As we detailed earlier, the new iPhone 3G S has much more horsepower under the hood than the iPhone or iPhone 3G. Much of the gaming muscle in the unit comes from its PowerVR SGX graphics processor.
A video demo running on a pre-production Pandora dev board shows the GPU in action. [ via iPhone Alley ] (The upcoming Pandora mobile game console, like the iPhone 3G S, is based on a 600MHz Cortex A8 CPU and the PowerVR SGX GPU.)
Additional details of the capabilites of the PowerVR SGX were provided by a Freeverse developer in a discussion with our own Eli.
Toon shading and spherical harmonic lighting are shader effects only possible on the 3GS. The 3G only seems to support one user clip plane (from my experiments) so there's another one. Morphing and objects changing shape is actually possible on the 3G thanks to its ability to do matrix blending. The translucency and reflection map effects on the vase I'm not sure if they're possible on the 3G, same with the texture effects on the second balloon demo.
...
"Real" shadows and distortion effects (the last few mask demos) are not possible on the 3G. In a lot of them the description was illegible but basically anything that has fancy "gleaming" light, especially in combination with other things, is 3GS-only.
...
Also keep in mind that many things the 3G is capable of on paper are too slow to use in practice (like the alpha test, which apple specifically recommends against); this will no longer be the case.
This morning I met with Aurelien Kebeci, CEO of the French development group Agharta Studio to see their upcoming game, Rogue Planet. Previously known for 1112 [App Store], Kebeci blew me away with what he had to show me.
Rogue Planet is a turn based strategy game that consists of 15 campaign missions, as well as 15 additional maps for free play and multiplayer. In the initial release, multiplayer will be limited to local WiFi, but with 3.0 right around the corner, Bluetooth local multiplayer as well as asynchronous online multiplayer with push notifications will be available as a free update.
The entire game is rendered using extremely detailed 2D sprites on a 3D background, and the presentation is absolutely gorgeous. The isometric 3D view reminds me of Final Fantasy Tactics and each unit has its own set of sounds which gives the game a very lively feel as vehicles' engines start when you activate them and soldiers speak to you.
Each of the two factions have 10 different units to wage war with, and cover the standard array of what you would expect in a turn based strategy game. One intriguing mechanic is the importance of defending and destroying bridges. Tanks and other heavy units cannot cross rivers without a bridge, and the engineer unit can both blow them up and repair them.
Capturing buildings works a little different too, unlike Advance Wars, buildings must be destroyed first, then you send any foot soldier inside to instantly capturing it, which also consumes the unit. Rogue Planet also has all the multitouch view controls you'd expect in an iPhone game, complete with rotation of the game field.
The video I shot includes a demonstration of the view controls, how the story is delivered in the campaign, a few turns of gameplay, a demonstration of free mode, and some other surprises. Make sure you notice how fast the game loads.
The game in its current state is a work in progress, Kebeci said they have about two weeks of development left on the 1.0 release that they're going to spend adding sounds in the cinematic battle scenes, localizing to English countries, add some additional animations when your turn is over, and a few more unit actions such as repairing and refueling.
To celebrate this exclusive announcement, Agharta Studio has put their earlier game, 1112 episode 1, on sale for $1.99 (down from $7.99) [App Store]. 1112, an episodic adventure game, has been very popular in Europe, and comes packed with the same high quality hand drawn art and original musical score that we're going to be seeing in Rogue Planet.
If all goes as planned, Rogue Planet will be submitted to the App Store inside of two weeks.
Ngmoco has released a trailer for their upcoming first person shooter formerly known as LiveFire. The new name for the game appears to be "KillTest" based on the trailer video.
The video first appeared on GameTrailers.com and has since been mirrored onto YouTube (embedded below). Eli recently had hands on time with the ambitious deathmatch shooter:
The controls for LiveFire are so intuitive I had already figured out how everything worked before they even started explaining it to me. They call it a "touch anywhere" control scheme, where the right half of the screen regardless of where you're touching controls your aiming and the left half controls your movement. Since they're working with a limited set of input methods, firing is handled automatically. If you get someone in your crosshairs, you automatically start shooting.
Firing can also be triggered manually be tapping on the reticle.
The trailer video shows off the new look, maps and weapons of the game and emphasizes the ability to play over 3G or Wi-Fi.
Wednesday night Touch Arcade and MacHeist held the iPhone Launch Party 2009 during Apple's World Wide Developers Conference in San Francisco. The RSVP list included industry celebrities (such as Steve Wozniak and "DVD Jon" Johansen), a large number of notable iPhone developers, and fans of iPhone gaming in general.
