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Paris based developer Int13 are experts in the field of augmented reality on mobile devices. They showcased this on iOS in late 2010 with the release of ARDefender [99¢], an augmented reality tower defense game. In terms of content, ARDefender was a bit one note, though it did receive a nice update this past October that fleshed out some of the features. However, despite being a pretty simplistic game, the actual tech behind ARDefender was really solid and incorporated into the gameplay better than almost any other AR game I’ve played before. Also, it was just plain fun to play.

Now Int13 is taking a break from the augmented reality for their next iOS release in order to pay homage to a genre they enjoy: manic arcade shooters. A project that originally started back in 2010, Shogun: Rise of the Renegade is a bullet hell shooter in the same vein as the classic shmups that were prominent in arcades in the 90s, and like the ones CAVE has been so generous with porting over to the iOS platform. I’ve been playing a preview build of Shogun for the past week or so, and am super impressed with the title so far. You can check it out in motion with the developer’s trailer for Shogun below:

The game is absolutely gorgeous in person, the video doesn’t quite do it justice. The gameplay is also really solid, offering most of the bullet-hell conventions you would expect as well as a few twists on the formula to differentiate itself from the pack. Shogun is already submitted and awaiting approval from Apple, which means we could possibly see it as early as Friday but most likely it will be sometime next week. It will be free to download and contain the entire first level, with the remaining 3 levels unlockable through in-app purchase. Oh, and here’s something awesome: Shogun will have iCade support baked in, something people have been dying for with other shooters on the App Store.

If you’re a fan of shmups, keep your eyes glued to this space as we’ll have a review of Shogun: Rise of the Renegade whenever it ends up hitting the App Store sometime in the next week or so.

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Last month developer Mountain Sheep released Ice Rage [99¢], a simple arcade title that looked like ice hockey but played a lot closer to a game of air hockey. It nailed the simple, fast-paced gameplay but fell a bit short in terms of content, offering just one-off quick play matches against the AI or a same-device multiplayer mode. Granted, the multiplayer mode was a stupid amount of fun, especially on the large screen of the iPad, but Ice Rage still lacked that single-player staying power.

Over the weekend, an update was released that looks to improve this situation with a new single-player Tournament Mode. Here you’ll take on the 9 opponents in the game one after the other, and their AI increases in difficulty as you progress. Make it through them without dying and you’ll square off against Skar, the new boss character you can see in the icon above. Also, a very simplistic stat upgrade system lets you increase your character’s speed, power, and technique with each subsequent win.

While the Tournament Mode is cool, it’s still pretty thin. Upgrading your player is fun, but only lasts for your current tournament. A persistent profile where you could continue leveling up your player over multiple tournaments would be a neat addition. Still, the new Tournament Mode is a welcome addition, and despite being a bit shallow there’s something about it that just keeps me coming back to play some more.

Beyond the Tournament Mode and new Skar character, this update also brings some improvements to the visuals, animation, physics, and menu UI. In other words, some pretty standard, but necessary, update type of stuff. It sounds like Mountain Sheep have even more plans for updating Ice Rage, and this latest update is a step in a good direction. Definitely worth checking out for some simple arcade fun, especially if you have an iPad and someone to play against.

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Looks like we’ve got one more big release to add to today’s list. Kairosoft has just released their latest simulation title called Pocket League Story [$2.99]. By now you’re probably familiar with Kairosoft’s method of operation: pick a theme and develop a simplistic but deceptively deep simulation around it, then fill it to the brim with cute and colorful retro-style visuals and mobile friendly gameplay.

Pocket League Story appears to be no exception. The theme of choice this time around is soccer, or football depending on which country you hail from. You’ll build up a team of players, train them, and then take on the rest of the league. You also have the ability to sell your team’s own merchandise, build a gym for training, and even build your own stadium. The goal is to increase your fan base as you progress your team’s abilities through competition.

It looks as though all the components are here of another solid Kairosoft simulation, especially if you’re a fan of footy. We’ll be digging in a lot deeper before passing final judgement on Pocket League Story, but if you’re generally a fan of Kairosoft’s work you probably can pretty much guess what you’re getting here. You can pick it up for $2.99 which is an introductory price, and at some point it will raise up to their usual $3.99.

