMCO GAMES PORTAL, Free Namco bundled up Pac-Man Lite, Ace Combat Lite, Galaxa Remix Lite, Dig Dug Remix Lite and Time Crisis Strike Lite in to one app. I guess the one download is convenient, but looking at these games side by side just kind of makes you realize how lackluster Namco’s efforts on the App Store have been so far.

Need for Speed Shift FREE, Free Both Need for Speed games on the App Store have been awesome, and believe it or not, Shift actually feels a lot like the console versions of the game. It doesn’t have all the content of the 360/PS3 game, but it’s just as much fun. Take a look at our preview for some gameplay video.

PREDATORS™ Lite, Free From the guys behind Guerilla Bob comes this fully licensed Predator game which bucks the trend of terrible movie games and actually is quite a bit of fun. We have a fairly in depth review, but if you like dual stick shooters or the Predator universe you can just skip straight to downloading this game.

Psychoban Lite, Free This clever twist on classic Sokoban drops you in a hospital ward where you’re forced to solve a series of puzzles after going through a “procedure”. The controls work well, although at times the camera perspective can get a little wonky. We liked it in our review, and if you like puzzle games you should totally snag this lite.

X2 Snowboarding Base, Free If you have even a vague interest in snowboarding games, you need to have X2 Snowboarding on your iPhone. We explained how awesome it is in our review, and this is a game I’m still playing months later.

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TechCrunch posted today about 11 new startup companies to be funded by TechStars, a group that has provided seed money and mentorship for various startup companies for the last four years. Most of these companies seem to lead towards different web services, but GearBox is a "smart toy company" who have created a robotic ball which can be controlled via a smartphone using a simple API.

How this all works is summarized in a recent GearBox blog post:

So basically how HTC/Android/Apple make smart phones, we make smart toys. Our first smart toy is a robotic ball that you can move by tilting your phone in the direction you want the ball to roll. We are then leveraging the connectivity and computing power of the phone to create a fully interactive experience for the user. Our first app for the ball is Sumo. I throw my ball on a table, you throws yours on the table and then we can try and sumo each others ball off the table. However, while our physical balls are moving there is also an onscreen component with online stats, profiles, damage, powerups and other aspects of gameplay that aren’t possible with a regular remote control toy. For instance, when the balls collide they can sustain “damage” and roll slower or I could get a powerup to reverse your controls for a few seconds.

Other examples cited were a golf game where you swipe to "hit" the ball, curling where you roll the ball then "brush" on the screen, or even just control the ball to harass your cat. Currently all of the app development is being done on Android, but according to the guys at GearBox, iPhone development is totally possible and they're just using Android for prototyping. The Smart Ball is still in prototype phases itself, and it's hard to say when it will be available for sale. Either way, it seems that the Parrot AR.Drone isn't going to be the only toy in town to be controlled via a smartphone.

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If you like chucking gnomes (and who doesn't?), you need to be aware of Chuck Gnome [$1.99/Lite] from developer Movable Sprites. Essentially, it's a mixture of Ramp Champ [$1.99] and MUST.EAT.BIRDS. [99¢/Lite], but with 100% more gnome flinging. The painfully simple mechanic of pulling back and launching gnomes at targets is bolstered with some complex level designs and excellent presentation. Simple enough that anyone can play, but requiring a surprising amount of skill and determination to be successful, Chuck Gnome is a game that is full of challenge and a lot of silly fun.

As the name implies, the task at hand is to chuck gnomes at various targets in the game. Each of the 5 levels (plus a bonus level) has the colorful, illustrated look of a children's storybook come to life. The levels also evolve as you play, with backgrounds and targets changing as you progress, sometimes resulting in a level that is completely different than it was when you started. It's quite a sight to behold, and coupled with the charming background music the presentation in Chuck Gnome is a real high point. The levels are set up like shooting galleries, with different targets moving as if on a track or popping up from the edges of the screen. Another neat aspect to the levels is the clever use of the accelerometer. Similar to the game Bowmaster [99¢], tilting to either side shifts your view to reveal more of the level, and can give you an extra chance to hit a missed target.

Simply pulling back on the slingshot at the bottom of the screen launches your gnome, and how much you pull him back dictates how far he will travel into the distance. You have an unlimited number of gnomes to launch, which may make it seem like you could rapidly spam gnomes to take out all the targets, and to a certain extent this is true. But this will only get you through the first few levels at best, as the later levels require precise aim to take out targets. Also, this tactic won't net very high scores due to the multiplier aspect of scoring. Successfully hitting targets in a row builds up a progressive multiplier, and thoughtful shooting can result in some monster scores.

