We have come such a long way from Steve’s iPhone SDK announcement in late 2007. Even before the official SDK was released, developers were writing simple games. Simple games evolved in to pick up and play examples of gaming perfection like Flight Control [App Store] and Scoops [App Store]. Ambitious developers have even released some great 3D games. But last weekend, Gameloft’s Let’s Golf [App Store] raised the bar to a whole new level in providing what can best be described as a remarkably console-like 3D gaming experience at the very reasonable price of $5.99.

Let’s Golf features several game play modes, briefly outlined in our first impressions review. The first of which is Instant Play, which is pretty cut and dry. Upon selecting your golfer, you’re thrown into a random selection of three holes--Complete them all, hopefully under par, and you’re done.

After breezing through the included tutorial and getting a handle for the controls, most players will probably want to skip the Instant Play mode and head straight on over to Tournament mode to tee off against several AI golfers for fame, fortune, and most importantly…unlockable clothing and accessories!

In your first tournament, you only have access to two golf courses in easy mode with 1-9 hole, 10-18 hole, 1-18 hole, or 9 hole shuffle options. As you win trophies, more courses are unlocked, as well as additional difficulty levels, items, and golfers. While Let’s Golf only features four available golfers, they can each be customized with clothing, headwear, and golf balls. These seem to be randomly rewarded, as I won a dress for Elena while playing as Vincent.

Character attributes are measured across four different statistics: power, accuracy, recovery, and putting. Equipping different unlocked items provides an opportunity to increase these stats. For instance, the “school girl suit” provides +1 to recovery, making it easier to accurately hit the ball in the rough. Another noteworthy bonus of unlocking these perks is: any benefits gained from equipped items are also present while playing in Instant Play, Free Hole and multiplayer modes. The final single player game mode is Free Hole, where you can play on any of the four courses and any hole set by yourself, on any difficulty

Let’s Golf would be an excellent game with just these play modes, but Gameloft takes it one step further and includes not one, but two ways to challenge another player to a round of golf. In Hot Seat both golfers play using one device, passing it back and forth, depending on whose turn it is. If you find another person who also owns Let’s Golf, you can challenge them to a local WiFi match where each player uses their own device to compete. In my testing, both multiplayer methods worked great. Playing over local WiFi has a small amount of lag, but nothing that would ever be noticeable unless you have both screens side by side.

Let’s Golf has two available control methods: Classic and Advanced. Classic mode plays like most golfing games where you press a button to start your swing, again to select your power, and a third time to select your accuracy. Classic controls also provide an indicator on the swing power selector to show how strong your swing should be to end up in the estimated landing grid. By moving this grid around, different clubs are automatically selected depending on the distance. Also like most golf games, the grid indicates the elevation of the terrain using a red to blue gradient, and the incline using small dots that move across the grid, downhill. While putting in Classic mode, you choose what direction your character is facing and the strength of your putt. Even though the game gives you an estimate of how hard you need to hit the ball on the green, putting on an incline or from a long way away can still be pretty challenging.

In Advanced mode, while clubs are still automatically chosen, you are given no indicator for how strong your shot should be. Instead of the three-click method, you move your finger in a semi-circular pattern to swing. While some players may prefer this control method, I didn’t really feel it added to the difficulty of the long game at all and, instead, artificially inflated the difficulty of the short game. While classic controls help you determine the strength of your swing, it doesn’t take into account the wind, and shots that are perfectly lined up rarely land dead center in your targeting grid. Putting in advanced mode, however, is truly something else. Without any real idea of how hard you need to tap the ball, getting it in the hole once you’re on the green in advanced mode can be extremely brutal.

With both control methods, you can add English to the ball after the ball is in the air by dragging your finger across a representation of the ball that appears in the lower left corner of the screen. If there's one thing I'd really like Gameloft to tweak, it would be how this works. There's only one speed that you can spin the ball, and it never really seems to be enough to make that big of a difference.

Let’s Golf plays remarkably similar to the Sony PSP’s Hot Shots Golf: Open Tee and does a great job in duplicating all the fun things about the Hot Shots series. The graphics are superb for an iPhone game and the only noticeable frame rate dips are minor and only seem to occur when the camera pans out quickly. One complaint I have with the title is the fact that the indicators used to swing your club are tied to the frame rate of the 3D components of the game. Small frame rate hiccups have caused me to miss a few perfect shots as the power gauge stuttered for a tiny fraction of a second.

