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A couple of weeks ago, we had a chance to get some hands-on time with the iPhone and iPad version of Puzzle Agent from Telltale Games. The story of FBI puzzle detective Nelson Tethers was coming together nicely for the iOS devices, and now the game is finally available. Puzzle Agent succeeds beautifully in the art style and story departments, but falls a little flat with the actual gameplay offered. If you go into Puzzle Agent expecting a robust puzzle game with a lot of content and replayability, you'll likely be disappointed. However, if you're looking for an excellent mystery to solve with humorous characters and an interesting plot, you'll find a lot to enjoy about the overall experience of Puzzle Agent.

The game starts with Nelson sitting at his desk in the FBI headquarters. You can tell he doesn't see a whole lot of action, as he is surprised to receive a phone call asking him to go on an assignment in the field. The eraser factory in Scoggins, Minnesota has ceased production, and thus been unable to supply the White House with their required allotment of erasers. All inquiries as to what the problem is at the eraser factory have resulted in odd puzzle-related responses from the townsfolk in Scoggins, making Nelson the perfect candidate to have investigate the situation. You'll travel to Scoggins to question people, solve puzzles, and uncover a twisted tale of what has gone awry at the eraser factory.

Puzzle Agent functions similar to other point-and-click adventure games, giving you a scene with various interactive elements to investigate. A circle will emanate from wherever you touch on the screen, and an icon will show up within that circle if something can be interacted with. I love this mechanic as it allows me to easily check an entire area for clues without tapping on every square inch of the screen. Talking with characters in the game is definitely the high point of Puzzle Agent. Each character is fully voiced and has multiple points of conversation to engage in. The amount of personality and humor that the characters exude through the dialogue is phenomenal, and playing through Puzzle Agent is analogous to watching a well crafted animated film. The art style is also very pleasing, featuring the minimalist hand drawn style of Graham Annable who created the Grickle comics and animated shorts.

iPad screenshots (click to enlarge):

The actual puzzles you'll be solving in Puzzle Agent are a mixed bag. Some are interesting, intuitive, and fun while others are just plain awkward and frustrating. Many times it's just not clear what you are supposed to be doing in a given puzzle. A hint system is in place in case you get stuck, so it never really prevents you from progressing, but it can be annoying to spend time trying to solve a difficult puzzle with trial and error when you are immersed in the story. Another frustration with Puzzle Agent is the controls. The game is designed very well for touch screen, but the actual responsiveness when touching or dragging items is not so great. It feels like the game is optimized for the mouse and cursor of the Mac/PC version, and using the larger surface of a fingertip doesn't afford the precision needed to perform some of the basic actions in the game.

There also isn't much reason to go back and play the game once you've beaten it, as the puzzles and story don't change. One important point to bring up is that Puzzle Agent looks far better on the iPad than it does on the iPhone. Many of the textures are blurry and show signs of artifacting, and are a far cry from the App Store screen shots that look like they are optimized for Retina Display.  This leads me to believe that it's just a bug with the release version that doesn't allow it to display the game in the proper resolution, although I have yet to confirm this. It doesn't completely ruin the game, but it is a significant distraction. The iPad version doesn't seem to exhibit this problem, and hopefully the issue gets rectified with the iPhone version soon.

Even with these issues, Puzzle Agent is still a really enjoyable experience. And that's what it really boils down to – it's better served as an exceptional entertainment experience rather than an exceptional game. The art style, music, voice acting, and story are incredibly well done, but the controls and puzzles are pretty hit and miss. If you're looking for something akin to an enjoyable interactive movie, Puzzle Agent serves this purpose really well.

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Today Apple held its media event at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco and unveiled its work in significantly evolving a number of its mobile and media products. I had a chance to see it all first hand and spend some hands-on time with the fruits of the company's recent labor.