The biggest issue I had with Chuck Gnome is that it can be very hard to progress in the game. Each level must be unlocked by finding a key in the previous level. Taking out certain targets before time runs out will result in the key popping up on screen, which must also be hit with a gnome to initiate. This can be difficult to pull off at times, but is definitely possible with perseverance especially as you learn which targets to shoot for in order to get the level to switch to its next set of targets eventually leading to the key appearing. Another minor issue is the sensitivity of pulling back the sling doesn't feel consistent. Sometimes it seems the slightest pull will send your gnome flying completely offscreen, and vice versa. You get used to it to an extent but it still feels rather touchy.

What appears to be an overly simplistic game on the surface actually has a ton of subtle depth, and Chuck Gnome is one of those games that's easy to pick up and play for short or long periods of time if you end up getting sucked in to maximizing your multiplier with precise gnome shooting. OpenFeint is in the game for online leaderboards and achievements, and it should take a good amount of time to play through every level. Even once completed, there's incentive to go back and try to top your previous high scores by playing a level more efficiently. Overall, Chuck Gnome combines a fun flinging mechanic with stellar visuals, and players are enjoying the game in our forums as well. If you're on the fence, give the lite version a try first. Content is fairly limited in the free version, but it will give you an excellent idea of how much you like the flinging mechanic the game hinges on.

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Ever since a slew of new APIs found their way into the latest version of Apple's iOS, the one that we've been waiting for somebody to really take advantage of is the ability for applications to finally be able to tap into the music library of the device itself. We even dreamed of the classic Audiosurf making its way to iPhone in a post from early last month. With the success of rhythm games in the past few years, and especially the Tap Tap Revenge series on iPhone, gamers have been clamoring for a similar game that they can play using their own music. Enter Tapic [99¢], the first game (that I know of) that creates a tapping chart directly from a song in your music library for you to play with. Tapic attains various levels of success in what it sets out to do, but it's far from perfect. Still, it's a novel use of the new API and is pretty fun in its own right.

The interface used in Tapic is simple to use. Choosing Play from the main menu brings up all the songs from your music library. After selecting a song Tapic will create a note chart for it, which takes about 10-20 seconds, and next you'll choose which difficulty to play it on. The harder the difficulty, the faster the notes come barreling towards you down the lanes. Choosing More Songs from the menu allows you to select a bunch of songs at once and have them prepared in advance for playing. Depending on how many songs you choose this can take a quite a few minutes, but allows you to play from songs in your playlist in succession without waiting for each one to create a chart in between.

The game can be played in portrait or landscape mode, although landscape must be purchased and unlocked using collected in-game coins (or by buying them with real money as IAP). Portrait uses three lanes of notes to tap along with, and landscape uses five. The game is at its best in landscape mode, and it's annoying that this must be unlocked rather than available from the start. Portrait is still ok, and it's a good way to get acclimated with playing Tapic, but landscape is where I spend most of the time playing. Different themes can also be bought using the game currency for both portrait and landscape mode, adding some graphical variety to the backgrounds.

The presentation and functionality of tapping the notes all work extremely well in Tapic, but it's the actual chart generation that fails to really impress. It doesn't ever feel like the notes jive with the song in a meaningful way as they rarely sync up properly, and when they do it mostly just feels like a coincidence. Some songs fared better than others while testing out the game, but overall you really feel like you're just playing an unrelated tapping game while listening to your favorite tunes. In my experience, and the general consensus of gamers in our forums, is that hip-hop and techno music gives the best results, while rock and metal generally don't.

The funny thing about the chart generator is that even though it's somewhat lacking, Tapic is still a lot of fun. I found myself continually wanting to keep playing, even though it didn't really feel like my performance had any impact on the song that was being used. I just can't help but feel like if the developer can improve this aspect of the game, which they have stated they are working on, then Tapic could really be something special. My other biggest point of contention is having to play for an extensive period of time (or spend real life money) before being able to unlock the landscape mode. It just feels like a cheap aspect to an otherwise excellently presented game. Perhaps the game will be taken to the next level over the course of its lifespan, but even right now Tapic is an interesting and fun way to experience your music.

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Italian iPhone development house KF Lab is soon to release their stylized run-and-jump title A Skeleton Story, that we first spotted back in October, for the iPhone. The developer long ago posted a lavish cinematic trailer , and has just posted a bit of gameplay footage to give readers a taste of what's to come from this title that's based on a "Burtonesque noir fairy tale" comic of the same name. We've also had a chance to spend a little time with a pre-release build they were kind enough to provide.

