Are you the kind of person who has such an extreme affinity to retro gaming that you've let your lust for games like Pac-Man and Galaga invade every aspect of your life, but you've often found yourself disappointed that they haven't taken over your social media feeds? Well, Namco has the answer for you, and it's not part of a twelve step program-- It's PAC'N TWIT [Free]. This free Twitter client does what most Twitter clients do in that it allows you to view your timeline, replies, direct messages, and all that jazz. It even has push notifications, which I was more than a little surprised to see implemented.
PAC'N TWIT also has some strange mini game integration. You can spin a roulette wheel based on the number of tweets you've posted, and winning rewards a puzzle piece to a… iPhone wallpaper. Each skin has its own associated wallpaper to unlock, and apparently aside from the two included Pac-Man skins and two included Galaga skins there are more on their way via updates.
It seems weird for Namco to dedicate resources to developing and releasing a Twitter client, but it was also pretty weird for Taito to release a whole mess of utilities like Space Invaders Calculator [99¢]. Myself, I'm a fan of Tweetbot [$2.99], although I suppose the one drawback that it has is a significant comparative lack of retro game skins.
In case you didn't know, Unity provides the glue that makes a considerable amount of iOS games work. It's a game engine, development environment, and multi-platform publishing tool rolled into one easy to use package. (You can read all about it here.) The magic behind Unity is what brings the world of Aralon [$4.99] to life, and what allows you to level up in Order & Chaos Online [$6.99]. Similarly, it's what allows Gameloft to take Order & Chaos and seamlessly turn it into a Facebook game. The engine isn't limited to 3D either, it's what's behind fantastic 2D platformers like Max and the Magic Marker [99¢] and too many other games to list.
Recently, Unity 3.4 was released which brings a whole boat load of new features, functionality, and other tweaks. So many, in fact, that it's hard to pick out which to highlight. Personally, I'm excited for better water effects, because who doesn't love water effects? Also, finally having gyroscope support is going to be great. The best part about these kind of engine upgrades, is that most of the tweaks and enhancements are essentially "free" just as part as developers upgrading to the new version, and testing to make sure that nothing breaks in the process.
If you're a Unity developer, download 3.4 and give it a shot. If you're a gamer, keep an eye out for upcoming Unity titles that benefit from the mile long feature list of the 3.4 upgrade.
I've always thought the early Fallout games would work great on the iPad, (and to some extent they do, if you were able to download iDOSbefore it got pulled) but like many ancient PC games, the Fallout IP is securely locked up in a twisted web of developers and publishers that have been bought and sold over the years. In the case of Fallout it was originally an Interplay project, which got rolled into Bethesda, which now is part of ZeniMax. There's even been some brutal legal drama as who owns the rights to a Fallout MMO has been duked out in courts. What I'm getting at, is I'm not holding my breath for an iOS Fallout anytime soon.
So, having totally written that off long ago, imagine my surprise when I stumbled across PipClock [99¢ / Lite] randomly browsing the App Store today. In a nutshell, it takes the "dashboard" style clock and weather apps, but applies a glorious level of Fallout-esque style to it. Seriously, just check out the screenshots:
The functionality is basically what you'd expect out of one of these sorts of clock and weather apps, although everything has a wonderful Fallout spin. For instance, here in the "Ruins of Los Angeles" in "California's Wastelands" it's 85 degrees out with "poisonous fog not detected". Oh, there's a faux geiger counter built in too. Each element also has subtle animations, with static, scan lines, and even sparks.
Since upgrading to an iPad 2, I've been looking for a good use for my original iPad outside of checking to make sure games we're reviewing still run on it. With PipClock, I'm thinking I might have to relegate it to night stand duty as PipClock just looks too awesome to not be running all the time. It's universal too, so you could do the same with an old iPod touch if you've got one laying around.
In case you didn't know, TouchArcade is part of one big happy internet family with MacRumors which is the place to go for Apple news and rumors as well as AppShopper which catalogs the App Store and actually provides quite a bit of the glue behind the scenes that makes a lot of things on TouchArcade work. If you're already familiar with AppShopper, you might be aware of most what I'm going to go over in this post, so consider this a PSA for those who aren't in the know.
