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Chair Entertainment’s mucho-celebrated and super popular hack-and-slash RPG, Infinity Blade, is on sale right now for $2.99. We’re not sure if it’s on the cheap because of Black Friday, Thanksgiving or the latest surge of mentions courtesy Infinity Blade 2 coverage, but hey, that’s not what’s important here. The fact that it’s three dollars cheaper and also an awesome game seems like the jucier material at the moment.

We’re pretty sure 99 percent of you know, own, and probably dig Infinity Blade, so for you one percent-ers out there? Do yourself a favor: buy this game. Also, keep your heads on a swivel because Infinity Blade 2 is almost here. The follow-up is due out on December 1 and will carry a $6.99 price tag, which is the first game’s usual price plus one. So far, it seems fantastic.

Check out the new video:

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Surprise! Gameloft is holding a sale in honor of Thanksgiving. For a limited time, the studio is tossing out the regular price of a select 20 of its titles and lowering them to an agreeable ninety-nine cents. It wouldn’t be a seasonal break without this kind of slash-and-burn sale from the mega publisher, so we’re pretty relieved Gameloft stepped up and confirmed this year’s Thanksgiving week. Thanks, guys!

Oh! And what’s up for grabs? Surprisingly, a few uber-popular titles. Price of Persia: Warrior Within, Splinter Cell Conviction, and its Zelda clone Sacred Odyssey: Rise of Ayden are all on the list with a few other notables. Check it out:

• Assassin’s Creed: Altair’s Chronicles – $4.99 → $.99
• Assassin’s Creed: Altair’s Chronicles for iPad – $6.99 → $.99
• BackStab – $6.99 → $.99
• Eternal Legacy – $4.99 → $.99
• Eternal Legacy for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Fast Five the Movie: Official Game – $4.99 → $.99
• Fast Five the Movie: Official Game for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Gameloft Action Pack – $4.99 → $.99
• Gameloft Sports Pack – $4.99 → $.99
• Iron Man 2 – $4.99 → $.99
• Iron Man 2 for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• James Cameron’s Avatar – $4.99 → $.99
• James Cameron’s Avatar for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Prince of Persia: Warrior Within – $2.99 → $.99
• Prince of Persia: Warrior Within for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Rayman 2: The Great Escape – $4.99 → $.99
• Real Golf 2011 – $4.99 → $.99
• Real Golf 2011 for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Sacred Odyssey: Rise of Ayden – $6.99 → $.99
• The Settlers – $4.99 → $.99
• The Settlers for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Shadow Guardian – $5.99 → $.99
• Shadow Guardian for iPad – $6.99 → $.99
• Shrek Kart – $4.99 → $.99
• Shrek Kart for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Silent Ops – $6.99 → $.99
• Spider-Man: Total Mayhem – $6.99 → $.99
• Spider-Man: Total Mayhem for iPad – $6.99 → $.99
• Splinter Cell Conviction – $4.99 → $.99
• Splinter Cell Conviction for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Starfront: Collision – $4.99 → $.99
• Starfront: Collision for iPad – $6.99 → $.99
• Zombie Infection – $4.99 → $.99
• Zombie Infection for iPad – $4.99 → $.99

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Com2Us is getting in on the Thanksgiving slash Black Friday action alongside a bunch of other publishers. Starting now and, presumably, rolling until early next week, a smattering of titles in the studio’s massive App Store catalogue have been reduced to a hair under a buck. What this means for your wallet is savings. Also, a heavier load. Poor little guy.

Among the biggest and brightest titles on sale is Homerun Battle 3D. If you grabbed that one of the billions of other times it’s been up for a discount, don’t dispair: Inotia 3, Tower Defense: Lost Earth, and Puzzle Family are all great games and involved in this price-slashing endeavor. Here’s the list:

• 9 Innings: Pro Baseball 2011 – $2.99 → $.99
• Homerun Battle 3D – $4.99 → $.99
• Homerun Battle 3D for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Inotia 3: Children of Carnia – $4.99 → $.99
• Piggy Adventure – $2.99 → $.99
• Piggy Adventure for iPad – $2.99 → $.99
• Tower Defense: Lost Earth – $2.99 → $.99
• Tower Defense: Lost Earth for iPad – $4.99 → $.99
• Puzzle Family – $2.99 → $.99
• Zombie Runaway – $2.99 → $.99

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One thing about this week: you’ll save some money if you’re looking to stock up for a big drive or just content to use as “Ignore Family” fuel. The worldwide leaders of Sonic games, for example, is holding a fairly comprehensive sale, so if you were in the mood for a, uh … more historic afternoon of App Store appreciation, then get your download fingers ready.

The big ticket items, as usual whenever Sega holds a sale, are its Sonic series games. It seems like the general fan audience is mixed on the quality of these, but at prices like one dollar, it’s hard to feel too conned by the much-beloved, yet also heatedly criticized publisher. Also, of note? The oft-featured Monkey Ball games have been lowered to a buck.

