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

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

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.

Nearly five months ago now Tapulous first announced Riddim Ribbon [App Store] on stage at an Apple keynote. Oddly enough, aside from graphical changes, the game that is available today is almost exactly what Tapulous promised at the event. Three songs from the Black Eyed Peas are included along with three additional 99¢ tracks available via in-app purchase. (Two by Tiësto and one by Benny Benassi.)

The objective of Riddim Ribbon is to guide a ball down a track, and tilt your device to follow a green line that moves left and right to one of the three songs you select on the main screen. When you stray from the track, the music begins to fade out until you're only hearing the faint backbeat to the song. Laid out on the green line are silver spheres to pick up, ramps to jump over, and hoops to jump through. All of these different pickups and obstacles are arranged so you're hitting them with the beat of the song, an experience that's actually pretty cool if you haven't played a similar racing rhythm game before.

As you're rolling down the tracks in Riddim Ribbon, you will be faced with both forks in the road and ramps that lead to secondary portions of track that allow you to mix the song by turning or jumping up on to the same portion of the song remixed by one of a number of different DJ's included in the game. By replaying individual songs and choosing different paths to take, you can come up with a number of different remixes of the same song.

Riddim Ribbon is a game that sounds really cool when you describe it, yet it somehow manages to be not that fun at all when you're playing it. The way the music is visualized is great, and the tracks are laid out very well to match each song. Unfortunately, it doesn't take long to get bored of the three included songs, and the tilt controls are frustrating.

Instead of like most racing games where you tilt to move right or left, then hold your device level straight to go straight, the amount you tilt directly translates to your position on the track. This causes you to spend most of your time holding your device at an awkward angle instead of making small tilting movements to steer as you're probably used to if you've played many racing games on the platform.

As mentioned previously, the way you interact with the music in the game is really neat but by default an announcer is almost constantly talking over it telling you how "dope" and "ill" your performance is along with announcing the many checkpoints on each song. It likely won't take you long to turn this off in the options.

Riddim Ribbon is a great idea for a game that ultimately is ruined by frustrating controls and gameplay which is too easy to get bored of.

App Store Link: Riddim Ribbon feat. The Black Eyed Peas, $2.99

There's a bucket full of games that had their prices slashed this weekend for various reasons. As always, standard App Store disclaimer is in effect in that these prices were all current at the time of this posting. Since sales are often very limited, if you've been waiting for any of these games to see a price drop, you may not want to wait very long before picking them up.

Assassin's Creed II Discovery, $9.99 → $6.99 – A fast paced side scrolling platformer that is highly reminiscent of Prince of Persia. We thought it was cool in our review, although to really enjoy it you need to play the game on third generation hardware, as the framerate on previous-generation devices left much to be desired.

Ravensword: The Fallen King, $6.99 → $4.99 – This impressive open-world RPG was developed by a two man team and features hours of gameplay. We liked the game in our review, and since then the game has been updated to include even more content.

Chop Chopa Ninja, $1.99 → 99¢ – Play as a ninja in this side scrolling beat-em up to rescue a princess. Instead of using on-screen controls, a series of gestures that are taught in the tutorial control the movements of your ninja. For more information check out our post on the game.

Chronicles of Inotia: Legend of Feanor, $2.99 → 99¢ – The first Chronicles of Inotia holds the claim to fame of being the first touch action RPG available on the platform. Released all the way back in 2008, Inotia has since seen a sequel that we enjoyed.

Crayon Physics Deluxe, $4.99 → 99¢ – A really fun physics game released in early 2009 that asks players to solve various puzzles by drawing crayon lines with their finger to create objects in game. You need to pick this up if you like physics games.

Heavy Mach 2, $2.99 → 99¢ – A top down mech game we enjoyed in our review. The sequel is an odd departure from the original which was a side scroller, and both games are worth checking out if you're in to vehicular combat.

iZombieland, $2.99 → 99¢ – One of the few movie tie-in games on the App Store that's actually worth playing. iZombieland loosely follows the movie Zombieland with a side-scrolling Splatterhouse-style beat em up. For more information, check out our review.

Theseus, $3.99 → 99¢ – A puzzle game that places players in a maze where they must escape a minotaur. The catch? The minotaur happens to move twice as fast as you do, but has predictable movements and mastering the game involves learning how the minotaur handles your actions. This was a forum favorite when it was released, and we liked it when we took a look at it.

Underworlds, $2.99 → 99¢ – Still one of my favorite hack and slash RPG's, Underworlds has had tons of content added to it since our initial review of the game. On sale for the Super Bowl, or, apparently, for a week following the Super Bowl if the Colts win.

