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Jamie Grove over at ThinkGeek, who was kind enough to show me around their Megaplex HQ and the original iCade prototype, just sent word that, as of 3PM EDT today, the iCade SDK is available for download, without an NDA.

Just click the developers link on ION Audio's iCade page.

Granted, the iCade Bluetooth keycodes have been known for some time and iPad developers had already started to work iCade support into their titles. But with the SDK now openly and officially available — what are you waiting for, guys?

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I think Jared is a time traveler. On last week’s podcast, The Bearded One asked us what happened to Marathon for the iPad. We reported on that back in February, but the project seemed to have gone dark. And here, just yesterday, Bungie out of the blue issued an update of sorts and interviewed the designer behind the project. Turns out that things have been going well enough. The iOS Marathon port will hit the App Store for $0 as soon as it clears certification, which it appears, presently, to be in.

If you’d like to know more about the designer, check out Bungie’s interview with him. It has a lot information about his experience with the Marathon series, development of the port, and even has some advice for would-be programmers.

Development iPad game screenshot. More here.

I’ve plucked this notable out of it just for you. As most of you know, Marathon is an old FPS built specifically for a mouse and keyboard. It took a lot of revisions, but it appears as though the nut for this game has been cracked.

There are still a lot of controls. For now, there is a left thumb virtual joystick for moving, the "action" button is tucked under. On the right thumb, you have primary and secondary fire buttons; the weapon switch buttons are at the bottom.

There are a few hidden buttons as well. Touching the HUD motion sensor brings up the auto map. The left and right sides of the ammo display switch weapons and the center toggles between the ammo and inventory displays. The original Marathon didn't have an aiming reticule, and by default the iOS version sticks to that, but it can be enabled in the options.

There is also an option to tap-to-shoot, but two finger tap for secondary fire didn't make it into the final build. Sorry to the lefties out there, a future release will have adjustable controls!

In other news, Bungie is releasing the source code for its final title in the Marathon series, Marathon Infinity. It’s now “open source,” so I suppose there’s a chance that we could catch it on the App Store, too! That’s hot.

Have a look at some Mac Marathon gameplay while you wait.

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War Grimoire [$1.99 / HD] is a tower defense title with the trappings of a great genre-based game, but its execution of fundamental elements and basic design are holding it back.

Instead of lingering on the bad, I’ll note what drew our all-seeing eye to the project in the first place: its visual flair.

War Grimoire's world is a vibrant one, enriched by traditional fantasy and Japanese comics and cartoon tropes. In this genre in particular, it’s unusual to see a well-budgeted game shoot for something outside of space marines, bugs, and ravaged worlds.

Character has a place, too. Instead of traditional towers, soldiers of all builds — including archers, mages, and dragons — are the pillars of defense. While it does default to dull monsters, there are some creative enemies that end up attacking your armies in ways I’ve never seen in a tower defense title before.

One of the more remarkable aspects is tower placement. Most levels allow you free reign with placement. It’s like the wild west of tower defense titles in this regard. Enemies pile in from all over the place, and you’ve got to be wise with your limited resources, but near infinite placement of long-distance soldiers and close-up fighters.

I also want to make note of the RPG tie-in. As in most tower defense games, you can upgrade your ‘towers’ while a level progresses. In this, however, you can take it a step further by upgrading individual class weapons and skill trees with points earned from the battles you’ve won, or hey, even lost.

In the pre-release images for War Grimoire, we saw massive battles: huge numbers of enemies and soldiers smacking each other in a centralized area. It looked chaotic, but in the fun, manageable sort of way. There was reason to the placement, at least.

In execution, battles fall apart. They’re in fact, too chaotic. Enemy pathways are clearly enough defined from the get-go, but then they take odd turns that you can’t anticipate if you haven’t played a level before. Worst case, they take odd turns that you flat-out can’t defend because it’s impossible to earn enough in-level currency to defend these points.

Disorganized chaos is the tip of the iceberg in a title otherwise riddled with much smaller design issues. The UI is needlessly heavy, games don’t always save properly, the English translation is terrible, and in general, success is measured by trial-and-error.

I’d love to see this game patched with a couple of updates. It has a bright future if the core is tweaked and massaged.