• Altered Beast - $2.99 → $.99
• Gunstar Heroes – $2.99 → $.99
• Samurai Bloodshow – $4.99 → $.99
• Sonic Spinball – $1.99 → $.99
• Sonic The Hedgehog – $3.99 → $1.99
• Sonic The Hedgehog 2 – $3.99 → $1.99
• Sonic The Hedgehog 4: Episode 1 – $4.99 → $2.99
• Sonic & Sega All Stars Racing – $2.99 → $1.99
• Super Monkey Ball – $2.99 → $.99
• Super Monkey Ball 2 – $2.99 → $.99
• Super Monkey Ball 2 Sakura Edition – $4.99 → $.99
• Streets of Rage – $2.99 → $.99
• Streets of Rage 2 – $2.99 → $.99
• Streets of Rage 3 – $2.99 → $.99
• Virtua Fighter 2 – $1.99 → $.99

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Namco Bandai is getting into the gorging spirit of Thanksgiving Day here in the US and encouraging gamers to gorge on new games for their iOS devices with a week long Thanksgiving sale. There’s a staggering amount of games listed on sale, so surely something to pique anyone’s interest.

Personally, I’m quite partial to Pac-Man Championship Edition, Puzzle Quest 2, and Time Crisis 2nd Strike. Oh, and Splatterhouse. Yeah I said it. Sure, it takes a brutally difficult arcade game and makes it that much more difficult with the addition of virtual controls, but I’m just a sucker for nostalgia.

• Ace Combat Xi Skies of Incursion, $4.99 → $0.99
• Buccaneer Blitz, (Universal) $2.99 → $0.99
• Dig Dug Remix, $2.99 → $0.99
• Fossil Feast, (Universal) $1.99 → $0.99
• Galaga Remix, $2.99 → $0.99
• House of Glass, (iPad Only) Free+ $4.99IAP → $2.99IAP
• Isaac Newton’s Gravity HD, (iPad Only) Free+ $4.99IAP → $2.99IAP
• Isaac Newton’s Gravity, $2.99 → $0.99
• Lost in Time: The Clockwork Tower, (iPad Only) Free+ $4.99IAP → $2.99IAP
• Mappy by Namco, $1.99 → $0.99
• Mishap, $4.99 → $2.99
• Mishap for iPad, (iPad Only) $4.99 → $2.99
• PAC-MAN CHAMPIONSHIP EDITION, $4.99 → $0.99
• PAC-CHOMP, (Universal) $1.99 → $0.99
• PAC-MAN REMIX, $2.99 → $0.99
• PAC’N-JUMP, (Universal) $1.99 → $0.99
• Pool Pro Online 3, $1.99 → $0.99
• Pool Pro Online 3 for iPad, (iPad Only) $1.99 → $0.99
• Puzzle Quest 2, (Universal) $4.99 → $2.99
• RALLY-X Rumble, (Universal) $1.99 → $0.99
• Ridge Racer Accelerated, $6.99 → $1.99
• Sky Gamblers: Rise of Glory, (Universal) $4.99 → $2.99
• SPLATTERHOUSE, $2.99 → $0.99
• Time Crisis Strike, $2.99 → $0.99
• Time Crisis 2nd Strike, $6.99 → $1.99

I noticed that not every sale seems to be active yet in the App Store as of this writing, so it’s probably a good idea to double check the pricing before blindly mashing the purchase button. If a price hasn’t dropped yet for you, just give it a bit and check back. You’ve got all the way until Monday the 28th to take advantage of these sales.

Also, prepare yourself for the likely onslaught of other Thanksgiving Day related sales during this week and into the coming weekend.

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I’m not sure how it is that Kairosoft does it, but they’ve managed to nail a gameplay formula that’s so engrossing that seemingly everyone is more than willing to overlook the fact that all of their games are mediocre ports of feature phone games. I, for one, don’t care at all, and have spent an embarrassing amount of time building game studios, racing teams, shopping malls, schools, and all the other things the guys from Kairosoft have put me in charge of.

For a limited time, Grand Prix Story [99¢] and Mega Mall Story [$1.99] are on sale. As you probably guessed by the title, in Mega Mall Story you manage a shopping mall. We explain how it all works in details in our review. Similarly, our review of Grand Prix Story goes over all the ins and outs of your racing career.

My favorite Kairosoft game is still Game Dev Story [$3.99] and I really recommend diving into that first if you’ve yet to play a Kairosoft title as its premise is likely the most familiar to readers of TouchArcade. Regardless, all the games are tons of fun (although some are more confusing than others) and you really can’t go wrong with any of them.

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Surely you’ve heard of Words With Friends by now, haven’t you? I figure, if my mom plays it, that’s a pretty good benchmark for the entire world knowing about a video game. Well, if you haven’t, here’s the gist- Words With Friends is basically the game of Scrabble with a social cross-platform twist. Utilizing the magic of asynchronous multiplayer and push alerts, you can play games of Scrabble with friends across the world. Cooler yet, it doesn’t matter if your friends have Android phones or are even playing the Facebook version of the game… It just works.

