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Since getting the new iPad last Friday, I’ve been having a blast playing through the games that have been updated to take advantage of the beautiful new screen. Of course, gameplay reigns king when it comes to any game, but the visuals are important too, and it’s pretty crazy just how much a big bump up in the graphics department can add to a gaming experience.

So far, my favorite example of this has been Zen Bound 2 Universal [99¢], which was just updated with Retina iPad visuals. In early 2009, the original Zen Bound was a technical showpiece for the iPhone in terms of its striking visuals as well as its incredible use of multi-touch. Right off the bat, the sequel followed in these same steps by being a launch title for the original iPad back in April 2010, and a few months later for harnessing the power of the iPhone 4’s gorgeous new Retina Display and Gyroscope capabilities.

And here we are again, not even a week into the launch of the long-awaited Retina Display iPad and Zen Bound 2 Universal is again a stunning showpiece of the new technology. The high resolution textures and fancy lighting effects combine to create remarkably realistic in-game models. If there was such thing as an uncanny valley for tiny carved sculptures, this would be it. Everything runs at a silky smooth framerate too, further making the visuals feel like they just pop right off of the screen.

The enhanced visuals have got me hooked on Zen Bound 2 all over again, just as I was when it first released, and if you haven’t checked out the game previously now would be an excellent time if you’re an owner of the new iPad. It’s a perfect game to show off the screen of the new device to people, and the unique multi-touch gameplay is just as impressive as ever, too.

With its slow-paced, meticulous gameplay Zen Bound 2 isn’t for everybody. But if you’re intrigued by the look of it and want something to show off your new iPad then it’s totally worth its current sale price of 99¢. The bonus is that if Zen Bound 2 is your cup of tea, it comes equipped with more than 100 puzzles to work through that can very easily eat up your free time if you aren’t careful, made all the better with the gorgeous new Retina Display iPad visuals.

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Well, that didn’t take long. There’s been rumblings over on TechCrunch for a few days now that Zynga was in acquisition talks with OMGPOP as a result of the smash hit Draw Something [$0.99 / Free ]. The original suggestions were that the purchase price would be somewhere in the neighborhood of $150m to $250m, as OMGPOP itself is a company that’s already fueled by $17m worth of investor cash as is.

Zynga scheduled a call at 3:00 PM Eastern today to discuss a “news announcement,” but the guys over at All Things D have the scoop early: Zynga has picked up OMGPOP for a cool $200m, which isn’t too shabby considering two years ago they doled out $53m to buy Words With Friends creator Newtoy.

I’ve got mixed feelings about this news. On one hand, I’m glad that OMGPOP is reaping the rewards of creating a fantastically successful game. Zynga has proven in the past that they talk acquisitions first, but if you turn them down, they have no problem ruthlessly cloning your game instead. On the other, I really like Draw Something as it is now, and I’m really not looking forward to Zynga, well, Zynga-ing it up. But, I suppose Word With Friends is still a fun game, so, whatever.

I imagine the guys at OMGPOP will be popping some champagne bottles this afternoon, if they haven’t already.

UPDATE: It’s official. OMGPOP is now a part of Zynga. Also noted in the call: picture saving and chat as possible updates, people don’t like the word “latrine,” and over 1 billion drawings have been created since the game’s launch. The more you know!

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As I mentioned yesterday, I can’t get enough of OMGPOP’s Draw Something [$0.99 / Free ]. All of my iOS device owning Facebook friends seem to be playing it, and we all seem to be equally horrible when it comes to drawing things. The dudes over at IGN, however, apparently are playing games with people who aren’t horrible at drawing.

Take a look:

There’s even more where those came from. Seeing this sort of talent really makes me wish Draw Something had a better social sharing component, as I’d be great if I could mash a button and automatically tweet one of my drawings, and, in the process, be able to look through the drawings of others.

Have you saved any particularly incredible drawings either of yours or of your opponents in Draw Something? Drop ‘em in the comments, I’d love to see them.

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I genuinely have no clue how we missed this the first time it hit the internet (in late 2011), but Lego’s Life of George [Free] just blew my mind. This is everything I wanted and more as a Lego-loving child. Check out the video:

In a nutshell, utilizing the Life of George ($26.99 on Amazon) Lego set, the app challenges you to build different Lego objects, then take a photo of them using the camera of your iOS device. The game scores you based on how long it took you to build the object, and a recent (Well, “recent” as in Christmas!) update added 30 new challenges and 45 new models to build.

