In December of last year, Celsius Game Studios released Red Nova [99¢], a frantic arcade-style space shooter. The emphasis in Red Nova is on survival, as you play a lone pilot who must defend an endless onslaught of enemies in order to draw attention away from your home ship the Red Nova, thus enabling it to escape. It’s an absolutely perfect premise for this type of game since you know from the beginning that your chances of survival are nil and you can comfortably focus on destroying as many ships as you can before meeting your demise. A unique and responsive control system complements the experience, and Red Nova is a breath of fresh air in an overly saturated space shooter genre.

Today, the first major update has hit for Red Nova and it addresses the chief complaint from our original review which is the game’s brutal difficulty. I understand that I’m on a suicide mission in the game and should expect to die, but even on the lowest difficulty setting I would get obliterated in a matter of seconds. I don’t want to totally knock the difficulty though, as it was the kind that invited you to practice and improve, which I slowly but surely did. Still, the inclusion of the new Easy mode is a welcome addition. In Easy mode enemies will do less damage and you will do more damage, and their starting spawn rate is lower too. I fired up Easy mode to try it out and more than doubled my previous high score from Normal mode. The difficulty in Red Nova seems much more balanced now with the availability of a fourth difficulty setting.

The other big addition in this update is a brand new ship called the FX-22 Gungnir starfighter. This blue beauty is heavily armored with a high top speed, but the acceleration isn’t so great so it’s not as nimble as the other craft. That brings me to another strong point to Red Nova which is that the four available ships all feel unique from one another, with different strengths and weaknesses and each with their own type of handling. It makes playing the game using each one a lot of fun. I don’t really have a “favorite” ship as I like to use them all, and the new ship fits right in with the current fleet.

If you already have a copy of Red Nova, shoot on over to the App Store and grab this latest update. People who were having a hard time dealing with the difficulty will enjoy the new Easy mode, and everybody should enjoy the new playable ship. If you haven’t yet checked out Red Nova, it’s 99¢ of pure awesome and is an easy recommendation for fans of arcade shooters.

It was just a couple of weeks ago that Capcom Mobile unleashed Devil May Cry 4 Refrain [$4.99] into the App Store. This mobile version of the 2008 console game featured merely average visuals and repetitive level designs, but really nailed the controls and combat system. There was just something very satisfying about beating up on the many baddies in the game and pulling off stylish combos, and despite its few drawbacks we enjoyed Devil May Cry 4 Refrain in our review.

One other aspect to the game that was underwhelming was its length. The 10 levels in the game could be completed fairly quickly, and although there was incentive to go back and replay levels to earn a better grade it still left us with the feeling that we wanted more. Capcom had promised updating Devil May Cry 4 Refrain with a new playable character, series mainstay Dante, and last week they fulfilled that promise much quicker than I could have expected by releasing a free update.

While you’ll still play through the same levels with Dante as you did with Nero, he does come with an entirely new storyline and his own set of offensive moves and upgrades. Playing through the game again with Dante and unlocking all of his associated moves goes a long way towards increasing the length of the whole Devil May Cry 4 Refrain experience. This new content does come with a price increase however, but with two different playable characters the $4.99 price tag is still fairly reasonable for fans of the series.

Of course if you already own Devil May Cry 4 Refrain, make sure and update to the latest version to give Dante a spin, but note that he only becomes available to play as after completing the game once as Nero.

NewFX Games just announced their upcoming title Mad Wheels, published by Chillingo. Details are a little vague right now, but the game basically seems like a top-down racing-centric version of the classic game Twisted Metal for various Sony consoles. What we do know is there will be multiple cars, each with their own super power, and tracks will have various power-ups that can be used. There will be 5 distinct environments, online leaderboards, and WiFi multiplayer.

Take a look at the trailer:

The developers have yet to discuss release dates, but they've mentioned the current state of the game:

At this moment in time the core game engine is almost complete, but there is still a lot of work left. We're experimenting with some features, polishing the gameplay and doing our best to make sure you will get the most of your playing experience!

I can't wait to give it a try, whenever it's released. In the meantime, the best place to find information on the state of this game seems to be on our forums where the developers are actively posting.

As part of a recent promotion, Gameloft left it up to the people to decide what game it would offer up for less than a dollar in celebration of Valentine’s Day. Those people have since spoken, indicating that it wanted the FPS, Halo-clone NOVA 2 [.99 / HD] to be sold at .99 cents. It is now available for that price on the App Store, but be weary of the one-click purchase, as the iPad version of the game is still sitting at a juicier $6.99.