The AppShopper site itself is incredibly useful because it makes browsing through the App Store quite a bit easier (and often times quite a bit faster) than just using iTunes. For instance, part of what I do every morning to find games to cover on TouchArcade involves going through the listing of all the new games that have appeared on the App Store. Similarly, you can see all games that have had a recent price drop and all paid games that recently got switched to free. That second link is particularly useful, as since it's generated as close to real time as possible you often can scoop up awesome free games hours (or even days) before they appear on the various free app promotional sites.
If you're only interested in iPad or universal games, there's toggles for that. Also, if viewing everything the App Store has to offer is overwhelming (which it totally is at times) you can mash the "Popular" switch to only show things that the 1,000 monkeys on the 1,000 typewriters powering AppShopper have deemed as such. Where things get really useful in all this is that every view of AppShopper has its own custom RSS feed, so if you're an RSS kind of person, you can add specific views such as popular universal games that dropped to free right in line with whatever else you've got in your RSS reader of choice.
The reason for this particular plug of AppShopper is due to a recent update to the AppShopper App [Free]. This app does everything the AppShopper site does, and more, packed into a slick native application. It's got a bunch of cool features, but what people will find the most useful around here is the wish list functionality with push alerts. If you read TouchArcade on a daily basis, you'll totally be inundated with cool games you'd like to check out. You also likely have more games than you even know what to do with already on your device which can make buying everything the instant it comes out at full price a little silly (and potentially expensive).
If this describes you, you should really give using the AppShopper wish list as a way to "bookmark" games a try. Here's how it works-- You see a game you thing looks cool, but don't necessarily need right away. You add it, then when it drops in price you'll get a handy alert telling you so... Both reminding you that a game you thought was cool still exists, and that it's now on sale.
If you're already a faithful user of the AppShopper app, here's some great news: It's been recently updated to be even better. The app now includes links to TouchArcade reviews as well as reviews from our friends over at 148apps. Also, you can customize when push alerts get sent, so you won't be woken up at 3:00 AM anymore to be alerted that a game you've been keeping your eye on went free. (Unless of course, you want to be awoken for something like that, of course.) In addition to app ratings being implemented, there's all kinds of new filters for searching within the app.
The AppShopper app is totally free and is ad-supported. If you're the kind of person who hates ads, a single 99¢ in-app purchase will get rid of them forever.
I’ve been a pretty big fan of the Joypad Game Controller [Free] ever since we reviewed it back in February. In a nutshell, Joypad allows you to display a selection of different virtual controller types on your iPhone or iPod touch. You then pair the Joypad app with a desktop client via Bluetooth or WiFi which remaps keys on your computer's keyboard to the virtual buttons of the Joypad, and remaps mouse movement to the accelerometer. This allows the Joypad to control games on your Mac or PC, and makes for a very capable substitute controller when you don’t happen to have a real physical controller handy.
While that’s pretty cool in and of itself, the team behind Joypad have taken things a step further and released an SDK which allows any developer to implement Joypad support into their games natively, bypassing the need to pair with the desktop software. This also means that Joypad support can be baked right into iPad games, a feature we saw demonstrated at WWDC a few weeks ago.
And now we have the first actual implementation of Joypad support in an iOS game with Lars [$1.99], a retro-style platformer from Icarus Interactive. The short video below shows just how quick and easy it is to get Joypad working with Lars:
I’ve been playing around with Lars using the Joypad for a couple of days now, and it works just as flawlessly as it does in the video. The connection between the two devices happens automatically and near-instantly, and there’s literally zero lag when playing. One thing I do wish however is that developers putting Joypad support in their games would offer the ability to remove the onscreen virtual controls when the Joypad is in use for a more seamless experience.