We’ll have a full review of Pocket League Story in the near future, and until then you can check out impressions in our forums which are starting to trickle in.

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Justin Smith from Captain Games is probably most widely known for sparking off the Enviro-Bear 2010 phenomenon of 2009. The world’s first bear driving a car simulator made a huge splash on the App Store, and proved that beyond the surface of MS Paint quality visuals and purposely awkward control schemes could lie a surprising amount of depth and replay value. Also, you play as a bear driving a car through a forest. Not every video game lets you do that.

Those same principles of low-fidelity visuals, unwieldy controls, and high playability carried through to his next iOS release So Long, Oregon! [$1.99], and they are ever-present in his latest bit of zaniness know as Justin Smith’s Realistic Summer Sports Simulator [99¢]. Don’t let the ironic title fool you, there is absolutely nothing realistic about Summer Sports Simulator. In fact, it’s greatest attraction is just how NOT realistic it portrays the various Olympic-style events it contains.

Your job is to pick a fictional country and compete in up to 14 events against three other fictional countries to see who can win the most gold medals. The events themselves are simplistic 2D affairs that are what you might have expected to find in an Olympics game for the Atari 2600 in the early 80s. Pretty standard retro-inspired stuff, but where things start to get really Enviro-Bear-y is in how you control your athletes.

Rather than traditional controls featuring d-pads and buttons, you’ll direct your athletes in Summer Sports Simulator with a spring attached to their bodies (and sometimes, the athletic equipment itself). So for example, to run the 100 meter dash you’ll touch the runner directly and drag him down the track by his springy attached string, over and over, as he clumsily tumbles, cartwheels, and flies towards the finish line.

I just cannot stress enough how terribly awkward this is, and yet, it totally works. Plus, it’s downright hilarious at times watching your blocky athlete stiffly flop around the screen. I’ve easily had more laugh out loud moments with Summer Sports Simulator in the past week than I have with any other game, book, or movie this past year. It’s the game I immediately gravitate to on my springboard when I know I need instant fun and a hearty chuckle, and so far it hasn’t disappointed once.

So while the simplicity and absurdity of Summer Sports Simulator come together to create a fun experience, the game does lack a sense of direction that holds it back a bit. There’s no persistent player data, so each time you start up the game you begin as a new random country. It would be cool if you could pick your own country to play as every time where it kept careful track of all your stats and high scores.

For such a high score focused game, some persistent game save tracking is essential to keep me coming back to play. On that same note, an online network like Game Center would be great to compete against the scores of other players around the world. Based on the developer’s comments in our forums, it looks like more country customization options and better high score tracking will be coming in future updates. Right now, although still incredibly fun, the entire affair feels a bit too much like a one-off arcade experience each time you play.

Finally, I’m not a huge fan of the pay model used in Summer Sports Simulator. The initial game costs 99¢ and comes with 4 events, and 10 more events can be unlocked via a $1.99 IAP. I definitely feel like the entire package is worth the $3 you’ll end up spending to get the whole thing, but with such a “love it or hate it” type of gameplay I think it would have been beneficial to let players try out those initial 4 events for free, to make sure it’s something that would suit them. Lowering the barrier of entry for a game like this is important, and I’m not so sure how many people will be willing to pay a dollar to try out what essentially feels like a set of demo events.

Despite my minor complaints though, Justin Smith’s Realistic Summer Sports Simulator is some of the most fun I’ve had with an iOS game in recent memory. It’s the perfect game to jump into and play around with in short bursts, or focus hours of your attention on trying to earn high scores. The complete lack of instructions on how to complete the events is part of its charm, as it’s actually fun to experiment with different techniques trying to find the best one for each event.

I’ve also dumped an embarrassing amount of time into playing around with the interactive torch lighting ceremony before your events begin, or the medal ceremony at the end where it rains hundreds of medals on the athletes which you can fling around the screen. There’s no gameplay benefit to these things, but they’re the type of silly little details that I love. Seriously, I can’t think of any other game that let’s you grab a jet out of the sky by its rainbow contrail and spin and flick it around to your heart’s content.