Another negative is the fact that there’s no option to listen to your own music while playing (and the included track gets somewhat repetitive). Let’s Golf also doesn’t respect the state of the ring/vibrate switch on the iPhone, playing all music and sound effects regardless. Also, I would love a way to see replays, and ideally somehow save replays to show unbelievable shots to friends, later.

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Gameloft provides a very complete golfing experience for the iPhone in Let’s Golf at a fraction of the price you would expect to pay for an identical game on a "real console". Our forums have been going wild with praise for the game, and as of this writing, Let’s Golf is sitting at a comfortable 4.5 stars in the App Store.  If you liked the Hot Shots series, you’re doing yourself a disservice by not picking up this game.  Something to keep in mind though is the fact Let’s Golf is an arcade style sports game, so if ultra-realism is your thing, you might want to hold off to see what Tiger Woods PGA Tour ’09 has to offer.

This review was written by Eli Hodapp, a guest contributor at TouchArcade.

Nitako's Rasta Monkey [App Store] arrived in the App Store early this morning and we've since had a chance to sit down and play this interesting iPhone title.

The game is a 2D platformer in which you play a Rastafarian monkey. Your job is to swing through the branches to collect fruit and navigate obstacles. You control your monkey by way of the multi-touch screen. Pressing on the right or left sides of the screen provides you with movement, while holding down on both sides of the screen allows you to start swinging in a circle. Let go at the right moment, and you catapult yourself into the air. This swinging/jumping maneuver is central to the gameplay and you'll have a chance to practice it -- a lot.

Even in the weeks leading to its launch, this title was often compared to another iPhone swinging-platformer Sway. After playing both of the games, the comparisons become even more pronounced. The early play (and frustrations) of the games do feel similar. You'll find yourself falling -- a lot. You'll also find yourself trying the same segment over and over until you make it through. The game controls and overall feel, however, are quite different.

Rasta Monkey is a relatively simpler affair in both graphics and gameplay. The game comes with only 10 levels of progressive difficulty, and the first few levels are rather short and easy. The most challenging portions of the game come primarily from the aiming and timing of your launching abilities. Thankfully, checkpoints are frequent, but there can be a level a high level of repetition and frustration to these portions of the game. And it wasn't until the last few levels that we saw some fun and interesting level design elements that we wished we'd seen sooner.

At only $1.99, it's hard to be too critical of the game and many of our forum users seem very happy with their purchase. The gameplay, however, simply didn't capture us enough to make us feel that this is a "must have" title even at this price.

The developers do provide a web demo (click on Play tab) if you have the Unity web plug-in installed. The demo provides a reasonably accurate taste of the early levels with keyboard controls.

[ Full HD version | Low Bandwidth version ]

App Store Link: Rasta Monkey, $1.99

Illusion Labs has released a new 1.1 update to their excellent iPhone platformer Sway [App Store]. The new version adds 10 new levels, 3 new characters, bugfixes as well as "new gameplay elements".

The game came out last month and has since become one of our favorites. The unique controls do take some getting used to, but once you get the hang of them, the game is a whole lot of fun. In fact, the only real criticism about the game has been its length which seems to have been addressed in this update.

This gameplay video is from the 1.0 version after we've had some practice:

[ Full HD version | Low Bandwidth version ]

App Store Link: Sway, $4.99

Moregames/Chillingo has updated their popular survival shooter iDracula to version 1.1 [App Store]. The new features include:

• 4 new monsters
• 2 new maps
• Perk system updated, new perks added
• 2 game modes: Super Survival, Wave Attack
• New powerups - Haste, Rage, Time Stop, Bomb (only available in Super Survival mode)
• Earn money and buy reinforcement in Wave attack mode
• Rush mode updated - you can choose a weapon now.
• Added 2 new options for better weapon switching
• 2 new weapons - one (Blade Ripper) only accessible in Rush mode, other (Flamethrower) is everywhere.

Be forewarned, the update clears your high scores, presumably due to the level balance changes included in 1.1.

App Store Link: iDracula, $2.99

Aqua Moto Racing [App Store] is a Jet Ski racing game, which hit the App Store last month. As Resolution Interactive’s second title, Aqua Moto Racing has secured their reputation in my book as yet another developer to keep an eye out for when looking for great games. Featuring 18 tracks that take place in three different aquatic locations, Aqua Moto Racing provides a dynamite package of speed, great graphics, and the best controls of any iPhone racing game I’ve played. Add to that the $2.99 price tag and Aqua Moto Racing is a hard title to pass up.