Also, Lars isn’t exactly the greatest platformer in the world, although it’s certainly not the worst. In fact, it’s pretty fun, but it does feel a bit bland and repetitious. If you’re curious about trying the Joypad support though, then it might be worth the two bucks to pick up Lars and check it out.
The developers of Joypad hint that there are more games with Joypad support coming out soon, and I'm really curious to find out which games will utilize the functionality. It’s such a great experience playing an iPad game with the Joypad that I hope a lot of developers give the Joypad SDK a look for their own games. For now, at least Lars is a start.
Early yesterday I made a post sharing Manomio CEO Stuart Carnie's intent to bring iCade support to his Commodore emulation systems. Early this morning, he posted a video of the Amiga game International Karate + running under his iAmiga emulation system with full iCade support. I've not had a chance to test out his latest development build personally, but I wanted to share the video for to pique retro gamers' appetites.
And, speaking of Manomio's Amiga and C64 emulators, Craig Rothwell behind the iControlPad (and Wizzley Presto) reached out and is sending over an eval device for us to check out. Manomio is currently in the process of building iControlPad support into their emulators, as promised. We'll report on that shortly.
Back in February, my jet-setting TouchArcade cohort Eli Hodapp found himself wanting to play some video games on his laptop while on the road. Not one to carry around a bulky Bluetooth controller just for that specific purpose, he came across a novel little app called Joypad [Free] which was a suitable alternative. Basically, the Joypad app runs on your iPhone or iPod touch and turns the device into a wireless controller for your computer with a highly configurable set of virtual buttons.
The Joypad app syncs up with a desktop client which allows it to be used to play any game by remapping the keyboard controls to the virtual buttons on the device. It works really well, is fairly easy to setup and get running, and is a great companion for the traveling gamer, as we noted in our review of the Joypad.
So since that time, the two man operation Zell Interactive who are responsible for the Joypad have been quite busy. First of all, the formerly limited free version of the Joypad has been updated to include all the same functionality of the paid version. Basically, this means you can download the Joypad and the desktop client and have your very own virtual controller on your iOS device at no cost at all. As the developers do enjoy putting food on their tables, the way they will monetize the Joypad from here on out is by offering additional skins as in-app purchases.
The first set of skins will be a retro pack that will offer skins from the NES, Game Boy, Genesis, and many other classic consoles. The skins are purely visual and don’t alter the functionality of the app, but if you use the Joypad for playing classic console emulators then the appropriate skin can add a bit of fun to the experience. The skins will be available individually for 99¢ each or together as a complete pack at a discounted price. The original paid version of Joypad has been renamed Joypad Elite [$11.99], and will always receive all the new content as free updates rather than IAP. If you don’t already have Joypad then the free version is the way to go, but this way they can still say thank you to their previous customers who supported them by buying the app initially.
While the skins are a neat feature, the really big news about the Joypad is that the developers have recently released a free SDK that will allow other developers to easily integrate native Joypad support into their desktop or iOS games. On your computer, this means that if a developer integrates the SDK into their game you’ll be able to play that game using the Joypad without the need of syncing with the Joypad Connect desktop client.
It all works incredibly simply. Just fire up a game with Joypad support on your computer or iOS device and then fire up Joypad on an iPhone or iPod touch. The game will automatically detect the Joypad running and send the appropriate controller configuration to the device. There can be a mixture of various types of buttons, d-pads, or analog sticks on the Joypad that suit each individual game. Shortly down the road, the ability to add custom controller skins for a particular game will be added into the SDK for an even more cohesive experience.
The Joypad developers have added in Joypad support to an open source version of Wolfenstein 3D [$1.99/Lite] just to demonstrate how easily it works:
Another recent addition to the Joypad app is mouse movement and clicking support when playing games on a computer. This means you can control the cursor in a game that normally needs a mouse just using the accelerometer of your iOS device. They demonstrated this feature to me by playing Minecraft using just an iPhone and the Joypad app, and I was pretty blown away with how well it works:
The Joypad app comes with pre-configured settings for both Minecraft and Portal 2, but the controls can be configured pretty much however you want to make them work with a ton of desktop games. They’ve also added support for connecting via Bluetooth in addition to a local WiFi connection, which takes care of some of the connection issues that were present when trying to use the Joypad on a crowded WiFi network.