If you don’t mind dropping a dollar to see what it’s all about, Summer Sports Simulator offers a deceptive amount of depth and playability. It won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but if it clicks for you then you likely won’t hesitate in dropping an extra couple of dollars to unlock all the events. If a couple of future updates can tighten up the experience with persistent profile saves and online scoring features, then Justin Smith’s Realistic Summer Sports Simulator will end up living a long happy life on my springboard right next to its brother Enviro-Bear 2010.

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In the crowded genre of endless games, developers need to do more than ever to distinguish themselves. Some attempt to do it via heightened visuals and presentation while others do it by modifying core gameplay elements to try and differentiate themselves from the pack. Stay Alive [$0.99] falls more in the latter category, with the endless arcade shooter making some changes to what is otherwise a standard leaderboard oriented endless game. While these changes are interesting (and possibly controversial), Stay Alive doesn’t particularly separate itself from the pack as much as it may like.

Stay Alive has you piloting a starship through a perpetual asteroid field littered with enemy ships taking pot shots at you. In addition to avoiding all these hazards for as long as possible, your goal is also to pick up as many floating orbs as possible, which are currency for the upgrade store. Also littered throughout the playing field are power-ups that range from more ammo to a temporary laser weapon that lets you destroy everything in sight. OpenFeint leaderboard support (Game Center is not supported currently) keeps track of total kills across all games, as well as the longest distance traveled during one run. As is the case with most endless games, the primary goal is to beat your (and your friends) leaderboard scores.

From a presentation standpoint, Stay Alive is rather typical. The visuals are simplistic and lack the nostalgic personality that most games are looking to achieve with this art style. The same goes for its music, which has an 8-bit MIDI feel but isn’t as catchy as I’d like, especially considering that you’ll be hearing it time and time again with each run. There’s nothing particularly wrong with Stay Alive’s presentation; it’s just nothing out of the ordinary.

One area that Stay Alive succeeds in is with its controls. While decidedly simple (a quick swipe on the left side of the screen moves your ship up and down, while touching on the right side shoots your weapon in the direction you tapped), I thought the controls were very smooth and definitely responsive enough for the amount of close-knit navigating that this game requires. One minor complaint is with the location of your ship’s information (shields, ammo count, etc.), as it’s located right next to screen space for steering your ship and easily becomes partially concealed with your hands.

While endless shooters tend to reward players with cosmetic upgrades or items that provide limited gameplay advantages, Stay Alive’s reward system is a bit more significant and lasting. At the end of each run, players will have the opportunity to enter an in-game shop to spend those hard-earned orbs on ship upgrades. Upgrades range from increasing the inherent strength of your hull and shields to increasing the amount of starting ammunition and armor. These upgrades are permanent and allow your future runs to last just a bit longer.

While I’m a fan of the upgrade system and I think it improves replayability, it’s important to note that having a permanent upgrade system drastically changes the dynamic of Stay Alive in comparison to other endless shooters. Some of the appeal of other games in this genre is the fact that, when all is said and done, each player is competing on a somewhat level playing field, and the only main differentiators are skill and luck. While both of those variables still factor in Stay Alive, upgrades play a far more important role in the long run. In other words, you’ll going to have to play for quite a bit to get the upgrades needed to make a dent in the leaderboards.

There are a lot of gamers that may be inherently turned off by this change to the endless shooters formula, especially since it effectively turns leaderboard chasing into a grind. In that respect, Stay Alive does lose a lot of its appeal with fans of the core genre and may be passed over. On the other hand, folks that may not be the best at endless games might appreciate this change, as more playtime means more orbs and the greater chance of being able to easily go further in a run. Regardless, if being first on the leaderboard isn’t the end-all of your enjoyment, then Stay Alive does offer enough in terms of fast-paced gameplay and replayability to warrant checking out.

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In the interest of full disclosure, I have to get something off my chest: I’m a huge sucker for stop-motion animation, and especially when it involves clay. In fact, one of my all time favorite games is Platypus [$2.99/Lite] not only because it’s a solid horizontal shooter but mainly because all of the game’s assets were painstakingly modeled out of clay. It just gives the game a look that’s unlike anything else that uses pixels, polygons, or other types of visuals.

