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As we alerted our readers earlier today, Osmos is heading to iPhone and has just appeared to go live in the US App Store. The game is supposed to be largely identical to the iPad version released last month, with some slight tweaking to accommodte the smaller screen of the iPhone, and after spending some time with the game I can confirm this to be true. Osmos plays beautifully on the iPhone, and is an experience that should not be missed. Here are some excerpts from our review of the iPad version, as they sum up the iPhone version as well:

Osmos has a wide variety of different level types, which all revolve around one common theme: Be the biggest. You control a tiny organism called a "mote". By tapping in a direction, you expel mass towards where you tapped, and your mote goes zooming off the other direction. With each tap you lose a little bit of your mass, so it doesn't take long before you're making extremely calculated taps to get exactly where you want to go with minimal loss of size. Your mote can absorb any mote that it smaller than it, but it also can be absorbed by any mote that is larger than it. You can also zoom in or out using a pinching gesture.

Initially levels simply ask you to be the biggest, but it doesn't take long until Osmos throws other level types at you such as levels where everything is orbiting around a central mass and you must carefully expel your own mass to change your orbit to absorb other motes as well as levels that require you to capture a specific mote.

In all, eight different levels types are included, which all have their own unique mechanic centralized around the physics engine powering Osmos. You can even speed up or slow down time by swiping the screen, a function that becomes very handy in later levels when you need time for precise movements. Following the completion of Odyssey mode, arcade mode is unlocked which allows you to play any level type on whatever difficulty level you choose. OpenFeint is even bundled in for tracking the various in-game achievements.

The iPhone version of Osmos includes support for fast app switching and the iPhone 4's Retina Display. The graphics look phenomenal on the iPhone 4, with razor sharp text and extremely crisp in game graphics. Some of the levels have been adjusted for the iPhone screen and create a somewhat different and slightly more difficult experience. If you don't own an iPad and have been curious about Osmos, now is your chance to get in on the fun. The game has received a ridiculous amount of praise for both the Mac/PC and iPad versions, and this new iPhone edition is no different. This is one of those games that must really be experienced by everyone, and can now be enjoyed by iPad and iPhone owners alike.

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Ever since a slew of new APIs found their way into the latest version of Apple's iOS, the one that we've been waiting for somebody to really take advantage of is the ability for applications to finally be able to tap into the music library of the device itself. We even dreamed of the classic Audiosurf making its way to iPhone in a post from early last month. With the success of rhythm games in the past few years, and especially the Tap Tap Revenge series on iPhone, gamers have been clamoring for a similar game that they can play using their own music. Enter Tapic [99¢], the first game (that I know of) that creates a tapping chart directly from a song in your music library for you to play with. Tapic attains various levels of success in what it sets out to do, but it's far from perfect. Still, it's a novel use of the new API and is pretty fun in its own right.

The interface used in Tapic is simple to use. Choosing Play from the main menu brings up all the songs from your music library. After selecting a song Tapic will create a note chart for it, which takes about 10-20 seconds, and next you'll choose which difficulty to play it on. The harder the difficulty, the faster the notes come barreling towards you down the lanes. Choosing More Songs from the menu allows you to select a bunch of songs at once and have them prepared in advance for playing. Depending on how many songs you choose this can take a quite a few minutes, but allows you to play from songs in your playlist in succession without waiting for each one to create a chart in between.

The game can be played in portrait or landscape mode, although landscape must be purchased and unlocked using collected in-game coins (or by buying them with real money as IAP). Portrait uses three lanes of notes to tap along with, and landscape uses five. The game is at its best in landscape mode, and it's annoying that this must be unlocked rather than available from the start. Portrait is still ok, and it's a good way to get acclimated with playing Tapic, but landscape is where I spend most of the time playing. Different themes can also be bought using the game currency for both portrait and landscape mode, adding some graphical variety to the backgrounds.