There have been a few games that utilize playing on the iPad using an iPhone or iPod touch, and EA Mobile is dabbling in this area as well, but the release of the Joypad SDK means that there is the potential for any game to use this functionality, and it can be an attractive extra feature to add to any iOS or desktop game. Couple Joypad support with the display mirroring capabilities of the iPad 2, and suddenly your mobile devices have taken on the traits of a home console. While the Joypad isn’t a total substitute for a physical controller, it still works really well and is a lot of fun to use. Hopefully developers will check out the free Joypad SDK and we will see support for it in many more games in the future.
Believe it or not, E3 wasn't all big name developers and publishers, even though the insane show floor would make most believe otherwise. No, actually, it turns out that there were quite a few indie developers around enjoying the sights and sounds that I was able to catch up with. The first of which was the guys from Muteki Corporation, who had a few really rad things to show off.
Dragon Fantasy - There's already a thread in our upcoming games forum, but here's the gist- Muteki, like most of us old school gamers grew up with all kinds of fantastic old school RPG's. The battle system is basic, the graphics are pixelated, and the story is gloriously cliche... And that's just the way we like it. Dragon Fantasy is an homage to these games of yore.
Give it a look:
Next up was Game Studio, a neat little utility that we got a semi-secret look at during GDC earlier this year. It's in the same vein as Game Salad and other similar easy game creation suites, except this one exists entirely on the iPad. My favorite feature of it is the drag and drop game logic portion.
Check out this extensive walkthrough:
Last, but certainly not least, was a look at an impending update for Super Jetpack Dragon IV [Free / HD]. It shifts the gameplay style from an endless running kind of thing to a level-based platformer. It's pretty neat, and more features and functionality in existing games is always welcome around here.
Hudson is doing a fantastic job of keeping a fresh batch of new games pouring into their excellent TurboGrafx-16 emulator app called the TurboGrafx-16 Gamebox [Free]. The app launched last December with a decent selection of titles, all of which could be purchased from within the app for $2.99 apiece with one rotating title per day available for a free timed trial. We really enjoyed the TurboGrafx-16 Gameboxin our original review, and within a couple of months a new selection of titles was added improving the game further.
Earlier this month, yet another update hit adding another 5 brand new games to the package, including the classic pinball game Devil’s Crush and the third entry in the Bonk’s Adventure series. Now, just a few weeks later we already have another new update to the Gamebox adding 5 more new games.
Likely the most recognizable of the titles is the vertically scrolling top-down shooter Raiden. Raiden was an absolute classic in the arcades a couple of decades ago, and remains one of my very favorite shmups of all time. The TurboGrafx-16 version is obviously highly scaled down from the arcade original, but while it lacks the graphical oomph it still contains excellent gameplay. Performance-wise, Raiden can slow down a bit when action gets intense on screen, but overall it’s pretty solid.
A far more exciting addition to the Gamebox, at least for me personally, is Dragon’s Curse. You may know it by its former name, Wonder Boy III: The Dragon’s Trap, as it was called on the Sega Master System back in 1989. This was one of my all-time favorite action/puzzle/platforming games back then, and it still holds up extremely well today.
It has a Metroidvania vibe where you must take on the roles of different animals that each have unique abilities that allow you to access new areas of a huge non-linear world. There's a number of different weapons, armors, and items to buy which adds a nice RPG element to the gameplay. Dragon’s Curse is colorful, clever, and just plain fun, and I’m really excited to have the game in my pocket to play through for the umpteenth time.
The three other titles in this latest update to TurboGrafx-16 Gamebox aren’t as familiar to me, but they may hold a special place in your own heart. These titles are: Shockman, Moto Roader, and Out Live. There’s plenty of other classic TurboGrafx-16 games I’m still waiting on too, like Keith Courage, Super Star Soldier, and Legendary Axe, so hopefully Hudson continues to crank out the updates. Currently, I think they’re doing a pretty darn good job, and the TurboGrafx-16 Gamebox continues to be a shining example of how to do emulators right on iOS.