The announcement that is likely of the most interest to our readers is the arrival of the new iPod touch, thinner than ever and featuring the same razor-sharp Retina display used in the iPhone 4. (And, holding the new device in my hand, I can confirm that the screen is every bit as sharp as that of the iPhone 4.) The upgraded device is, indeed, basically "an iPhone 4 — without the phone," with a few exceptions. It utilizes the same A4 processor used in the iPhone 4 and the iPad, and features integrated gyroscopes for added in-game control precision. It has front- and back-facing cameras, as well, allowing FaceTime video chats. But the rear-facing camera offers a relatively low 960×720 pixel resolution, as compared to 2592×1936 pixels on the iPhone 4. That means it produces photos that are only 14% the size of those taken with big brother iPhone 4.

But, we're gamers here! And in that capacity, the new iPod touch is a golden mobile gaming device. During today's event, Steve Jobs indicated that the iPod touch is presently the #1 selling mobile game device, outselling Sony and Nintendo's devices, combined. He revealed that 1.5 billion entertainment and game app downloads have passed out of the App Store. With the dramatic enhancements on most every front that the new iPod touch puts in the hands of gamers, we don't expect the touch to give up the crown anytime soon.

Another big announcement that Steve had in store is the reinvented Apple TV. No longer a scolding-hot slab of metal and plastic with the footprint of a Mac mini, the new Apple TV is a quarter the size of its predecessor, shrouded in black plastic, and cool to the touch.

This time around, Apple dispensed with local media storage and has positioned the new unit as a video streaming device, built on a video rental model. First-run HD movies can be rented at $4.99 per, with HD TV shows available at $.99 an episode — all HD. Netflix streaming is integrated, as well. And all of the local media sharing capabilities of the original device (tying to computers in your home for media display on TV) are preserved, with the notable addition of media streaming from an iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch. And all that, which I can confirm fits comfortably in the palm of your hand, can be had for just $99.

The new Apple TV should be of particular interest to our readers for another reason — it's based on Apple's A4 processor. Intel is not inside, this time around. Given that, it's clear that the new device is based on some form of OS X for the ARM processor. Apple isn't calling it iOS but, if it's not iOS proper, it's something extremely close. But, likely, it actually is iOS under the hood. Daring Fireball's John Gruber recently lent strong confirmation of that, as well.

And if, indeed, the new Apple TV is an iOS device, is there an App Store in its future? Let's hope so…

Apple also showed a new iPod shuffle which, happily, brings back the buttons of the previous versions and also demonstrated the new iPod nano. The nano is about the size of the shuffle, but features a multitouch display and a user interface styled after iOS (though it's not iOS-based). It's a pretty amazing device to play with, extremely light, small, and functional. It's not improvements all around with this one, though; the new nano lacks video recording as well as playback capabilities. It seems Apple's decided that's functionality to be found only in the iPhone and iPod touch.

On the software front, Apple has released iTunes 10 (available now), which offers several interface improvements as well as Ping, a new social network of sorts that allows iTunes users to follow one another and share news of what they're listening to online. Facebook integration is in place as well. iOS 4.1 will be released next week and will include a number of new features including the launch of Game Center — Apple's leaderboard network. Other improvements include bug fixes, and performance enhancements for 3G owners. iOS 4.2 was also previewed which will finally bring OS 4 to the iPad and is due in November.

It's clear from today's event that Apple has been keeping a laser focus on the areas that have become its clear domain: media and mobile.

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The human intellect is a remarkable beast. Just when we think that all possible Zombie concepts have been duly wrung out from our collective minds, developers renderPaz go and throw us a curve-ball. Picture this: you're driving down the post-apocalyptic interstate, weaving through abandoned vehicles strewn everywhere– when you see a hitch-hiker. Naturally, this being post-apocalyptic America, the rule of thumb (think Zombieland) is to just keep on driving. In Zombie Highway [99¢] you aren't afforded that luxury.

The object in Zombie Highway is to just keep on driving– pedal to the metal, you have only one speed– faster. That's not to say you're get very far, as zombies don't generally take kindly to your brains being cocooned inside an SUV's hard exterior. And unlike the variety in Zombieland, these zombies are willing to work to get them.

