We just got word that Gameprom's set of three pinball games for the iPhone are coming to the Mac in one application that is going to serve as the hub for all of their desktop-sized pinball ports. The Pinball will allow you to play full screen high resolution versions of Wild West Pinball, The Deep Pinball and Jungle Style Pinball and bring several new features to the table such as greatly improved graphics, as well as a stereoscopic 3D mode that will require red/blue 3D glasses to play.

Available along side the launch of The Pinball is the companion iPhone app Pinball Remote which will allow players to utilize their iPhone as a wireless controller while playing The Pinball. You will also be able to use Pinball Remote to browse scores online, as well as purchase other pinball tables to play. Gameprom mentions Wild West Pinball available for free for users who download Pinball Remote, but has yet to reveal pricing details on both The Pinball Mac game or additional tables for Pinball Remote.

Here is a video of Pinball Remote and The Pinball in action:

Gameprom is hoping to launch The Pinball and Pinball Remote on March 1st, and being a Mac user who obviously owns an iPhone, I'm anxious to try these games full screen on my iMac.

In 1941, Argentinian author Jorge Luis Borges published the first book featuring decisions the reader could make to change the way the story ended through two different branching points that asked readers to flip to a particular page depending on which option they choose. Several other early game books were released over the years, but it wasn't until the late-70's that the genre exploded with several different series of varying complexity– The most popular of which was undoubtedly Choose Your Own Adventure with over 200 titles that were almost always checked out of my local library.

Fighting Fantasy

Fighting Fantasy is a similar series that was released around the same time that distinguished itself from the rest of the game books by implementing a single player dice rolling system to determine the outcome of fights and other situations (like Advanced Dungeons & Dragons).

The first entry in the Fighting Fantasy family of books by Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone hit the App Store recently and is a phenomenal fit for the iPhone. Fighting Fantasy: The Warlock of Firetop Mountain [$2.99] sends players on a treasure hunting quest to locate the treasure of a powerful warlock, who as you may have guessed, stashed it deep inside of Firetop Mountain.

Fighting Fantasy: The Warlock of Firetop Mountain

Throughout the journey players collect keys, fight orcs and dragons, and finally face the warlock himself. Getting to the end is easier said than done, and much like the game books of my childhood, The Warlock of Firetop Mountain is filled with sudden death and countless ways to make mistakes, even if you're rolling your dice well.

Gamebook Adventures

Even though Fighting Fantasy books have nearly a 30 year lead on the recently released Gamebook Adventures, the team at Tin Man Games have put together an equally remarkable and entirely original virtual game book for the iPhone. Gamebook Adventures 1: An Assassin in Orlandes [$4.99] is the first in of an up and coming game book series by author S.P. Osborne. Much like the Fighting Fantasy books, throughout the adventure you will need to use dice to determine which fork in the story you take by winning battles and succeeding in various challenges.

Gamebook Adventures 1: An Assassin in Orlandes

The premise of An Assassin in Orlandes involves an assassin who is on a killing spree eliminating the nobles of the city of Orlandes as a part of a massive conspiracy that is slowly revealed, assuming you make the right choices along the way. Gamebook Adventures features much better illustrations and dice animations, which honestly make very little difference in the overall experience since most of your time is actually spent reading.

Tin Man Games also released the following trailer:

Both titles play comparably and are both worth consideration, so if you're looking to try just one, simply pick the plot that most appeals to you. I'll be looking forward to new entires on the App Store from both series of books, and have my fingers crossed on both hands that we'll see iPad-optimized versions as both game books are practically begging for a bigger screen to be displayed on.

App Store Links:

• Fighting Fantasy: The Warlock of Firetop Mountain, $2.99
• Gamebook Adventures 1: An Assassin in Orlandes, $4.99

Macworld Expo 2010 kicks off this week and TouchArcade will be in attendance. If you are a developer and want to meet up to show us your games, feel free to contact us at tips@toucharcade.com.

We will also be attending GDC 2010 from March 9-13, 2010 also in San Francisco, CA and PAX East 2010 from March 26th-28th in Boston, MA. Feel free to start contacting us (email) to meet at those events as well. We welcome all developers to reach out and get in touch. If you have nothing specific to show, we'll also be around at the various organized social events and can be contacted via Twitter (@arnoldkim at Macworld, @arnoldkim/@hodapp at GDC, and @hodapp at Pax East).

Meanwhile, IUGO is again organizing a party for GDC, so at a minimum we'll see you there.

