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When I was growing up I lived right down the street from an R/C car racing track at the local park. I was pretty young during this time, and thus couldn’t afford the rather expensive professional grade radio controlled cars that folks would bring out to race. So I was relegated to just a spectator, but I still got such a thrill out of watching these miniature vehicles race and jump around the dirt track, all the while being controlled remotely by people who were standing right beside me on the sidelines.

Sadly, over the next few years the R/C track’s popularity dwindled and was eventually torn down in favor of a dog park. It probably goes without saying, but dog parks aren’t nearly as cool as R/C car tracks when you’re a kid. So when developer Sunlaris emailed a trailer for their upcoming game Model Auto Racing, I immediately got a nostalgic twinge of excitement. As you can see in the trailer, it looks to be a proper R/C racing title for folks like me who couldn’t afford to indulge in the hobby as a kid.

Model Auto Racing will contain 3 different vehicle categories drawn from the real-life R/C racing world: buggy, short course, and touring car. It will also give you the choice of a top-down camera view or a fixed-position from the sideline podium, just as if you were at the track yourself. Other features include Universal support, Retina graphics for the new iPad, Game Center with online multiplayer, 12 tracks and 48 event types, and upgradeable vehicles. Model Auto Racing is awaiting review from Apple and should be out before the end of the month.

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Usually when we call a game a sandbox, we’re referring to some kind of open world game where you can wander, free of restraints, and do anything you can think of. The Sandbox [ Free ] isn’t quite that kind of game. Instead it straddles the border between game and art project, rewarding players for creativity while giving them near-infinite possibilities.

You don’t play a character in The Sandbox, you play a god. You can paint with pixels of stone, draw towers of earth and set them to grow. You can draw just about any non-living thing you can imagine, paint it into a scene, and then bring it to life with the forces at your command. You have electricity at your fingertips, steam and oil in your grasp, and much more. It’s less a sandbox than a blank canvas, waiting to be filled.

There are two ways to play (with) The Sandbox: Free Mode and Story Mode. Story Mode is misnamed; there is no story, just a complex, goal-driven training ground. The game walks you through each element so you can learn how it interacts with the others, teaching you tricks like how to use heat and electricity to boil water, or how to grow a forest using soil, seeds and rain.

A disproportionate amount of Story Mode is spent on working out the finer details of the freemium model, unfortunately. The elements can be unlocked via IAP or mana earned in game, but the latter option is complicated. The Sandbox doesn’t give out enough mana in Story Mode to unlock the elements when you need them, but if you switch over to Free Mode and earn some achievements you’ll be awarded more. It seems like it might be possible to unlock all the elements for free with enough careful planning and time. Otherwise you can purchase mana, or a launch pack with everything for $6.99. It’s an unnecessarily complicated system that draws attention to the man behind the curtain when you should be focused on learning the ropes.

However you do it, once you work through all 24 Story Mode levels you’ll have the full stable of elements and climate options at your command. That’s when things get really fun, when you move into Free Mode and start creating. You can essentially paint any sort of pixel environment you want, with a huge selection of unlockable backdrops and the freedom to combine elements to do just about anything. Players are only just starting to explore the potential of the game—if you want to be inspired you can paw through the gallery of shared worlds and play with any that you like.

All this freedom comes at a cost, though. The game has a few bugs, like level conditions that trigger incorrectly and Game Center achievements that don’t seem to work. But the part that counts, the ways the elements interact with one another, that part works beautifully. The elements may not always have the properties you might expect, but they can do quite a lot. It would be a dream come true to play a game with this complexity in worlds like those of Minecraft, where you could work some serious feats of 3D engineering.

The Sandbox isn’t that kind of sandbox, sadly, but it’s still fun to play in just two dimensions. Build a world, populate it with flowers and trees, then burn it to the ground. Experiment with the debilitating effects of acid rain. Or build complex Rube Goldberg machines that really work. The sky isn’t quite the limit, but The Sandbox is well on the way. And with a planned Universal update in the works, its canvas is set to grow. So go, make something amazing—then stop by our discussion thread to share your creation with the world.

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If there was a list of things that I never expected to be talking about today, Duke Nukem 3D [ Free ] getting an update would probably be right near the top. But that’s just what has happened as MachineWorks has issued a new update for 3D Realms’ classic first-person shooter that looks to address the long-derided virtual controls in the game.