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The wait for Tales of Monkey Island HD episodes is over. In one of the craziest App Store maneuvers I’ve ever seen, Telltale Games pushed out the remaining four episodes of the five-episode arc in a single afternoon. Each title is available at an agreeable $6.99, which a few dollars shy of what they continue to cost on other downloadable services.

In the interest of drumming up interest, Telltale has also slashed the price of the first game to $0 for a limited time. It’s a good game at a great price, and like the rest of the titles in the series, it’s faithful to the vision of Monkey Island while also still exhibiting its own charm and takes on the universe.

I've been there and back again with the series, so allow me to give you a little look at each app:

Monkey Island Tales 1 HD, Free – [Review] – [Forum Thread] – Talk about opening with a bang. Within the first minutes of the Tales series, Guybrush defeats his arch-nemesis the evil pirate LeChuck. Unfortunately, in the process, Guybrush loses his wife, his ship, and… unleashes a deadly pox into the world. Most of this episode centers on Guybrush getting a ship in order to find Elaine.

Monkey Island Tales 2 HD, $6.99 – Things don’t easier even though a few minor goals were met in the previous episode. In this adventure specifically, Guybrush re-unites with his wife and meets the Mer-people in his search for La Esponja Grande, which is otherwise known as the cure for the misanthropic pox infesting the world.

Monkey Island Tales 3 HD, $6.99 – You’d roast me if I revealed the setting for this episode, but I do want to note that it’s something COMPLETELY different than the previous episodes. In this place, Guybrush meets two new characters to the series, one of which becomes a key driver in the rest of the story arc.

Monkey Island Tales 4 HD, $6.99 – Guybrush goes on trial in the place where it all started. How does he defend himself against the accusations thrown at him? If only it was as simple as “Look behind you, a three-headed monkey!”

Monkey Island Tales 5 HD, $6.99 – Now, the task is to save the world against a threat. How Monkey Island of Telltale. Oh, and if it wasn’t plain, this is indeed the last episode of the series. But what a conclusion, let me tell you.

As a whole, this is a fantastic series. Sure, there are spots where the story drags and, yeah, there are definitely some horrible puzzles, but this series is easily some of Telltale Games sharpest work. The writing in particular is impressive. If you dig the first episode — don't forget, it's free — definitely start diving into the rest of these. They're worth your time.

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Ever since we posted the first trailer for 1-bit Ninja [$1.99] from developer Kode 80 I’ve been anxious to get my hands on the title, and after a small delay past its intended release date it’s now available in the App Store. 1-bit Ninja is a platforming game that's an homage to the classic handheld gaming systems of the 80s, but with a modern technical twist. At any point in the game you can tilt the perspective, exposing the previously flat 2D terrain as a 3D environment à la Paper Mario. It’s a neat effect, but also one that impacts the gameplay as it allows you to discover hidden aspects of a level, which makes for one of the most unique platforming experiences in the App Store.

The first thing to notice about 1-bit Ninja is that it completely nails the retro look and feel that it was going for. The game looks like it could have launched right beside Super Mario Land on the Game Boy two decades ago and would have fit right in. Despite the simplistic, blocky pixel graphics, there still manages to be a ton of character and style in 1-bit Ninja’s visuals. Those without a fondness for the handheld gaming graphics of yesteryear may not be so impressed, but for the rest of us the look of 1-bit Ninja should bring back memories of the good ol’ days.

Of course, it’s easy to get snapped out of that retro nostalgia haze once you shift the perspective to 3D. Touching either of the upper corners of the screen will swing the camera around and give you a look farther down the level either ahead or behind you. The effect is quite awesome, and still impresses me each time I see it. Beyond just looking cool, it also serves a critical function: checking certain parts of a level in 3D will expose hidden paths and secrets which are integral to completing every goal in a level.

There are 20 levels across 4 worlds in 1-bit Ninja, and just completing a level will unlock the next one. This is easier said than done, though, as each level is fairly lengthy and can be quite difficult to complete. You’re given 2 minutes to finish a level, and there are coins to collect and enemies to kill along the way which will add to your score. Each level also has 5 bonus coins to seek out and collect, some of which can be very tricky to get to. Going back to discover these bonus coins and shooting for better times and high scores give the levels in 1-bit Ninja a ton of replay value, though unfortunately there’s no online component for me to see how I stack up against my friends.