NOVA 2, is a competent follow-up to the original NOVA, which did a lot to set the bar for iOS first-person perspective shooters. Like in the series its based upon, Halo, NOVA 2 has you shooting aliens, running through corridors, and even killing fake-real people in a robust competitive online offering. This follow-up in particular features a bit more compelling variety in its campaign, too -- if you’re into piloting mechs, shooting super powered guns, and driving motor bikes that is.

A dollar is a great price for this game. Good job, Gameloft fans. I’m a fan of you.

Back in April of last year, a fun arcade survival game called Hungry Shark was released in the App Store. The game had you controlling a shark with an insatiable appetite as you swam around a huge underwater world exploring your environment and gobbling up delicious sea creatures (and hapless humans). The goal was to continuously be eating so as to sustain your ever-decreasing health meter, scoring points and multipliers along the way based on what and how many creatures you were eating. It was a formula that worked extremely well and we thoroughly enjoyed Hungry Shark in our original review, and the game only got better with a massive Part 2 update that hit a couple of months later.

Now developer Future Games of London has released Hungry Shark - Part 3, a brand new entry in the series. The gameplay remains largely the same, swimming around using either tilt controls or a virtual joystick and basically eating everything in sight. What Hungry Shark - Part 3 brings to the table is high resolution Retina Display graphics, a humongous new world to explore that includes an underwater volcano, a ton of new creatures to chow down on, and many new hazards and enemies to avoid. There’s also Game Center integration for comparing high scores and unlocking achievements.

Best of all, right now the original Hungry Shark - Part 2, which also contains Part 1, is available for free. If you’re curious about Hungry Shark - Part 3, give the original a download as the gameplay is nearly identical to the new game and should give you a great idea what to expect from the new game. Heck, even if you’re already sold on Part 3 download Part 2 anyway as it essentially contains two full games for free. It’s worth pointing out though that Part 3 “feels” a bit better than the first two, with movement and controls that seem faster and smoother, and the higher resolution graphics look fantastic. This doesn’t make the original two episodes any less fun, but in my opinion Part 3 is the definitive Hungry Shark experience.

For iPad owners, you can actually buy all 3 episodes in one package as Hungry Shark Trilogy HD, and Part 1 is available for free as a sort of lite version. No matter which device or what episode you end up playing, Hungry Shark is a really fun series, and I’d definitely suggest at the very least downloading Hungry Shark - Part 2 while it’s currently free.

Update: Well, as is common on the App Store, not too long after posting this Hungry Shark - Part 2 reverted back to paid. However, the standalone version of Hungry Shark - Part 1 has always been free so I've updated the links below to include this for those that want a free version to try before buying.

This might be a long shot, considering this event seems to be overrun by Android and other non-iPhone mobile devices, but I will be at Mobile World Congress all week this week in Barcelona, Spain. In addition, I will be on two panels of sorts this coming Thursday, one announcing the winners of the International Mobile Gaming Awards and a second "live pitching session". If you happen to be in Barcelona either for the event, or just because you happen to live in the area, I'd love to meet up with you if you've got something new, cool, and/or exciting to show off.

If you'd like to schedule a meeting, send an email off to tips@toucharcade.com and be sure to include "MWC 2011" somewhere in the subject so it properly gets filtered in my inbox. Keep in mind, I'm very much a typical American and really only speak fluent English. If you don't (wait, how are you reading this?) I'm still totally willing to meet up, but communication might be difficult.

For everyone else not at the event, I'm really not sure what to expect. I've been told this is the "CES of mobile phones". I sort of thought CES was the CES of mobile phones, but you never know. If I see anything neat on the show floor that pertains to iOS on any level, you can look forward to finding out about it on TouchArcade. The show hasn't even started yet and I've already seen some flat out insane Tegra 2 tech demos, and I seriously can't wait to see what is coming in the next round of Apple hardware if it's anything like that.

Here's Galaxy on Fire 2 running on the Tegra 2 chipset:

That's just crazy for a mobile device.

Last November, NaturalMotion Games announced that they would be bringing the beloved block-based party game Jenga to iOS. A game like Jenga [99¢/HD], where you must pull blocks from a wooden tower and place them on the top while avoiding being the first one to topple the tower, was in good hands at NaturalMotion with their extensive expertise in the area of physics technology. We checked out Jenga when it released in December, and despite not having that certain “feel” that you get from physically interacting with the game in real life, Jenga on iOS was about as great as a virtual interpretation of the game could be.