It’s casual and simple enough that you could play with your grandma, while being classic enough that it’s fun for even the most hardcore types who enjoy playing word games with their friends and family. Seriously, I can’t say enough good things about Words With Friends.

I can say one bad thing though, in that the advertisements that power the free version can get a little obnoxious at times, especially if you have a hatred for interstitial ads… Which is exactly where today’s sale comes in. For a limited time, you can get the ad-free version of Words With Friends for 99¢. I can almost promise you’ll get more than 99¢ worth of entertainment out of this game, but, if you’re a cautious App Store customer you can always try the free version first. All of your games will transfer over if and when you decide to spring for the paid version.

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In honor of the release of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim today, tons of iOS developers have dropped the price of their games. I suppose this sale could also be for Veteran’s Day, but that seems to be just as weird of a reason to slash prices of iOS games as the release of Skyrim. So, since everyone else has abandoned me for Skyrim, I’m just going to assume that these sales are some kind of consolation prize to give me something else to do today other than be forever alone.

Out of all the things on sale, this is the ten bucks I’d spend:

Cowboy Guns HD, $0.99 – [Review] – Sure, there’s a billion dual stick shooters on the App Store, but I’ve got to tip my hat at any that have an actual story-driven single-player campaign to play through instead of just throwing you into a pit full of monsters to see how long you can survive.

Flapcraft, $0.99 – This game was a little hard to recommend when it first came out because of how short and linear it was for a “see how far you can fly” kind of game. But, for a buck, it’s totally worth picking up just to see how incredibly detailed the graphics are on the Retina Display.

Grand Prix Story, $0.99 – [Review] – My latest Kairosoft obsession. Take the gameplay of Game Dev Story and apply it to racing. It works really well, and unlike other Kairosoft games features gameplay which seems fairly clear-cut and sensible. Upgrade cars, do better in races, trick out your garage, etc.

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, $0.99 – [Review] – We didn’t think a whole lot of this game when it was originally released, it was expensive, buggy, and felt awkward as an iOS game. Well, a price drop and a few updates fixed the first two problems, but I’m not sure what can be done about the third.

Peggle, $0.99 – [Review] – Is there a person on this planet who owns an iPhone and doesn’t have Peggle on it? I certainly hope not, but if you fall into that group I’d seriously fix that as soon as possible. Peggle is amazing.

Scribblenauts Remix, $0.99 – [Review] – The Scribblenauts games for the Nintendo DS were incredible, so naturally, when you take those two and cram ‘em together into one iOS game that’s also universal and supports iCloud syncing? …Yeah, you need to get this game.

SHADOWGUN, $0.99 – [Review] – Like Madfingers’ other games, Shadowgun is very heavy on the eye candy and a little light on gameplay. Regardless, if you’ve got a recent iOS device, for a buck you should totally check out the graphics Shadowgun can make it pump out.

Super Crossfire™ HD, $0.99 – [Review] – This is what happens when you take the classic game of Space Invaders and crank it up to 11 with bright colors, particle effects, and a really cool warping mechanic that puts a new twist on the whole thing.

World of Goo, $0.99 – [Review] – I wouldn’t really say the small screen of the iPhone is the ideal way to play World of Goo, but this game is so good that you should try it anyway. Although, if at all possible, check out the HD version on the iPad.

WORMS, $0.99 – [Review] – Even though I still don’t think the port is the best, it’s still really rad to be able to play Worms on your phone. A recent update added Bluetooth multiplayer, so if you’ve got local iOS gamer friends, this is a solid purchase.

Also, just like most holidays, there’s tons of other games on sale (and quite a few even free) for the release of Skyrim. I’ve written up a handy-dandy guide for finding everything that’s on sale or free. Alternatively, you can check out our price drops and freebie forum to see what forum members have found.

Happy Skyrim release day everyone!

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It’s probably fair to say most episodic series experience big-time drop-offs in sales after each new release. It’s just what happens, regardless of quality. But on the App Store, one big studio, Telltale Games, is actually seeing sales spikes after each release of Hector and “substantially less” drop-off with other series in general. File that away in your “the more you know” drawer.

Producer Dave Felton dropped this nugget in a recent interview with Gamasutra. Fleshing out the why, Felton said Telltale attributes “the device form factor and the App Store environment” as making the difference.

“On iOS devices there’s really no way yet to fulfill the ‘Season Pass’ concept through the App Store, but the encouraging thing is the drop off from episode to episode is substantially less than we have seen on any other platform to date,” he said.

We have nothing to add here on our end because Felton is probably right: the App Store is much, much more consumer-friendly and facing than any other platform Telltale releases on, so it’s generating more sales. And, yeah, these devices can go anywhere with us. Want to play some Monkey Island on the toilet? You totally can. Do that with an Xbox.

[Via Gamasutra, via Joystiq]

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