The presentation and functionality of tapping the notes all work extremely well in Tapic, but it's the actual chart generation that fails to really impress. It doesn't ever feel like the notes jive with the song in a meaningful way as they rarely sync up properly, and when they do it mostly just feels like a coincidence. Some songs fared better than others while testing out the game, but overall you really feel like you're just playing an unrelated tapping game while listening to your favorite tunes. In my experience, and the general consensus of gamers in our forums, is that hip-hop and techno music gives the best results, while rock and metal generally don't.

The funny thing about the chart generator is that even though it's somewhat lacking, Tapic is still a lot of fun. I found myself continually wanting to keep playing, even though it didn't really feel like my performance had any impact on the song that was being used. I just can't help but feel like if the developer can improve this aspect of the game, which they have stated they are working on, then Tapic could really be something special. My other biggest point of contention is having to play for an extensive period of time (or spend real life money) before being able to unlock the landscape mode. It just feels like a cheap aspect to an otherwise excellently presented game. Perhaps the game will be taken to the next level over the course of its lifespan, but even right now Tapic is an interesting and fun way to experience your music.

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As you may recall back when Star Wars: Trench Run [$4.99] first came out back in November, we weren't too kind in our review. Basically, in the game, through a series of levels that feel a lot like different Star Wars themed shooter mini-games sewn together with clips from the movies, you re-enact the various events leading up to the original destruction of the Death Star. There wasn't much gameplay to be had in the mission mode, and arcade mode wasn't particularly compelling either.

The latest update adds three new levels and introduces four new ships: The Millennium Falcon, the Y-wing, along with both standard TIE fighters and Darth Vader's own TIE fighter. The new levels focus on flying the Millennium Falcon either attacking TIE fighters as you ferry Princess Leia back to the Rebel base or flying over the Death Star trench protecting three Y-wings from TIE fighters and turret fire. The third level also has you protecting the same Y-wings in arcade mode attempting to survive as long as possible.

While I'm sure there are some people out there who will absolutely love the fact that they're piloting the Millennium Falcon or getting in dog fights behind the controls of Darth Vader's TIE fighter, ultimately nothing that has been added provides any more depth or variety to the gameplay. Star Wars: Trench Run still retains the mini-game feel, and like most video games based on movies, its greatest asset is the included licensed content.

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The App Store has its fair share of top-down shoot 'em ups, with the overwhelming majority of them feeling very same-ish and not really doing much to set themselves apart (bar a few notable exceptions such as the recent Espgaluda II). Newcomers to the iOS, Art In Games, are looking to break that mould with the release of AirAttack [App Store] [Lite].

AirAttack departs from the traditional 2D platform of vertical shoot-em-ups and opts for a fully realised 3D world. This is what gives the game its own identity, as you'll see enemies not only fly towards you, but loop-the-loop back over you, too. What's more, Air Attack has an emphasis on bombing runs and laying waste to anything on the ground– something made all the more satisfying when that silo beneath you actually crumbles to smithereens.

The exceptional models and animations really help sell this feature too. Textures are vibrant and detailed across the board too which really helps distinguish the many different level themes. Coupled with the awesome flight and crashing animations and specular and light maps at work, Air Attack is a visual treat on any device.

Despite all this, AirAttack ran silky smooth on the 3GS device we tested it on (the game supposedly running well on 2nd gen devices and up, according to the devs) . The options for controlling your aircraft cover the gamut of tilt, touch, relational touch and on-screen joystick; leaving everyone happy. Controls are responsive and straightforward, with on-screen icons activating the many power-ups collectable throughout the level and a simple double tap activating your regenerating bombs.

Between and throughout the levels is a checkpoint system that doubles as an item store. Items are purchased with funds collected from enemy drops and cover standard upgrades such as cannon firepower and rockets; and special upgrades such as wingmen, lightning guns and even additional lives. The latter levels will see you with enough money to buy power-ups that slow down time, or give a protective shield. The more powerful upgrades have to have certain conditions met before becoming available, functioning alot like an achievement system.