Ever since the announcement of Jenga though, people have been asking in the comments section and in our forums “what about multiplayer?”. It’s a valid question, since Jenga at its heart is a party game to be enjoyed with other people. The game did ship with a multiplayer component in the form of a pass ‘n play mode, and you could compare tower height in real time with your friends’ Game Center scores. Fun efforts in their own right, but not an adequate replacement for a true online multiplayer mode.

Today at the IMGA Judging event in Barcelona, NaturalMotion has announced that they are one-upping their multiplayer game and bringing asynchronous online multiplayer to Jenga through Game Center. I think it goes without saying that asynchronous multiplayer has proven to be well suited for mobile gaming, and the idea fits in perfectly for a game like Jenga. The Android version of the game will be getting this feature as well using OpenFeint, and the developers have stated that it’s a “definite possibility” that they could enable cross-platform play between iOS and Android devices in the future.

Besides this huge announcement, NaturalMotion has also hinted at some special types of blocks being added to Jenga that can greatly affect the physics in the game. Examples could include rare African wood which would be much lighter than normal, or metal blocks which would obviously be much heavier and harder to remove from the tower. It definitely sounds interesting and I look forward to seeing how they will spice up the traditional play of Jenga beyond the included Arcade mode. What’s really exciting though is the announcement of online asynchronous multiplayer through Game Center, which should be hitting roughly in the next couple of weeks.

Here's another one for the oldschool gamers out there, especially those on the other side of the pond. Elite has just released Matthew Smith's well loved UK home computer platformer Jet Set Willy for the iPhone and iPad in the form of the emulator-based, standalone titles Jet Set Willy: ZX Spectrum [link] and Jet Set Willy: ZX Spectrum HD [link].

Originally released for the Sinclair ZX Spectrum in 1984, Jet Set Willy is a sequel to the similarly popular UK classic Manic Miner and involves guiding Miner Willy around his massive mansion (60 screens in all) in an effort to clean up the place, collecting various items strewn about it during a party the previous night so that his housekeeper will let him into his bedroom to get some much needed sleep.

The game was typically played via keyboard directional controls way back when, and on iOS devices is controlled via tap (below the action in portrait, overlaid in landscape), but with a bit more flexibility than the typical iOS D-pad touch game, thanks to Elite's customizable "iDaptive" control system. Both iOS versions of the game offer the standard play mode as well as an infinite lives mode for the weak.

In addition to these standalone versions of the game, Jet Set Willy will soon be arriving as part of a downloadable content pack for Elite's ZX Spectrum: Elite Collection [iPhone, iPad], as did Manic Miner [iPhone, iPad] following its standalone iOS release. TV-out is expected for all of the mentioned Elite titles in a future update.

Jet Set Willy, in all of its color clashing goodness, is certainly not much to look at today, but rendered out in those 15-colors are some insanely difficult platformer challenges. And, after the first few minutes, your eyes will stop bleeding, I promise.

DeceasedPixel has just dropped the price of their universal iOS game (for iPhone, iPad) Super Mega Worm [App Store], a pixellated take on JTR's Death Worm, to zero for a limited time in celebration of the release of the game in the Mac App Store [link] and the launch of the Verizon iPhone.

Super Mega Worm opens with an 8-bit retro cutscene explaining how humans have consumed the earth, and how mother nature now has a bone to pick with us. She tasks her favorite pest exterminator, Wojira the Death Worm, with wiping humans from the earth and restoring balance to the force…you get the idea. It's a nice little setup for the mayhem that is the hallmark of the giant worm game, and an introduction to the glorious mario-like pixel art.

We enjoyed the game in our review back in August and are happy to report that most of the issues we encountered way back when have been addressed in updates from the developer.

Early last month, noted gamemaker Jeff Minter released Solar Minotaur Rescue Frenzy [App Store], the first title in his Minotaur Project, an effort to release a series of new games in the style of the hardware of days long past, but without any of the limitations of the original platforms. Over the past weeks we've noted with anticipation (and some fear) Jeff's tweets, providing hints at the progress of the second game in this effort -- at least, we seriously hope that's what all those tweets were about... In any case, Jeff has just given us the best hint of all: an exclusive preview build of the game, known as Minotron: 2112, which turns out to be an enhanced iPhone / iPad (universal) remake of his 1991 shooter Llamatron: 2112.