If you are amongst the millions of iPhone owners who also happen to have PS3's, I've got the perfect app for you. Behold, PSN Status [Free]. This free app will tell you both quickly and easily whether or not PSN is up. Sure, it would have been much more useful last month, but it will be handy to keep around if/when PSN goes down again.
Oh also, on the subject of PSN being down, if you're like me and really only use your PS3 for watching BluRays, don't forget to claim your free games. Even if you weren't really affected by the downtime in any real way, you're still eligible for two free PS3 games and two free PSP games. The selection is surprisingly decent, too.
On a somewhat related note- If you're a proud PS3 console warrior and your pride has taken a substantial hit over the last month as you were the brunt of countless "PSN is down" jokes from your Xbox 360-loving friends, don't forget to also download i360Emu [Free]. It's a shockingly accurate emulator of early Xbox 360's, or, it was, before they changed the power-on animation.
Recently I embarked on a quest to see if there was a way I could stream my PC games to my iPad using the various remote desktop apps available on the App Store. Initially, this resulted in countless hours (and dollars) wasted, only to be disappointed time and time again. Some apps had no audio, others were nowhere near responsive enough, and some of them just flat out didn't work-- Then came Splashtop Remote Desktop [99¢ / Lite / HD].
Splashtop is a remote desktop client that streams your PC or Mac screen directly to your iPad, iPod touch, or iPhone with amazingly fast response times, and full streaming audio. Installation and setup couldn't be easier. All you do is install the desktop software and download the app and you're up and running. Keep in mind, using Splashtop outside of your local network will require fiddling with port forwarding, and unless you've got an insane internet connection, will bring the response time down to be almost unplayable. However, on the same network, Splashtop is basically a 1:1 representation of what is happening on your PC, and is totally enjoyable to game on.
Late last year when TurboGrafx-16 GameBox [Free] first hit the App Store, I was beyond excited our review. I'd still list the TurboGrafx-16 as one of my favorite game systems of all time, and the potential that an officially sanctioned emulator has is still something I'm still glad to have, I just wish it had more games. Hudson has slowly been leaking out updates to the emulator with new packs of games included, but like most other official emulators, it's sorely lacking in the classics department. Not to say that Bonk isn't a classic, but come on, where is Blazing Lazers, Keith Courage, and other phenomenal TG16 games?!
Anyway, the newly included games are Bonk's Big Adventure, Image Fight, Break In, Devil's Crush and Nekketsu Koukou Dodgeball-bu PC Bangaihen (say that one three times fast). Payment still works the same way in that there's a daily rotating free game, or individual titles can be permanently unlocked for $2.99 a piece. Devil's Crush is worth checking out, I'm not so sure about the other four.
We've been tracking Elite's retro game releases through its ZX Spectrum: Elite Collection [App Store] and associated apps for some time now. This weekend, Elite released another emulated classic that many gamers on both sides of the pond will recall fondly: Barbarian from Palace Software.
Barbarian (distributed in the U.S. by Epyx as Death Sword), originally released for the Commodore 64 in 1987, is a hack and slash fighter that places you, the barbarian, in a series of fighting pits on a mission to slash your way through warrior after warrior and ultimately defeat the evil wizard Drax and rescue the ample Princess Mariana. It's all in the spirit of Conan. The game was noted for its realistic character animation (despite its simplistic graphics), considerable gore, and pleasant dose of wit. More than all of these, perhaps, it was noted for its racy box cover art featuring a bikini-clad Maria Whittaker, who had recently made an appearance as a topless Page Three girl in The Sun, and some dude. The outcry was dramatic.
