TouchArcade.ru

Mika Mobile’s side-scrolling follow-up Zombieville USA 2 will miss its summer launch window, but development is still rolling. In an e-mail update given to us alongside a hip new teaser trailer, the studio said it’s in the final testing phase with the game and hopes to get it out of the door a little later this month. It added “we’d rather ship a good game slowly than a crappy one today,” which is a sentiment we totally agree with.

From what we're gleaning, Zombieville USA 2 is primed to be a significant upgrade. It'll boast new faces, an assortment of shiny new weapons and interesting firing mechanics, and some cool character customization, of course, but it'll also introduce 3D movement that actually let's you dodge enemies and a fresh new take on the level formula by the way of mission-based play.

Mika Mobile announced Zombieville USA 2 earlier this August. In the same month, it also 2011-ized the original game [$1.99] with Universal support, retina display visuals, and support for “fast app switching.” We hope to grab a build and report back to you in the near future, but until then, we definitely suggest you keep yourself busy with the first romp.

[source]

Chair Entertainment’s Infinity Blade 2 will be a lot more than a facelift. From our side of the aisle, it appears as though the team is attempting to widen the scope and breadth of the original experience, all the while giving players something they didn’t have a lot of in the first game: choice. In a must-read interview with IGN UK, Chair co-founder and technical dude Geremy Mustard revealed that the game will launch with over 100 new weapons and items, boast a significantly larger world with more intricately constructed environments, feature way more enemies and optional side-paths, and it’ll roll out with fun battle additions like, say, dual- and two-handed fighting styles and weapons.

"The player will explore many different environments in this game," Mustard told IGN. "You'll see some stuff that looks familiar, but the castle in this game is very different. We'll also be exploring environments in a more Asian-themed landscape."

“With each environment, we wanted to create these water cooler moments — these areas where players can look back and converse about that battle that took place in front of that huge tower or by that really cool clock,” he continued. "There's always something in the environment that will keep your focus and lead you through the level."

We got our first look at Infinity Blade 2’s December-bound feature set at Apple’s press event the other afternoon and came away ridiculously impressed with the technical majesty. Can this game come any faster, please? Pretty please with sugar on top?

[Via IGN]

[source]

2K Games’ NBA 2K12 [$4.99 / HD] doesn’t have quite the thrill or the touch of its brethren, but it’s a competent basketball title that stresses simulation over finesse and AI over finer points of control. Super fans might want to stay on the bench, though: 2K has reigned in and streamlined the overall NBA 2K experience to such an extent that it's hardly a recognizable game in the long-running series. It’s a shell of the experience available on consoles, and it’s not much of a looker, either.

What 2K did with 2K12 is similar to how it handled Civilization Revolution [$6.99 / HD]. Civ Rev, which was already a dumbed down version of Civilization proper, is even more dumbed down on touch devices, offering up simpler menus and actions that keep the pace ramped up without throwing away what made the core game good in the first place. 2K12 is an exceedingly simplistic game in the same vein. You can’t pick plays, some control options have been removed, you won’t be going online, franchise mode is missing some parts, and some of the special Michael Jordan touches — the retro teams in particular — have been stripped. What’s left is a fairly linear basketball simulation experience that you never really have direct control of, but can still participate within.

Playing this is like playing a Mario game in which Mario automatically runs on a pre-defined path and the only thing you can do is choose his jumps and activate his special powers. On the surface this sounds pretty terrible, but NBA 2K has always been a strong simulation game with cultured AI and a ton of dice rolls that already pre-determined success. The lack of control and player-born dynamism in this particular one isn’t that big of a turn-off — the simulation remains sharp and, frankly, it didn’t need a user to feel even better. If anything, we’ve been breaking the elegy 2K has been constructing over the years

The feel I’ve been describing applies to both of the game’s control modes: one-finger and a more direct option dubbed classic. In one-finger, you’ll flick and swipe the screen to pass and defend the ball, while also holding onto players to shoot and attempt steals. In classic, you’ll be allowed to actually move around players of your choice on the court and activate more awe-inspiring moves with a jiggle of the virtual stick it brings into the equation.

On-court turnouts remain about the same using the either. Quite simply, you’re not meant to be the be all and end all in 2K12. So, while your impact varies, the game part remains a hardboiled sim experience throughout.