Llamatron, which was originally released as shareware for the Atari ST, was a shooter inspired by Eugene Jarvis' Robotron: 2084. The game plays more or less like a single-stick version of Robotron -- wander about the playfield shooting baddies and not getting killed, but you're a llama instead of a superhuman and its beasties instead of helpless civilians you're rescuing. Minotron plays basically the same, but this time around, you're a minotaur, and things have gone dual (virtual) stick, so what you get feels a whole lot like Robotron, but on acid (which is a phrase that could be used to describe a great many of Jeff's creations).

Minotron offers four modes of play: Normal, which is the standard "dual stick" mode with lots of power-ups to be had; Assisted, where you are assisted by an indestructible helper droid and less power-ups are available; Simplified, where the player only has to move and avoid being killed, aiming and firing are automatic; and Hard, where only the power-ups from the original Llamatron are available.

The game's control system features temporally separated movement and aiming touches; the first thumb to contact the screen becomes the movement thumb, and the second becomes the aiming thumb, which provides a nice bit of control flexibility. (The developer suggests players may find that the use of an occasional swipe to alter the firing direction, as opposed to a constant touch to the "stick," is the better way to go and minimizes thumb obscuring screen.) And, in any playmode, the trippy visuals provided by Llamasoft's new Neon 2 engine are in full effect, as is the amusing cacophony of explosions, blasts, and bleats.

See our brief gameplay video of just the first few levels of the game.

As mentioned previously, the game is not quite finished; Jeff indicates that about a week or two's worth of finishing touches -- level balance tweaks, new enemy graphics, leaderboards and achievements, etc. -- should get it in order for submission to the App Store. And when Minotron: 2112 lands, unless one of the last minute tweaks is to scrape off all the awesome that's smeared all over this preview build, retro fans and arcade shooter fans alike are in for some serious, white-knuckle beastie saving.

Clever Hamster Games' Pixel Quartet [99¢] is a perfect example of a really unique puzzle game that came out of nowhere on the App Store. It recently popped up on our radar, and I've been trying my hardest to play through it. The thing is, it's incredibly difficult, especially if you're not very good at matching musical tones. I'm not sure how much of a "review" I can offer, as I admittedly got stuck fairly early on in the game, but I'll lay out the basic premise for musical warriors greater than I to take up their sword in attempt to vanquish the puzzles in this game.

At its most basic, gameplay in Pixel Quartet involves listening to a short musical track that only consists of a few notes. These notes are then represented by a ball that rolls across a grid, and in order to replicate the short clip you heard initially you need to position notes and directional arrows on the grid. Whenever the ball hits one of these tiles, it plays a musical note. The level is complete once you figure out where to position the arrows and musical notes to make the ball follow a path to repeat the initial musical loop three times.

Sound hard? That's because it is. The next level has you managing not one, but two balls, each which must play a separate musical loop. Further on, you're faced with managing even more loops and recreating them with the finite space of the game grid along with the various tiles you're allowed to drag on to it. These tiles do things like change the pitch of a note, make the ball pause for a number of beats, and more.

In order to solve each puzzle, you need to have each ball playing one of the musical loops laid out at the beginning of the level, and it has to repeat each time. You also have to avoid the balls crossing paths, adding an even greater wrinkle of difficulty.

I'd guess for most people, this level of difficulty will result in quite a bit of frustration. Often your loops can just barely be off, and fixing them requires reassembling all or most of your loops. Similarly, if you don't have a discerning ear, matching the pitch of each of the notes can involve an irritating amount of trial and error. I can hardly fault the game for this though, as I've told a few friends of mine who fancy themselves musicians who also love iOS puzzle games and they've reported having a fantastic time with the game. I'm just not the target audience.

If you're the kind of person who likes puzzle games with a difficulty level easily disguised as "brutal", and you've got an ear for music, Pixel Quartet is a game that you simply must try. To sweeten the deal, it's even universal for both the iPhone and iPad. I wish a lite version was available, as I feel this is a game that you'll be able to tell which side of the love/hate fence you're on within a few moments of playing. Regardless, at 99¢, it shouldn't be that big of a leap of faith to slam the "download now" button if this at all sounds interesting to you.