There are 8 lengthy missions divided up into several checkpoints each and a whopping 58 different enemies to defeat. The 8 boss encounters at the end of each level are the fight to look forward to most though, as they're screen-spanning, multi-part battles that are quite challenging even on the normal difficulty. There is both an easy and hard mode though if you're finding it overly difficult or feeling masochistic, respectively.

The only setbacks to AirAttack's otherwise winning formula is that occassionally, enemy fire seems to just disappear into your aircraft, making it hard to see if you've been hit or not. It also feels at times that your hitbox is a bit larger than what it appears on screen, causing you to take hits where you think you've avoided them. The other issue we had was that AirAttack only offers a local high score system; and when online leaderboards are fast becoming the norm, this may disappoint some.

Even still, it's hard to look past AirAttack, particularly if you're a shmup fan. It's a challenging visual spectacle with solid gameplay elements backing it up throughout. Bosses are great, powerups are numerous, and your tenacity is rewarded as it should be in these games by added firepower and lastability as you progress perishing. Graciously, there's a lite version available too, so there's no excuse not to at least give AirAttack a go if you're interested.

App Store Link: AirAttack, $0.99, AirAttack Lite, Free.

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Here's a look at a couple of games that I've been having a surprising amount of fun with lately. They both use the same general concept of keeping a ball bouncing for as long as possible, but each accomplishes this goal with their own unique style. Neither will likely be considered the second coming of video games as we know it, but instead are just a quick bit of fun at an affordable price to eat up a spare few minutes when you're bored.

Tilt Ping, 99¢ – Everyone at one point or another has probably tried to see how long you could keep a ball bouncing in the air with a paddle or racket, and Tilt Ping brings that experience to your iPhone in very nice fashion. You hold your device out flat in the air, just like you would with a paddle, and use subtle tilting to keep the onscreen paddle under the bouncing ping pong ball. Adding variety to this idea is the special powerups that will appear every so often. They are designed in a way to try and distract you from keeping the ball going and force you tap icons that appear on the screen. Trying to maintain your bounce while focusing on tapping the bonus icons (some of which alternate between good and bad bonuses, requiring you to be even more careful) can become a really hectic and fun experience.

The game is hard, but keeps you coming back for just one more go. The whole experience of Tilt Ping is done with nicely detailed and colorful graphics, as well as OpenFeint integration for tracking achievements and many different statistics, making for a fairly robust package for such a simple game.

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Juggle!, 99¢ – What we have here is basically the antithesis of what Tilt Ping brings to the table. Imagine you invited a friend over to play Pong in the 70's, but they cancelled at the last minute, so instead you decided to concoct a way to play by yourself. In essence, this is Juggle! Forgoing the pretty graphics of Tilt Ping and instead paying homage to the aforementioned Pong, Juggle! is a deceptively compelling game. You start with a ball dropping from the top of the screen that you must keep in play by continuously bouncing it with the paddle at the bottom. With each bounce on the paddle, the ball (which is technically a square due to the retro theme) gets smaller and smaller, until it's just a tiny pixel. As play advances, more balls are added into play, requiring you to “juggle” them all to increase your score. You must keep at least one ball in play at a time, or else it's game over.

Again, it's an incredibly simple concept but one that's executed really well and is hard to put down. Like Tilt Ping, OpenFeint is included in Juggle! along with stat tracking and a nice set of options.

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The original Train Conductor was a sleeper hit that we really enjoyed and remains a staple on many users' iOS devices. That version featured a distinct Australian backdrop that many of us may have found unfamiliar. Train Conductor 2: USA [iPhone/ iPad] puts Uncle Sam in the driver's seat, embarking on 5 new levels from New York to the Grand Canyon.

Train Conductor 2 retains the basic Flight Control on Rails gameplay from the first game, but re-imagines both the setting and each level's special gameplay twist.

One such twist challenges you to flick trains upwards and or downwards depending on their color, whilst the others are a spin on the standard formula. The New York subway sequence for example provides non-sensical numerical and alphabetical line names that confuse just as they do in real life.