2K12 does suffer for this approach. When the AI gets finicky or makes a bonehead play choice, you can do nothing but helplessly watch. You’ll also rarely be the hero or driver, regardless of how you choose to play. But the thing that really gets under my skin is the lack of spark — there’s no sizzle, exhilaration, or emotion to be had. This is almost as cold as it gets in the basketball simulation world.

The absence of titillation is lightly mitigated by the stupendous presentation effort, which makes its way to this version pretty well in-tact. Accurate courts, awesome play-by-play, and great animations are all a part of this package. And while the players look OK, you’ll still be treated to a trip straight down into uncanny valley — some dudes look downright horrifying, if not in need of immediate medical attention.

2K12 needs a bit more to hold my attention over significant stretches of time — I’d love to see some sizzle from anywhere and especially from the action on the court. That said, I’m not sure the point here was to give me thrills; this is a simulation to the bone and all of its struts and constituent parts support its sharp, through pretty strict “action.” If anything, this is a good start for a series that'll, hopefully, find some better legs down the road.

[source]

The iPhone 4S will utilize the Apple-designed A5 chip, which according to Apple, allows for studios to make games with up to “7X faster graphics.” At its press event moments ago, Apple brought Epic Games CEO Mike Capps on-stage to discuss the innovation and show off a new project set to harness the dual-core chip: Infinity Blade 2, the sequel to the hugely popular and eye-poppingly gorgeous Infinity Blade by Chair Entertainment.

The demo was brief, but people on the ground apparently got an eye-full of graphical awesome, as Capps showed off a significantly better looking sequel with shadow and reflective effects, as well as some neat little touches like, say, real-time koi swimming in a pond. The mechanical part appears to be pretty similar: you'll play as a soldier-y type of guy charged with killing big monsters with various slashes.

Capps said, during the demo, that the game is “only going to run like this on the iPhone 4s. Why? Because it's awesome." And the wait for it won't be long: Infinity Blade 2 is due out this December 1.

[via Endgadget]

[source]

Backflip Studios' Boss Battles [Free / HD] is difficult to really talk about in a lengthy matter. After all, you know exactly what the game is based on its title alone and the fact it's free should ensure nobody will hesitate over it too much. Still, the concept alone is interesting enough to warrant a discussion.

The idea of basing a game on boss fights has been done before, Shadow of the Colossus, for instance, and Cave's Japanese only Kesui Death Label, but Backflip's pedigree of casual titles mixes the idea up a little by creating an easier to push through barrier of entry.

Boss Battles is a vertical, bullet-hell shoot-em-up, where you control a ship blasting through space by simply moving your finger across the screen. The game is packed with eight boss battles, each with five different levels of difficulty that reward you with gems based on which level of difficulty you choose to play.

Those gems unlock different power-ups and weapon enhancements, as well as extra lives. The freemium model is employed for those who don't want to grind through the game to get new weapons, but if you've got even just a smidgen of patience, you'll never need to use the in-app purchases.

Technically, Boss Battles is slightly more than just a series of bosses, as each stage starts with a simple, but necessary farming run where you shoot humble enemies as they drop from the top of the screen to get more gems. While the bosses are certainly the highlight and beating them will collect the most gems, farming in the stages early portions will ensure you'll be able to save up for whatever weapon enhancement you've got your eyes on.

As for the bosses, they're visually ridiculous and over-the-top. They're not particularly difficult after the first round provided you've outfitted your ship with the right weapons, and they don't do much to scale the difficulty other than shoot out more projectiles or move a little quicker. Most can be beaten by simply hammering bullets into them and don't require the usual puzzling and tiered elements we're all used to in vertical shooters. Still, the right weapon will make short work of an enemy, so it's possible the studio wanted to stress that more than ripping brightly colored pieces off a boss.

Unfortunately, the free part isn't entirely supported by IAP's, there is also a banner ad on the top of the play screen. Some games can handle this fine, but in a vertical shooter, it cuts down a bit too much on screen real estate and when the ad changes mid-game, it's a distraction from the dodging and shooting you should be doing. It would be nice to be able to buy out of the ads, but no option exists at the moment. It's also a little odd the app isn't universal, but that might have something to do with a complexity of in-app purchase transfers. As you'd expect, the HD iPad version looks significantly better, but it also means the ads are bigger.

