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Last month we posted a short preview of the upcoming GoatUp [link] (then to be called Goat Goes Up) from ungulate adoring game developer Jeff Minter. GoatUp is a retro-inspired platform game — Llamasoft's first ever, in fact — and is a title I've spent a great deal of time with over the last week or so. The game has just gone live in the App Store, so let's take a look.

GoatUp is a platform game of the endless climber sort that, according to Minter, draws inspiration from several oldschool platformers, including the Atari 2600 title Man Goes Down, Nebulus, and Rainbow Island. The game puts you in control of a cute little nanny goat faced with a never-ending, downward scrolling tower bristling with platforms. Your job is to climb as high as you can by deftly jumping from platform to platform as they scroll off the bottom of the screen. It's a mechanic that's pretty well represented in the App Store, but GoatUp is full of twists (so to speak) that make it something special.

You start the game off at the bottom of the tower in a zone of grassy platforms. As you run back and forth, making your way up the ever-scrolling tower, you eat the grass and reveal eclectic arrays of bonus items that, once found, can be picked up for points — the higher up the tower, the more points per item. Every so often you'll encounter an amorous billy goat who you can "kiss" to start your belly growing. A bit more grass consumed and it's – plunk – time for congoatulations, mommy goat! Your new little kid follows along right behind you as you do your thing on the platforms. Kiss lots of billy goats to build up a chain of kids that follow you around like a tail and help pick up bonus items, gain more points, and knock off the baddies wandering the platforms a little higher up.

Like most of Minter's games, GoatUp bundles up a focused style of gameplay, trippy visuals (watch out for the poison mushrooms!) and a pixellated retro style that, together, evoke a sense of arcade gaming as it once was. This latest from Llamasoft, however, takes the stroll down memory lane to another level, thanks to the particular designs of the various zones you encounter in ascending the tower. After the grassy zone, you find yourself moving through a progression of zones with platforms and baddies styled after various well loved games of days gone by, such as Miner 2049er, Manic Miner and Canyon Climber (whence came your goat). And, with the various platform styles come different platform behaviors. Remember Manic Miner's disintegrating floors? That's what we're talking about here.

GoatUp is a universal app that runs natively on both the iPhone and iPad. It features mirrored swipe / tap goat control, as well as a tilt option well suited to the smaller devices. Just after the game was submitted to the App Store, the developer added (and demonstrated) iCade support, which should arrive in an update soon. Both OpenFeint and Game Center are integrated to track scores and keep things competitive.

At a glance, and especially in static screenshots, GoatUp might look fairly dismissible given the plethora of endless climbing games in the App Store. The large number of unique elements that mix up the gameplay along with the progressive variation that the heights of the tower bring, however, really set this game apart. Now, that's not to say that it's without fault — some lively background music would be a nice addition, and the storm of nostalgic icons flying about might seem a shade, well, confusing to the uninitiated. Even so, in the week I've been evaluating GoatUp, it's grabbed as many (and "many" is the word) hours of my time as has a certain other game involving a little fellow wearing a jetpack. That "just one more game" draw is in full effect, here.

I have long counted Jeff Minter's Minotaur Rescue [link] and Minotron: 2011 [link] as two of the very best games in the App Store, and I can tell you that GoatUp solidly lives up to the greatness of those titles. It's quite a different sort of game, but the pieces come together just as nicely.

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By the unspoken law of videogames, a sequel tends to follow at least a full year after the original, but in the case of HotGen's To-Fu: The Trials of Chi [99¢/ HD], it has been less than six months before we're seeing the follow-up, aptly titled, To-Fu 2 [99¢]. You wouldn’t think much could happen in just those few short months, but what To-Fu 2 lacks in artistic changes, it makes up for in level design chops.

In a lot of ways, it would have been easy to pull a Madden 12 on To-Fu 2 because, for the most part, this is the same game as it was before. The art, music, sound effects, and everything else are pulled from the original. That is, except for one single new feature: you can now charge To-Fu and send him rocketing through wood blockades.

Other than that and a couple environmental hazards, the basic design remains the same. You pull To-Fu in the direction you want him to go, then watch as he flies across the screen. Your goal is to get to a pink fortune cookie at the end of a spike or chainsaw riddled stage. This time around, the game comes packed with 100 levels, but unlike the first one, the levels are more diverse and far more difficult.