A great wind blows from the land of memory, bringing omens and old sensations. The Kingdom of the Dead, where everything seems bound to eternal rest, is troubled by some obscure presence, an intruder…something alive! A loving kitten’s going to make this world up-side-down!

Will Musil, the skeleton detective, is at his desk in his office…he’s deep in a restless sleep, hovering between his dream and the memories of his past life, still unaware of what lies ahead…

A Skeleton Story is a platformer of sorts, highly reminiscent of Canabalt — but at closer range and with a bit more graphical character. A number of additional gameplay elements are present, as well.

Your overall goal in the game is to send skeleton detective Will Musil leaping from rooftop to rooftop in an effort to retrieve a fleeing, black kitten. Along the way there are coins, boxes to collect, as well as oncoming villains that can be shot or leapt over (if you're quick). Letters that spell out "W-I-L-L" can be collected, as well, granting temporary invisibility when the word is complete.

There are an infinite number of levels in the game, and each time you manage to retrieve the cat, you will be taken to Henry's Pub where various character attribute enhancements can be purchased with accumulated money: increased ammo capacity, more lethal attacks, higher jumps, run faster, and more. But, if you tarry and don't manage to catch the kitten before it flees offscreen, it's one life gone, for you.

Making it from rooftop to rooftop isn't necessarily a simple matter. As the game progresses, more and more roofs are of different heights, and some houses can't take Will's weight and begin to collapse upon contact, Canabalt-style.

The game features a lively spy-capers sort of soundtrack and utilizes an onscreen stick and buttons for negotiating the endless series of rooftops that lay in wait. OpenFeint integration tracks online scores and achievements along the way.

The final version of the game should be in the next few weeks.

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Fishlabs' latest addition to the App Store is a modern take on the arcade classic, Missile Command. While we've seen a few games adopt this formula, none have looked as darn pretty as Earth Defender [99¢]. Earth Defender's interpretation of Missile Command on the iOS devices dispenses with the missiles launching from Earth, and opts for a more responsive explosion-on-touch mechanic. The swarms of multi-colored aliens descending on our fair planet won't know what hits them when a well placed bomb explodes in their faces. Of course, where would Missile Command be without chaining; Earth Defender ensuring that explosions from one alien will in-turn kill others nearby, allowing for well placed screen clearing multipliers.

Earth Defender is host to a variety of weapons and a horde of aliens to use them on. Weapons include a few very different effects that will need to be used differently to adapt to the circumstances. The black hole bomb for instance, will suck up the smaller critters, but are usually limited in number. The electrical bomb will zap any enemies near the blast radius and is used almost as a mine to pre-empt attacks. Weapons are gradually updated in size and power too, level-to-level, to accommodate for the greater difficulty.

Enemies generally take the form of two types– those that can be killed by bombs, and those that can't. For the latter, you need to hold your finger over the enemy to charge an electrical bolt from Earth, slowly whittling them down. There are 14 different enemy types in the game; with some of the more interesting ones cloaking at random, or combining to launch a suicide attack against your shields.

To defend against the onslaught, the Earth has 3 shields barriers divided into multiple segments. Enemies target these segments, either with their own bombs, or by very damaging kamikaze runs. If they happen to pierce through any part of the 3-layered shield, an invasion warning begins, indicating the descent of the alien mothership. It's up to you to kill enough enemies to then generate a shield power-up in time, or risk losing the Earth entirely. Power-up drops are fortunately frequent and forgiving, so this really only becomes an issue when you are seriously in trouble.

For all that the Earth Defender description touts its boss fights, we found this to be the weakest area of the game. Essentially, one snake-like boss attacks multiple times (until the final boss), narrowly escaping you each time until you finally dispense with him. We would have liked to see different bosses with different attack patterns that require a more measured use of the various bombs at your disposal. This is a criticism that may be leveled at the game as a whole too, though– as bombs are not selectable and power-ups simply replace the bomb in your possession– allowing for no real strategic use of weapons.

Earth Defender looks and sounds fantastic, and plays just as frantically as Missile Command of old. You will quickly become overwhelmed by the sheer number of enemies launching at your shields, and the difficulty of the last few levels is considerable. Unfortunately, Earth Defender doesn't escape the feeling that after the first few levels you've seen it all; with the basic gameplay simply increasing in pace. Instead, we would have loved to see levels or bosses that require you to fully explore your arsenal. Still, Earth Defender is a true-to-its-roots Missile Command inspired game; and with 5-finger multi-touch and OpenFeint, should really appeal to fans of the genre.

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