If it's even feasible to create a casual shoot-em-up, Backflip has certainly come close. At the moment, it still feels more like a proof of concept than a full-fledged experience, but as a quick and free distraction it works well. It doesn't have anywhere near the visual flair of a Cave shooter, but the core idea is entertaining enough. If a little more love had been poured into the complexity of the battles as they evolve over difficulty tiers, it would have been a more thorough experience.

[source]

Simply put, Rescue City [Free] is a worthy addition to the line-drawing genre that has long since been dominated by the prowess of Flight Control. Rather than directly mimicking the open-world environment of the flight-landing title, Rescue City succeeds at implementing a more structured approach to vehicle management that not only still requires strategy and management, but also manages to simplify the core gameplay experience.  A tough difficulty curve and a lack of variety in environments are the only significant obstacles that hold Rescue City back.

Rescue City places you in charge of the police, firefighter, and ambulance services for a section of a city. As various incidents pop up, you must dispatch the appropriate emergency services by drawing a route to the location. Each incident has a countdown timer attached to it, and the game ends if you do not respond to the incident in time. In addition, the game also ends if any of your vehicles collide with each other while on the road.  Obviously, the crux of the gameplay becomes effective route management as you will be trying to respond to each incident as fast as possible while preventing any vehicle crashes.

As mentioned above, veterans of Flight Control will feel right at home with the gameplay and control scheme of Rescue City. However, Rescue City has some important gameplay tweaks that lead to a somewhat different experience. For example, the cityscape environment of Rescue City means that your line-drawing escapades will be restricted to the available streets, rather than the unlimited possibilities of sky navigation.

In addition, each service has different dispatch methods and vehicle stats, which add further depth to the game. For example, the ambulance incident begins at the location of need, and your job is to always guide the ambulance back to the hospital. The fire truck, meanwhile, always begins at the station and must be guided to the fire (and is much slower than the other vehicles). The police dispatch is the most interesting element: initial dispatch begins at the police station, but the car can resolve multiple police incidents without needing to return to the station. However, the police car gets its own timer, which must be reset periodically by returning to the station (and yes, the game will end if you don’t get your car back in time). The different vehicles are definitely what set Rescue City apart from other line-drawing games, and I think it’s a well-done addition to a genre that’s characterized as being full of stagnant clones.

Rescue City falters somewhat with its environment variety as well as its tough difficulty curve. Rescue City does do a good job introducing all the core elements in the first few levels, but it seems as if the difficulty gets turned up significantly once the tutorial period is over. Personally, I don’t have a problem with the difficulty (in fact, I thought it was a refreshing change of pace), but I imagine that some casual gamers may become quickly frustrated with progression. If you are one of those folks, the easiest way to succeed in Rescue City is to play the mission several times, memorize the locations of the initial emergencies (each level is fixed in that regard), and use the extra time to formulate additional strategies.

One other issue with Rescue City lies in its lack of variety in city settings. The overall game is divided into three cities with different graphic styles. However, within each city, maps get reused several times, which can make the game a bit drab and repetitive. More unique maps within each city would have gone a long way towards fixing this issue.  Also, while Rescue City scores each mission upon completion, it would have been nice if the game provided some sort of ranking system and leaderboard, as this would aid in potential replayability. Currently, once you finish all the missions, you really have no reason to return.

At its heart, even with the nice additions to the gameplay, Rescue City is still a pretty simplistic game (as are most line-drawing titles). As such, gamers looking for a particularly complicated or deep experience probably won’t find that here. However, casual gamers looking for a well-done take on the strategic line-drawing game should definitely check out Rescue City – especially since the first fifteen missions are free (the rest of the game can be unlocked as an IAP for $0.99).

[source]

Earlier this month we brought news of Elite Systems' initiative to expand on their ongoing retro rebirth efforts and bring a host of classics of old to iOS — those that originated on platforms beyond the ZX Spectrum, which was their initial source platform. Studio co-founder Steve Wilcox was kind enough to provide us with builds of the first wave of titles that will soon arrive in the Elite Collection of 8-bit home computer games to share with our readers.