Coming early next year is a new game that’s taking the “made entirely with clay” approach. It’s called Clay Jam, and it’s being developed by Fat Pebble. The premise sounds pretty simple: you’re a small pebble rolling uncontrollably down a hill. You’ll want to roll over things that are smaller than you, while avoiding things that are larger than you. As you roll over tiny monsters they get stuck on your pebble, increasing its size and allowing you to roll over even larger objects and creatures, Katamari-style. You can control your pebble’s path by drawing trenches into the clay ground, guiding the pebble left or right around objects you’re trying to avoid.

You can get a pretty good idea of the kind of gameplay in Clay Jam with the following preview trailer:

You have to admit, while the gameplay itself looks mighty simplistic, it does look pretty darn fun, especially digging trenches in the clay using your finger. Plus, the creatures and objects created out of the clay and the way they’re animated look downright awesome. I love the little behind the scenes peek you get on how they make and animate their clay models. According to Fat Pebble, Clay Jam is on schedule for a February release, and I’m really excited to check it out. Look for more on this squishy little title in the coming months.

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One genre that seems to be overlooked a bit on the App Store is tank games. Sure, there’s certainly a ton of them available for download, but it always seems as if they contain the same boring gameplay, drab military-esque visuals, and awkward controls. Enter Tank Riders [$1.99], the latest title from Polarbit (maker of Reckless Getaway) which attempts to differentiate itself from the rest of the genre with vibrant visuals and objective-based campaign gameplay. Unfortunately, the lack of content, multiplayer issues and frustrating controls keep Tank Riders from reaching its true potential.

At its core, Tank Riders is a somewhat simplistic, top-down 3D tank driving game. Players run through approximately 25 colorful levels (with five additional tutorial levels) with the goal of either getting to the other end of the map or collecting items to advance to the next mission. At the completion of each level, players are scored via a number of categories (such as health and speed) and are ranked via a 3-star system.

Along the way are enemy tanks equipped with one of several weapons along with destructible walls that occasionally hide coins (which boost your score) or hearts (which recover your health). Most levels also feature barriers that require a switch to either be stepped on or shot at in order to proceed. If the core gameplay seems basic, that’s because it is; there is very little in terms of actual innovation. However, it’s important to note that what Tank Riders does offer is implemented pretty well, which can be a challenge in itself.

The controls in Tank Riders are one of the more frustrating aspects of the game. The primary control method has movement done via a virtual joystick on one side of the screen. Attacking, meanwhile, is done by touching whatever direction you want to aim around the tank. The core problem with aiming in this mode is that the tank is always centered in the middle of the screen, meaning that if you’re trying to attack on the side with your movement stick, you have to either stop moving and use that hand, or use your opposite fingers and work around your other hand (which is presumably controlling movement at the same time).

Thankfully, Tank Riders does offer an alternative ‘dual-stick’ mode, but you lose a lot of accuracy and speed when using this control option. Considering that some of the later missions require a lot of simultaneous shooting and dodging, the shortfalls in both control options are disappointing.

In addition to the short single-player campaign, Tank Riders also features multiplayer. Normally, I’d expect multiplayer in a tank game to be pretty fun, but unfortunately there are a few flaws in Tank Riders. For one, multiplayer requires registration in yet another online service, and there’s currently no support for Game Center. Even worse, it’s nearly impossible to find a match currently, much less a match with more than one opponent (which really isn’t all that much fun).

To add insult to injury, each match I tried had a certain amount of lag and hit detection issues, which made the matches even more unsatisfying. In addition, there doesn’t appear to be an option for local Wi-Fi matches, which would have been a decent alternative for players looking to play something.

If multiplayer was working properly, Tank Riders probably would have been a game worth checking out. The controls, while annoying, were workable, and the different types of weapons offered some variety in taking out opponents. Unfortunately, without multiplayer, all you’re left with is the too-short single player campaign which can be completed in a few hours and simply doesn’t have enough content to carry the whole game. If Polarbit were to perhaps expand on the single player, Tank Riders might be worth the price of admission. Unfortunately, as it currently stands, you may want to pass on this ride.

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In August of last year, developer Oyatsukai released Final Freeway [99¢], a retro-racer that was lovingly crafted as an homage to the classic arcade game OutRun. We totally enjoyed the game in our review, and were especially impressed with the high framerate and crazy sense of speed in Final Freeway. This past October, the developer announced that a sequel to Final Freeway was in the works, and right now that sequel is going by the working title of Final Freeway 2: Retro.