The party served as the launch event for a number of great iPhone titles as well as a demo opportunity for the recently announcedDoom Resurrection.
A particularly entertaining part of the evening was Monodomo's demonstration of their iPhone beat-box app, bChamp [$0.99]. Have a look at the raw beat-boxing action that unfolded at the event.
The Launch Party 2009 seems to have been a blast for all involved and Touch Arcade is very happy to have been involved in making it happen. We thank all that were in attendance for being part of the event.
One of the big surprises to me in iPhone gaming is how much I’ve been drawn to tower defense games. I never really understood why people were so into them back when the Warcraft III tower defense maps were so popular (and don’t even get me started on Defense of the Ancients) but the iPhone quite literally is the perfect platform for these types of games. Ngmoco's Star Defense [App Store] is the latest in the series of tower defense games for the iPhone and with the Twitter challenge as well as the early review copy I was sent, I’ve managed to sink a ridiculous amount of time into this game.
The basics of Star Defense are no different from any other tower defender, and if you’re even remotely familiar with the genre you won’t need any explaining to pick it up instantly. You place towers along a path to defend your shield wall from hordes of S’rath invaders, kill them to get credits to buy more towers or upgrade your existing ones, survive for a certain number of waves, and win. Standard stuff.
What sets Star Defense apart from the other tower defense games on the iPhone is having to build your towers on 3D spheres (cubes in later levels) and constantly managing the viewport of the game using standard iPhone gestures. It’s all very intuitive and works exactly as you would expect, pinching controls zooming, a single finger swipe moves the camera, and two fingers on the screen rotates it. Handling the camera creates an effect similar to fog of war in real time strategy games, and as the path the S’rath travel down snakes all over the planet you’re defending, you’re only ever capable of seeing half of it at a time.
Included in the game are five tower types which cover the standard array of towers we’ve seen in other tower defense games. Gauss Turrets serve as the standard low-cost tower, Neo-Plasma Blasters have a damage over time effect, DX-3 Cannons slow enemies, Phase Coils do area effect damage, and Quantum Launchers do high single target damage. Naturally, each can be upgraded, and part of the strategy of Star Defense is deciding when to upgrade and when to build more, as each upgrade is progressively more expensive.
Additionally, each tower has a damage type which may be more or less effective depending on the enemy. For example, some of the S’rath are resistant to fire, so your massive array of Neo-Plasma Blasters will be rendered ineffective. Obviously this forces you to have a variety of towers, which adds a level of complexity as some tower defense games are just a race to fill up the map with whatever the best tower is fully upgraded.
In this initial offering of Star Defense players can fend off the S’rath across seven different planets, as well as playing an endless Challenge mode. Each planet can be played on three difficulty levels, and I found them to be varied enough that each one required a different strategy to complete. ngmoco previously detailed on their blog about the work that went into balancing the way Star Defense plays, and it really shows.
Playing the game on Easy is, unsurprisingly, very easy. Unless Star Defense is your first tower defense game, I’d recommend starting on Normal. I’ve found Hard to be brutal, and while I haven’t yet broken out the ol’ pad of graph paper to map out some of the levels as I did when competing in the Twitter challenge, I’m getting close to it.
Instead of achievements in Star Defense, you earn commendations. Some of them will be easy and you will earn them without even trying, but others like completing 40 waves without selling any towers or upgrading 1000 towers total will take some work.
The included galaxy map is a great time, but the Challenge mode is where the meat of the game is going to be for hardcore players looking to compete against friends. This is exactly what we played in the Twitter challenge, so give it a try and see how you could have done against us.
Star Defense was demonstrated during the WWDC 2009 keynote, and towards the end, ngmoco's Stephanie Morgan revealed the ability to (BAM!) add a second galaxy to your pocket via microtransaction downloadable content (DLC) add-on packs. DLC has been a hot topic lately on our forums, and I’ve seen some people suggest that Star Defense is an incomplete game that simply a vehicle to sell things that should have been included in the release.
As I posted in a previous story, this is an area that ngmoco seems to be taking very seriously. I asked several people at the press event what their plans were with DLC and everyone stressed that they were approaching it cautiously, being sure to provide a good value to the gamer, with no intentions to nickel and dime anyone. Morgan mentions in the keynote video that the additional galaxies add tons of gameplay, so I’m having a hard time getting worked up over them selling add-ons for the game if they do in fact substantially increase the originally included playtime. And with that said, Star Defense is certainly a complete game in its current form.