Zombies in Zombie Highway will pounce on your car's side rails as you speed past them, doing all they can to bring the car to a stop– generally by using their superhuman undead strength to wrestle it till it topples over. There are 7 types of zombies all up, from the skinny fledgling variety, to the stronger, health-regenerating, weightier monsters that do a world of hurt to your center of balance. As zombies stack up on one side, this is only compounded, with your only recourse being to get the buggers off as quickly as possible.

Fortunately, your own driving prowess and an arms dealer friend in the back provide all the tools you need to get through the zombie horde…at least for a couple of miles. Zombies can be exited from the vehicle by tilting your device to sideswipe them onto one of the many ruined cars littered across the highway. Each zombie has a health bar, and whittling that to zero will ensure they won't be sticking around. To help, your aforementioned friend riding shotgun (ho ho!) has a formidable arsenal that is gradually unlocked as you accumulate collective mileage across all your games. Weapons are fired by touching the corners of the screen– if a zombie is on the right near the front of your car, tapping the top right area will fire at it.

It's a straightforward formula that creates a fun and remarkably gratifying zombie slaying experience. It's also quite challenging, as zombies are super aggressive, and your car's physics are fantastic. For instance, don't expect to steer out of a lean by driving the other way– it'll only tip it further. Instead, a bit of load balancing and fast firing fingertips are required to keep the rubber on the road.

Our only gripes with the game are that for all the great 3D models and presentation there is a notable lack of any real sound effects. Your car is effectively muted until it's being weighed down, and then the creaks it makes are whisper quiet. Not hearing the engine at all detracts from the experience dramatically. In fact, the only sound you'll really hear from the car are the squeaks of your tires as you slide around the road. There is absolutely no music to be found either, which would have done a world of good to further build atmosphere and character.

We're also not quite sure why the developers didn't stick with Openfeint or a similar platform for its social functions, as their current Twitter implementation is rudimentary at best. And though the Facebook option results in a neat competition feature where you can track your friends, those who keep their gaming separate from Facebook are left on the curb. Thankfully neither of these platforms are required to access high scores.

Still, it's hard to stay disappointed with these drawbacks for long because running from hordes of zombies is just so much fun. The further you get, the more obstacles are thrown in your path, until you are eventually wrestling your device to fend off zombies, dodge roadblocks and keep your SUV from going belly up as you're two wheeling back and forth. It's a singular experience seemingly lifted right from classic zombie films and as such is effortlessly recommended. We just hope the developers look at the sound issue, as well as maybe add an achievements system ala Monster Dash [99¢] to pad out the survival game replayability.

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Quest of Knights Onrush [Free] was originally thrown together by developer MoreGames and Chillingo to spearhead a marketing campaign for their then primary focus, Knights Onrush [$0.99], a castle defense game. It turns out that their promotional app, a side-scrolling arcade beat 'em-up, was even better received than the game it was promoting, and in April we revealed that it was being made into a full fledged game. That game, Knights Rush [App Store] is finally here.

Knights Rush takes the formula of the original game– what was essentially a limited, endless mode-only beat 'em up– and breathes the life of an entire campaign into it. Not shying away from that very definition, developer MoreGames envisioned an 'entire campaign' to mean 40 sizeable campaign levels over 8 unique worlds, and a battallion of 50 different enemy types and 8 giant bosses to clog the daylights out of. Not to mention two very different endless modes that improve greatly on its origins thanks to the huge library of art assets now available.

The campaign begins with a short in-game cinematic where your knight, after a little soul-searching, gets pulled into an alternate dimension. It's a no-fuss opener designed to get you into the action as soon as possible, as it's clear this is where the developer has spent most of their time. You start with a tutorial level, where you are soon introduced to two other knights to battle with. Before beginning each mission, you spawn in a portal room, where you can select from one of the three characters: a human Roman-esque knight, an other-world looking, dual scythe wielding knight, and a dwarven, hammer wielding knight. They each play very differently and have their own set of skills and perks to unlock.