For a quick backstory, Duke Nukem 3D launched in the App Store way back in August of 2009. Id Software’s Wolfenstein 3D [$1.99 / Free ] had hit iOS several months earlier and received critical acclaim, mostly centered around how well their controls worked. With a Doom [ $4.99 ] iOS port also on the horizon, having Duke Nukem on my iPhone seemed like the greatest news in history for a long-time FPS fan like me.

However, the initial version of Duke had possibly the worst controls I’ve ever encountered. I mean downright unplayable. To the developer’s credit they quickly issued an update about a month later with a bunch of new control options, but sadly it did little to help. Sure, some people could find a scheme that was workable for them with some heavy tweaking of options, but the controls still felt pretty bad and have remained that way ever since.

Until today that is, closing in on 3 years after the last update to Duke Nukem. Surprising to say the least, but unfortunately it’s also a good news/bad news situation. The good news is that the controls are actually quite decent now, offering an improved (but still lackluster) dual-stick option as well as a very good “drag anywhere to aim” scheme which really nails it. It may have taken a long time (that’s an understatement) but I can finally enjoy Duke Nukem 3D on my iPhone. Also, it appears that the visuals have been cleaned up considerably, and actually look quite good for a 16 year old game.

Now for the bad news. The update is full of bugs, one of which can render your controls unusable. You can avoid causing this by going into the control options before loading or starting a new game and selecting and then deselecting the dual-stick controls, but that will erase whatever custom scheme you might have previously created by dragging the virtual buttons around the screen. Basically, it’s not much of a solution.

In addition, there’s also a bug that silences the sounds from the game which I’ve only been able to fix by saving my game and killing it from the multi-tasking screen and then starting it up again. Also, for some reason the end-level stats screen is upside down and they’ve disabled the mirror reflection effect in the game. Finally, advertisements have been inserted into Duke Nukem 3D which will pop down when you first start the game and when wake your device from sleep with the game running. Lame.

As delighted as I was to see a surprise update to one of my all-time favorite games, unfortunately this latest update for Duke Nukem 3D is a complete mess. If they can sort out the bugs then I really believe the new controls are a huge improvement, and bring the game more in line with the newer FPS games on the App Store. However, given the lack of attention paid to the game the past few years that seems like a pretty big “if”, especially since the iPad version Duke Nukem 3D SE [ $0.99 (HD)] hasn’t been updated at all. Also, I’m not crazy about ads being put into a game that I previously paid for.

At any rate, Duke Nukem 3D is currently free right now, so if you didn’t have it already you might as well grab it just in case they do sort out the bugs. If you could manage just fine with the controls the way they were before, then you’ll probably want to hold out on this update altogether until (and if) they can fix this situation.

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It’s a Thursday on the App Store which is as just as good of a reason as any to set your games’ prices to free if you’re an iOS developer, or, at least, so it would seem. It sort of goes without saying, but due to the volatile nature of pricing on the App Store, you better grab these games now if you’re interested in them. Few things are more annoying in the world of iOS gaming than missing a killer freebie.

Get your downloading finger ready:

Beyond Ynth, Free – [Review] – [Forum Thread] – An absolutely fantastic puzzle game where you play as a little ladybug doing your best to survive each level, often by rotating curiously sectioned off boxes. Do not miss this game while it’s free. If you want to give it a go on your iPad, there’s Beyond Ynth HD [ $0.99 (HD)], too.

Braveheart, Free – [Forum Thread] – You probably have a lot of games on your iPhone, but how many of those games have you searching for the Holy Grail? (Not many, I’d guess.) You’ll hack and slash your way through all sorts of normal monsters, boss monsters, and other monsters. If you’re looking for the iPad version, Braveheart HD [ Free (HD)] is what you seek.

Escape The Ape, Free – [Review] – [Forum Thread] – This jumping game puts you to the task of drawing lines to create trampolines for JoJo the monkey to bounce on. While it looks simple, gameplay is deceptively deep especially when you start reaching higher altitudes and need to work harder to collect power ups.

Fish Tycoon, Free – [Forum Thread] – I’m including this game in the list because these dumb Tycoon games are responsible for soaking up countless hours of my time, going all the way back to my Palm Treo 650 days. Or, before that, now that I think about it. …And now, fair reader, I place this curse upon you.