The bread and butter of Aqua Moto Racing is the championship mode, where you race your Jet Ski against five other AI opponents in series of six races. Points are awarded at the end of every race, and if you finish in at least third place overall you will unlock the next series of races as well as earn three tuning points to spend upgrading your Jet Ski.

Tuning points can be spent in one of four ways: top speed, acceleration, steering, and boost. Before every race you have the opportunity to modify how you have your Jet Ski tuned, which is a nice change of pace from most games where upgrades like this are permanent. If the mini map for the upcoming track looks like it has lots of turns, take some points out of top speed and throw them in steering. Are there lots of straights in the next track? Put as many points as possible in top speed.

Making your way through the races will come naturally to anyone who has ever played a Jet Ski racing game before. Tracks are laid out with a series of red and yellow buoys, red need to be passed on the right and yellow need to be passed on the left. Complete three laps--hopefully in first place--and the race is over. Miss three buoys and you’re disqualified.

Aqua Moto Racing’s controls are flawless. You steer your Jet Ski by tilting right and left and while the sensitivity of the tilt controls are customizable, I felt they were spot-on by default. You can slow down to make it around sharp corners by touching the left side of the screen. Touching the bottom of the screen turns the camera around so you can see behind you, and touching the right side of the screen burns through your boost meter and sends you rocketing forward. To get more boost, pass buoys on the correct side and successfully land tricks.

Of course, no Jet Ski racing game would be complete without an onslaught of ramps on which to do stunts. (The first ramp you come across is in the fourth race of the first championship series.) While you’re airborne, tilting the iPhone upwards enables stunt mode--the game then goes in to slow motion, and all the interface elements are replaced with six different buttons for tricks you can perform with stars to indicate difficulty. Hold down a button to perform a trick, but be careful to release it in time to allow your racer to get back in to riding position before you land. If you don’t successfully land the stunt you’re attempting, your racer goes splashing in to the water, usually resulting in being passed by a few AI racers.

Boost helps you get more air off a ramp but, generally speaking, the small amount that you gain from landing a stunt isn’t worth the risk of falling off your Jet Ski. In my experience, once you get passed by a few of the AI racers, it is very difficult to ever make up the lost time to get back in to first. There doesn’t seem to be any mechanic in place that allows you to go faster or gain more boost when you’re behind, like a lot of racing games have, so if you fall off more than twice you’re usually better off just cutting your losses and restarting the race.

On top of racing AI opponents, Aqua Moto Racing also has a time trial mode (you can play any track you’ve unlocked by winning championships), complete with ghosts of your best time and an online leader board. One thing I found fairly odd about the leader board system is, in order to use it you must register first, which is normal, but the email confirmation is the most ambiguous thing I have ever seen. It’s little more than a plain text email referencing your “Resolution Account” making no mention of Aqua Moto Racing, high scores, or anything else remotely related. If you didn’t know that Resolution Interactive made the game, I could easily see the email getting spammed or deleted because “Resolution Account” just sounds fishy.

The graphics in Aqua Moto Racing are unbelievable for a game you’re playing on your phone. The draw distance is better than most 3D iPhone games, and there’s never any pop-in for distant objects. If you would have told me in 1996, when I was spending more time than I’d care to admit unlocking everything possible in Wave Race 64, that I’d one day be playing an equivalent game on my phone… Regardless, comparisons to Wave Race 64 are inevitable for any Jet Ski racer (even more so now that it is available on the Wii Virtual Console.)

One thing that Aqua Moto Racing is missing (and I must stress I’m using the word “missing” in an extremely loose manner, as this game is great as is for the $2.99 price tag) is more activity from the water you’re racing on. I miss being able to jump big waves like in Wave Race 64; all the water in Aqua Moto Racing is remarkably calm. Another thing mysteriously absent from Aqua Moto Racing is a stunt mode, which is odd considering the emphasis put on doing stunts to gain boost. This is particularly unfortunate given how well the game's slow motion, with a secondary interface for performing tricks, is implemented. As someone who really enjoyed Wave Race 64’s stunt mode, I could see myself spending a lot of time doing tricks and submitting scores online.