Like the first game, you'll have three objectives in each level: finish it, get all the blue orbs, and do it in a set number of moves. In most cases, you'll need to replay a level twice to get everything. The first To-Fu was challenging, but never really displayed any levels that could be called memorable. To-Fu 2 pushes the difficulty up, making it much twitchier, complicated, and ultimately a more memorable game.

There are essentially two reasons why the game is harder this time around. First off, the level design is, to put it bluntly, better. Levels have several tiers and they're mixed up in a way where they don't get stale. Getting all the orbs and completing the level in a set number of moves feels like two distinctive objectives, and totally changes how you get through each stage. The side effect of that is that they're wildly inconsistent. You'll blaze through three or four levels before getting stuck on a particularly hard one. It's not a building process from simple to hard, it's more of a random scattershot of levels thrown together.

They're also a lot tighter. Where the first game would give you a bit of leeway in you movements, this time around, To-Fu will die on you if he even gets close to spikes. It makes the game considerably more tedious and oftentimes annoying, but for the most part, it keeps things interesting by requiring a pinpoint precision with everything you do.

Unfortunately, it retains some of the problems from the original. The game assumes you're willing to trial-and-error your way through certain sections. Since the levels are often rather large, it also means you'll be flying blind a lot, especially during the parts where you have to fly out of teleporters at an exact angle. The screen real estate is made a bit better on an iPad, but during a lot of the sections, To-Fu 2 suffers from the same problem as Angry Birds where you feel like you're kind of flinging him in the general direction of where it needs to go, but never being certain of what the results will be.

Calling To-Fu 2 a sequel seems a little off. While it's not just about the game's artistic direction, To-Fu 2 doesn't offer enough new stuff to really make it feel like anything but an expansion pack to the original. It's a good thing the first game was good and the core  formula is certainly worth repeating, but don't expect anything new or special here.

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Steampunk-themed programs have done pretty well on the App Store. Games such as Gears [$1.99] have certainly demonstrated the viability of incorporating that sort of fantasy/mechanic aesthetic into a game. ArkanoArena [$1.99 / Lite / HD] is the latest game to incorporate the fantasy/steampunk motif, this time in a brickbreaker. While I think ArkanoArena definitely nails the steampunk visuals, issues with the controls may turn off some folks.

Before we get started, a quick history lesson on ArkanoArena. It was originally released as an iPad-only game back in early January. A “free” version of ArkanoArena then appeared on the App Store for the iPhone in July as a prelude to the full version of the game, which came out last week. This full version of ArkanoArena for iPhone includes more levels (or “Arenas”) as well as a third weapon that wasn’t in the main gameplay mode of the free version.

Simply put, ArkanoArena is a brickbreaking game in the vein of titles such as Arkanoid and Breakout. In fact, ArkanoArena also includes the majority of the classic power-ups, such as paddle expansion, multi-ball, and so on. Where it differs somewhat from its classic brethren is in its inclusion of an in-game store that you can visit between levels that allow you to spend points on various weapons, ammunition, and even extra lives. Weapons and ammunition also play a more prominent role in ArkanoArena, as have most recent games in the genre. Overall, you aren’t going to find any significant differences here from a core gameplay perspective.

Interestingly, ArkanoArena is one of the more challenging games that I’ve played lately. The inclusion of enemies that fire projectiles at you and can destroy your paddle in one blow, combined with the expensive cost for extra lives means that you’re going to be restarting quite a bit. Also, the fact that ArkanoArena’s main gameplay mode is a “tournament” in which you must start over from level one every time you want to start a new game (vice being able to select any level you’ve beaten) means that for some folks, you’re never going to see those later levels. The easiest mode does let you restart the last level you’ve played as many times as you wish, but if you started that level with only one life, then you will continually only have one life each time you restart, increasing some of the frustration. Overall, I didn’t have too much of an issue with the game difficulty-wise, but it can become frustrating when combined with its controls.