Highway Rider, Free – [Forum Thread] – Have you ever been sitting in traffic when some dude on a motorcycle recklessly lane splits you at what seems like a million miles an hour? Well, in Highway Rider, you can be that jerk. The point system even encourages it, in fact.

Swordigo, Free – [Review] – [Forum Thread] – A side scrolling action RPG that is just fantastic. Imagine if you took something like Zelda II and released it in 2012, that’d be Swordigo. Download it. Play it. Love it. Trust me.

Towers N’ Trolls, Free – [Forum Thread] – I love tower defense games, you love tower defense games, and this is a tower defense game. It’s a pretty good one too, so if you haven’t scratched that whole laying out towers and murdering creeps itch in a while, here’s your chance.

Trigonon, Free – [Forum Thread] – The gimmick of this puzzle game is that it takes place in the factory of your mind. Your thoughts are represented by steel spheres, and you’ve got to get them out. Seems reasonable, and looks cool.

Vermes on Mars, Free – [Review] – [Forum Thread] – An interesting shooter where you control a small squad of robots (which are all upgradeable). You position them, and tap to target. It takes place on Mars, and your enemies are worms. The control scheme is worth giving this game a try.

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On the iOS platform, nobody has done as much for the 2D scrolling arcade shooter genre than Japanese developer Cave. For the past 2 years, they have consistently delivered high quality ports of their stellar back catalog of games to the App Store. They have yet to really have a misstep either, providing you have an especially unquenchable thirst for bullet hell-style shooters.

Cave’s iOS games come with several hallmarks, like touch controls that are arguably even better than physical controls, plenty of variety in scoring techniques, and a staggering amount of screen-filling explosions and interesting enemies and bosses. Their latest release Bug Princess 2 [$6.99 / Free ], which hit early last month, is no exception. It’s the sequel to last December’s Bug Princess [$4.99 / Free ] and you might also know it by its original name Mushihimesama Futari. It is widely considered by fans to be the best and most challenging entry in the Mushihimesama series.

If you played Bug Princess on iOS before, then things will seem incredibly familiar to you with Bug Princess 2. The menus and UI are largely the same, you have the same options for screen sizes and button placement, and of course the same great touch controls. Also like the original, the meat of the game comes in a 5 level campaign which can either be played straight through in one go or individually by level in a score attack mode.

You have the option of 2 ship types to play as, each with their own firing style, and on top of that you can choose what kind of shot type you want: Normal or Abnormal. Normal keeps your satellite helper ships tightly beside you, while Abnormal has them moving more tactically independently from your own ship movement. Finally, you have a choice of 4 difficulty options – Novice, Normal, Hard and Hell – which do a great job of tailoring the game’s challenge to suit practically any type of player.

Bug Princess 2 retains another feature from its iOS predecessor (am I sounding like a broken record yet?) which is 3 types of gameplay modes: Original, Maniac, and Ultra. In Original mode you build up a multiplier counter in the corner of the screen by collecting gems dropped by defeated enemies. You’ll need to switch back and forth between normal bullets and lasers depending on the color of the counter, adding a layer of strategy as opposed to just blasting away at every enemy willy-nilly. Ultra mode uses the same scoring system but with arranged enemies and bullet patterns.

Maniac mode, however, is where Bug Princess 2 really shows its brilliance. Here you build up your multiplier meter using regular shots, and once it’s hit a certain point, you switch to laser to cash it all in. Using either regular shots or laser shots will produce different types of gems from fallen enemies too. This makes Maniac mode the most strategic in terms of variety of scoring ways, and in turn makes it the most interesting mode.

So there you have it. Bug Princess 2 shares a ton in common with the original Bug Princess, but thanks to some key differences in scoring and completely new stages it really stands out on its own. And like Bug Princess it’s also not overly complex like some later Cave titles, so for shooter newbies it remains a strong entry point to the genre. If you’ve had your fill of bullet-hell shooters then Bug Princess 2 probably won’t do anything to change your mind, but if you’re a leaderboard competitor or a Cave fanatic then you’ll find plenty of value in picking it up or at least checking out the lite version.

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If there’s anything I’ve learned after pouring several days of my life into the latest installment of Com2uS’s action-rpg Inotia franchise, it’s that no amount of Engrish exposure can truly prepare you for that strange moment when a gorgeous brunette clad in diaphanous silks informs a ‘pretty boy’ of an anti-hero that he is squirting blood.