So I suppose the inevitable question here is do I recommend Star Defense? It is more expensive than its competitors, but it does have all the fit and finish you would expect in an ngmoco game. The 3D graphics are great, the backgrounds are colorful, and I really enjoy the 3D camera management of the game. Star Defense gets incredibly hectic in later levels when multiple waves of S’rath are out at once, as all your towers need to be managed in real time. This is a welcome change from other similar games where you pause, build a few things, wait to get more money, and repeat. Star Defense brings an unexpected level of action to a genre that classically just has you building and waiting.
Because of this, I can’t help but recommend picking up Star Defense. Its classic tower defense gameplay combined with the unique 3D perspective puts Star Defense a step above my 2D tower defense favorites.
Star Defense takes the classic tower defense formula and puts a 3D spin on it. The spherical worlds the game takes place on adds a level of fast-paced action and micromanagement not seen in other tower defense games.
Ngmoco and a dozen other companies are presently sponsors of this site, but that does not affect our choice of coverage or influence our reviews.
It's been a crazy two weeks at TouchArcade. Coverage of E3 and WWDC have dominated our news stories, leaving little room for app discovery. As WWDC is starting to wind down, I thought I'd share a gem of a game that I found myself playing the most during my long plane flight to E3 last week.
PathPix [$1.99] by Kris Pixton is a simple puzzle game that has you drawing lines to connect numbers. The iPhone version of the game is based on the PC version of the same name but also resembles Link-a-Pix (Web) and Pic Pic's Drawing mode (Nintendo DS). A simple version of the game can be played here using your mouse. The rules are simple:
Draw paths with your finger, connecting pairs of colored numbers. The length of each path must match the numbers on the two endpoints. Draw backwards or double tap to correct mistakes. There's only one way to do it, and all squares will contain a piece of a path when the puzzle is solved.
Once you complete the board, you are rewarded with a final image that was created using the lines you connected. PathPix comes with 144 levels in all.
If you're thinking to yourself "that's it"? Well, I suppose it is. While the early levels will only take you a little time to complete, the later levels can be pretty massive. The game does get difficult in the larger levels as you will find with multiple connecting possibilities for each number. This may require some backtracking and mental planning. What I enjoyed most about the game, however, was the somewhat mindless process I could use to quickly fill in obvious lines and proceed to systematically fill in the rest. It was easy to lose myself in the game and it was particularly satisfying when I did complete a level.
For only $1.99 and 144 levels, this game comes highly recommended. I did have a few minor quibbles with the interface of the game, but nothing that really interfered with my overall enjoyment.
At long last, the highly popular mobile game Peggle [link] from PopCap Games has dropped in price all the way down to $0.99. The game was originally released at $4.99.
Peggle, which MSNBC named one of the "Top 5 most addictive computer games of all time," is a 2D game in which the goal is to use an aimable ball launcher at the top of the screen to fire a ball into a screen full of pegs and bricks and eliminate all orange-colored pegs and bricks before running out of balls.
The iPhone version of the game has seen rave reviews and has made converts out of many doubters. For only $0.99, it's definitely a steal. The only real complaint from the iPhone version was the lack of music, but we've heard that music is on the way.
Today at WWDC, Touch Arcade met with Henry Ho and Dave Vallejo of Flying Dino to preview their upcoming multiplayer 3D mech battle game iMech.
iMech is a 3D, over-the-shoulder style combat game that puts the player in control of one of three different mech vehicles to engage in online battles of up to eight players per game, across five different maps. At the players' disposal are five different weapons: machine gun, laser, flame thrower, missiles, and mines. Each player's mech features shields and a jetpack boost feature (to make quick jumps through the environment) that share energy -- so boost sparingly.
Control is handled via dual on-screen sticks with a tap to switch out weapons. The game offers an in-game chat feature where users tap to select a positive, negative, or neutral comment, with a second tap to select from a short-list of quips from each category.
We engaged in a three-way online match, running through Flying Dino's local laptop server and were impressed with what we saw. (When the game goes live, there will be an East coast and a West coast server to handle community matches.) Gameplay was intense, with very nice effects and a smooth framerate, even on the original iPod touch.
Right now iMech is online multiplayer only, but a future update should bring a single-player Campaign mode as well as a Survival / Skirmish mode for quick, intense matches.
See our gameplay video of the multiplayer action.
3D mech battlers were huge a decade ago. Anyone who enjoys that sort of steel on steel crush should have a great time with this one. iMech should be submitted to the App Store towards the end of next week and will retail for $2.99.
Events like WWDC are great... not only to put faces to names but when else would we realistically be able to talk face to face with many of the iPhone developers from around the world. Australian-based Rob Murray of Firemint was present last night to show off their new Real Racing game to the crowd and during the demo he announced that a pending update will be adding 6-way Wi-Fi Multiplayer.