Car Mania, 99¢ → Free – A traffic management game we had some minor issues with in our review, but you can't really go wrong with a free game– Especially when it comes packed with full OpenFeint integration to pad your OpenFeint score.

What do you get when you cross line drawing with a pack of hungry lions? Lion Pride [App Store], of course. As OpenFeint's free game of the day, you really don't want to miss this strange warthog munching simulator.

From our review:

The premise of the game is simple, you control a pack of lions and need to gather food for the rest of your pride. Thankfully, in this corner of the African savanna there seems to be a constant stream of warthogs, gazelles, and other beasts to munch on. Similar to Draw Race, you control the speed of the lions by how fast you draw lines from them on screen. Sneaking up on animals is important to keep them from running off, so you start by moving your lions slowly, then quickly go in for the kill. If something starts to get away, tapping twice on them will briefly stun them.

As you get further in to the game, you get more lions to control and tougher prey which needs to be attacked by multiple lions in order to be brought down. Lions need to be positioned to work as a team to all strike at once, and if any wandering hyenas come on screen they need to be scared off to prevent them from disrupting your food supply.

I really liked Lion Pride when we first took a look at it, and since then they've added additional game modes and all kinds of OpenFeint functionality to give the game tons of replay value through achievements and friends challenges. There's even fun facts about lions in game, how can you go wrong?

App Store Link: Lion Pride, Free (Today only.)

Blizzard forum poster Bornakk recently mentioned as a part of their efforts to increase the functionality of the World of Warcraft Armory that players will soon be able to access in-game auction houses through the web site itself, as well as an app that's in the works to manage your auctions on your iPhone.

Features and functionality of the app are still in the process of being worked out, and Blizzard admits that since this is a fairly complex addition to the integration seen with both the armory and the iPhone so because of this they don't have any kind of release estimate yet. Also mentioned is that parts of this service will be "premium-based", and more details on what exactly that means will be revealed at a later date.

Blizzard isn't exactly shy about charging players for in-game services between character server changes and sex changes, so it's anyone's guess as to where the "premium" will come in to play with this new app. Previously released Blizzard iPhone apps, World of Warcraft Mobile Armory [App Store] and Battle.net Mobile Authenticator [App Store] have been popular amongst our community, so we will be keeping a close eye on the development of the auction house app.

Thanks to everyone I used to play World of Warcraft with relentlessly IM'ing me about this today.

In 1989, influenced by Tetris and tic-tac-toe, Dave Akers and Mark Stephen Pierce created Klax, originally programmed in just a few weeks in Amiga Basic. Nearly 20 years later, Mark Stephen Pierce flying solo with the help of Super Happy Fun Fun released Star*Burst [App Store], a matching game with tons of particle effects and all the gameplay from classic Klax turned upside down as the rights to the original Klax seems to be trapped somewhere in Midway's bankruptcy-powered licensing purgatory.

If Klax was before your time, or you just never got around to pumping quarters in to a Klax machine, here's the basic gist of the Star*Burst– Randomly spawning bricks come down a conveyor belt towards a paddle which can catch and hold up to five bricks at once. Moving your finger around controls the paddle, and swiping down throws a brick back up on to the conveyor belt, while tapping the paddle throws the brick up to the five by five grid at the top of the screen.

Blocks on the top of the screen are cleared by matching them horizontally, vertically, diagonally, and other more complicated layouts such as forming arrows, an X, or stars. The more blocks you clear the more points you earn, and as blocks are removed the existing blocks compress to fill any spaces that may have been created as blocks disappear– Allowing you to chain massive combos (and earn point multipliers) if you can set them up.

When you get farther in to the game, wild blocks that will match any color and bomb blocks appear that can destroy nearby blocks on the grid. Just like Klax, achieving high scores involves thinking ahead and intelligently managing which blocks you keep on your paddle, which blocks you flip back up on to the conveyor belt, and how you arrange the blocks on the grid. The game is over when you either fail to catch five blocks from the conveyor belt, or you run out of spaces on the grid to place new blocks.

If you were a fan of the original Klax, you need to have Star*Burst on your iPhone. The touch controls work well, and really my only gameplay criticism is that the on-screen button to make the conveyor spit out blocks (the small square with two arrows near the top in screenshots) seems to be awkwardly positioned. You really only need to speed up the block conveyor in the earlier levels when blocks come slower, so this is a very minor issue.

Star*Burst has online scoring and tons of achievements, but unfortunately uses Facebook instead of Plus+ or OpenFeint so the online scoring/achievement functionality is fairly primative and seems to be limited to your Facebook friends and spamming your Facebook wall. With a better online scoring system, Star*Burst would be amazing.

App Store Link: Star*Burst, $1.99