This awkwardness informs a lot of the dialogue in Inotia 4: Assassin of Berkel [$2.99 / Free ]. While relatively free of the grammatical errors that usually plague such games, Inotia 4 has a rather, uh, unique way with words. Here, you’ll find imposing-looking orcs declaring that things are “kinda awkward” and villains that order their lackeys to “allure” helpless souls to a nefarious end. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, mind you. Unless you’re totally adverse to the idea of peculiar phrasing, the accidental humor actually offers a light-hearted touch to what otherwise feels like a stereotypical jaunt.

The story in Inotia 4: Assassin of Berkel is one built out of familiar tropes. For example, the protagonist’s an effeminate-looking but curmudgeonly chap who also happens to be young, gifted at the art of assassination and a member of the Shadow Tribe. His star-crossed love interest? A young woman who bears more than a passing resemblance to Final Fantasy heroines like Rinoa, Garnet and Yuna. Needless to say, this sort of sets the pattern for the rest of the game. Inotia 4 is a little bit of everything you’ve ever encountered in an RPG from the Orient. There are warring factions, magic, subterfuge, hidden pasts, and even an arrogant stranger with an overpowered weapon. If you were looking for something new, this isn’t the KRPG you’re looking for.

While I’m not particularly fond of the virtual d-pad utilized here or its periodic lack of responsiveness, the controls are pretty standard fare. It’s the interface that bugs me to no end. On top of many smaller issues, the deluge of buttons, character portraits, health bars and mana bars can make it literally impossible to see where you’re going. To be fair, it doesn’t happen all that often but when it does happen, you’ll take painful notice.

From an audiovisual perspective, Inotia 4 is neither particularly impressive nor completely humdrum. An odd mixture of Retina quality elements and retro-looking graphics, the game feels a little older than its actual release date. As for the audio, I’m somewhat on the fence. On one hand, the music isn’t too shabby; it’s the kind of stuff you would expect from an RPG. On the other hand, the sound effects left something to be desired for.

So, why play Inotia 4? Why go through strange localization and flighty controls? Why endure the storyline you’ve probably heard a thousand times before? Why did this get a four star as opposed to a plea for you to run away?

Simple. Because it’s actually pretty good.

Like a blind date between mostly compatible people, things can begin on a slightly shaky note. However, once momentum has been built, beautiful things can happen. If you have nothing against grindfests (it IS a Korean RPG, after all) and an obsessive-compulsive need to build the perfect party, Inotia 4 will eventually suck you in and keep you there.

The party system, though far from ground-breaking, is rather commendable. One of the things I liked best about it was the fact that while you can only have two party members (in addition to the protagonist) active at any given time, the game not only allows you to keep a stable of six but also ensures that all of them level up in an appropriate manner as you progress through the game. It’s a small feature but a clever one. Unlike many other RPGs, you can actually elect to mix and match your selection of humanoid minions without having to first devote extensive amounts of time to their personal developments.

Speaking of party members, they will consist of mercenaries summoned from item drops and, from time to time, the odd plot-generated NPC. Most of your time, however, will be spent with the former. Your mercenaries may belong to any of the six different classes available in the game. They also come with as many item slots as the protagonist, their own set of skills and statistics appropriate to the quality of the item that conjured them. While you’re in command of their equipment, you will need to cough up a few crystals if you want to change the rest.

As you can imagine, some of the appeal in the game lies in how you can tailor the composition of your party. Curious as to how pet-wielding classes will do against a stubborn boss? Bring them out and prepare for a crowded rumble. Fancy seeing how well three tanky priests can hold up against the game’s dungeons? Go ahead and test out that theory. Nothing will stop you. The level of micromanagement required is also entirely dependent on you. While you can choose to rely on your A.I settings, you can opt to take control of any of your characters at any given time.

Inotia 4 is also a dream come true for those who just HAVE to have the best gear. By and large, there’s no shortage of equipment to collect. Random beasts will sporadically drop legendary headgear. Fusion machines will occasionally offer the chance to engage in repeatable quests, quests that will grant you access to recipes for absurdly powerful items. You will also find goodies from boss battles, treasure chests and their spoils, side quests and shady merchants marketing what may or may not be the next best thing. Inotia 4 makes it easy to be covetous and is shameless about rewarding those willing to grind their way towards glory.

You know what the best part of all this is? Your party’s appearance will change with every high-priced trinket you acquire.