The first Elite Collection titles that will arrive in the App Store are Datasoft's 1987 magical platformer Black Magic, Image Works' lovely 1992 release First Samurai, and the frantic 1992 space shooter Enforcer from Manfred Trenz. Every one of these titles is very well implemented in iOS and is among the top tier of games to be found on the 8-bit platforms of decades past.

Let's have a look.

Black Magic

The evil wizard Zahgrim has turned good Aganar to stone. Being a ghastly sort of wizard, Zahgrim has removed his six eyes and placed them in different locations across the land so they may view the destruction being wrought in his name. Your task is to recover each eye and place them, one by one, into the empty sockets of the Blind Statue. Hordes of monters roaming the land make this a challenge, but you've got your arrows and magic to aid you, and a bit of help from a somewhat fiendish troll.

In researching Black Magic for this post, I found a great many fond recollections gamers shared of hours spent chasing down the six eyes of Zahgrim. The title is very well loved and secured an 8.2 user rating from Lemon64.

Enforcer

Enforcer: Fullmetal Megablaster is an excellent side-scrolling space shooter released for the Commodore 64 in 1992. That it is, indeed, excellent should come as no surprise, given that it was written by Mafred Trenz, the developer behind the Turrican series, the C64 version of R-Type, and The Great Giana Sisters. Enforcer features some of the best graphics ever to grace the C64's screen and the on-screen action is furious and maddeningly difficult.

The game features six levels through a range of space and cave backdrops, with an boss waiting at the end of each. It is a very well-received title that has secured an 8.3 user rating on Lemon64.

First Samurai

First Samurai, released for the Commodore 64 in 1992, puts you in the shoes of the first samurai in history. You start out as a hermit travelling through an ancient land, but with enough food — and sake — you will grow stronger and stronger, gaining power and eventually becoming a samurai. That is, if the daunting enemy creatures don't do you in first, which they probably will.

First Samurai is, without question, one of the five best looking C64 titles I've ever encountered and features very nice platform combat action. Elite's iOS version features glass-smooth sprite animation and brings a truly worthwhile platformer to our favorite mobile game devices. First Samurai got an 8.3 user ranking at Lemon64.

The Elite Collection titles detailed here will be available in both standard (iPhone, iPod touch) and HD (iPad) versions that are playable in both portrait and landscape orientations. (All videos in this post are of the iPad HD versions of the games.) Each title features the latest implementation of Elite's iDaptive control system, which allows highly customized placement of both virtual joystick and virtual key controls on the game screen, as illustrated in the embedded videos. I am in hopes that Elite will consider the addition of iCade support for all of these titles, to allow for an even more authentic retro game experience.

Elite has gathered quite a collection with which to launch their new retro effort, and I must confess it's been rather painless labor running through these titles in preparation for this post. For the retro fans out there, each of these titles is a no-brainer buy — obviously — but, as I am one who appreciates the simpler formulas of old, I must urge even those without a nostalgic bent to have a close look at the provided videos and consider giving these titles a shake.

My crotchety old self is often of the mind that "they don't make 'em like they used to," when it comes to games I really want to spend time with. This initial Elite offering is a rather good representation of "the best they ever made 'em." And there's much more of this ilk on the way from the studio. It's a pretty great time to be a (retro) iOS gamer.

We will let readers know when the first three Elite Collection titles go live in the App Store this weekend and will keep the news coming on future titles in the collection, as we hear it.

[source]

There’s a grotesquely misshapen tiger that haunts my dreams. His butt is where his head should be. He implores me to make him whole again, but the more I try to help the more horrific he becomes. I move his parts around in a fevered panic to no avail, unwillingly transforming him from proud feline predator into a twisted terror that would give even H.P. Lovecraft pause.

He is the tiger that was on the plastic sliding puzzle I had when I was 5 years old. When I finally did get that poor beast into his god-given form again, it was as if I had exorcised a demon. It felt like the laying on of hands. Much more pleasant and significantly less nightmarish was my recent experience with MixZle [$.99]. No pictures, no waylaid arses, just a simple but challenging physics puzzler with a sliding panel mechanic.