I was worried that constantly checking everything in 3D for secrets would slow down the pace of the game, and in fact, it kind of does. But that’s all part of the grand scheme of things in 1-bit Ninja. The game is really designed for two different types of play. One has you taking your time and exploring every nook and cranny for secrets and bonus coins, while at the same time learning the layout of a level. Once you’ve played a level enough to know what the optimal route is, then you can go for the perfect speed run. It works out incredibly well, and I’ve had a great time replaying levels over and over again trying to master them.

One of the radical design choices in 1-bit Ninja is the controls. Kode 80 has boiled the controls down to just two buttons, one that moves you forward and one that jumps. The inability to move your character freely back and forth completely changes how you play the game. If you miss collecting a coin or taking the path you wanted you aren’t able to go back and correct your mistake. You’ll just need to file that information away for consideration in a future run through of the level. To me, this makes for an interesting twist on a traditional platforming game, and I appreciate the different strategy that is needed in order to be successful. But for people who are just interested in having a new Mario-like game, you might never warm up to the idea of only moving in one direction.

If you can approach 1-bit Ninja with the right expectations, it’s easily one of the most enjoyable platformers in the App Store. The retro visuals are a delight and the 3D camera shift effect adds a super unique element to the game. The control style does take some getting used to, but after about 15 or 20 minutes with the game I had the hang of things and haven’t had a problem since. Opinions are pretty split in our forums, with some loving the unique twist on platforming and others unable to accept the limited movement.

Personally, I’m completely hooked on 1-bit Ninja, and if you think you’re able to accept some of the design decisions in the game and you're a fan of its retro aesthetics, then I’d definitely recommend checking it out.

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Continuity is a pretty awesome Flash game. It won the Best Student Game award at 2010 Independent Games Festival and the Gameplay Innovation Award at IndieCade 2010, so it clearly has some indie cred. Sadly, it also has a huge flaw that most Flash games share—it isn't on iOS. I'm willing to forgive that, though, because we just got an even bigger dose of awesome on iOS in Continuity 2: The Continuation [$0.99].

Continuity 2 is a mind-bending puzzle platformer. Each level is drawn on a number of sliding tiles. You can move them around to rearrange the game world as you play, but you can only connect matching edges. This part of the game is like a simple tile sliding puzzle, though there are never more than 8 tiles to contend with.

Inside the tiles, you control a little stick guy by tapping either side of the screen to walk, and swiping upward to jump. These controls are serviceable, but they don't feel fluid. That's okay, though—after a quick introduction to the basics, you won't be doing a lot of platforming. Rather than moving around the level, you'll usually be moving the level around you.

The game is divided up into 6 worlds. For the first two worlds, you'll be playing with pretty basic puzzles. Find your way to the level's key, then head to the door, going out of your way only to grab coins. After that, things get interesting. In world 3, you'll learn to rotate your phone to change the level's orientation, so you can walk on walls, fall down floors and climb on ceilings. This technique will keep you going for a while, and then you'll discover switches that trigger gates that are often linked up on completely different tiles.

These later levels get pretty wild, but Continuity 2 is great about introducing concepts slowly enough that I never felt completely out of my depth. There's no punishment for false starts or failed attempts. I was genuinely excited to solve a puzzle by leaping down a hole, swapping tiles for my destination part way through, rotating my phone and then flying back to yet another tile. Our forum users seem pretty impressed, too.

There are a total of 50 levels, with minimal replayability. If you collect all the coins in a level, the game tracks your completion time, and each level has a challenge time to beat. Achievements and leaderboards would probably help give Continuity 2 a little more staying power. On the flip side, the game won't ever leave you stuck— you can play each level in a world once it unlocks, and you can unlock them without completing every level.

You really shouldn't pass Continuity 2 up if you're a puzzle-game fan. Screenshots don't do it justice – the minimalistic style works beautifully in motion—and both the music and sound effects are great. It also has the rare distinction of being a game that really feels at home on iOS. The touch-screen tile sliding is great, but once the rotation comes in it seems only natural that it's been taken off the computer screen and made portable. I'll probably keep this one around long after I master all the challenge times, just to show people how neat iOS gaming can be.