By the way, I’m impressed with how Com2uS handled one aspect of their IAP system. In Inotia 4, crystals are used for, well, pretty much everything. Have a weapon you really want to make but lack the ingredients for? Pay for its creation with a handful of crystals. Want to resurrect your party instead of restarting from the last saved point? Cough up the crystals. We know you have them in there. While hardly the most unusual approach, Com2uS has made usage of those crystals as enticing as ever. In the grand scheme of things, five crystals is nothing compared to an hour spent scouring the maps for material. You almost find yourself compelled to conform.

In between all of this, crammed between the good and the bad, nestled between the occasional guilty crystal expenditure, that’s where the magic happens. Inotia 4 will have you mashing buttons, switching hot keys, pondering talent points and beating on artillery turtles without so much as a second thought. It will have you gathering ingredients for a powerful new weapon even as you effortlessly transform your glass cannon of a priest into a shield-wielding bastion of power. It will keep you trucking towards the next level, determined to see how your new weapon will do against the latest dungeon or how well your latest collection of party members will hold up. Inotia 4 isn’t the most original title out there but it certainly knows which buttons to press.

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It’s been over a year and a half since we last covered the boy wizard and his Lego debut on iOS. Now, after much waiting the adventure is finally ready to be concluded with Lego Harry Potter Years 5-7 [ $4.99 ]. While most Potter diehards will likely flock to this version and have a decent time, a few annoying missteps keep the title from having a wider appeal.

As was the case for the previous Lego Potter game, Years 5-7 is a port of an already existing portable game for the 3DS and more recently, PlayStation Vita. This means that you’re going to have (for the most part) a fully-featured game with a wealth of content. You’ll play through the final four movies of the series reimagined in the now-typical Lego way, each with its own chapters and sub-chapters. In addition, there are tons of unlockable characters as well as collectables. Suffice to say, there shouldn’t be any worries about getting your money’s worth with this title.

Gameplay is standard for what you’d expect from a Lego game at this point. You’ll spend the majority of the game engaged in simple exploration and puzzle solving, with some occasional combat thrown in for good measure. And, of course, you’ll spend a lot of time collecting studs which can be used to unlock new characters who have abilities that can open up previously locked areas. One new element added to the mix is the inclusion of Wizard Duels, which pits your character against another wizard in what is essentially a rock-paper-scissors battle for wand supremacy. While I didn’t think it added much to the overall gameplay, it was still a welcome sight for variety’s sake.

It feels strange saying this, but I was impressed with the visuals in Years 5-7. There was a certain clarity and visual sheen surrounding the in-game environments and character models on the iPhone 4S which put the game on par (or even better than) its portable console brethren. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for the movie cutscenes, which were incredibly compressed. The audio suffers from a similar fate with annoying artifacts which simply feel out of place.

An interesting side effect is the fact that Years 5-7 will drain your iPhone’s battery very quickly. It seems like an obvious statement to make when you’re dealing with graphically-rich games, but I was still surprised at the how fast it drained (60-70% in about two hours of play). Just keep this in mind if you plan on a heavy gaming session away from a power source.

One of the areas we enjoyed in the previous Lego Harry Potter game was its intuitive control scheme, which used a more touch-centric (tap to move, swipes, etc.) method for controlling your character vice a virtual control pad. Unfortunately, Years 5-7 moves away from that style and settles firmly on a virtual joypad complete with various action buttons. While a virtual gamepad scheme is nothing new, the implementation feels off with small buttons that aren’t clearly labeled and the occasional non-register of a tap. Other actions, like specifically selecting a spell, become exercises in redundancy with the current control setup.

There are also a few nagging issues on top of the controls that just bring the experience down. The camera angle occasionally put you in a position where it’s hard to see pitfalls and other insta-death elements, causing sudden death if you’re not careful. I also encountered several situations where it was possible for your character to just get trapped on objects and just hang. Thankfully, the game will mercifully kill you after being this way for a while, but these sorts of bugs just shouldn’t be happening.

I’m happy to see that the Lego Harry Potter series finally completed on iOS. However, I’m not sure why it took so long for this port to land on the platform. Sure, Years 5-7 looks good visually, but the switch to a virtual gamepad along with the issues mentioned above deter the game from being better. As it is, the Lego gameplay is intact, meaning that fans of the series should continue to enjoy it. However, you can do better if you’re simply looking for the next great action/platform game.