TouchArcade Rating:

In Japanese, the word Karoshi translates to “death from overwork”, which makes it an absolutely fitting title to They Need To Be Fed [99¢] developer YoYo Games’ newest offering. In Karoshi [99¢], you play as none other than Mr. Karoshi who is stuck working long hours at a job he hates in hopes of getting a promotion. This work-related stress has finally got to him, and he spends all his time dreaming up different ways that he could end it all.

You may have come across Karoshi in various forms as a PC or Flash game over the past several years, and it appears that the content in this new iOS version differs from the others. Each of the 50 levels in Karoshi look similar to your average 2D side-scrolling platformer, though instead of actually reaching the end of a level, the goal is to figure out how to kill poor Mr. Karoshi, which is not quite as easy as it sounds.

You can move Mr. Karoshi left or right and jump using onscreen virtual buttons. There are boxes that can be moved and switches that can be activated, which will do things like trigger flames or electricity in the ground or make once solid platforms disappear. These hazards, along with touching any spikes or being struck with objects, can quickly end Mr. Karoshi’s fragile existence. The levels are set up so that you must find out how to use these instruments of death to put Mr. Karoshi out of his misery.

There are also two characters who will affect Mr. Karoshi in different ways during the game. One is his wife, Mrs. Karoshi, whom he loves dearly. Coming into contact with her elates him, giving him the ability to jump much higher and rendering any spikes in a level into harmless flowers. The second character is Mr. Karoshi’s boss, whom he hates with a burning passion. Coming into contact with him depresses Mr. Karoshi, causing him to not be able to jump as high as he normally could. At certain points in the game it’s even necessary to control these characters directly to accomplish your goal.

What makes Karoshi so downright awesome is how you must take all of these factors into consideration in order to beat the game’s levels. Karoshi is more of a puzzle game than anything, with platforming as its mechanic. Some of the levels are fiendishly difficult too, often with the answer blatantly staring you in the face the entire time. Finally figuring out a tricky level is extremely gratifying though, and you’ll often sit back and marvel at just how clever some of the level designs are.

There’s also an additional mode aside from the 50 level Story mode called KaroshiWare. As the name implies, it’s a WarioWare-type survival mode that features a random series of tasks that must be completed in rapid fire succession. After a brief countdown you’re presented with a simplified level setup and instructions to either kill yourself, survive, or not move at all. You’re only given 5 seconds to complete each bite-sized level, so you must react extremely quickly to the instructions. This mode is totally fun and a nice diversion from the main game, and could easily be a separate game itself.

Up to this point everything is sounding pretty good for Karoshi, but unfortunately there is a huge drawback to the game which is the terrible controls. They are among the most unresponsive and finicky controls that I’ve ever encountered on iOS. Due to the puzzle-like nature of the game, they are still serviceable as you don’t always need pinpoint precision to play. But they will still frustrate you to no end. I have uttered curse words I didn’t even know existed because of the poor controls. It’s strange too, because I haven’t heard anybody in our forums complain of this problem. Sadly, the control issue has turned what could very easily be one of my favorite games into a less enjoyable experience, and I’m really hoping it can be addressed in a future update.

Even with the problems with the controls, Karoshi is still a game worth playing. The fact that I’m willing to put up with such a frustrating complication is a testament to the quality of the game. The ingenious level designs and dark humor of Karoshi is worth occasionally fighting the controls for.

Update: For whatever reason, the control problems mentioned in this review have since disappeared. I persistently encountered these problems for several days before writing the review, and had tried a couple of things to fix the issue without success. Nobody else I had encountered seemed to have these problems, but I couldn’t in good conscience not mention my own experience in the review. Since the problem has sine corrected itself (though I still have no idea what caused it) I wanted to add a footnote to this review in case the control issue was scaring anybody off. I elaborate on the problem in this post in our forums if you’re interested to hear more.

TouchArcade Rating:

Pocket Legends [Free] succeeded where World of Warcraft has failed me. Try as I might, I’ve never been able to play Blizzard Entertainment’s MMO on the toilet. Now, Pocket Legends, on the other hand... man, we’ve had some seriously productive time together on the toilet.

And in Q2 2011, I’ll have to shed Pocket Legends for another MMO created by the gurus over at Spacetime Studios. It’s called Blackstar, and like its predecessor, it’ll feature three unique classes to choose from, a 3D world to interact within, tons of loot, and even a few chat features like in-game chat and friends lists.

Unfortunately, Spacetime isn’t divulging much at the moment about Blackstar other than those basics, but we do know a few cool specifics: its plot, it’s past, and its platforms.

