Rift, a fairly popular MMO from Trion Worlds, has a mobile companion app. Earlier this December, the studio pushed out a free "beta" build that lets Rift users do all sorts of cool stuff, like, for example, chat in real-time with friends and guild mates, as well as peruse "the latest wall postings."
Rift Mobile [Free], as it's called, also comes stocked with a trio of mini-games -- Planar Invasion, Craft Critters, and Shinies -- that give players, and apparently not just ones with a Rift account, a "chance" to win in-game crafting and artifact loot. These games all seem pretty simple, but hey, loot.
Trion describes this release as the "first stage" of an overall Rift Mobile rollout. The final launch, accompanied by an Android app, is expected in Q1. We're pretty stoked to see where this goes -- no-one has really nailed an MMO companion app, so it'll be fun to watch it grow and, hopefully, become truly awesome.
Zeboyd Games radical 16-bit parody RPG, Chtulhu Saves the World, is coming to mobile devices this year. And sooner than you'd think. On Twitter, lead designer Robert Boyd says the studio held this announcement until work was almost finished, and he expects the game to hit at some point this quarter. Nice guy!
Meaningful details, like, how this version will control, if it'll include any extras, or its price point aren't being discussed at this time. A note on the game's blog does say that more information is coming in the next few weeks, but since we're so nosey we've reached out to Zeboyd for more anyway.
If you've played Breath of Fire or an old-school Final Fantasy, you'll be able to get your head around Cthulhu's systems and mechanics pretty quickly. The awareness of what genre its in, the sharp improvements it makes, and the humor is what makes it pretty great. Here's hoping the mobile ports rock just as hard.
Grand Theft Auto 3 [$4.99] is good and all, but wouldn't it be better if you could, say, adjust the draw distance? Or turn up the Awesome on those muddy A4 chip textures? Some of our more technically savvy and adventurous message board users are doing just that right now, believe it or not, and without a jailbreak.
How? Turns out that Grand Theft Auto 3 on iOS and Android has the exact same file structure as their PC versions, which opens them up for modding after a bit of directory digging. The thread we mentioned is a guide of sorts if you'd like to get in on the action. If you're looking for how to do it, or have questions along the way. That's the place to go.
Cult of Mac speculates that modding could lead to Hot Coffee-type inclusions into this version, if modders wanted to go that far with additional content. It'll be interesting to see how Apple would react to that. Guess: not favorably.
This is probably ancient news for the biggest of big fans of Catan [$4.99 / HD] in general, but check this: USM, the same dudes responsible for the App Store port of the popular board game, are putting out a port of Rivals of Catan. This morning, actually, we were told that the "first version" is currently in testing, and USM is inviting its users into a beta to give it a spin.
Rivals of Catan is a card game adaptation of Catan proper built for two players. In brief, it's all about expanding principalities and scoring points for various things in a fairly rapid-fire fashion -- players roll dice for bonuses and draw cards each round, some of which activate a special event or allow general improvements. You can read more about it here, if this is tickling you in any special way.
And by the way, that Cities & Knights expansion is still coming to Catan. A beta test is planned to start at the beginning of the year, and DSM hopes to release at some point around February or even March. Cross-platform multiplayer is also still scheduled to hit at some point after this update, FYI.
Earlier this summer, we caught word that Frontier Developments's LostWindswas headed to iOS and Android. Now, we've got a great first-look at the iOS version title in action -- and, guys, it's silly gorgeous.
Once an acclaimed WiiWare title, Frontier has obviously pushed the visuals to the max for our phones and tablets. And if you look, you'll notice that it's a fairly HUD-free port with specific touch actions, which has us thinking that we're actually in for an all mobiled-out experience.
No solid date or price point have been announced, but we do know that LostWinds is coming to every iDevice this holiday as a Universal app. Also, it'll ship with a "new map feature" specific to touch devices. Our popcorn is ready, for sure.
UPDATE: Yay, technology! The trailer we originally posted was cut short for some... reason. This is the full thing.
The wait for Grand Theft Auto 3 on iOS and Android is almost over. On its blog a few minutes ago, Rockstar revealed that the 10 Year Anniversary Edition port of the game-changing open-world title will hit the App Store and Android Marketplace on December 15th at an agreeable price point of $4.99. A new trailer giving you another taste of what's to come is expected to release next week, but we've got some new screens right now to hold you over.
We've been following GameStop's entry into the tablet gaming world for some time now. Rumblings started when GameStop started taking iOS devices on trade-in, which we determined utilizing the latest tinfoil hat and witching stick technology might mean they were going to start selling iOS devices soon. A few days later, news hit that GameStop wouldn't be selling iOS devices, and instead is launching it's own Android gaming tablet. Since then, we've speculated heavily on our podcast regarding what this tablet will be like, if GameStop will have a proprietary storefront for it, and whether or not that storefront will offer some kind of trade-in gimmick.