Id's Doom II RPG [$3.99] was released yesterday, and so far has had an overwhelmingly positive reception in our forums. Much like Wolfenstein RPG [$1.99], Doom II RPG is a turn-based 3D game chock full of crazy humor, items to loot, and enemies to slay.

Here is some gameplay footage of the first few moments of the game:

We're still powering through the game for our full review, but right now, it's safe to say if you like silly turn based RPG's, Doom II RPG is a worthy purchase.

App Store Link: Doom II RPG, $3.99

According to a post on the Myst Online forums, an iPhone port of Riven, the sequel to Myst [App Store], should be available "by early summer at the latest."

Myst is a point and click adventure puzzle game first published for the Mac in 1993. Loaded on a CD-ROM, Myst was absolutely revolutionary at the time. We enjoyed the iPhone port in our review, and there's not much reason to think that Riven wouldn't translate to the iPhone just as well.

Riven is set immediately following the events that transpired in Myst and the plot is hard to describe without revealing some spoilers from the original game. It's safe to say if the iPhone port of Myst was your first foray in to the series, you will also enjoy Riven as it was highly praised by critics and comes packed with even more immersive puzzles to get hopelessly stuck on.

Unfortunately it sounds like the rest of the Myst games might not be making it to the iPhone due to technical issues and licensing, but news of Riven joining Myst on the App Store should get any fan of the series excited.

Thanks Cougarcat

The Great Giana Sisters, as it was originally known, has an interesting and cheeky history, being pulled off the shelves as soon as it first went on sale in 1987 for the Amiga, Atari and Commodore 64, due to its incredible likeness to Super Mario Bros on the NES– henceforth cementing it as a highly sought collectors item. Many years down the track, it was re-imagined on the Nintendo DS in 2009, a port of which has now made its way to the iPhone as Armin Gessert's Giana Sisters [App Store], named after the C64 version's original programmer.

Having just played through the first and second worlds, it is immediately obvious where Armin Gessert's Giana Sisters has derived its inspiration. Our early experiences were replete with head-butting brick-smashing platforming, jumping on unsuspecting enemies, pipes, and a steady stream of fireball upgrades. It goes so far as to have coin-bricks, and hidden coin-bricks, and a flag at the end of each level.

It isn't all Mario though, as Armin Gessert's Giana Sisters appears to have an abundance of its own charm. The platforming is straightforward, but challenging, and it really comes into its own after the first few stages. There are two control schemes available– a Classic and Touch setting– the latter of which seems a bit too unorthodox to time pin-point jumps. Fortunately, the Classic setting is as you would expect it; movement buttons on the left and jump and shoot buttons on the right which work a treat. Both modes have a swipe feature to help you look below and above you. A number of different power-ups are also available throughout the 80 newly-crafted levels, after which the 32 original 'retro' levels are unlocked.

The full feature set, as provided by Bad Monkey is as follows:

We've thoroughly enjoyed what we've played so far of Armin Gessert's Giana Sisters. There's something special about a great 80's platformer, and this one seems to get all the elements just right. Expect a more extensive review in the near future as we put Armin Gessert's Giana Sisters on the iPhone through its paces.

More first impressions from our readers are already amassing in our forums.

App Store Link: Giana Sisters, $4.99

Today, an iPhone port of the well-reviewed mobile title DOOM II RPG [App Store] from id Software LLC appeared in the App Store. Doom II RPG was created by the same team that brought us Wolfenstein RPG and offers a turn-based take on the Doom universe:

The forces of Hell have invaded our dimension once again, and only you can stop them from their ultimate goal—conquering Earth!

A mysterious distress signal calls your team—two hardened Marines and a rookie scientist—to a Union Aerospace Corporation research facility on Earth’s Moon, but you were unprepared for what awaits you. The forces of Hell itself have taken hold of the station and its inhabitants! Zombies and demonic monsters roam the halls, killing all who cross their path. Your backup squad is dead. Mysterious scientists conspire against you. Even the facility’s AI cannot be trusted. You are being hunted from all sides. Now, you must fight to survive, and try to stop the invasion—and uncover the truth—by any means available. The fate of all humanity is at stake!

The game challenges you to choose one of three available characters through which to take on a veritable menagerie of Hell-spawned beasts. Cacodemons, Cyberdemons, Spider Masterminds — they're all here for your goring enjoyment.

