Genius Defense Force, Apocalypse Train’s third iPhone game is nearing completion. Cashing in on the recent popularity of math games on the App Store, G.D.F. very well could be the most creative game we’ve seen so far featuring basic mathematics as its core gameplay element. This Japanese-console-games inspired brain game features a ridiculous backstory, anime cut scenes, huge bosses, chain attacks, performance grades on each level, and even a robotic dog. Depending on how big of a math nerd you are, you’ll be overjoyed to hear the game also has an option to enable reverse polish notation and there’s even talk of hexadecimal mode coming in a future update.
Playing Genius Defense Force is a matter of tapping to select your target, then inputting a set of 3 numbers and 2 operators to result in the target number. If you are correct, a green checkbox pops up to fire your weapons, otherwise you can hit the X to cancel and try again, or the refresh icon to get a different (and hopefully easier) set of numbers. When things blow up, splash damage also blows up surrounding objects which then chain to blow up other objects, so you will often find yourself playing a dangerous game of waiting to line up shots perfectly or just firing as fast as possible to defend Earth.
Check out this awesome trailer for the game:
Genius Defense Force is said to start slow, and is going to be balanced so casual players can complete the game with a “C" grade on each level, but true completionist math nerds will have to practice to get an “A" on each level. Oddly enough, I’ve really found myself enjoying these math-based game for the iPhone and really look forward to this one. If only I could find a time machine to show my 5th grade self that one day I’d be solving math problems for fun on a portable gaming device…
The developers hope to submit G.D.F. inside of the next two weeks, in the meantime you can check out Apocalypse Train’s two other games, both of which are word puzzles– Ravel [99¢ / Free] and Wordee [99¢ / Free].