Some early impressions from a fan of the original in our forums:

Each level is a survival level. You route your trains until you crash. When you crash your score is displayed and you then have a choice of playing the level again or going to the map which is a US map drawn in the same style as the Aussie map in the first game. You also get a choice to post the results to Facebook or Twitter. To find out how many more trains you need to route to unlock the next city you just tap the locked city to activate the bubble with the answer. The visual style is consistent with the original game.
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There is no longer night/day button. The cities now can only be played in one mode i.e. New York is a day map and Nashville is a night map with Ghost trains. I am enjoying the game so far and can recommend it, especially at $0.99.

For all these new gameplay mechanics though, it seems that in some ways Train Conductor 2 is a scaled back some aspects of the first game. Objectives required to unlock the next level are much easier to obtain; there are no day/night sequences for each track as there was in the first game; and there is no longer level bonus' for speeding up time or acheiving a streak of connections. Facebook high scores also replace the Plus+ integration from the previous iteration.

In fact, if you had not played either game and were interested in the base gameplay, we'd still recommend you to try the original Train Conductor first. What Train Conductor 2 does add is a flashier, higher resolution look for the iPad and iPhone 4 Retina display and a funky new soundtrack to suit each of the new U.S. level themes.

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Osmos was originally released in late August of 2009 for the PC, and went on to win numerous Editor's Choice awards as it was initially reviewed, then was awarded further at both the Independent Games Festival, PAX, and even the Spike TV 2009 Video Game Awards. In fact, if you want to see just how much the gaming media loves Osmos, take a peek at their web site where they've got links to a ridiculous amount of reviews with all of them near the top of the scale each media outlet used.

As I mentioned when we first heard about the game coming to the iPad, it didn't take much more than a few seconds of playing the game on my computer to realize just how well it could work on the iPad. I'm happy to report that my suspicions were correct, and Osmos for iPad [$4.99] is a fantastic fit for the device. To get players up to speed on the iPad, Osmos includes "Odyssey mode" which is a 27 level tutorial of sorts which will walk you through everything there is to know about the game.

Osmos has a wide variety of different level types, which all revolve around one common theme: Be the biggest. You control a tiny organism called a "mote". By tapping in a direction, you expel mass towards where you tapped, and your mote goes zooming off the other direction. With each tap you lose a little bit of your mass, so it doesn't take long before you're making extremely calculated taps to get exactly where you want to go with minimal loss of size. Your mote can absorb any mote that it smaller than it, but it also can be absorbed by any mote that is larger than it. You can also zoom in or out using a pinching gesture.

This gameplay mechanic works extremely well on the iPad, and is expertly paired with some fantastic mellow electronica that does a great job of setting the mood of the game. Initially levels simply ask you to be the biggest, but it doesn't take long until Osmos throws other level types at you such as levels where everything is orbiting around a central mass and you must carefully expel your own mass to change your orbit to absorb other motes as well as levels that require you to capture a specific mote.

These levels are my favorite as the "enemy mote" (if you'd even call it that) is also trying to absorb anything smaller than it to get bigger than you to munch your mote up. Since there are only so many smaller motes around for you to absorb initially, these levels turn in to a really fun race for motes you can absorb while avoiding larger ones that will absorb you, and finally absorbing your target mote.

In all, eight different levels types are included, which all have their own unique mechanic centralized around the physics engine powering Osmos. You can even speed up or slow down time by swiping the screen, a function that becomes very handy in later levels when you need time for precise movements. Following the completion of Odyssey mode, arcade mode is unlocked which allows you to play any level type on whatever difficulty level you choose. OpenFeint is even bundled in for tracking the various in-game achievements.

If you're curious about Osmos, there isn't a lite version, but there's a free demo for Windows, OSX, and Linux available on the Osmos web site. Overall, Osmos is a great experience, and while I'm still waiting for a game that feels like it could only exist on the iPad, Osmos is definitely a game that feels a whole lot better on the device.

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