For those not familiar with the Real Racing, we thought the game offered an unrivaled racing experience on the iPhone. The game has been earning some much deserved recognition and is quickly making it's way to the top of the App Store charts.
We caught up with Rob later in the evening to see what his plans were now that Real Racing had finally been released. Rob indicated that they still have a lot of work planned for Real Racing itself and that the 6-player local Wi-Fi multiplayer update would be submitted soon. For the Real Racing plans beyond that, we'll just have to stay tuned. Rob also reports that they are still working on other iPhone games and have been heavily prototyping various concepts. He seemed aware that the expectations for his company are quite high after the massive popularity and success of Flight Control and the wonderful early reception of Real Racing. We'll be sure to report on their future plans when they are ready to announce them.
Last night we had the opportunity to spend a brief amount of hands-on time with the upcoming Doom Resurrection. The iPhone game was developed by Escalation Studios in conjunction with id Software's John Carmack and has been a secret project for the past 6 months.
The gameplay itself is best described as an "on rails" experience where the player is moved through the levels automatically while aiming their targeting reticule with the accelerometer and tapping a button to fire. The game also offers a dodging button to avoid enemy fire as well.
The game is set in an impressive 3D environment and across 8 brand new levels. Like with their PC titles, the Doom Resurrection engine is pushing the boundaries of what has been thought possible on the iPhone. Gameplay time is estimated at 4-6 hours.
While some are going to pass early judgement due to the "on rails" aspect of the game, we think that's premature as both Eli and I had a lot of fun with our time with the game. The tilt controls to target felt good. The game would auto calibrate to your natural position when the game started. Almost needless to say, the graphics and sound were very well done and immersive (the game borrows the assets from Doom 3 which cost millions to make). Dodging with a button and aiming with the accelerometer provided a good amount of Doom feel even though your forward movements were scripted.
Escalation Studio's Tom Mustaine told us that a lot of work went into finding the right gameplay mechanic and that before they came across this latest incarnation, they were ready to scrap the entire project if it wasn't going to be fun enough to play.
Mustaine has a long history in game development and has been involved a laundry list of projects including several using the Doom and Quake engines.
Toy Kite software released their first iPhone game at the iPhone Launch Party last night. The game is called iSamurai [$0.99] and offers players the chance to finally swing their iPhones like swords.
iSamurai is an accelerometer-based iPhone game that recognizes certain gestures as specific sword fighting attacks or blocks. The developer's video shows it well:
The game comes with both two player (WiFi) modes and single player modes. The single player mode is surprisingly well implemented and pits you up against a computer opponent who calls out their attacks (like Left strike or High strike). In this mode, you must defend yourself by performing the correct block and finding your spot to attack. Meanwhile, two-player mode acts as you'd expect, allowing you to trade blows with a real life opponent.
The moves take a little practice to learn but the game comes with an extensive tutorial with videos of the exact movements.
At last night's launch party, Freeverse previewed a number of their upcoming games including Warpack Grunts, Warp Gate, TrackZ, Flick Baseball and Thor.
While not all the presentation video has been released, we do have some early footage of a couple of these games.
Warpack Grunts is a squad-based shooter in which you control your pack of soldiers and lead them across various missions. Grunts are first equipped with a standard machine gun but can later pick up rocket launchers and sniper rifles. This basic video shows the early gameplay:
A second video that was shown at the launch event shows the sniper rifle as well as vehicular play (tank and helicoptor). The game is said to have gone gold master so we should expect it shortly
The next notable game Freevers previewed is one called Warp Gate. The game is described as a 3d space exploration / shooter / trading game that seems similar to Escape Velocity with a fully 3D engine.
The game is still under heavy active development, so many of the details are not yet complete. The game is said to include hundreds of different star ships and 30 different solar systems.
This early gameplay video shows the controls of the game, while a second video offers an overview of the game.
iPhone Launch Party is under way and it's a great turnout. iPhone developers and industry personalities are sharing company, drinks, tales, and a general good time all around.
From a game perspective, the is serving as the launch party for Firemint's just released Real Racing as well as first looks at Freeverse's War Pack Grunts and Toy Kite Software's iSamurai. Meanwhile, Escalation Studios will also be present to demo the just announcedDoom Resurrection.
Macworld reports on a "secret" project that id software has been working on for the iPhone: Doom Resurrection.
The previously unannounced project is due for release in about a month and represents a completely new game. Macworld describes it as a "first-person shooter designed exclusively for the iPhone and iPod touch". The game does borrow assets that were originally developed for Doom 3 so may look familiar to long timer gamers. Carmack has been very open about his interest in the iPhone platform and seems to have made special efforts adapt his games to the iPhone.