By far, the best thing about ArkanoArena is its overall presentation. Everything from its steampunk backdrop and retina-display graphics to the ambient music in the background while you’re playing are well done. It’s pretty obvious that Sketch Games took great pains to make sure that nearly every aspect of ArkanoArena would shine graphically. While the background doesn’t directly impact the gameplay, it is teeming with life and activity. Also, graphical touches like having giant blimps fly across the screen while you’re playing are nice as well. Be advised that ArkanoArena is steampunk through and through; if this sort of graphical flair turns you off, then you’re not going to enjoy it. For everyone else, it truly is a delight and the highlight of the game.

It’s because of ArkanoArena’s awesome presentation that its flaws are so frustrating. The most glaring issue I had was with its erratic controls. On the iPhone version of the game, the only way you can move your ship is by dragging your finger back and forth. Normally this is fine (in fact this is usually the normal way these sorts of games are controlled), but ArkanoArena only lets you drag your finger across the bottom portion of the screen, rather than the standard screen-wide touch area.

Considering there’s not a lot of clearance below your ship, there were many times when my drags weren't being registered quickly and I couldn't get the paddle to move fast enough. There were also times when my touches just weren't registered at all, even though I know they should have. Combine this with an general slight delay in controlling your ship, and the whole game experience just becomes frustrating. The iPad version allows you to tap on the left or right side of the screen in order to move your ship, but this control scheme is just as unreliable if not more so.

I’m sure you’re thinking that I’m making too big a deal about the controls, but when it comes to reflex oriented games like brickbreakers, having fast, responsive controls is almost a prerequisite in order to have an enjoyable gameplay experience. This goes double for a game like ArkanoArena, which takes the normally fast-paced brickbreaker genre and infuses it with power-ups that can drastically speed up or alter the path of the ball and enemies that shoot projectiles that must be avoided. Admittedly, I found that the game controls a lot better on the iPad, but for those that have to use the iPhone, it’s definitely a problem.

Another strange issue with ArkanoArena (at least on the iPhone) is that the game does not respect the ringer mute/unmute switch. There were a few times when I launched the game at work for a quick run and the game started blasting its music even though I had the whole phone on vibrate. In this day and age, this kind of bug should never happen.

ArkanoArena is one of those frustrating games that manages to get certain things absolutely right while falling short in other elements. While I absolutely love the steampunk theme and the overall presentation, I just felt that the controls were definitely lacking. I’d recommend at least checking out the Lite version to see if the controls are an issue for you. If they don't pose a problem for you, then consider picking it up as it’s certainly one of the prettier brickbreakers I’ve seen.

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If you missed out on our WWDC preview, allow me to calibrate your expectations about Tiny Heroes [$2.99], a new tower defense title from Simutronics Corp. You may have heard that the team behind this game was headed up by David Whatley, the developer of the outstanding geoDefense [$1.99 / Lite] and geoDefense Swarm [$1.99]. Already your brain may be whirring along, thinking about upgradeable towers and mazing. Stop that. You won't find those here. And you won't miss them, either.

In Tiny Heroes, you are the master of a dungeon rich with treasure. In classic Dungeons & Dragons style, where there is treasure, there are heroes. Are you going to sit back and let them take your treasure? Heck no! So you set up defenses in their way, and who can blame you if a few of those defenses are a touch lethal? You have liability insurance, right?

Once you push past the first few levels, which introduce you to the basics a bit too slowly, you'll find a game that has more in common with Plants vs. Zombies than geoDefense. The first clue is in the resource management: rather than profiting from killing heroes, you build mana stones that generate mana every few seconds. You use that mana to build your defenses, which are designed to block the oncoming heroes. Why politely leave a path for them to travel down when you can stop them in their tracks?

As you progress through the game, you unlock all manner of vicious defenses. Spike traps, catapults and barricades are just the beginning. You'll get so many that you won't be able to carry them all into battle. Instead, Tiny Heroes requires you to strategize and pick your poison before starting each stage. You'll need to learn how to combine your most brutal traps with static defenses and creatures to effectively guard your treasure, and you'll need to make sure you have the resources to pull your plan off.

But for each imaginative defense you set up, the heroes are ready to counter it. Knights march in with a single-minded appetite for destruction, thieves dismantle your traps from a safe distance and wizards take out your mana crystals, starving you for resources. Once you get a handle on defeating them, you'll find yourself facing epic versions of each. Your unbeatable combo may be able to take out basic knights with ease, but then an epic ranger will sweep in and keep things balanced.