Has anyone out there tried this? Looking at the charts, Life of George seems to have had some pretty dismal download numbers, peaking at #57 in the family subcategory. That’s too bad, since this is the exact kind of stuff I like seeing the iOS camera doing.

Thanks Marcos!

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Alright, I’ll come clean. When I saw OMGPOP’s Draw Something [99¢ / Free] glued to the #1 positions on both the free and paid charts I assumed it was yet another flavor of the week flash in the pan freemium game. Then I tried it, and wow is this game good. I’m not quite sure how they did it, but Draw Something is a perfect witch’s brew of Facebook integration, word scrambling, and asynchronous two-player Pictionary.

It works a little something like this- You start a game with someone (I’ve found games with people you actually know via Facebook seem to be the most fun.) and are given the choice of three words of varying difficulty. You choose one, do your best to draw it, and hit submit. Your friend gets a push alert, sees your drawing, and is given a array of scrambled letters to spell the word with. If they guess correctly you’re awarded between one and three coins, they take their turn, and the process repeats.

The free to play mechanic is actually sort of neat, as you can play the free version for eternity with ads and a limited set of colors to draw with. Alternatively, you can spring for the 99¢ ad-free version. The coins you earn are used to either buy bombs which nuke some of the letter tiles which don’t go to the word you’re supposed to guess or buy more colors to paint with. Sure, you can just do your drawings in the few colors that everyone gets, but to really tweak out your illustrations you need at least a few more paint sets.

The rub of the coin system is that actually earning enough coins by playing to buy bombs and unlock paint sets takes forever, which means you basically have to buy them unless you’re way more patient than I am. But, at the end of the day, I’m having a really hard time getting that worked up over the IAP as the game is worth every penny worth of the $4.99 bucket of coins I bought to unlock a bunch of paint (and the 99¢ I dropped to get the ad-free version).

Recently, the game was updated with additional words, and complete support for the Retina Display of the new iPad. In fact, my original intention of this post was just a quick news article on that fact, but I just can’t help but gush all over this game. Everyone I know is playing it, and recently taking my turns in Draw Something is both among the last things I do before I go to bed and the first things I do when I wake up every day.

So, I’m tagging this as a review, giving Draw Something five stars, and telling you again: Download this game.

TouchArcade Rating:

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Depending on how much you relish your DotA (If the acronym made you raise a puzzled eyebrow, don’t worry. We’ll get into all that shortly), you may either find Plants War [Free] an unexpected treat or a moderately competent RTS. It could go either way. Best described as a heavily diluted, single-player version of the world’s favorite Warcraft III mod, Plants War will have you leading Dryad Forest’s local vegetation in a struggle against some encroaching… animals? Global warming definitely screwed up the environment here.

Gameplay-wise, Plants War – Gamevil’s latest freemium title – works something like this. Before you begin each stage, you’ll be asked to elect an upgradable hero (the first you get for free, the others you’ll have to earn through extensive grinding or buy as an in-app purchase). After that, you’ll be at liberty to select the troops you want to deploy in the upcoming onslaught. Yet again, only the first one comes free.

To unlock the other units, you’re going to have to amass a fortune in gold or green leaves. A fair warning, however – the number of horticultural soldiers that you can utilize is limited by the number of slots and plants points you have available. In order to exceed the quota, you’re going to have to (you guessed it!) make a few choice purchases.

Once you’re done with all those decisions, the action begins. The objective here is to blow up the enemy’s base before they can do the same to yours. At regular intervals, both bases will spawn pre-determined units that will barrel towards their opponent with all the suicidal fortitude you would expect of NPC shock troopers. Needless to say, death is their only inhibition. Though you’re significantly more powerful than the ground troops, you’re not omnipotent. In order to succeed in your mission, you’re going to have to make efficient usage of your unsuspecting meat shields.

You will also have to make full usage of the four different skills available to the Leafy that you’re using. Initially, you’re only going to be able to invest a point in one skill. However, as you gain in level (acquire the last hit on an enemy to gain the maximum amount of experience points possible), you will be able to pour more points into your skills. Alternatively, you can choose to increase your mana pool. The choice is yours. Anything goes so long as it ensures certain victory.

(For those of you who do play DotA, Plants War can be summed up as ‘Middle-lane only DotA with no river, items or neutral camps.’)

And that’s pretty much the whole game in a nutshell. It doesn’t get more complex than that. However, the details are what make Plants War work. Each stage will impose a new challenge to your talent for picking the most suitable troops. Are you facing off against highly aggressive mice with a penchant for gnawing through shrubbery? Be sure to bring along a Tree Protector and a grim-faced Potato Blower. Are you up against some sturdy bears? Try some Seed Shooters.