The game is a series of challenges (ala Angry Birds or Cut the Rope) where you must drop a ball from the top of the screen and ensure that it goes through a hoop elsewhere on the screen. Drop too many without getting one through and you must restart the level. It’s as stripped down a conceit as you’re likely to find.

Don’t let that throw you off, however. There’s plenty of depth and variety here, due to the aforementioned sliding puzzle mechanic. Every level is a series of panels with one square missing. The others will either be blank or contain structures that you can position to divert the course of the ball towards the net. Early levels will be a breeze, as the correct positions for most tiles are quickly apparent.

The challenge steadily ramps as new structures come into play, which ensures that MixZle is fresh throughout. Rudimentary planks and ramps give way to fans, pneumatic launchers, and more. Additional difficulty is slowly mixed in, in the form of fixed tiles that you must work around, cranks which can rotate tiles, and other constraints. Also, not every tile with a structure on it will be necessary to solving some puzzles; it’s a clever twist that keeps your mind working.

The developer clearly has a mind and a passion for puzzle design. The game has over 100 levels, so value-per-dollar hounds will find no complaints in the content category here. A score is assigned based on the number of ball drops and tile movements it takes to complete each level, meaning perfectionists will find lots of replayability looking for that optimal solution.

On the minus side, the need to restart a level after x number of drops kills the will to be creative with your problem-solving. There’s already a point system that will tell me if I made a mess of things or took an embarrassing number of moves, so having the panels reset to their beginning positions is an unnecessary fail state. Not to mention I had some cool moments of emergent gameplay where I had fun setting up panels and just playing with the physics, and it always seemed that the level would reset right when I had the board the way I wanted it.

Lack of character is this game’s biggest drawback. It’s a smart game, but it doesn’t seem to really have a sense of play to it. The art is clean and the music is chilled out and conducive to puzzling; there’s just nothing in the presentation to get very excited about. With such well done level design, it’s a shame to have the vanilla assets and sounds turn me off to extended play. In short bursts, however, the game shines as a bite-sized brain teaser.

There’s much to like about MixZle, and at a buck for a heaping biggie-sized helping of levels, the value proposition cannot be denied. It’s not going to set the world on fire, but it’s a smartly executed twist on a well-worn genre. Pick it up, and you’ll find yourself stashing it in the corner of your screen and snacking on it periodically, like trail mix on a road trip. It’s a great palette cleanser between games, and if you’re like me, you may find yourself redeeming some of the dark shames of your childhood ineptitude.

[source]

Big Blue Bubble’s Burn The Rope Worlds [$.99] is an intensely faithful follow-up that feels like a yearly iteration of a well-trod franchise. It’s as great as its predecessor is, but only in the strictest sense. It’s as if the core of Burn The Rope [$.99 / Lite / HD]was transplanted, not massaged and implemented, into this sequel, which makes the staggering amount content the only meaningful mark of differentiation between the two games. A better name for this would have been Burn The Rope: More Burn The Rope — a great proposition, but a flat approach to sequel design.

If you’re new to Burn The Rope, the short of it is that it’s a rotation-based puzzle game where you control multiple points of interest (fire) on a line of virtual rope by tilting your phone. If you tilt it the wrong way, the flame goes out. You’re awarded with medals and progression if you manage to burn significant chunks of rope, which can be a harder task than you’d think since additional flame can spurt whenever it hits fulcrum points. Colored rope and bugs are later introduced as complimentary parts that add to the strategy. By setting fire to a bug, you get a special color of flame that can only effect that color of rope.

The disconnect between the characterization of the flame and the actual fire mechanic is an issue in Worlds just like it is in the original, but Worlds is a much more coherently themed package. As its namesake implies, there are several worlds to visit and all four of them have an effective thematic hook. The coloring of the puzzles and the art design in general are the real stars of the approach, as they subtly give each world a vibe that the others don’t have. Each world is also represented by an avatar overlord, but just like with fire character, Big Blue fails to connect these things in a meaningful way.

If you tire of one world, you can switch to another freely, which is a great touch that can stall the monotony of long sessions. The increased focus on bugs and colored rope helps too, as well as the intricately produced — and sometimes wildly angular — puzzles. In the first title, these three constituent parts fleshed out a fire mechanic that could quickly get dull. In this one, the focus tends to give levels more of a puzzle-y vibe and add to the strategy, as well as compliment an overall pace that feels ramped up.