Per a recent report from PC Mag, GameStop just started a pilot program where they will be selling not one but three Android tablets in 200 locations. The lineup includes the Acer A100 at $329, the Asus Transformer at $399, and the Samsung Galaxy Tab at $499. Naturally, these are coming pre-loaded with GameStop software, and they'll be promoting tablet-optimized games to play on them. Interestingly enough, it doesn't sound like GameStop is going to be pushing touch-based games, as all but the low-end tablet will come packaged with a Bluetooth controller.
We'll have to wait and see how this pilot program does, as it's very interesting seeing GameStop respond to iOS games taking off the way they have as well as online game distributors and streaming services like Steam and OnLive eating so much of their proverbial lunch. I tend to think for this to get anywhere GameStop will need to take a much more unified and powerful approach to the whole thing, far beyond the "Oh hey, here's three Android tablets and two of them come with Bluetooth controllers" thing they're doing now.
So far, the top note on my "Things I Didn’t Expect To Hear This Morning List" is this: Grand Theft Auto 3 is coming to a smattering of high-end tablets and handsets later this fall. No, really -- I have a list and, yeah, Rockstar Games announced plans to port its once-technical marvel to touch devices at some point in 2011 in celebration of its 10th birthday.
We don’t know anything about Grand Theft Auto 3 for mobile, including what it’ll look like or what price it’ll launch at. The blog post announcing this ‘big deal’ bit of news is strangely focusing more on a new and limited run of $150 12-inch Claude toys with “30 points of articulation” instead of the game. But, hey, pre-orders for the toy are open now!
I’ve got a fantastic and equally unfulfilling love and hate relationship with GTA3, just as I do with every other GTA title. I love the bluster, the scale, and a good deal of the content, but the controls and general technical wonkiness of Rockstar’s open worlds drag everything down. It’ll be interesting to see if this tenth anniversary edition on handhelds will debut with an improvement or two. I guess we’ll see.
Oh! And here’s the devices you’ll have to have in order to play it:
Apple iOS Devices: iPad 2, iPhone 4S Android Phones: Droid X2, HTC Evo 2, LG Optimus 2X, Motorola Atrix, Samsung Galaxy S2 Android Tablets: Acer Iconia, Asus Eee Pad, Motorola Xoom, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1
Madfinger Games is continuing to tinker with Shadowgun [$4.99] after its shaky late September debut on the App Store. For starters, the game is cheaper. For a limited time, you can grab it at $4.99 instead of its usual upper tier price tag of $7.99. It’s also less buggy. An initial patch run has sealed up its iPad 2 crashing issues, the Driller bug in the fourth level, and ‘optimized’ memory on lower-end devices.
These things combined present an interesting value proposition for anyone who read our review of the original build and remain on the fence. While we loved its technology, we weren’t too big on its level design or a handful of its mechanics.
Here’s a snippet:
If Madfinger can fix the crashing and save-game deletion issues with a patch, they're still left with a repetitive, but lovely looking shooter. There are hints of true quality in the boss fights and some minor sections of the campaign, but the majority relies on a simple, corridor design that's hard to find engaging for very long.
We’ve seen Madfinger say that it’s continuing to work on the game post-release and that’s great news. Its also still planning for an Android release later this month. We’ve been told that the Android iteration will support anything with a Tegra chip in it, so make sure you’ve got the right hardware for the job if you want in.
Mediocre’s Sprinkle [$.99] got a little bigger and presumably a smidgen more controversial with its fans this afternoon. In a new update, the studio added Game Center support and tacked on two new levels to Sprinkle’s initial world. It also added a new juicy 12-level world to the core game, bringing the level count up to a healthy 60. In a strange twist, this update also packs in a separate six-level content update exclusively for those who grabbed the game’s IAP back when it was available.
If you haven’t been keeping records at home, Sprinkle came under some fire after its initial release for offering level unlock functionality via IAP. Medicore removed the IAP, but kinda left those paying owners a little high and dry in the process -- until now, at least. We just wonder how that same crowd who let their feedback be known will respond to this move. (more...)
Don’t count out the possibility of a handset version of Botanicula. In a chat with Pocket Gamer, Czech dev Amanita Design said it was at least considering the idea of bringing the mind-meltingly gorgeous point-and-click “exploration game” to phones. Fleshing that comment out, it cautioned that Botanicula for phones is “still just an idea and we need to carry out a few experiments before we can talk about it seriously.”