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I’ve been a pretty big fan of the Joypad Game Controller [Free] ever since we reviewed it back in February. In a nutshell, Joypad allows you to display a selection of different virtual controller types on your iPhone or iPod touch. You then pair the Joypad app with a desktop client via Bluetooth or WiFi which remaps keys on your computer's keyboard to the virtual buttons of the Joypad, and remaps mouse movement to the accelerometer. This allows the Joypad to control games on your Mac or PC, and makes for a very capable substitute controller when you don’t happen to have a real physical controller handy.

While that’s pretty cool in and of itself, the team behind Joypad have taken things a step further and released an SDK which allows any developer to implement Joypad support into their games natively, bypassing the need to pair with the desktop software. This also means that Joypad support can be baked right into iPad games, a feature we saw demonstrated at WWDC a few weeks ago.

And now we have the first actual implementation of Joypad support in an iOS game with Lars [$1.99], a retro-style platformer from Icarus Interactive. The short video below shows just how quick and easy it is to get Joypad working with Lars:

I’ve been playing around with Lars using the Joypad for a couple of days now, and it works just as flawlessly as it does in the video. The connection between the two devices happens automatically and near-instantly, and there’s literally zero lag when playing. One thing I do wish however is that developers putting Joypad support in their games would offer the ability to remove the onscreen virtual controls when the Joypad is in use for a more seamless experience.

Also, Lars isn’t exactly the greatest platformer in the world, although it’s certainly not the worst. In fact, it’s pretty fun, but it does feel a bit bland and repetitious. If you’re curious about trying the Joypad support though, then it might be worth the two bucks to pick up Lars and check it out.

The developers of Joypad hint that there are more games with Joypad support coming out soon, and I'm really curious to find out which games will utilize the functionality. It’s such a great experience playing an iPad game with the Joypad that I hope a lot of developers give the Joypad SDK a look for their own games. For now, at least Lars is a start.

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Casey's Contraptions [$2.99] was already a great game before this week's update. In our review, we applauded it for its charming approach to creative physics puzzling. But there was one outstanding concern: for a game with a full-featured level editor, it really sucked not to be able to share new levels with the world.

Turns out the developers got right on top of fixing that problem, because the newly released 1.1 update adds a global level sharing system. You can still share your contraptions with just your friends by email, but now you also have the option to share with the whole world. You can also download other users' creations by heading to the My Contraptions menu and hitting the Download Contraptions button. This takes you to a website that lists all the published contraptions, which you can grab with the tap of a button.

This leads to a new problem that anyone should be glad to have—an overabundance of choice. Thankfully users need to successfully play through their levels to post them, so there are no worries about broken levels. But given how popular level sharing is already, I won't be surprised if a ranking system shows up soon.

For those of you playing with children or family members, there's more good news—a user profile system has been added with support for up to six individual players. There are also a few bug fixes and tweaks to round things out.

It sounds like the next update will give us even more reason to keep playing. According to the developer, there are plans for a new location, new items, and the highly-anticipated iPhone version. The iPad version should be going universal too. Great news all around for Casey's Contraptions.

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Gameloft's BackStab [$6.99] was released for Xperia Play a few months back as a timed exclusive, but now that it has finally arrived on iOS as a universal app, we get to take a look at the studios take of Assassin's Creed via Pirates of the Carribbean. Which is to say, it's an open world action adventure game with lots of jumping around and stabbing things.

The core of the game relies on the same parkour and action mechanics of the Assassin's Creed games on consoles. That means the bulk of the game requires you to run around a somewhat open world and jump from object to object. Control wise, you'll get a virtual thumbstick and some buttons to control sword swipes and jumping. Combat is a button mashing affair and while you get some counter moves, you don't get a block, so most battles can be won by hitting the attack button repeatedly. Touching and scrolling anywhere on the screen moves the camera around. It's tolerable, but there will be plenty of instances where you miss jumps, balk stealth sequences or attack thin air because you can't quite get the camera settled properly.

The same goes for free-running, which only works in certain contextual situations. Occasionally you have to push the jump button and sometimes the game does it for you. It's confusing at best, unpredictable and annoying at its worst and you'll die a lot if you don't get the hang of it.

You'll be doing all of this dying, running, jumping and stabbing across several locales in what can only be described as one of the most insane, brain-melting stories I've played through in a long time. From the outset, you play as Henry Blake, an officer in England's Royal Navy who ends up with a faux-hawk and a badass biker jacket after being double-crossed by a man who was apparently an old friend. This puts you into shackles, gives excuse for a daring escape and eventually provides the reasoning for the crux of the story, your revenge. To get your revenge, you'll kill chickens and rabbits to make food for a buxom lady, run errands for random people and explore a few different Caribbean Islands in a series of missions only slightly related to the main story arc.