Another feature I’d love to see is some kind of track editor similar to the one recently released for SlotZ Racer [App Store]. Since the 18 included tracks are just different buoy and ramp configurations on the same three aquatic areas, I could see a top-town interface to drop buoys and ramps to save as a new track not only being great fun, but also providing infinite replay value--especially if they could be shared online.

If you enjoyed Wave Race 64 (or really any other Jet Ski game) or like racing games in general, you’ll be right at home with Aqua Moto Racing. $2.99 is a steal for a game this polished, and I can’t wait to see what Resolution Interactive puts out next.  Those on the fence can check out the limited, free Aqua Moto Racing Lite [App Store] to try before buying.

See the developer's trailer video for a look at the gameplay.

This review was written by Eli Hodapp, a guest contributor at TouchArcade.

iPhone-toting crossword addicts now have a new way to feed their addiction.  The official New York Times crossword puzzle game, The New York Times Crosswords Daily 2009 [App Store], has appeared in the App Store.

Developed my Magmic Games, New York Times Crosswords for the iPhone is a port of the developer's mobile version.  And while the mobile version is a subscription-based game ($2.99 per month), the iPhone version at $9.99 provides access to all daily (and archived) crossword puzzles published in the print newspaper through the end of 2009, making it a better value than the mobile version for avid crossword fans.

Features listed by the developer:

• Play the daily puzzle from the New York Times newspaper.
• Play over 4,000 classic puzzles from the New York Times archive.
• Send messages and compare your solve times with friends online.
• Compete against top players via the online leaderboards.
• Listen to the in-game soundtrack or your favorite tunes from your iPod.
• Write in ‘pen’ or ‘pencil’.
• Solve puzzles on the grid or directly from the clues list.
• Automatic highlighting of related clues.
• Check or reveal letters, words or the entire puzzle.
• Check out the front page of today’s paper.

App Store Link: The New York Times Crosswords Daily 2009, $9.99

All the news in the twitterverse over the past few days seems to be about @SXSW.  That's South by Southwest, an interactive media, film, and music festival that takes place every spring in Austin, Texas.  This year it runs from March 13th-22nd and is presenty underway.  One of the components of this year's event that readers may find of particular interest is the iPhone Gaming Panel.  The panelists consisted of Stephanie Morgan of ngmoco, Danielle Cassley of Aurora Feint, Brian Greenstone of Pangea Software, and moderator Raven Zachary (who hosted the iPhone Intelligence Party that Touch Arcade attended during Macworld 2009).

TUAW recently recently took at look at the event's iPhone developer gathering.

Ngmoco's Stephanie Morgan explained that the iPhone is unlike any gaming platform or handheld currently in circulation.

She explained a sort of tiered approach to ngmoco's efforts: starting with free apps to build awareness, moving up to building a platform for good games, and ultimately expanding into the paid apps -- where the money is, of course. Stephanie did put some stats on the board, however.

For one, we found out that iPhone games don't have to be designed for McNugget-sized attention spans. According to ngmoco, the average time spent playing Rolando is over 20 minutes each time it is played. Of course, there are lots of levels in Rolando. By comparison, MazeFinger average play time was around 6 minutes.

Daniel Cassley, whose original Aurora Feint release saw over one million downloads in its first month, spoke of the challenge that the iPhone presents, given that a game can be interrupted at any time by a phone call.

This poses a huge problem for her, as Aurora Feint Arena relies on a networked gameplay experience. As she explained, due to latency and possible disconnections, the OpenFeint platform had to support asynchronous communications, and games must provide a way to store the data and upload or download it when the network becomes available again.

Pangea's Brian Greenstone shared some compelling numbers with the crowd.

Enigmo, arguably the least "flashy" of Pangea's games, has thus far made $1.5 million in profit. That's profit, after Apple took their 30%. That's 810,000 downloads from July to January. By comparison, Nanosaur 2 has been downloaded 133,000 times and has made only $77,000. Not bad, but also a good deal for the designers who helped him as they are sharing in those profits. Given the success of their games and ease of developing for the the iPhone, Brian said Pangea won't be developing any more Mac games and will focus solely on the iPhone and iPod Touch.

Everyone on the panel agreed that the iPhone platform brings the best overall experience to users and gives developers an ideal development environment, which accounts for the success of the App Store and its developers.