Being a title running in Elite's ZX Spectrum emulator, Barbarian: ZX Spectrum is, of course, the ZX Spectrum version of the game. Unfortunately, this was not one of the strongest ports. Due to limitations of the Speccy's hardware, the actual play area and the characters within are rendered in monochrome. The detail is there, but the presentation feels pretty sparse. Another negative in this emulated iOS release is the control scheme. Despite Elite's "iDaptive" control system, where button (or key) layout can be custom arranged, the types of wildly varying moves that you need to pull off in rapid succession to excel in this game are not particularly conducive to touchscreen-style D-pad play. Happily, the customizable controls let you move the D-pad out of the way of your character in landscape mode, but that doesn't help with the feel of the controls.
Barbarian for the C64 and other platforms of old featured both a single player campaign mode (the quest to rescue Mariana) and a two-player challenge mode. It's worth noting that the version presented here offers only a single player mode.
See a video of the game as played on the ZX Spectrum.
Barbarian: ZX Spectrum is a stand-alone title with versions for both the iPhone [link] and iPad [link], and will be appearing as part of a new download pack for Elite's ZX Spectrum: Elite Collection [link] on Friday, when the number of available games in the collection will reach 108.
As a fan of what I knew as Death Sword on the Apple II back in the day, I was happy to see Barbarian arrive on iOS, even if it's come in a non-native fashion. I'd wager that the happy customers here are going to be other oldschool gamers who have fond memories of gut kicks and decapitation as Palace delivered them. Those unacquainted will probably find this one wanting.
Even though an iOS version of the fantastic Portal series of games are nowhere to be found, this isn't stopping the release of official spin-off apps of sort on to the App Store. This one in particular is home to several interesting nuggets of information that any Portal fan will enjoy. For instance, Valve Software didn’t always have a clear vision for Portal 2, which hit earlier this week on the PC, Mac, and HD consoles. At one point early in its creation, Portal 2 was a prequel set in the 1950s. Also, it didn’t have portals.
This is according to game journalist Geoff Keighley in his brand new magazine-style app called “The Final Hours Of Portal 2.” [$1.99] It’s essentially an interactive article -- with loads of text, some videos, and even pictures -- that tells the story of the creation of Portal 2 and brings to light a lot of cool, previously unknown information.
I should note that Valve doesn’t open up a lot to the media, so this is both a pretty rare and privileged kind of story and definitely a cool way to throw your support behind a gifted writer. Beware, the app is home to some minor spoilers. Really though, if you're the kind of person who is contemplating purchasing a supplemental app to read about Portal 2, you've likely already beaten it, so this shouldn't be much of an issue.
...And if you haven't played both Portal and Portal 2 and you own a capable PC, Mac, Xbox 360, or PS3, you really need to fix that.
Early this morning Atari released perhaps the most significant single retro gaming application yet to appear in the App Store. Atari's Greatest Hits [link] is a free Universal application for the iPhone and iPad that comes bundled with their first game ever, the 1972 classic Pong. And, while the games-for-free situation ends there, the fun certainly doesn't -- not by a long shot.
By way of in-app purchases, Atari's Greatest Hits can deliver to your iOS device up to 99 more games from the historical studio's back catalog, a mix of both arcade and (then) cartridge-based VCS / 2600 releases that you just might've grown up with. These games can be had in four-title game packs available at $0.99 each, as well as in a 68MB lump download of the entire library for $14.99. (The path you take here will reveal to you just how much of a bull geek retro gamer you are, so choose wisely.)
One hundred vintage Atari games for fifteen bucks. It's quite a proposition. But, what are we talking about here?
The almost awkwardly long list of game packs and the titles within them can be seen in our earlier post about this release.
Are you the kind of person who has such an extreme affinity to retro gaming that you've let your lust for games like Pac-Man and Galaga invade every aspect of your life, but you've often found yourself disappointed that they haven't taken over your social media feeds? Well, Namco has the answer for you, and it's not part of a twelve step program-- It's PAC'N TWIT [Free]. This free Twitter client does what most Twitter clients do in that it allows you to view your timeline, replies, direct messages, and all that jazz. It even has push notifications, which I was more than a little surprised to see implemented.