Though certain combinations work better than others, it’s not impossible to be creative with things. As you progress through the game, you’re also going to have to battle with a variety of enemy heroes, each more difficult than the last. While you can bring a different hero to the conflict (assuming you’ve already purchased them, of course), you can also attempt to make do with the first Leafy you use. How do you bait a fast-moving tiger into being mounted onto a wall? Can you kite a hard-hitting bear around in circles while slowly pepper spraying him into submission? Once again, it’s entirely up to your own discretion.

The controls in Plants War are responsive and extremely simple to learn. To move, you tap on the screen. To attack, you tap on the screen. To use an ability, you – you get the picture. In order to zoom in and zoom out, you’re going to have to alternately pinch and unpinch the screen. My only complaint here is the fact that targeting can be extremely difficult at times when the hero is clumped up with their troops.

With three levels of difficulty associated with each stage, twenty-four achievements to unlock, a multitude of rewards to collect and a menagerie of units to discover, there’s not much to dislike about this stream-lined little title. Unfortunately, there’s also not much to it. Once you’ve beaten the first few levels, things can grow rather repetitive. You can only do so much with the same set of faces. If you want new minions to abuse, you’re going to have to either spend an inordinate amount of time grinding for gold coins or cough up the greens.

All said and done, however, it isn’t too bad given the non-existent price of admission. The problem here is whether or not you like this style of play. If you enjoy this sort of experience, you will probably lose occasional hours to the game. If not, you will probably lose interest after the first three games. It’s all rather binary.

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Flight Control Rocket [$.99] is beautiful. The art is pyrotechnic: the groovy colors are sharp and detailed, betraying no fuzz, gloom, or jagged edges on the new iPad. Even the menus have flair. Created intricately to reflect the swinging sci-fi themes that the rest of the game is so gleefully entrenched in, they’re a pleasure to plumb. The on-screen antics feel just as good, as Firemint has iterated on the core design in really fresh ways. But, it’s a shame that all of this is wrapped in the stench of corporate influence. Some of the most interesting additions to the core play model are rendered meaningless courtesy clumsily handled free-to-play functionality.

The sci-fi influence, outside of the slicker and more vibrant visual appeal, is just a fun contrivance to push the series’ usual conceit: take a ship, plot a course, and then repeat until the screen is so full of ships, that it becomes impossible to not avoid a mid-space collision. New features include a fascinating variety of ships with abilities, all of which refreshingly change up the pacing. There’s 15 new ships in total, including a snake-like series of ships that coils as you move it, a ship that splits into two, and even a new drop-ship type that spits out smaller ships into the playing area.

The new ships also feel like stopgaps, designed specifically to keep you from developing a rhythm or from zoning out. Flight Control is usually just an effort in concentration; but with these, it is becoming a much more viable strategy game. There’s enough content on a micro-level now to warrant focus, forethought, and tactics.

To its credit, the action stays manageable despite the varying seeds, sizes, and the abilities of certain ship classes. In part, this is because the action feels a hair or two slower, but there’s also a new health component that allows for a couple of hiccups along the way, whereas the previous game just ended after one collision. It also doesn’t hurt that this series remains a breeze to play: tap and trace, that’s it.

A not-so-clever IAP system sours all of the good vibes these parts of the experience can offer. As you play across the game’s two modes, endless and a time-based survival mode, you’ll earn pieces of optionally purchasable in-game gold. You can use this, in turn, to buy robitic avatars that grant specific bonuses during play. The starter robot randomly ratchets up the score of a landed ship, for example, while others bump up gold earned or grant you extra lives. These sound neat in theory, and they would be totally fun adds if (a) they weren’t saddled by egregious IAP loops, and (b) weren’t laughably expensive.

In order to use a robot more than three or so times, you need to spend in-game gold on the batteries to power them. IAP loops consistently strike me as beyond tacky, and in this situation, they’re rigged in the game’s favor. Also, my mental math says it’ll take me at least a dozen hours to obtain one of the top-tier robots without spending any dough, which is especially silly considering this game costs real money to begin with. It’s sad. The robots idea is a casualty of a crazy business model that is too aggressive, too Facebook-y to take seriously. It’s a big, black eye instead.

Minus the free-to-play shenanigans, Flight Control Rocket is easily the best entry in the series so far, as it sports a lot of fresh and fun ideas, as well as a groovy new theme that Firemint fleshes out splendidly throughout. It’s also one of the best looking new iPad games. But, the free-to-play components do exist, and they keep the experience from feeling like a cohesive whole. This game is split into parts, as a result, and the bad has a habit of putting a damper on the good.