It's the dungeon layouts and pathing that take Tiny Heroes from Plants vs. Zombies clone territory to something quite different, though. Each level has a unique layout, requiring an original strategy. The level layout can help or hurt the heroes, because they don't travel in the ways we've come to expect. In most tower defense games, enemies use basic pathing logic. They'll travel down the path that takes them to their goal most quickly, to hell with the consequences.

In Tiny Heroes, on the other hand, the heroes are a little more complicated. In their tiny brains they have a drive to explore, to find the best path based on what they can see. While this does occasionally lead to weirdness, like heroes wandering back and forth under fire, it also means that they put up a good fight — and that you can trick them.

For a game about the wholesale slaughter of friendly adventurers, Tiny Heroes is surprisingly adorable. Big goofy eyes can be found on the heroes and more of the defenses than you'd expect, and the animations are similarly charming. The only thing that's missing is music. I've spent hours on end with this game and haven't minded the lack, but if you're auditorially inclined you'll certainly miss it.

But otherwise, Tiny Heroes is a complete package. The two included campaigns are huge and challenging, and there's a third coming as a purchasable update. The Game Center/OpenFeint achievements are done beautifully: you're rewarded with new defenses for completing groups of them, adding quite a lot of replayability to the game. You can play through in Campaign Mode, and then replay individual levels for higher scores and achievements in Quick Play. There are also challenge levels to be had, and these put your skills to a serious test.

There is one in-app purchase available, but let me stress that it's totally optional. The Defense Expansion gives you four new defenses that aren't available in normal gameplay. They are very slightly overpowered, but this is by design: they're there to help people who find the game too frustrating. If you're stuck and you'd rather not pay, the developers have a series of walkthrough videos available on their website, and forums to discuss strategy.

iPad users are currently out of luck, but according to the developers an iPad version is planned. It's expected to have it's own set of levels that take advantage of the extra screen real estate, so it should be worth the wait.

I can't say enough about Tiny Heroes. It's a fantastic game, with few flaws to speak of. Challenging, but rarely frustrating, it had me returning to levels again and again to improve my score. By turning genre conventions on their heads, Tiny Heroes succeeds brilliantly. And you don't have to take my word for it alone — our discussion thread is packed with fans. Who wouldn't want to throw down against a bunch of greedy do-gooders, just this once?

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A lot of people have learned a lot from id Software’s classics, which are available in open source form all over the Internet. Even the iOS versions of DOOM Classic [$6.99] and Wolfenstein 3D [$1.99] have been floating around available for anyone to take a look at and tinker with if they so choose. If you’re one of those people, you’ll like this bit of news: Bethesda has released the open source code for these two games in their latest iterations. You can download DOOM Classic open source here and Wolfenstein 3D here and check out what went into the big-time updates that hit both games just as Quake-Con kicked off earlier this summer.

As a refresher, both games were turned into Universal support apps complete with Retina Display support. Also, both games saw a UI overhaul, some music tweaks, and other assorted technical brush-ups, including bug fixes.

If your’e the developer type, I’d imagine there’s something cool to learn here, or hey, if you’re just starting out, I can’t think of code better than John Carmack’s to take a gander at. Plus, it’s free! Everyone loves free.

[Via Bethblog]

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It takes a special kind of game to pull off surviving exclusively through tilt controls. That goes double for games that attempt to do it and are only available on the iPad. Sure, the iPad’s accelerometer has got to be used for something, but some folks (and rightfully so) find the idea of having to tilt your tablet every which way just to play a game to be a bit daunting. Pod Odyssey [$2.99] is the latest attempt at a tilt-controlled iPad exclusive. While its controls aren’t perfect, there’s certainly enough here for an enjoyable experience with some caveats.

Pod Odyssey isn’t a game with a particularly engrossing story. In fact, all you know is that you’re piloting a ship (that looks strangely like a squid) that is exploring various alien planets in labyrinth-like levels. The game gives off an abstract Lunar Lander sort of vibe. Each level has a primary and secondary objective, and your goal is to successfully complete both without dying (i.e. running out of energy for your ship). Standing in your way is a variety of structures that shoot projectiles at your ship. Those projectiles are anything from dumb missiles to land (space?) mines to heat seeking bombs that attempt to follow you.