[ photo courtesy of Fellowship of the Rich ]

Since we first got word back in January of Nitako's upcoming platformer Rasta Monkey, we've been keeping a close eye on the title.  The fast-paced, innovative gameplay seen in Nitako's demo videos has had our readers anxiously awaiting the game's release.  Well, the wait is over.  Rasta Monkey [link] is now available in the App Store.

As described by the developer,

Rasta Monkey is by far the best Iphone 2D action platformer out there. With perfect physics based gameplay that you will love. You play an extraordinarily happy Rastafarian monkey. One day, Your old father asks you to help the family out: "You need to collect dem fruits for mi special fruit-shake before mi head go CHAKA CHAKA!..."

You must swing around and grab onto branches, using your awesome monkey skills to snag some delicious fruit. Now go on, make your madda proud! The fun physics gameplay in Rasta Monkey is truly awesome! everything you do in this game, including moving, jumping, climbing, swinging on ropes, fighting monsters and more, is based on the manipulation of gravity and other forces of nature. Together with the addictive original dub music and kawaii graphics, it will be very hard to stop playing..

Nitako's latest demo video gives a feel for the monkey business:

We'll soon be taking a much closer look at this one.  Stay tuned.

App Store Link: Rasta Monkey, $1.99

Simon Oliver/Ngmoco has pushed out an update to their popular Rolando [App Store] game.

The 1.1 version update offers improvements to the physics and rendering engine but also notably adds 5 additional "secret" levels. Rolando is an iPhone original platform game that was first released in December. We reviewed the game at that time and found it to be a wonderfully polished production and amongst the best the App Store had to offer.

The first secret level is unlocked after you complete the first world of the main Rolando storyline, while subsequent levels are available as you solve the secret levels sequentially.

App Store Link: Rolando, $4.99

Late last month we previewed Gameloft's Let's Golf and were impressed with what we saw.  This afternoon, this highly anticipated golfing game was released in the App Store [link].

Since then, I've had the pleasure of playing through a few rounds of both single player and multiplayer. As a huge fan of the Hot Shots Golf series, I'm overjoyed to be able to say that the gameplay of Let's Golf is remarkably similar, the controls are awesome, and from a graphical standpoint, Let's Golf gives the Sony PSP's Hot Shots Golf: Open Tee a run for its money.

Available play modes are Instant Play, which throws you into a random series of three holes, Tournament, which allows you to compete for unlockable additions to your character such as different clothes and golf balls, and Free Hole, which allows you to practice a course by yourself. In addition to the three single player modes, both WiFi and single-device multiplayer allow you to challenge friends to golf battles regardless of whether or not they have an iPhone or own the game!

Controls are similar to the rest of the golfing genre--Let's Golf features the standard single-button power and accuracy swing method as well as an "advanced" mode, where you drag your finger on screen to swing your club. Standard controls provide guidance, based on where you aim your shot on the map. In advanced mode, you're on your own. Spin can be put on the ball by dragging the on-screen ball in whatever direction you want it to spin after the shot is in the air--not highly realistic, but with the limited input methods, an understandable compromise.

Early gameplay video:

My first impressions of Let's Golf's performance are been positive. Frame rates are solid with only minor drops when the camera zooms out. Multiplayer works flawlessly, and the WiFi mode even includes a lobby system to organize local games. So far, I'm impressed with Gameloft's efforts in producing a golf game that effectively duplicates everything I love about Hot Shots Golf. Needless to say, fans of the series will feel right at home.

Keep an eye out for our in-depth review of Let's Golf.

App Store Link: Let's Golf, $5.99

This first impressions article was written by Eli Hodapp, a guest contributor at Touch Arcade.

The iPhone platform and the iTunes App Store present a rare opportunity for game developers.  Never before has there been a highly capable device with such a unique array of input technologies married to so elegant and intuitive a software distribution model.  Not to mention the free SDK and zero barrier to entry.

We've highlighted a number of iPhone developer success stories in the past, such as that of Steve Demeter (author of Trism) and Ethan Nicholas (author of iShoot).  And while not every developer's tale is one of extreme success--in fact most aren't--an opportunity is there for those with innovative titles, a solid pricing strategy and, perhaps, a little bit of luck.

To the list of App Store success stories, we can add Simon Oliver of HandCircus, author of the critically acclaimed Rolando [App Store], published by ngmoco.  It's really no surprise, given the quaity of the title and the consistent raves it's received from iPhone game reviewers.  What we didn't realize was just how well the title has performed in the App Store.