One of the key improvements outside of Worlds sharper presentation is the cornering of the flame: tough angles are easier to manage from a rotation and a difficulty perspective. This alone makes for a slightly better experience on an already tight and refined foundation that, really, had no other significant flaw. It’s just more fluid now.

If you’re going to take home one thing about Worlds, it should be that — sure, it’s more of the same, but the “same” part is consistently fun, well-produced, and well-designed. Worlds straight up has the potential to provide hours of entertainment. The 100 puzzles that Big Blue has added is like an extra and prettier layer of icing on a fab cake.

There are a few misfires. The penetration of ads across the “Puzzle of the Day” and the full-screen ads before regular campaign missions are disruptive. On a more insignificant note, the new Snake-like game mode “Endless Burn” feels like an out-of-place and tacked-on feature. It doesn’t feel like a part of the game, it doesn’t play like the game, and it plain just isn’t that much fun to fiddle with.

Worlds fulfills at least one promise of any sequel: it’s more of the same great game. And while we’d love to have seen more progression, this is still a fantastic product that should keep you busy in bursts or even in couch sessions. I recommend it.

[source]

It's almost a certainty that no one who considered themselves a Mac gamer in the late '80s or early '90s could be unfamiliar with John Calhoun's Glider.

Perhaps the quintessential early Mac game, Glider was first released as a black & white shareware title in 1988. The game challenges you to fly your paper glider from room to room through a series of houses while avoiding a wide range of obstacles and using only basic controls and updrafts from floor air vents to keep yourself aloft. It sounds simpler than it was, and what it was was a whole lot of fun. After the original release, Calhoun followed with several new versions of the game — Glider 3 perhaps being the most well known — and finally, in 1991, partnering with now-defunct Casady & Greene for the commercial release of Glider Pro (which is now available for free).

We're happy to report that iOS gamers will soon have the chance to experience the magical little game that is Glider in Calhoun's upcoming App Store release of Glider Classic. I recently had a conversation with Calhoun, who left Apple after 16 years this past summer in order to bring Glider to iOS, to find out more about his coming release.

After parting ways with Apple, Calhoun wasted little time jumping into the iOS game scene, releasing Lab Solitaire [App Store], a photo-realistic version of Free Cell, last month. After that was out the door, his full focus moved to Glider Classic, which is now complete.

The iOS version, from a play mechanics standpoint, is something of a mix of several of the early versions of the game. (The developer, and a number of the game's fans, felt that Glider Pro deviated a bit too significantly from the spot-on formula of the original.) All of the graphics used in the game have been re-created with pen and paper, through a process that Calhoun details on his blog, giving the game a very clean look, evocative of the original's artwork.

Glider Classic features tap-based controls and is a universal application that runs natively on both the iPhone and the iPad. In the first release, iPhone 3GS and 3G iPod touch devices will be the minimal supported platforms, though earlier devices will gain support in an update soon to follow. Calhoun indicates that a Mac App Store release of Glider Classic is also likely at some point, given that Glider Pro for the Mac is PowerPC-only and will not run under OS X Lion. In fact, we might one day see a desktop "house editor" emerge, allowing players to create their own houses for both the iOS and the likely Mac OS X versions of the game.

Calhoun told me that, from the view of an old-school designer, he absolutely loves iOS as a game platform. He got out of game writing way back when largely because the "big guys" came in and basically stole the show from indie developers like himself. He sees iOS as an excellent opportunity for indies to get their work out there and embraced by gamers, and it's a notion backed up by so many one-man home runs we've seen since the App Store went live. Calhoun has a number of other iOS projects in mind to follow Glider Classic, and I'm anxious to see what we've got to look forward to.

In addition to Glider, Calhoun released several other games for the Macintosh in the distant past, including Glypha III (there's an iOS version by another developer), Pararena, and Stella Obscura. For a bit more history on John Calhoun's days as a Mac game maker, I recommend checking out Bitmob's excellent article entitled "Dreaming of a thousand-room house: The evolution of Glider," as well as MacScene's two part interview with the man in question.

Glider Classic is expected to arrive in the App Store this week at a launch price of $0.99. We'll post a closer look at the game when it lands.

[source]