According to Pod Odyssey’s iTunes description, its controls are so easy “a six-year old can play.” Assumedly, that depiction is referring to the game’s accelerometer based controls. Controlling your space pod is as easy as tilting left or right for directional controls, while tilting forward and back raise and lower the pod’s altitude. In addition to movement controls, you can tap the left side of the screen to raise a damage shield, while hitting the right side of the screen launches an EMP which slows down obstacles. Overall, the accelerometer controls are well done and offer enough precision in order to navigate through the smallest of passages with a steady hand.

My only lasting gripe about Pod Odyssey’s controls is the fact that you will need to continually calibrate your game whenever you shift into a different position while playing. This isn’t a problem solely with Pod Odyssey – this issue exists with most games that require precise accelerometer controls. Still, it would have been nice to have some sort of alternative control scheme in case you didn’t feel like tilting your iPad in order to play. However, once you do get the controls calibrated, Pod Odyssey becomes pretty easy to navigate.

It’s a good thing Pod Odyssey’s controls are well done, because you’re going to need every bit of skill in order to successfully complete every mission and secondary objective. I thought Pod Odyssey did a great job balancing its difficulty curve. The first third of the missions are spent introducing the various enemies and tools available for use, while the rest of them slowly ramp up both the general difficulty of each level as well as the secondary objectives. The last third of Pod Odyssey definitely turns up the difficulty and requires many runs in order to fully complete each level. However, I was never overtly frustrated with the difficulty – an important point for games such as this.

My most favorite thing about Pod Odyssey is its overall presentation. Both the music and graphics do a great job adding to the ambience and creating a feeling that you really are lost on a distance planet.  It combines that sort of surreal feeling you get when you’re playing a game with no real objectives, but then manages to successfully incorporate action sequences and goals on top of it.

Despite its strengths, I think Pod Odyssey does suffer from a lack of variety in both level design and enemies. As the levels progress and get harder, you aren’t really introduced to new challenges. Rather, you get the same obstacles thrown at you, but in greater quantity. Sure, the difficulty is there, but it can definitely become bland towards the end. Also, Pod Odyssey only features 27 levels, which means that even if you don’t mind some monotony, your experience isn’t going to last very long.

Regardless of these gripes, Pod Odyssey is a solid arcade-style maze crawler that gets a lot of the basics correct. If you’re looking for a challenging (but short) game to test your precise reflexes, and you don’t mind putting the accelerometer in your iPad to good use, give Pod Odyssey a try.

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Musical game-like apps have had a great life on the App Store. Smule seemingly launched the genre of musical toys with Ocarina [99¢] (if my memory serves me correctly) and later expanded out to fully licensed titles like Glee Karaoke [99¢] and I Am T-Pain [99¢]. Songify [Free] was one of the next major musical crazes to hit, which made the auto tuning process found in I Am T-Pain even easier. Tonight, Harmonix, creators of Dance Central and Rock Band up the ante even further with VidRhythm [$1.99].

In VidRhythm, you can quickly and easily create video remixes of a series of videos you shoot to have a product that's vaguely similar to some of the incredibly in-depth video remixes found on YouTube. The process couldn't be more simple. You shoot a small handful of clips, the app suggests what you should try to make one sound like, and then it auto-magically makes a video like this:

There's a number of different themes you can use, and exporting then uploading the videos to YouTube, Facebook, and/or your camera roll couldn't be simpler. I'm amazed at both how easy this whole thing is and how well it works. I mean really, it can take the weird sounds my dog makes and turn it into a coherent musical video. That's pretty awesome. I can only imagine what people will start creating once people with actual musical talent grab hold of the app.

Seriously, if you've had fun with these weird musical game-y apps in the past, you need VidRhythm. I've been having a blast with it. Also, if you like my weird dog videos, you'll love my dog's Facebook page.

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Maybe it’s just me, but I have a hard time getting into trailers anymore. Spend enough time following the games industry and you eventually develop an elephantine level of skin thickness to ward off promotion and hype. Even being as jaded as I am towards anything but gameplay footage, every so often, I see a video or promo and I just know in my gut that I’m going to love the game.