As for the plot, the game will revolve around a “conflict” set in the 41st century between four groups: the arcane-infused Scorn and the cybernetic Riven, and the terrans and their robotic counterparts, dubbed the Mode. The game will, presumably, be split into chapters, but I'd imagine this stuff will have a place in each.

Interestingly, the framework in which this battle will take place is built on the back of an unreleased PC game going by the same name. Spacetime Studios talks up the fact that it is using that title’s tech and art, attempting to reassure folks that the game won’t be a content-light. We’ll have to see about that, though.

But before I close this out, I’ll note this cool factoid: Blackstar is slated to be a cross-platform game, seeing a release in Q2 for both Android and iOS. And while we’re touching on network, know this: the game will support EDGE, 3G, Wi-Fi, and even 4G connections. Radical.

Sounds like Pocket Legends with a sci-fi twist, right? That’s not a bad thing, either. We were huge fans of that initial MMO, and I’d imagine a few community members are still messing around in the world.

It’ll be interesting to see if some of the problems from that game will be addressed in this one, provided that they’re actually related. Also, it’ll be just as interesting to see if IAP will be used as heavily. C’mon Q2!

Back in December, Rocketcat Games released their third grappling hook-themed game Hook Worlds [99¢] into the App Store, following their previous excellent efforts Hook Champ [$2.99/Lite] and Super QuickHook [$2.99]. We liked Hook Worlds an awful lot in our review as it essentially contained four separate endless running games in one package, all based around a novel hooking mechanic. Well, people who bought the game the first weekend received four worlds anyway, as the fourth world was a bonus addition for early adopters of the game.

Late-comers fear not, however, as the latest update to Hook Worlds makes available this special fourth world to all owners of the game. It’s a good thing too, as the fourth world is easily my favorite. The graphics are based on Atari 2600-era games, with extremely basic and blocky graphics, and the gameplay is loosely based on the original Hook Champ. It’s so simple and so elegant, distilling the hooking formula down to its bare essentials, that I find it to be my most played world in the entire game. You’ll have to work for it though, as non-early adopters must earn at least a Silver medal in any of the regular three worlds to unlock the fourth.

Other additions in this meaty update include Game Center support, enhanced visuals for the Retina Display, fast-app switching, and loads of new gear for the characters. Some of these new hats, hooks, and costumes are a free addition to the game but you can also buy a pack of gear for each of the characters as IAP. Each character pack costs 99¢ and adds a number of new items to choose from. It should also be noted that these items are cosmetic only and in no way affect the gameplay, and are entirely optional if you wish to support the development of Rocketcat’s games.

As a huge fan of Hook Champ and Super QuickHook, I can’t recommend Hook Worlds enough. It offers a ton of content, gameplay, and production value for the price. That said, I have definitely heard from players in our forums and elsewhere who have had a difficult time getting the hang of Rocketcat’s hooking games. With that in mind, Hook Worlds is still recommended as it’s a great entry point into the hooking genre. The controls have been simplified to just two buttons so it’s easily the most approachable of the three, and the low price point means there’s not a lot of risk if you decide it’s just not for you. If you end up liking it you can always upgrade to their previous games which offer much more complex gameplay.

Note: There have been a couple of minor hiccups with this latest update that you should be aware of. A menu display bug has crept in there, and for now this can be fixed by turning the screen flip to “off” in the options screen. Also there have been some quirks with uploading score and achievement information to Game Center, though I personally haven’t encountered this. Rocketcat is aware of these issues and is already addressing them with a patch that will be put out as soon as possible.

Even developers who don’t normally fiddle with their prices are now fiddling with their prices. For the first in almost two years, Imangi Studios tells us, the price of Imangi: The Game [Free] has been dropped. But get this: it’s free and will remain so for “the foreseeable future.”

When we took a look at the game back in 2008, we praised the word game’s hook. It’s something of a cross between Scrabble and a Rubik’s Cube -- you’re presented with a cluster of lettered tiles that you need to arrange in as many words as possible horizontally and vertically with mighty swipes of columns.

It’s a neat game and, well, pretty popular amongst the word game and puzzle crowd. So popular, in fact, that the husband and wife crew who created it were able to eventually build a company around the success of it and their other titles. Dig Max Adventure [$2.99] ? Thank Imangi.

Check out this video of the game in action to get a better sense of what I’m talking about if I failed you with words.

Or, hey, just go download it. It's free! Duh.