The skill system itself needs some explanation, as it may not be apparent how it functions when first picking up the game. Each level, you begin by choosing a character, which is then spawned at level 1. Even if you come out of the first world at level 14, you'll still spawn in world 2 with your character reset. At first, this put me off, as I was having lots of fun with the progressive empowerement of my knight. In retrospect however, this seems to be a very clever implementation. Firstly, it allowed me to explore the breadth of each characters abilities over the campaign, mixing them in ways that I was not able to do in my first attempt. And secondly, it gave a nice sense of character scaling as I sliced through the 5 levels that make up each game world, leveling periodically without maxing out each and every skill.

Ultimately, each character has only 2 active spells that can be unlocked. Abilities are sorted into 'skills' and 'perks', and each level up you have access to 1 skill and a couple of perks. Perks supplement skills and your standard attacks, by adding benefits such as fire or ice to your attacks, or by increasing the rate at which you level or critical strike, or how much health is restored when you pick up health potions (or even how many additional skills or perks you earn each level). Skills on the other hand, include your two active abilities and several other passive abilities, such as attack strength or health bonuses. Each ability has 5 levels, and over the course of a world you'll generally be able to max out 3 or 4 of the reasonably lengthy list before having to reset.

As well as your active skills, the game includes a variety of consumable spells, from a crazy fox strapped with dynamite to your standard room-clearing freezes, proximity mines, or giant balls of energy. Though combat suffers a little from a tendency towards a truckload of frantic attack button mashing, the 3 skills nearly always at your disposal are crucial to surviving anything after about world 3. At this stage, the odds you face will progressively become more and more overwhelming and any previous thoughts of encroaching monotony are quickly swept away in the chaos. Unfortunately this doesn't extend to the huge, great looking boss enemies, who after the horde of enemies you have to wade through to get to, largely seem like pushovers. I would have liked to see a little more strategic varience to these encounters.

In any case it is clear that alot of time has been spent on the enemies in Knights Rush. Having 50 different enemy types is no small feat– but having them all looking unique and with their own individual abilities and attacks is simply astounding. You'll encounter a host of different enemy knights, swamp monsters, giant crabs, giant spiders, the undead, wizards, vikings, golden scorpions, jumping iron-maidens…and more. These are then backed up by the legion of mechanical devices that are littered across each of the worlds. Worlds are replete with spiked traps, falling blades, rotating saws, raining arrows, giant boulders that fall from the sky, cannons, ballistae– you name it, it's there. And in an interesting twist, these enemies can only be defeated by standard attacks (if at all).

Knights Rush has to be one of the most gorgeously detailed and painstakingly created game worlds we have seen on the iOS device. Each character and enemy is inked in a stylized fashion closely resembling that of Castle Crashers on XBL. The backdrops are equally lovingly rendered, richly detailed and set-off in layers to give a pseudo-3D effect that I absolutely love. Playing through the Super Endless Mode– where worlds and enemies are randomly generated as you progress– is a visual treat.

Finally, the standard Endless Mode rounds out the Knights Rush content, where levels you unlock in the campaign can be played endlessly. High scores for both endless modes are recorded in Chillingo's Crystal social platform, which offers additional replay value above and beyond the Campaign's 3 or so hours of game time (which can effectively be doubled or tripled if you decide to attempt Hard or Insane difficulties).

While some may initially be deterred by the few active skills available or the kitten-soft boss fights; you can't dispute that the sheer weight of content here resembles something more like what we'd expect from an expensive console downloadable title. That there are three very different knights to fight with further compounds the game's fun factor as you delve into their individual skill sets. All up, Knights Rush is a highly recommended addition to any action fan's game library, and should be a no-brainer pickup for beat 'em up fans. (Note, we did encounter a small bug where reloading the campaign following an endless mode sessions resulted in the wrong skill tree for our chosen knight, something we expect the developers will address soon but certainly not game breaking.)