It happened for me on the PC with Magicka’s brilliantly funny video campaign earlier this year, and when I saw the trailer for Radballs [$2.99] a gigantic smile spread across my face. I knew that if the execution of the gameplay was even half as clever as Glow Play’s promotional efforts that I’d have a pretty wicked time on my hands. Now that the game is out? Well, I shan’t mince words any longer; my expectations were both met and exceeded.

Radballs is first and foremost (for me) an 80's retro lovefest. Don’t confuse my meaning here; I’m not talking 8-bit sprites but rather the type of art style that screams Breakin’. The colors, the patterns, and entire aesthetic are simply spot on nailed. As a gamer raised in the 80's, I found myself awash in memories of parachute pants, Z Cavariccis, Hypercolor t-shirts, Front 242, KMFDM, Ministry, New Order, and adolescent shame grown fuzzy over time.

The music for the game is fantastic, and kudos to Neil Voss’ (New Tetris, Tetrisphere) work producing the soundtrack. I know I just mentioned a bunch of new wave and industrial bands, but that's not what this game is about. It’s a mix of original electro tunes, tracks from lesser known artists but excellent dudes like Daze and Com Truise, and even some remixes of a few songs by Ok Go. Despite being from contemporary musicians, the electro/synth angle on all the tracks complements the games 80's vibe, dare I say, to the max?

Honestly, the phrase “match-3” has such a stigma on it now that it’s hardly fair to use it for fear that you will turn people off before they’ve given a game a fair shake. But, that’s the inspiration for Radballs’ gameplay. Instead of lining up 3 Radballs, the goal is to build at least a 2×2 formation that then fuses into a MegaRadball. You can add additional Radballs to the formation to increase the size. The larger the MegaRadball is when it is cleared from the board, the more radness gets added to your meter. I’ll come back to the meter in a bit.

The way music is integrated into the game mechanics is simple and elegant. Timed to the beat of whatever track is playing, a wave will periodically travel down the screen and clear any formed MegaRadballs it passes over. The cool mechanic here is that you can directly manipulate the wave. Touch the wave and flick it back upwards, and you can buy yourself more time to build larger/more MegaRadballs to increase your bonus.

Even more tubular, however, is the fact that you can grab the wave and scratch it back and forth over a MegaRadball to charge it up for extra radness. Manipulating the wave directly affects the music as if you were scratching or cutting on a record. It’s this integration of the auditory experience driving the gameplay and vice versa that transforms what might otherwise be horribly vanilla into something unique and outstanding.

Now, back to the radness meter. Radballs handles its difficulty curve better than almost any game I’ve ever seen on the App Store. The game is not over when your screen fills with Radballs, it just gives you more material for matching. The only way you can lose is if your radness meter depletes over time. As you progress through the different levels, the meter depletes faster. This requires you to employ more advanced tactics and learn to effectively use the few available power-ups to be successful.

For example, setting up a cascade where a MegaRadball being cleared results in another fusing together creates additional radness. Even though it took me some time to get the hang of setting up those complex formations in advance, if the meter ever started running low, I could buy myself just enough time on the radness meter to keep from losing by relying on the techniques I’d already mastered.

So, while the game forces you to get better, you aren’t punished as you’re learning. The skills you’ve practiced will keep you alive enough to evolve your strategy as the game ramps up. This makes for a smooth and enjoyable ride throughout the course of the game, and eliminates the ragequit factor so prevalent in titles where time is a factor. This gives Radballs a bump up in the “just one more round” category.

Contributing to the game’s longevity are two important features. Going to the settings on any level will allow you to switch from arcade mode (which ends when you clear 8 radness meters) to an endless mode that only stops when your meter depletes. This is perfect for when you just want to zone out to the music; pick a difficulty level that works for your chilling out needs and then just kick back and get rad.

Taking nothing away from the stellar soundtrack that comes included with Radballs, the music for any game gets old over time. Glow Play’s masterstroke here was to build in the ability for players to use their own music tracks. Following the trail blazed by games like Audiosurf and Beat Hazard, this feature takes your songs and synchronizes the beat wave accordingly. You aren’t just listening to your music – you’re playing to it. Scratching with the beat wave has the same effect on imported tracks as native ones, making for some fun emergent experiences with songs you know and love.

