I downloaded 3.0-only apps (to desktop iTunes) before I upgraded my phone to 3.0. When I synched, I notice appeared that the following updates would not be installed. And the old versions remained on my iPhone–they were not deleted, and kept working just fine. So I had the old version on the phone, and the new on desktop iTunes, and all was well.

So, at least the developers in this case weren't saying that your situation is "good enough." Your situation isn't expected to happen at all. The developers expected that the old version would remain on your device and keep working.

(But I can see the frustration when your problem did happen! Ouch.)

As I said it's not a big deal, I'm not going to deal with Apple customer service over a three dollar game, but it is frustrating (and the Defender devs were both rude and vague when I inquired about why this had to be.)

As for the reasoning you gave, yeah, I can see where new features would require the new OS and most players would say "go for it!" … But the majority is not always right, and it's pretty screwy in my opinion to demand a $10 OS upgrade on a game that's barely two months old and was sold as 2.0 compatible. From looking through their forums I'm not the only one who feels this way. But hey, it's only $3, as I say, and I know not to buy from them again.

Zenonia is way overrated. I can live with the virtual pad control for movement but why on earth it is not using touch interface on inventory management. Lazy programming and not iPhone friendly.

If your previous version of the app somehow deleted itself, that may be a bug, and iTunes customer service might be able to help you get the old version back (or at least a refund). That definitely didn't happen to me before I updated to 3.0: the old version kept on working.

As for why this particular app requires 3.0, I don't recall the reason, but certain features do need 3.0. The DC developers were discussing the issue with their users in the TA forums weeks ago, asking for input, and it seems that the choice to add those features now, rather than waiting, was a user-driven one.

The devs seem to be shifting the blame to Apple, as in they were forced not to allow backwards compatibility, which seems to be to be an outright lie as I have a dozen or two other apps that have updated without problem in that time.

Would've been nice at the very least if they'd given warning, so I could have made a point to retain the previous version that worked.

(And yes, I could update to 3.0, but I'll be buying a new touch this fall when the new models come out and I don't want to spend $10 for an OS update on an updated device.)

It's not that big of a deal, but this is just a heads up to any other iPod touch users who haven't updated to 3.0 yet.