Oyatsukai released a new gameplay trailer a few weeks back for Final Freeway 2R which shows the slightly new look of the game. While the first Final Freeway seemed like it was going for a more realistic, digitized look, this second entry has more of a cartoonish feel with hand-drawn sprites and bright colors. I think the result is a more accurate take on OutRun, from the video you can see other tiny new touches like your choice of different characters and the ability to actually crash and flip your ride.

Once again, the framerate and sense of speed in this new Final Freeway sequel are just crazy. Despite being so simplistic and a bit short, I still regularly bust out the original Final Freeway for my retro arcade racing fix, so I’m definitely looking forward to a new entry that offers a refined experience. Development seems to be slow but steady, and when the game was announced in October the developer was hopeful that it was about 3 months off from being finished, which would put it at an early 2012 release. Hopefully they are on track for this still, and Oyatsukai has started a campaign at the Kickstarter-like Appbackr in the hopes of crowd funding the cost for the final push towards completion.

We’ll keep tabs on Final Freeway 2R and will hopefully see it in the not too distant future, and until then you can join the discussion of the game taking place in our forums.

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Easily one of my most anticipated games this year, and I’m sure many of yours out there as well, is Warballoon Games‘ Star Command. In case you aren’t familiar, Star Command can most simply be described as Game Dev Story meets a Star Trek-like science fiction theme, though from what we’ve seen of the game thus far I’m not totally sure that does it justice. Game Dev Story was beautiful in its simplicity, but Star Command appears to take those simplistic game mechanics and add all sorts of depth on top, creating what we hope will be a deep strategy affair that’s still not too convoluted for anybody to jump in to.

We first learned of Star Command this past March, and originally the game was slated for a summertime release. However, that didn’t quite pan out, and in August we got a look at some new screenshots for the game but we haven’t really heard anything since then. Today Warballoon sent over a quick update on the status of Star Command, along with a slew of new screenshots to check out. It sounds like they are really interested in making the best possible game that they can, rather than trying to rush something out just to hit a planned release date. This latest set of screens is to demonstrate a bit of the work they’ve put into tightening up the overall user interface.

Above are a couple of shots of the crew management screens, where you’ll be able to choose what skill trees to progress through and define the roles of each of your crew members. The below screens are of the navigation interface, where you can choose what galaxies and solar systems to explore:

The following gallery how you produce tokens, the currency in the game, as well as assign your crew members to their various duties and upgrade the rooms inside of your ship:

Lots of screenshots there, so hopefully you’ve clicked through and checked them all out. I’m totally looking forward to finally getting my hands on Star Command, but it sounds like the release may still be a ways off as right now “due out next year” is about as specific as it Warballoon is getting. They do however mention that the alpha phase of the game should be wrapping up this month, and so barring any major issues during the beta phase, we might be seeing it earlier in 2012 as opposed to later. I certainly have my fingers crossed, but I’m also more than willing to wait as long as needed to make sure the final product is just right.

You can check out some discussion of Star Command in the game’s forum thread, and we’ll be keeping tabs on its progress as it inches towards a release next year.

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Earlier this week, Warner Bros. and Mortal Kombat developer NeatherRealm Studios surprised everybody by dropping Batman Arkham City Lockdown [$5.99], an iOS spinoff of the critically acclaimed console series, into the App Store. Batman Arkham City Lockdown is a streamlined take on its console big brother games, placing you in the role of Batman as he faces off against a stable of Gotham City’s infamous villains in one-on-one battles. The presentation and overall “Batman-ness” of the game are absolutely fantastic, and although the combat is a bit rigid and flat, Arkham City Lockdown offers a fun mobile version of The Dark Knight’s superhero escapades.

Immediately upon starting up the game, you’re thrust into a fight with one of the Joker’s thugs which acts as a tutorial in the ways of combat. The controls are fairly straightforward: Tapping the screen allows you to dodge an incoming blow, swiping the screen left or right throws those respective punches, swiping up does an uppercut, and swiping down just when an enemy is about to strike does a deflection move resulting in a dizzied opponent.