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Aby Escape [ Free ] is the newest freemium title from BulkyPix and Pixel Ratio, and a 3D spin on the iphone’s popular runner genre. Instead of dashing full speed to the left or right sidescroller style, the game plants the camera just behind Aby’s back and leaves it to you to guide the terrified raccoon down paths cluttered with rocks, cars, animal herds, beer-bellied hicks who lie in wait until you approach, and other obstacles.

To keep your unstoppable force from running smack-dab into immovable objects, you tilt your phone to weave side to side, swipe your thumb up the screen to jump, and swipe downwards to drop to your knees and pull off a Catwoman-in-Arkham-City slide, minus revealing cleavage. (Yeah, I know. Can’t have it all, though.) The core gameplay idea is reminiscent of Temple Run [ Free ], but Aby Escape does a nice job at iterating on the formula with some new ideas and some variety.

The game features two game modes: Story, and Unlimited. In Unlimited, your goal is to stay alive for as long as possible. You accomplish that feat by weaving in and out of danger to pick up shoes that keep your perpetually draining energy meter topped off. Aby gradually picks up speed the longer you survive, making extended play an exercise requiring absolute focus and twitch reflexes. Besides shoes, you can grab coins with which to purchase power-ups, characters, new Unlimited levels, and other unlockables.

And that’s where the trouble begins. The first time you load up Aby Escape, only one Unlimited level, Greystone Park, is available. Two other Unlimited stages are available from the in-game store, but at a cost of more than 3000 coins each. Want to try Story mode? That’ll run you 7500. You can unlock these modes in one of two ways: grind Greystone Park and pinch your pennies for hours on end, or shell out real money for IAP coin bundles.

The unbalanced economy pervades in other ways. Besides new stages, the shop also sells items like speed boosts that blast you forward and render you impervious to harm. The problem is, every item carries an exorbitant price tag. Each item can be upgraded up to five times. The first upgrade for each item costs 400, the next 1200, then 3000, and so on. Handy, but a major cut into your savings when you’re stuck with only one level to play. Playable characters and different types of feet like hairy Hobbit toes go for between 2000 to more than 4000, but don’t alter the game in any way; they’re purely for aesthetics. I hate to harp on this point, but with only one level to play, I simply considered all other purchases a waste until I’d invested in at least one change of scenery to spice up my time with the game.

Unlimited levels feature challenges that reward you with coins, but some of them just don’t make “cents.” Buy two upgrades at 400 coins apiece, get 50 coins back for completing the challenge. Uh, no thanks. I bought an IAP item that gives me two coins for every one I picked up, but that only increased my income from a drip-drop to a steady trickle. Eventually I shelled out five bucks for 20,000 coins—not because I wanted to, but because I felt like I had to. It was either that or more grinding. I unlocked the last two Unlimited levels before diving into Story, a sprawl of levels spread across Greystone Park and two new areas, the same ones you’ll play in Unlimited if/when you fork over the coins.

Story tasks you with racking up a high score by staying alive as long as possible and collecting every pair of shoes on each stage. Running into obstacles knocks points off your score and sets you back at a checkpoint. Most checkpoints set you so far back that you’ll have forgotten earlier terrain in your effort to remember what to do in the area that tripped you up, which amounts to a lot of frustrating memorization and trial and error.

Technical issues also abound. The frame rate chugs sporadically, spelling certain death in trap-heavy regions. Also, since you spend the game running forward into the distance, terrain you pass slides backwards as you run along but some of it slides too slowly, clogging the screen and blocking your view of the next hurdles. More seriously, though, was a store calculation error—I had more than the 400 coins I needed for an upgrade, but the transaction somehow took my wallet down to -97, which shouldn’t even be allowed to happen—and a crash bug that dumped me back to the home screen every time I tried to load an Unlimited level.

With so many strikes against it, what could possibly convince you to help Aby Escape? Because I’ll be darned if it isn’t fun. Grinding grew monotonous only because, really, who wants to look at the same environment over and over in any game? Actually <em>playing</em> the game is quite enjoyable. There’s a feeling of satisfaction and skill in any runner game that comes from guiding your scurrying lemming over, under, and around obstacles, marveling at your response time, dexterity, and lasting for as long as possible before inevitably slamming into something that reduces your bones to a fine powder.