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If you’re familiar with our sister site AppShopper, you’re likely all over the various search and RSS functionalities of the site. If you’re not, I go over a few neat tricks in a post from Labor Day on how to find games on the cheap or even free utilizing AppShopper. Well, AppShopper has another trick up its sleeve, making it easy to find new games and apps that have been recently updated to support the Retina Display of the new iPad.

Check out these two searches:

• iPad games updated with Retina support.
• All iPad apps and games updated with Retina support

Those two links are updated as close to real time as Apple allows, and they can be subscribed to in your favorite RSS reader so you can always stay on top of what is being released. Pretty snazzy, eh?

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New Scientist is reporting on a study by Purdue PhD computer science student Abhinav Pathak on energy usage in free mobile games. If you browse around Pathak’s site, he’s spent his time building all sorts of in-depth debugging tools to really nail down where your battery is spent on different functions inside of a mobile application.

The findings aren’t surprising:

For example, in Angry Birds only 20 per cent is used to display and run the game, while 45 per cent is spent finding and uploading the user’s location with GPS then downloading location-appropriate ads over a 3G connection. The 3G connection stays open for around 10 seconds, even if data transmission is complete, and this “tail energy” consumes another 28 per cent of the app’s energy. …Read More

Angry Birds isn’t alone in this phenomenon, as basically any free game that’s serving you ads is doing all sorts of battery-burning stuff in the background to constantly fetch the newest and (hopefully) most relevant advertisements for you. Again, this might be one of those “Well, duh” sort of stories for a lot of people out there, but it’s just another fantastic example in that even though the price of a free game might technically be zero dollars, even without IAP, you’re “paying” for that game in other ways– Often at the expense of battery life.

[via New Scientist]

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Azkend [Free / HD] took me by surprise—a gem matching/hidden object game that devoured my hours and my phone’s battery until I’d burned through everything it had to offer. After that, Azkend 2: The World Beneath [$2.99 / Universal] shouldn’t have been much of a surprise, but it was.

Trouble is, the surprise wasn’t good. The bones of the game are still there, and it’s prettier than ever with Retina graphics. But where the original sucked me in so hard I forgot to put my phone down until it was done, I keep dropping the sequel in frustration.

All the elements are in place. This game, like its predecessor, is split into two parts. The first is a matching puzzle where you chain identical icons together to flip a hex grid board. The second is a hidden-object style puzzle where you match small segments of an image to their positions in a larger landscape. The two intertwine in a sweet and simple adventure story.

In Azkend, the matching game was a blast. The chaining mechanics allowed players to set up and execute outrageously long chains, something I found super satisfying. Powerups were unlocked bit by bit and expanded your capabilities like crazy. The powerups made it back into Azkend 2, but the satisfaction is gone. The board layouts are painfully constricted. Long chains aren’t usually possible, no matter how carefully you set them up. In fact, there comes a point when you’re lucky if you can make chains at all.

No joke, about a quarter of the way through the game I began to run into levels where the board would shuffle with no moves left, I’d make a single move, and it would shuffle again. This kept happening. At first I thought I’d forgotten how to play effectively, but when there’s only enough room on the board for one or two matches in a row you just have to accept that something’s gone terribly wrong.

As a result, most levels are an exercise in tedium. You rarely get to set up great chains or plan ahead to set off tesla coil explosions. You hunt down the single match that’s hiding on the board and pray that when it shuffles you’ll be blessed with a setup that works. There’s simply no room to strategize.

This doesn’t mesh well with the new goals that have been scattered throughout the Adventure mode levels. Each of these goals requires you match things in unusual ways. Fog and fire can be cleared by matching adjacent tiles (and fire spreads if you don’t succeed), bugs get hurt by matches and lightning, flowers need to be matched before they lose their petals, and everything is on a tight time limit. That would all be great if there were room for strategy, but instead it just makes survival even more of a struggle.

The hidden object sections are lovelier than ever, with pretty, animated vistas, a robust soundtrack and passable voiceovers. And there are other ways to play. The Time Challenge mode is super fun—it’s a race against the clock to clear wide-open boards over and over until the timer runs down. It reminds me of the good old days. You can also play through the game’s levels a second time for timed awards in the Medals Challenge mode.

It’s hard to recommend Azkend 2 in its current state. The board layouts are too frustrating, and the game never opens up enough to make the struggle worthwhile. It’s a simple problem in a game that would otherwise be excellent, but it’s also an insidious one. It’s hard to get past levels that just aren’t any fun, you know?

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