Add tight and responsive touch controls to a list that includes fabulous art design, awesome music, a new twist on an old mechanic, and the ability to bring in your own tracks and you end up with an experience easily worth your time and money. Oh, did I mention it’s universal? Well, it is, and I highly recommend it. Your friends and peers in the forums already know what the score is. Fire up a John Hughes flick and download it when you get a chance.

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1112 Episode 3 [$4.99/HD] is the latest addition to the graphical mystery adventure game series from Agharta Studio. It's also the best of this ongoing series, as it delivers more: More game-play, more puzzles, more characters, more locations and a whole lot more mystery.

We first meet the games protagonist, Louis Everett the antiques dealer, in Episode 1 [$4.99/Lite/HD]. Louis bears a striking resemblance to Johnny Depp, but he's having bad dreams, marital issues and work stresses. As you help him complete his daily tasks, it becomes apparent that something weird and mysterious is going on. There's a gap in his memory which Louis can't explain, and the number '1112' seems to keep recurring in his life. This game is about solving that mystery, but don't expect a final outcome yet, as each episode concludes with a cliff-hanger ending, to entice you into the next release.

After a long wait, Episode 2 [$4.99/HD] was released in 2010. It resumed the same storyline and continued in a similar fashion, but with a few more characters, locations, and puzzles, including the addition of three suduko puzzles as mini-games, which sent some players off to find online sudoku solvers.

Episode 3 opens with a brief recap of the first two episodes, which is a useful reminder if you played it years ago, but wouldn't really enlighten a newcomer about the storyline and atmosphere of this game. You could easily play this series starting with Episode 3, but that would be like starting with the third Harry Potter book. If you want the full experience, we recommend starting at the beginning.

Episode 3 features the same high-quality graphics and music that we've come to expect. Each object in your inventory is presented as a 3D rendering, which you can rotate or zoom with your fingers to examine more closely.  Like any graphical adventure game, the goal is to find, use, give and combine objects to solve problems and progress the storyline.

You also need to converse with various characters, for clues or to reveal the next objective. This involves tapping on any green words in their (unspoken) subtitles to collect "conversation starters". Alternatively, you can use a keyboard interface to enter certain words manually, such as answering riddles, or just try entering "1112" to see what various characters think of the games mysterous title.

Prior to release, we were told Episode 3 would contain a longer campaign than the first two episodes combined; and that has eventuated. It's considerably longer and more involved and could easily take 10+ hours to complete. Despite the longer storyline, the English translations are much improved this time around.

One of the main changes from earlier episodes is that specific objectives are now listed and ticked off once accomplished, which prevents players from getting lost within the longer plot and larger game-world. Fourteen Game Center achievements have also been added and are listed without descriptions, to avoid spoilers.

This game will be a challenge for most people to complete without some assistance. There's a lot of returning to previous places and people, even though you may think you've already covered them off, which requires patience. But don't fret, as there's plenty of hints from the developer in our forums, plus step-by-step walk-thrus for each episode are easily located via Google, so you won't get stuck for long.

If you're not ready to purchase this game, consider checking out the lite version of the first episode, as 1112 is easily one of the better quality adventure games on the App Store. This series is getting better, but since it takes the small development team at least a year to produce an episode, this intriguing mystery may not be resolved for a few more years; but we'll be waiting.

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Need help finding your way around Dead Island? There’s an official app for that. The new FPS zombie action game from the developers of Call of Juarez, Techland, is launching at brick and mortar this morning alongside a novel App Store companion app that’ll help you navigate the game’s sprawling and complex open world. The Universal, $2.99 app is the result of a group effort between BradyGames and game publisher Deep Silver.

In addition to providing basic navigation support, the Official Dead Island Map App [$2.99] also shows off locations to all the hidden items in the game, as well as allows you to keep track of what you’ve collected. For whatever reason, it also boasts music from the game.

The thing it’s missing is true connectivity — the app and your saved game don’t talk to each other, which leaves all the record-keeping up to you. Still, this is a really cool idea and I hope more publishers invest in these kinds of companion pieces moving forward. I mean, imagine having apps that keep micro-game elements in your pocket, or keep track of multiplayer stats, or you know, even allow you to plan out your next in-game visitation. There are tons of viable possibilities.

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