Collecting coins, shoes, and power-ups requires near dead-on collision to register, but aside from the somewhat sluggish tilt-controlled weaving that doesn’t always keep up with the game’s gradually accelerating pace, the controls usually responded sharply enough that I felt encouraged to veer into danger and risk another visit to the Retry screen if it meant snatching an out-of-the-way coin placed in front of a trap. The game also plays fair by giving you a chance to shoulder past obstacles like cars and rocks unless you strike them dead on, which made me even more willing to dash in front of dangerous objects and grab goodies.

Three strong redeeming qualities ultimately saved Aby Escape from outright deletion. It’s fun, it’s deep (you’ve still got all the challenges and your personal records to break even after you’ve opened everything up), and it’s free. If this were a paid game, I’d knock a star off the grade, and fairly. The game really should offer activities from the get go or at least mark down the fee for additional content, but what is there provides loads of entertainment.

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From the very first time I launched Pandemic 2.5 [ $0.99 ], I was out to obliterate humanity. My implement of destruction was a virus I called “Iloveyou”—named for a classic. Iloveyou started its life in South Africa, a humble disease with a single carrier. He probably didn’t even know he was sick. At first, we were asymptomatic.

Iloveyou had room to evolve, with 8 EvoPoints to grow into. I spent them carefully. I enhanced our heat capacity, so we wouldn’t die out in the desert. I developed our first symptom: rhinorrhea, the runny nose. A little mucus can go a long way toward spreading a cold, I reckoned. I hoped to spread out to insects, but we weren’t yet advanced enough. I threw in dysuria and photophobia for good measure—not enough to kill our hosts by far, but enough to cause a little discomfort and hopefully improve our spread.

Then we began. The number of infected grew quickly, then stalled out. I had a few more EvoPoints to work with at this point, so we brought in our insect friends. Even with a few more symptoms, Iloveyou didn’t make it much further than that; we were too slow and our infection vectors just sort of got better. But I learned from that first experience. On our next outing we made it to the next tier of symptoms, picking up a cough. Then our victims began to suffer fevers. We lost a few of the infected early on, but we were finally on our way.

And so it went. At first we refrained from killing our victims. Hosts are more important than corpses. We spread across borders before anyone knew to shut them, took out hospitals before anyone knew what was going on. Once most of the world was within our grasp we took the next step and became fatal.

When people started dying, they knew they had a problem on their hands. They mobilized quickly, developed a vaccine almost before we could react. It was too late for most of them, but it was also too late for us: the people that were left were cured, and we would never see our dream of total global destruction come true. Granted, it was quite the morbid dream. It made me a bit queasy to see the number of living humans dwindle, sure. But it’s never nice to lose.

If all this sounds familiar, it might be because you’ve played Pandemic 2. The Flash game has been around for years—it even has its own popular meme. Pandemic 2.5 is a complete overhaul for the mobile crowd. With a new interface and a few improvements, it’s decent port of the desktop classic.

Decent, mind you, but certainly not great. There are little problems, like awkward text fields and introductory text that flows right off the screen. Bigger issues include things like a complete lack of tutorial, and a news ticker that flies by too quickly to read if the game is in anything but full-on sloth mode.

The biggest issue of all is that the game can be agonizingly slow. It’s simply not ideal for a mobile platform in its current state. Playing Pandemic involves a lot of waiting, especially if you’ve already lost the ability to win and just want to get your final score. Normally I’d pull out my phone while the slow parts passed, but, well, you can see the problem with that.

Here’s the thing, though: Pandemic in this form is just as compelling as it’s ever been. Some of the bigger problems with the Flash game have even been worked out. The meme is outdated, as Madagascar is no longer ludicrously paranoid unless you’re playing at the top tier of difficulty. There are also traits (and associated achievements) you can unlock by completing hidden requirements, something that builds a sense of overall progression. If you can ignore the interface problems, this is the best take on the subject matter yet.

So consider this a cautious recommendation. If you can stomach the mild horror of obliterating humanity, if you can handle a somewhat clunky port, it’s pretty great to have Pandemic on the go. It sounds as though Dark Realm Studios is already working on fixing some of the game’s problems, too. Me, I’m working on a new strategy. With luck, we’ll take the island nations, wipe ‘em all out before they know what hit them. Awful to contemplate? Sure. But Pandemic makes a convincing argument: isn’t it time we gave the bugs their turn?

TouchArcade Rating:

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