The responsiveness of the controls is pretty good, and it’s easy to piece together some nice combos using the swiping gestures. However, it really just feels like a second rate attempt at Infinity Blade-style combat. A couple of additional elements do spice things up though. There is a counterattack mechanic where tapping circles that pop up on your opponent’s body will result in Batman doing various types of counters, most of which look pretty sweet. The problem with this is that you feel very removed from these moves, as you sit back and merely watch these canned animations after simply tapping some circles. Enemies can also go into a “rage” where your offensive efforts do nothing, and instead you must concentrate on dodging their incoming attacks until they cool down and you can get back to pummeling them in the face.

My main issue with the fighting mechanics is that they really lack depth. Most fights can be easily won by simply timing a deflection, dizzying your opponent, and swiping back and forth furiously to unleash a combo on them. Of course, if you make the effort to mix things up by doing different combos, using your arsenal of special gadgets, and utilizing counterattacks, then you will be rewarded with a better rating and more experience points when the battle is over. But, if you’re stuck on a particularly hard fight, the motivation isn’t really there to prevent you from taking the cheap and formulaic route to a victory.

While the actual combat mechanics feel simplistic, Arkham City Lockdown does offer quite a bit in the way of content. After your first tutorial fight, you enter into the Batcave where you can access a map of Gotham City which allows you to choose from a selection of battles. Only a portion of the city is unlocked from the start, with a few entry level fights for you to choose from. Each fight contains multiple opponents that you’ll face off against one right after the other, utilizing the same health meter for all of them to add some challenge. When oh when will villainous thugs learn to all attack at the same time?

After completing each of these battles you’ll unlock the boss battle for that area, the first being Two Face. He’ll send some goons after you at first, and in between bouts a new gameplay element is introduced. When Two Face tries to pop a cap in your behind with his tommy gun, you toss out your trusted Batarang. Here you get a third-person view from right behind the Batarang and you actually control it by tilting, directing it into Two Face and knocking his aim off kilter. As gimmicky as this sounds, I actually thought it was a pretty cool little diversion from the regular fisticuff action. After tearing through the thugs and tossing a few Batarangs, you’ll square off against the man himself, Two Face.

The first boss battle with Two Face is tough, and he handily kicked my ass multiple times in a row. This brings me to another aspect to Arkham City Lockdown, the character progression of Batman. Beating up bad guys earns you experience which will level up Batman and his attributes. You can also earn what is called Waynetech points which can be poured into upgrading your various gadgets, armor, combat skills, and more. If you want to speed up the process, you can get additional Waynetech points via in-app purchase, though so far it seems like you’ll naturally earn enough to trick out your Batman adequately during the course of regular play.

Aside from the regular campaign missions and storyline, there’s also some cool extra stuff like unlockable character bios, Batman wallpapers, a viewer for checking out a selection of included Arkham City digital comics, and several additional skins to outfit your Batman in. These can be immediately unlocked via IAP (and they’re all pretty sweet), but unfortunately there’s no way to earn these alternate costumes through normal play, which would have been a cool incentive for playing through the game or accomplishing specific goals.

In the case of Batman Arkham City Lockdown, my feelings towards the game are mixed. I’m not terribly excited over the simplistic fighting mechanics, but I absolutely love the character progressions system and bonus unlockable items. Plus, the combat system did end up growing on me, and as long as you’re not expecting something at the level of Infinity Blade II [$6.99] then you might actually have a good amount of fun making your way through all the fighting missions. Also, the game’s visuals look absolutely fantastic, not surprising given the use of the Unreal Engine. It definitely feels like a very authentic mobile spinoff to the console titles.

Whether or not you should pick up Batman Arkham City Lockdown will likely boil down to what your expectations are from the game. If you want a comparable experience to the console titles that you can carry around in your pocket, then you will probably end up disappointed in this effort. If you want a gorgeous looking Batman title filled with all sorts of nice fan service and simple combat that won’t bust your brain with strategic depth, then Arkham City Lockdown delivers this really well.

It will be cool if the developers support the game post-release, as there are only a few bosses to battle in the game and it all goes by fairly quickly. It’s pretty fun replaying through the game though, especially if you don’t mind forking over some extra cash for the alternate costumes which add a bit of a different experience to additional playthroughs. Overall Batman Arkham City Lockdown is a really well made title that I’ve ended up enjoying more than I initially thought I would, and if you’re a big Batman fan and can accept some of the combat limitations, then it’s definitely worth a look.

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