I'm weary to "spoil" the strangeness the game takes on around its mid-point, but let's just say it pulls an Uncharted and goes off the rails of reality and spills into something totally different. This wouldn't be a big deal if it made a lick of sense, but the game seems to push you to want revenge, not to run around caves searching out different artifacts to reverse an infection. The world simply doesn't justify the twist, but it's a point only a few will likely quibble with.

As far as the open-world is concerned, it's a mix between Assassin's Creed and Red Dead Redemption, in that you'll be running around and taking on missions from random people, saving people from being killed by the Spanish and picking flowers. The kitchen sink approach is admirable, but the game is so buggy it's difficult to really dig into. If you can deal with it, there is tons of content to explore, even if it's all a bit familiar. You can play through the main storyline in about four or five hours, but if you explore the extra missions and side stuff, there is plenty of gameplay to be had.

The engine is likely the place to put the blame for the bugs. Characters will fall through the ground, get stuck in jumping loops or disappear altogether. Design wise, several of the NPCs seem pulled directly from Assassins Creed II, but the low polygon count and often humorous animation means you'll never really mistake this for anything but a mobile game. While those are minor annoyances and are mostly expected in open world games, they happen far more than they should and even worse, happen to your own character sometimes. The game does a decent job of magically pulling you out of stuck corners, but I had to restart a few times after getting trapped on a ledge or in a wall.

That said, BackStab runs well on the iPad and only occasionally chugs on an iPhone 3GS. Control-wise, it's far better suited for the iPad's bigger screen and you'll likely be accidently touching buttons far more often on an iPhone. The world looks great on all of the devices, even if the characters don't.

The characters are fully voiced, but the dialogue isn't particularly noteworthy and the voice acting, while an admirable inclusion, doesn't really add to the experience. For their part, the sound effects and music do a good job of sounding like what they're supposed to, but don't plan on being blown away by the sound design or the acting. It's better than previous Gameloft titles, but still has a lot of room to grow.

If you've been desperately craving an Assassin's Creed game set in an 18th Century pirate wonderland to play on the go, this will do the trick, but don't expect too much from it. If you can deal with all the bugs, you'll certainly be taken on a bizarre ride and you'll have a ton of stuff to do in the world.

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P1XL Games, who brought us RPG Quest: Minimae [App Store], has just released an original collection of simple, C64-styled retro games entitled P1XL Party [App Store] — and it's a collection that retro gamers won't want to miss. The initial release brings three titles — Splatform, Wandererz, and Marz — but there's more on the way in free updates to come.

The first game on the list, Splatform, can best be described to readers as a side-scrolling take on Doodle Jump / Papi Jump — although it preceded both titles by years. It is a perfect recreation of the 2002 C64 title of the same name, 1st place winner of that year's Mimigame Programming Competition. In the iOS version, you tilt to send your bouncing ball from platform to platform in a quest for the greatest distance and highest score.

Wandererz is a mini-RPG, retro styled (of course), that puts you on a pixellated quest to rescue the seven lost daughters of the king. Your mission is to find the daughters, bring them back to the castle, and contend with the ghoulish creatures wandering the land along the way. There are potions, weapons, armor, treasure chests, dangerous swamps, and encroaching nightfall. It's a great little RPG experience packaged up for quick, mobile play sessions.

Marz is something akin to Space Invaders, but in reverse. You are in control of a space craft in a decaying planetary orbit. You will soon land, but you must first clear the surface of obstacles to avoid a crash. This involves precise timing and adaptation to your dwindling height from the surface. Once all the obstacles are cleared, it's thumbs up and you're planted firmly on the alien surface. A C64 color palette brings the nostalgia.

The developers indicate that coming titles in this collection include puzzle games, strategy games, racing games, and more. I'm pretty anxious to see where this goes. If you dig the retro, don't miss P1XL Party [App Store].

P1XL Games was formed in 2009 by Robin Harbron who worked with Jerri Ellsworth to bring the C64 DTV to market, and designer Sam Washburn. Harbron made the jump from Nintendo DS to iOS development in late 2008.

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