iPod Application Reviews!
Sky Force
It's a bit of a late heads-up, but scrolling shooter fans should take advantage of Infinite Dreams' weekend giveaway of Sky Force [App Store] in celebration of the studio's iQuariumbeing in the App Store Top 100 list.
Sky Force is a traditional vertical arcade shooter in which you must battle across seven different levels, one of which features a boss-battle at the end. The game offers a variety of pickups and powerups along the way.
The game bears much similarity to Infinite Dreams' earlier iPhone release, Sky Force Reloaded, which we reviewed back in March. (Reloaded was, interestingly, released to the App Store before Sky Force.) The game delivers a solid arcade shooter feel superior to that of many similar titles that can be found in the App Store.
Originally a mobile title that launched to rave reviews, the iPhone version, normally priced at $1.99, is free for the duration of the weekend. Don't miss a freebie on a great iPhone vertical shooter experience.
Sky Force is a traditional vertical arcade shooter in which you must battle across seven different levels, one of which features a boss-battle at the end. The game offers a variety of pickups and powerups along the way.
The game bears much similarity to Infinite Dreams' earlier iPhone release, Sky Force Reloaded, which we reviewed back in March. (Reloaded was, interestingly, released to the App Store before Sky Force.) The game delivers a solid arcade shooter feel superior to that of many similar titles that can be found in the App Store.
Originally a mobile title that launched to rave reviews, the iPhone version, normally priced at $1.99, is free for the duration of the weekend. Don't miss a freebie on a great iPhone vertical shooter experience.
Heavy Mach
When we took a look at the first Heavy Mach, we thought it was a fun side-scrolling shooter with room for improvement. Nearly a year later, developer IndieAn has released Heavy Mach 2 [App Store], a greatly enhanced sequel that abandons side-scrolling for a top down perspective among other changes and enhancements. Gameplay in Heavy Mach 2 consists of taking various missions that seem to either have you killing things or collecting things, going out in to the battlefield to fight with your tank and returning with your spoils. As you earn credits and experience by defeating other tanks and completing missions, you can eventually buy tons of weaponry and different upgrades to your tank as you level up. My favorite part of this game is how well the controls work. While the developers could have easily just used a typical virtual dual-stick control scheme, instead everything is done using different taps and drawing gestures on screen. To move your tank you can either tap on the battlefield, or you can draw a line with your finger for the tank to follow. Your tank will try to follow the exact course you plotted, so it will often get stuck if you try to make it cut corners or drive places it can't. This is easily solved by just tapping or drawing on the screen to move somewhere else.
Attacking enemies is as simple as tapping on them, and letting your weapons do the rest. Tapping on screen twice causes your tank to dash in that direction. There are buttons framing the screen to use special abilities (such as calling in air strikes) and changing weapons once you get more than the starting load out. The interface as well as the different tanks themselves and the terrain are extremely detailed, and the animations are great– Much like the original.
Attacking enemies is as simple as tapping on them, and letting your weapons do the rest. Tapping on screen twice causes your tank to dash in that direction. There are buttons framing the screen to use special abilities (such as calling in air strikes) and changing weapons once you get more than the starting load out. The interface as well as the different tanks themselves and the terrain are extremely detailed, and the animations are great– Much like the original.
Gunman
Aside from the Parrot AR.Drone quadricopter, we haven't come across much noteworthy in the world of iPhone gaming at CES– Everyone is far too busy looking at tablet computers being shown and speculating as to which is likely going to be the closest to Apple's tablet. That doesn't mean people at CES aren't playing iPhone games. The developers behind Gunman [App Store], a camera-based shooter game, are currently running a contest encouraging people to get involved in Gunman battles at CES– And if the Twitter activity is any indication, quite a few people are. While this contest is largely irrelevant to those of us who aren't at CES, one great thing came out of it: Gunman is free for the duration of the convention.
Gunman makes use of the iPhone's camera to create a real-world multiplayer game similar to laser tag. By connecting to a WiFi network, players join a game then "shoot" each other by taking photos using the phone's camera. If you're running the latest iPhone OS, you can even zoom in as if you were using a sniper scope. Each player is tracked by the color of their shirt, and in my testing of the game I found the color recognition to be shockingly good.
The game comes with a few caveats of course. Large multiplayer games require WiFi, everyone must be wearing a different color shirt, and needless to say, until an iPod touch with a camera materializes you need an iPhone to play. Still, if you can round up a few friends all willing to wear different colored shirts that have iPhones in an area blanketed by WiFi, and don't mind people wondering what in the world you're doing running around pretending to shoot people with your phone, Gunman looks to be a lot of fun.
Gunman makes use of the iPhone's camera to create a real-world multiplayer game similar to laser tag. By connecting to a WiFi network, players join a game then "shoot" each other by taking photos using the phone's camera. If you're running the latest iPhone OS, you can even zoom in as if you were using a sniper scope. Each player is tracked by the color of their shirt, and in my testing of the game I found the color recognition to be shockingly good.
The game comes with a few caveats of course. Large multiplayer games require WiFi, everyone must be wearing a different color shirt, and needless to say, until an iPod touch with a camera materializes you need an iPhone to play. Still, if you can round up a few friends all willing to wear different colored shirts that have iPhones in an area blanketed by WiFi, and don't mind people wondering what in the world you're doing running around pretending to shoot people with your phone, Gunman looks to be a lot of fun.