The Daily Mail reports that Oliver's Rolando has sold over 700,000 copies since it made its App Store debut last December at a price of $9.99.  Thanks to the game's amazing success, Simon has just moved his development studio from his bedroom to a proper office complex.  Thirty-one year old Simon, who was rejected by dozens of game development firms because of his lack of experience, is now running his own games publishing firm--a dream come true.

And for Simon, likely this is just the beginning.  The British designer / developer that ngmoco's Neil Young calls the next Shigeru Miyamoto is hard at work on a sequel to Rolando.  Congrats, Simon!  We're anxious to see what lies ahead.

Gameloft's much anticipated Let's Golf [App Store] game has appeared in the App Store at a price of $5.99.

• 63 holes in 4 distinct locations remodelled in 3D: Fiji Beach, the American Mountains, the English Countryside, and Scottish Lochs.
• 4 cool and animated characters customizable with your own style. Each player has unique strengths and weaknesses
• Controls adaptable to anyone: Advanced mode plays like a sports simulation game and you can even add spin to the ball. Casual mode for easy fun and fewer bogies (but no, it won't let you cheat).

Gameloft's trailer video provides a taste of the action:

We'll provide a gameplay video and some first impressions shortly.

App Store Link: Let's Golf, $5.99

"Meet the smallest enemies in the history of games. They're only one pixel big. They're 'one-dot enemies'!" reads the description of Kenji Eno's One Dot Enemies [App Store]

The free game involves simply mashing little one-pixel enemies that appear on your iPhone's screen. Tapping on them squashes them out of existence, but others quickly come to take their place. There's no time limit for the endeavor, but it keeps track of how many enemies you've destroyed in all.

1up also reports on a number of Easter Eggs found in the game:

Despite its small scale, the game features a number of Easter Eggs, as well as some real depth to the game mechanics. At its core, you're just trying to tap the enemies when you see them on screen, but considering how fast the pixel-high dots move (and how small they are) actually nailing one takes some serious hand-eye coordination. Skilled players will discover what happens if you can hit two O.D.E.s simultaneously, but only the quickest smashers will ever manage to nail 10 O.D.E.s in a row -- the game's most challenging combo.

Kenji Eno is a well known video game designer from Japan who also helped design Newtonica for the iPhone.

This simple game isn't necessarily going to be for everyone, but it's an interesting time waster that falls on the artsy-side of game development. Our favorite comment about the game comes from forum member VeganTnT:

I HATE this game! why? Cause after I figured out what I was supposed to do I found 4 invincible "one dot enemies" aka dead pixels. So now i'm playing and I have to remember the position of the dead pixels so I don't try and tap them again...

Ok, I actually love this game but I'm still pissed about those dead pixels, haha.

App Store Link: One Dot Enemies, Free

   

FDG Entertainment released to us these exclusive screenshots of their upcoming Bobby Carrot Classic game which should be arriving in the app store later this month. This will be the first in a series of ports of the original Bobby Carrot series that were previously available on other platforms. These will include:

1. Bobby Carrot 1: Classic
2. Bobby Carrot 2: Winterland
3. Bobby Carrot 3: Evolution
4. Bobby Carrot 4: Flower Power

All four games are ports of the original mobile games but with enhanced music and sound effects. Each game will sell for $0.99 as an introductory price but will go up to $1.99 later. Bobby Carrot Forever [$4.99], which we previously reviewed, was the 5th in the series and was a native iPhone version.

These $0.99 ports will provide fans of the series the ability to play through the original levels of the game, and could also serve to introduce new players to the series.

As Pocket Gamer reports, the first games that support Facebook Connect have appeared in the App Store.  Facebook Connect is a framework provided by Facebook that developers can utilize in order to allow players to link games to their Facebook profile for automatic posting of high score info to their profile feeds.

A recent update to Tap Tap Revenge 2 [App Store] (v2.0.1) adds Facebook Connect functionality to the game and iBowl's [App Store] recent (v5.0) update brings the functionality to the SGN title, as well.

The ability to link iPhone games to one of the internet's top social networking websites has the potential to bring the iPhone gaming community together in a whole new way.  Seeing what games your friends' are playing and how they're besting your score on your favorite game--in a place you visit daily anyway--should add a nice element of competition to titles that support the new service.