“We built a completely new play style for this game,” said Carmack. “We have no worries that we’re going to do something utterly not fun.”
According to Escalation Studios who has partnered with id on this effort, they settled on a control system that combines accelerator-based movement and aiming with tap-based firing. The game itself is said to have a parallel storyline to the original. Carmack also seems excited for the new capabilities provided in the iPhone 3G S, and the iPhone in general:
“In general, I am super-excited for the iPhone as a platform for Id to be involved in,” said Carmack. He said that he hopes to bring the entire “classic” Id Software game line — Doom, Quake, even Quake 3 — to the iPhone and iPod touch, along with updated versions of Id Software’s mobile titles, Orcs & Elves and Doom RPG.
At Apple's WWDC keynote on Monday, a faster, new iPhone was announced, as expected. Apple indicates that the the new iPhone is based on an updated chipset that is "up to 2x faster" and that it supports OpenGL ES 2.0. And that's all they've indicated about the hardware. Even to the iPhone developers attending this week's conference.
As we detailed early on, the iPhone and iPhone 3G use a Samsung System-on-Chip that contains an ARM11 processor core (532MHz in the 2G iPod touch, 412MHz in the rest of the family) with 128MB of system RAM and a PowerVR MBX-lite graphics processor. Early signs pointed to the next generation iPhone containing a faster ARM processor core and the next generation of Imagination Technology's PowerVR GPU, the SGX.
Now, shortly after the announcement of the new iPhone, the first official processor spec information has surfaced on a page at T-mobile.nl, which indicates that the iPhone 3G S features a 600MHz processor and 256MB of system RAM. And, indeed, it seems that the OpenGL ES 2.0-capable PowerVR SGX is driving the graphics side of the new device.
Providing much more detail about the inner workings of the iPhone 3G S is AnandTech's recent post "The iPhone 3GS Hardware Exposed & Analyzed". Within, Anand provides a detailed breakdown of the new iPhone's processor and GPU, according to their sources.
The breakdown reveals that the iPhone 3G S is based on (again) a Samsung SoC, but with an ARM Cortex A8 processor and PowerVR SGX GPU. This combination of hardware offers substantially more power to application developers than the previous iPhone chipset, especially in the area of 3D graphics.
On the CPU front, the performance improvement is about much more than simply a 188MHz boost in clockspeed. The ARM11 processor in the iPhone and iPhone 3G is a single-issue, in-order core on a 90nm process which can fetch, decode, and execute one RISC instruction at a time. It features 32K of Level 1 cache and no Level 2 cache. The Cortex A8, by comparison, is a dual-issue, in order order core on a 65nm process that can fetch, decode, and execute two RISC processes at a time. It is believed that the unit features 64K of L1 cache and 256K of L2 cache. Additionally, while the earlier ARM11 core contains a basic vector floating point unit, the Cortex A8 adds a much more advanced SIMD engine known as NEON. The A8 also sports twice as many double-precision floating point registers as the ARM11. These elements come together to provide a substantial increase in processing power as compared to the previous iPhone chipset.
One the graphics processor front, things get even better. As previously mentioned, the iPhone and iPhone 3G feature a PowerVR MBX-lite GPU. It's on a 90nm process and runs at ~60MHz, capable of rendering 1 million triangles per second and 100 million pixels per second. The new iPhone's PowerVR SGX is on a 65nm process and is believed to run at either 100MHz or 200MHz. The SGX in a 100MHz configuration is capable of rendering 3.5 million triangles per second and 125 million pixels per second. That's 3.5x the geometry throughput and 25% more pixel bandwidth than the original iPhone. In a 200MHz configuration, it is capable of throwing out 7x the triangles and 150% more pixels per second than the original iPhone.
Such a significant performance increase is big news for gamers and gamemakers alike. We're very anxious to see how developers harness the additional power of the iPhone 3G S. It may look like just the same old iPhone on the outside, but under the hood it's a screamer. Sony and Nintendo have good cause to shift from worry to fear as this hardware makes its way into users' hands. The PSP has nothing on Apple's latest mobile game console.
As we detailed earlier, the new iPhone 3G S has much more horsepower under the hood than the iPhone or iPhone 3G. Much of the gaming muscle in the unit comes from its PowerVR SGX graphics processor.
One of the big surprises to me in iPhone gaming is how much I’ve been drawn to tower defense games. I never really understood why people were so into them back when the Warcraft III tower defense maps were so popular (and don’t even get me started on Defense of the Ancients) but the iPhone quite literally is the perfect platform for these types of games. Ngmoco's Star Defense [
At long last, the highly popular mobile game Peggle [