Botanicula was revealed earlier this month and is currently slated for a release at some point in early 2012 across the PC and Macintosh. Its premise goes a little something like this: five bug-like friends go on a journey to “save the last seed from their home tree which is infested by evil parasites” and, apparently, spiders.
"Mind-meltingly gorgeous" is probably an understatement on my part, by the way. Botanicula is... just, wow. We sincerely hope a touch version will prove viable for the studio.
What does a good-looking, yet buggy and monotonous game like Shadowgun [$7.99] really need? It needs extremely ambitious multiplayer, apparently. Madfinger Games has announced that it’ll launch bits and pieces of the game’s slated competitive online component in waves. First up: cross-platform team and regular deathmatch. Next up: more exotic, though still un-announced modes.
Love or hate the game, you have to appreciate the scope of what Madfinger is working within as it continues to try to raise the bar with Shadowgun.
What’s kinda striking us as funny is that there’s no ETA on this update. Generally speaking, that’s a bad sign. We rarely see iOS game competitive components release after launch and if they do, they launch a long, long time after initial game release. Hold on to your butts, in other words.
Minecraft is coming to Android really soon -- like, September 29 soon. Earlier this morning, creator Mojang announced that the portable version of its eternally in-the-works tunneling / LEGO game is hitting capable Android phones just before the month closes. Previously, the title was shackled to the Xperia Play as part of an exclusive.
Oh! And it also showed off how the game will control. Basically, movement is confined to two virtual interfaces: a huge d-pad and a disappearing reticule. The d-pad is responsible for walking and strafing, while the on-screen reticule (which will be activated by flicks) is how you’ll alter the first-person perspective. All other core actions, like, say, breaking blocks, is managed by direct touch interaction with that object. Here's a little explanation in video form:
Minecraft - Pocket Edition looks like a fantastic Twister experience, so we’re stoked to get our hands on it. Pocket Gamer reports that the iOS version still doesn’t have a date, but it’s slated to get out of the door before 2012.
On the heels of the “Nintendo should move to mobile” investor talk and other related drama, Meganoid [$1.99] creator Orange Pixel decided to do something huge: develop a phone game the way it believed the publisher would if it ever bothered to enter the sector. Stardash, a super simplistic and obviously retro-inspired platform game, is the end result of this experiment, which hits later this week across the iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, and Android.
“Using GameBoy style graphics and sounds for extra memories of old-school running and jumping. It’s a little experiment to see if I could create such a game in the way the big N would do it,” Orange Pixel wrote on its blog. “A lot of care has been put in the level-design and the simplicity of it all,” it said.
Outside of the look and feel, Stardash's multi-faceted progression seems to be the place where Orange Pixel is really attempting to crib and build on Nintendo's secret sauce -- you can clear levels by beating levels within their time limits, by collecting coins, or by finding hidden keys that open up secret levels. Stardash will launch with four worlds containing nine levels each. And while the goal of every level is as simple as “run to the right until you see a balloon,” every level will have its share of challenges and secrets.
I don't think anyone is seriously expecting a level of Nintendo refinement (read: budget and time) from Stardash, but what a neat and challenging way to approach a project, huh? We’re definitely down for giving it a go as soon as possible and we’ll bring you our thoughts when we do get our grubby little hands on it.
So here we are, a couple of days out from Square Enix’s recent Tokyo Games Show press event and we’re still scratching our heads about an announcement it made. Cutting to the chase, it seems as though the publisher has confirmed that Chrono Trigger will be indeed be making its way to Android and iOS, just as it seemed to suggest it would via a teaser page from forever ago.
That’s huge news considering how well-loved, how fun, and how well designed of this game is, but the translations and breakdowns of the event we’ve read are seem to be missing bits of information. With this in mind, we’re actively being cautious about this announcement, as Square could have easily just announced a normal mobile version of the game. We’re still working on trying to get some stone-cold confirmation, so stay tuned on this one.
As an aside here, one little interesting tidbit that’s still emerging from this conference is the Square Enix Market, a portable “store” for all of Square Enix’s mobile games on Android. As of now, it appears it’s strictly tied to Japanese carriers, so don’t get too hyped up if you live elsewhere in the world. I'm going to go ahead and tease you with this though: apparently, games like Final Fantasy I and II, Chaos Rings and Crystal Defenders are all slated to arrive via this portal.
Anyway, supposing that Chrono Trigger is actually coming to smartphones -- how cool is that?
Rift, a fairly popular MMO from Trion Worlds, has a mobile companion app. Earlier this December, the studio pushed out a free "beta" build that lets Rift users do all sorts of cool stuff, like, for example, chat in real-time with friends and guild mates, as well as peruse "the latest wall postings." 
Zeboyd Games
Grand Theft Auto 3 [$
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