If you're still on the fence, head over to our forums to read other readers' opinions and be sure to check out the (slightly outdated) gameplay trailer above as the game looks infinitely better in action.

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By now I'm sure we all agree, Chillingo really have a soft spot for decaying dudes with a bad case of halitosis. They are Liches of the App Store, raising an undead army to swarm your iOS devices. For the most part, this is actually a good thing, as all their zombie offerings to date have been of a particularly high standard. So it's no surprise that they've championed Viqua Games' Zombie Escape [App Store], a game we were eagerly anticipating after our hands-on preview.

Zombie Escape takes the traditional line drawing experience and changes up the formula significantly. Rather than being the be-all-end-all of the game, where one misplaced line means instant death, the line-drawing mechanic is a means to an end; namely, directing survivors of the zombie infestation to a nearby chopper, filling it up, and waiting for the next to arrive. Sure, while your task each level might be rescuing each and every survivor, the zombies have to eat something right?

In this respect, Zombie Escape is a lot more forgiving than other line-drawing games, by allowing some casualties before outright failure, and permitting your survivors to fight back a little; in the form of a small window of opportunity for you to direct a survivor away if they are caught by a zombie– before their brains are eaten. This doesn't mean a less challenging game, but that the difficulty assumes a different form– something you'll appreciate when your screen is bursting with zombies and you're trying to thread your survivors through the most narrow of openings, all while avoiding your own airstrike.

The artillery at your disposal is crucial to staving off the zombie horde for as long as it takes for your lift-off to arrive. There are 7 items available to you, each unlocked as you work your way through the 28 levels and three different settings in the campaign mode. Items are peppered in-game through crate drops, covering the gamut of usual suspects; such as sniper rifles, bombs and airstrikes; as well as a few items unique to Zombie Escape such as the SOS helicopters, sleep grenades, hunks of meat (which attract zombies) and zombie-free tesla-coiled zones, the latter of which have a more utility role. Each item can be upgraded in different ways, some of which alter their purpose entirely, adding to its strategic value.

As well as your armament to consider, there are also varying zombie types which compound the danger your survivors are in. These include; a Seeker, which hunts your survivors down when in range; a Stinker, which leaves a toxic cloud behind it when it dies; and a Burster, a zombie that explodes after it is killed. Each of these super-zombies is more than capable of dispatching a hapless survivor in no time, so careful management of your survivors pathing and wonton destruction with your items is required. Oh, and carefully aim your SOS chopper pick-ups to land on a horde of zombies– it has the desired effect.

The level art in Zombie Escape gets the job done and is different across the 3 game worlds. Where Zombie Escape shines however, is in its 2D art, as all the zombies and survivors look great and are believably animated (I warmed especially to the survivors running around waving their arms above their heads). Unfortunately, I encountered a bug where the game's sound effects never worked for us, until I tried turning off and on the sound effects in the game menu a couple of times. Once I did, I was pleasantly rewarded with terrifying shrieks and groans that really helped sell their plight to us. Hopefully this bug will be addressed in a future update.

Zombie Escape's campaign missions are all driven by either the items available or the zombie types; you are frequently restricted to certain items to create a greater sense of strategy and difficulty, particularly in the later levels. The other tact that levels take are to throw at you large numbers of specific zombie types, a challenge that requires a combination of items and dexterity to keep your survivors alive. I was disappointed to see that Zombie Escape doesn't appear to support multi-touch, a feature useful in a game like this, though it never really became noticeable until the very last levels where micro-managing your survivors is essential.

With a further endless Survival game mode and the usual suite of achievements and high score tables provided by Chillingo's Crystal platform, Zombie Escape is certainly at the forefront of line-drawing games; up there with the likes of Boom Brigade in providing a guns-blazing, action-packed take on the formula. This one should provide for both line-drawing fans and action fans in general, as the pacing is good and the game notoriously difficult to put down. The couple of hours required to take down the campaign mode and the endless Survival mode should keep zombie-lovers entertained– just be sure to fiddle with the sound settings if you encounter the same effects bug I did.