Among the game's features as listed by id:

• Battle through 9 maps, spanning the Moon, Earth, and Hell itself. Over 8 hours of gameplay!
• Over a dozen unique weapons to find, plus improvised weapons such as Sentry Bots or even plumbing fixtures.
• Eleven different enemy types—each with multiple, increasingly-powerful forms—plus four bosses.
• Auto-mapping feature and mission-tracking PDA functions ensure you’ll never be lost again.
• Customizable controls; change the size, style, and placement of the control inputs.
• Three levels of difficulty will give players of all skill levels a challenge.
• Detailed graphics and complex levels which take advantage of the power of the iPhone.

As with Wolfenstein RPG, the pace of Doom II RPG game is entirely different than the first person shooter versions that we all know. We'll offer a closer look in time, while first impressions are being collected in our forums.

App Store Link: DOOM II RPG, $3.99

Plants Vs Zombies is Popcap's take on the tower defense genre, where players cultivate a crop of various plants that each have different abilities to play against the weaknesses of the many different types of zombies you will face. Progressing through the game, you eventually unlock all kinds of different defenses to choose from as you deal with zombies invading your front lawn during the day, across your pool in the back yard, and even fending them off at night. Each setting requires a slightly different strategy and this keeps gameplay fresh throughout the whole game.

The following trailer was released today, and mentions 2/15 as the official release date of Plants Vs Zombies for the iPhone.

Like most Popcap games, Plants Vs Zombies is available for the Mac and PC and currently can either be purchased directly from Popcap online or nearly any brick and mortar store that stocks PC games. You can expect a full review from us as soon as the game is released on the App Store.

Our January game ratings are in place now, and here are the top of the heap. Our monthly "best of" round-up summarizes the top rated games that we looked at in the previous month. Each game reviewed receives a 1-5 star rating relative to the other games from that month. Generally, a 3 or higher is considered a "good" rating.

Our final scores are not the product of any traditionally objective measures such as graphics or sound, but simply reflect the games we would most recommend to others.

5 Stars

Broken Sword – The remake of this 1996 point and click adventure was wonderfully brought to the iPhone. The story and all around high-quality production values of Broken Sword sucked us in. Whether you're an old fan of the original game, a newcomer to the series, or even someone who's never played a point-and-click adventure before, Broken Sword is a game with mass appeal that will draw you in. (Review, App Store)

Sword & Poker – Mix poker with a loose RPG and you get one of the most surprisingly compelling games from January. The variety of monsters, weapons and levels adds enough content to kept us coming back throughout the month. Even if the premise sounds strange to you, give the Lite a try. (Review, App Store, Lite)

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars – A great adaptation of a DS/PSP game, Chinatown Wars offers a level of depth rarely seen on the App Store. If you complete everything in game, playtime will need to be measured in days, not hours. The weapon targeting system can use improvement, but barely detracts from an otherwise phenomenal game. (Review, App Store)

4.5 Stars

Cogs – Cogs is a mechanical puzzler that challenges you to bring to life a series of increasingly complex machines by way of arranging sets of tiles, gears, pipes, and the like in such a way as to connect varying energy sources to their ultimate outlets across 50 different 2.5D and 3D environments It has become one of our favorite iPhone puzzlers. (Review, App Store)

The Deep – The Deep is all about exploring environments and finding important items that allow access to other parts of the map or give unique abilities to the main character. Unique level designs, the pleasant art, and that addictive, upgrade-focused exploratory gameplay kept us captive for hours (Review, App Store)

The rest of January game ratings can be seen in their respective rating categories (also found in the sidebar navigation): 5 Stars, 4.5 Stars, 4 Stars, 3.5 Stars, 3 Stars, and 2.5 Stars.

As always, we expect there will be some debate about relative scores, but keep in mind that everyone's personal ratings may vary based on individual tastes.

Hudson Entertainment just released an iPhone version of the classic turn based strategy game Military Madness (or Nectaris). The hex map strategy game predates Advance Wars and was originally released for the TurboGrafx-16 back in 1989. The game has since seen a number of revisions including last year's revival for WiiWare, Xbox Live Arcade and the PlayStation Network.

The iPhone version is an adaptation of Military Madness 2 and is said to take full advantage of the iPhone's touch control and graphics capabilities.

Military Madness: Neo Nectaris delivers a complete, turn-based strategy game from the masters of the genre. Through 50 levels of blistering tactical gameplay, you'll be wrapped up in every battle, every move, every step of the way.

We'll take a closer look at this game later this week.

App Store Link: Military Madness, $4.99