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For all the remarkable games we are seeing nowadays on the App Store, we are blessed with very few epic RPGs. It seems that developers are still unwilling to invest in the content heavy, quest-driven adventures that many other platforms routinely enjoy. Publisher Nate Games has thoughtfully identified this gap in the market and have given us the next best thing– a direct port of a critically acclaimed 2009 title for the PSP– Crimson Gem Saga [$9.99] by Atlus Games.

As the name would suggest, Crimson Gem Saga is indeed an epic by definition, weighing in at a satisfying 30-40 hours of story-driven, turn-based combat and exploration of a colorful, mythical world. Crimson Gem Saga makes no delusions, drawing strongly from the tenets of the Dragon Quest series in doing little to crack the molds of the genre, but focusing instead on bringing that traditional RPG experience in as fine a package as possible.

The wrapper to that package comes by way Killian, a tightly wound chevalier graduating from military academy and ready to embark on a new life in the big wide world. It's a setting told ad nauseum by RPGs, a factor that Crimson Gem Saga doesn't shy from. Wholly self-aware, Crimson Gem Saga instead colors that grey backdrop with a surprisingly well written, often humorous dialogue and a host of jaded protagonists alway at each other's throats– an interaction practically unheard of in JRPGs.

To look at Crimson Gem Saga, one would have to agree that it delivers abundantly in eye candy. The game is portrayed with a mixture of highly detailed and diversely animated sprites (for both characters and world objects) and painted, layered level design. In many ways, Crimson Gem Saga aspires to the likes of Star Ocean, with the same colorful and richly populated world and detailed anime dialogue sequences rounding out the game's visual spectacle.

Undoubtedly the meat of any RPG is in its combat system, where you'll be spending the majority of your time over the length of the story. And combat remains largely derivative in Crimson Gem Saga. You won't find any complex limit system or interwoven skill trees to get your head around; but on the iOS devices, that is actually a blessing. The most difficult concept to master is the eventual use of linked attacks, where certain powerful skills are only made available if particular characters have consecutive turns. Otherwise combat is straightforward but constantly challenging, maintaining its lustre throughout the game.

Where Crimson Gem Saga falls short is in its seemingly lazy port; something of a curse of crossing the platform barrier. The on-screen buttons are just plain ugly, something that could be forgiven (though we wish there was an option to hide them entirely) if the implementation was otherwise acceptable. But this is not the case, with the menu system providing a saga of its own to overcome. Context sensitive areas on the screen aren't readily understandable, and the swiping mechanic is backwards and overly sensitive. Granted, hours of playing the game does eventually train you to negotiate the UI's hitches, but do expect initial frustration.

Compounding these issues are a few major bugs encountered; from a game-stopping cutscene crash we experienced on our first play through (fortunately, not on our second), to a widely experienced upgrading item crash. And voiced dialogues are terrific when they do work, but also intermittently cut out and seem to arbitrarily skip sequences. The silver lining to all this is that the developer has already responded to complaints on our forums with a patch being worked on to address some of these problems.

Notwithstanding the above, Crimson Gem Saga is a well-rounded title whose whole certainly exceeds the sum of its parts. Its traditional approach to RPGs meshes well with its witty dialogue to deliver a surprisingly engrossing adventure. Though combat is simple, even the average encounter is never a push over and so remains fun and engaging. The characters too are infectious and constantly at odds with each other; giving rise to some very funny dialogue and pop gaming culture references. If you can endure the clumsily ported menu system, then Crimson Gem Saga will reward you with a notoriously rare, epic RPG on the iOS platform.

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Frogatto is an open source platforming game available on the Mac/PC that was released to the App Store last month. We took a close look at the game when it came out, and though our impressions were mostly positive a couple of issues stuck out in an otherwise excellent retro-styled platformer, most notably the somewhat finicky controls and a lack of a save state when exiting the game. Both of these issues have been resolved in a new update, and Frogatto now features much tighter controls (especially when navigating underwater portions) and the game saves right where you left off when interrupted. In addition, other tweaks and optimizations have been included, as detailed in the update notes:

• Significantly improved controls, both functionally and graphically.
• Fixed auto-saving on iOS4 where multitasking is supported.
• Fixed bug where a dialog could repeat forever.
• Fixed crash in world map when you hold down while entering it.
• Added music and sound volume controls to pause screen.
• Added half-hearts.
• Minor level changes.
• Updated music.

If any of these issues have held you back in purchasing Frogatto before, now is the time to grab the game as not only have these problems been addressed in this update but the game is also on sale for 99¢ for a limited time (down from $4.99). I've played through this updated version and can confirm that it's quite a big improvement from the initial release, and Frogatto stands as one of the better platform games available for the iPhone.

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The Hero places you in the role of a superhero tasked with preventing crime and catastrophic events from befalling various cities in the world, all while maintaining a positive public image and keeping collateral damage to a minimum. You control your hero with a virtual stick that allows you to fly in any direction through the air, with a button for speeding your flight as you rush to save citizens from the many hazards in each city. These can be robbers in the street, bombs or fires in the buildings, rescuing falling babies, and of course defeating zombies. When not saving the citizens, you're dishing out high fives to them as you fly by, which increases your various special move gauges and promotes fame and good will.

A new update to The Hero adds 3 mini-games to the 15 level campaign and 4 level survival mode, as well as minor artwork/storyline tweaks and a revamped scoring system:

• A Fully revised gameplay and scoring model
• 3 Brand New minigames: Asteroids, Bomb Run, High-Fiver
• Levels are now packed with even more action
• New super bonus from high five streaks

The Hero was released back in March, and we really liked it in our full review, but for some reason it has flown under the radar since then and we haven't heard much of it in the past few months. Hopefully this new update will rekindle interest in this underrated title, and to help with that The Hero is also on sale for a limited time for 99¢ (down from $1.99). If you missed it the first time around, it's definitely worth checking out with the addition of more content and this temporary price drop.

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Retro overlord Stuart Carnie of Manomio contacted Touch Arcade to let us know that after months of work, the C64 for iPhone v1.7 update will shortly be arriving in the App Store. This is a major update that brings numerous enhancements as well as a nice list of additional games available through the app's integrated game store.

Control Improvements:

• Corrected dead area at side of screen in landscape, rendering controls unresponsive for a small strip
• New fixed-mode joystick in landscape mode, automatically selected for specific games
• Option on the settings screen to force fixed-mode joystick in landscape mode for all games
• File-based disk support for multi-disk games. Does not work for those games requiring true 1541 support. (No virtual swapping of disks)
• Option to adjust dead zone / sensitivity of joystick

Updates Fixes:

• Upgraded to OpenFeint 2.5
• Removed bottom bar in full-screen landscape to prevent obscuring screen in games like Wizball
• Reimplementation of control layout system, to support the complex controls scenarios for games like The Last Ninja and Druid
• Borders are correctly drawn in landscape (Wizball looks better now)
• Hi-res icons added for retina and iPad displays so C64 looks better on your home screen

Usability Improvements:

• Display OpenFeint notifications at top rather than bottom
• Added grouping to In App Store to separate downloaded / purchased titles
• Shop now separates downloaded games

14 New Games:

• Armalyte
• Buggy Boy
• Druid
• Eliminator
• Heatseeker (FREE)
• Hunter's Moon
• International Karate
• Snare
• Summer Camp
• The Last Ninja
• The Last Ninja 2
• The Last Ninja 3
• Bozo's Night Out (FREE)
• Iridis Alpha (FREE)

Stuart indicates that, despite this major update, C64 is not the studio's only focus, by any means. Their brainteaser-style game Nerve Jangler – a NinjaDoodle license that's been played over 22 million times – will be complete and out the door in the next few weeks, and then it's all focus on the Amiga games. We hope to have some early ad hoc builds of a few Amiga classic nicely packaged up for the iPhone in the next few weeks. Stay tuned!

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