When Zen Studios originally announcedStar Wars Pinball in early February, they had stated the three new tables based on the iconic series would hit as both DLC for the existing Zen Pinball [Free] app and as a brand new standalone game. Then when the Star Wars DLC finally hit Zen Pinball towards the end of the month, there was no sight of said standalone game.
For whatever reason it was running a few weeks late, but Star Wars Pinball [$1.99] has just launched in the App Store as its own separate app, and it comes equipped with widescreen support for the iPhone 5 to boot, something we can't say for its older Zen Pinball sibling.
For the $1.99 download of Star Wars Pinball you'll get the table based on Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back, with the Clone Wars table and the one themed after Boba Fett available as in-app purchases for $1.99 each, all the same price as in Zen Pinball.
I'd like to see Zen Studios get widescreen support into the original Zen Pinball, and according to their Twitter it's on the to-do list. But if you held off on the Star Wars DLC before because you weren't interested in the whole package, or you're just dying to play with widescreen support, you can check out the standalone Star Wars Pinball right now. Oh, and just in case you missed it before, if you're like me and you love pinball but are completely terrible at it then check out this video series we came across to tighten up your game of silver ball.
By now everyone is familiar with the phenomenon that Temple Run has become. The original title was downloaded and played by millions upon millions of people since its release in 2011 and sparked off a deluge of similar games, basically creating its own genre of 3rd-person runner.
Last June, Imangi Studios partnered with Disney for Temple Run: Brave [$0.99], a version of the game based on the hit movie. You know you're big time when you're partnering up with freaking Disney. Temple Run: Brave wasn't drastically different from the original, but the style of gameplay fit well within the scope of the movie and it was still a lot of fun, which was refreshing as movie tie-in games throughout history have tended to suck.
Then this past January, we got a proper sequel in Temple Run 2 [Free]. Again, it didn't make many changes to the core formula, but it got a huge visual upgrade and lots of little nips and tucks that made it feel tighter than the first game. Like Brave, Temple Run 2 was well-received and has been on cruise control in the top of the charts since its release.
That was just six weeks ago, but today Imangi and Disney have confirmed what was accidentally leaked early last month with the announcement of yet another Temple Run movie tie-in game, this time based on the upcoming film Oz the Great and Powerful. I thought running through the woods away from a pursuing bear was a great fit for Temple Run: Brave, but running down the Yellow Brick Road in Temple Run: Oz [$0.99] might just be the ultimate perfect premise.
Temple Run: Oz is built on the same engine as Temple Run 2, so the visuals are top notch and there's a much more natural and flowing feel to the landscape in its levels. Like Temple Run: Brave and its arrow shooting mechanic, Temple Run: Oz also looks to add its own personal touch with a hot-air balloon flying segment, which is really just a tilt-based coin collect-a-thon but breaks up the action and has a cool epic feel. There are also dynamic hazards you need to be careful of, like a crumbling statue that will block your path or an enemy that swoops in from the sky that you'll need to quickly duck under.
Another interesting thing about Temple Run: Oz is that upon first boot-up it will detect your device and download additional assets for the higher end devices, so it still remains under the download cap of 50mb but you have the option of having a visually superior version if your device can take it and you don't mind the extra space. Also whole new environments are downloaded over the air, and you'll actually have the option of choosing which environment you'll run to next if you follow the directions of the signs.
It's all really rather great. I've been playing Temple Run: Oz since yesterday, and as strange as it feels to say this about a movie tie-in promotional game, I think this might be the best Temple Run yet. Granted, with the proper sequel launching just a short time ago, maybe you're on Temple Run overload, and I get that. But for a buck, if you have any interest in the upcoming Oz the Great and Powerful or are looking for more Temple Run goodness I think the Oz edition is a safe bet.
Also be sure to check out our TA Plays where Brad blows the exorbitant amount of $5 on in-app currency, or our forums where early impressions and discussion are rolling in. Temple Run: Oz is out right now for 99¢.
It's that time of week again when the deluge of new releases finally land on the US App Store. It looks like a pretty decent week based on what's in our weekly Coming Tonight post, and all those games are now available with the links provided there. As we usually do, we're highlighting what is the most noteworthy release of the bunch and this week that game is Might & Magic Clash of Heroes [$4.99].
Clash of Heroes is a match-3 RPG hybrid in the loosest sense, and is wrapped in a massive single-player story-driven campaign. Typical RPG tropes are at play as you follow along with a ragtag group of young heroes as they try to save the world from certain doom.
Battles are centered around the matching style gameplay, and as we've talked about previously in our preview coverage of Clash of Heroes, this is the game's biggest strength. There are layers upon layers of depth to the fight strategies and mechanics, and while the story and presentation are key components if Clash of Heroes was nothing but battling I wouldn't complain one bit.
That's sort of what the multiplayer is there for, though. You can play against AI opponents, battle real-life friends locally, or take on the competition online in asynchronous bouts. The single-player campaign in Clash of Heroes should keep you busy for quite a long time, but the multiplayer options are what really give it long-term legs.
Might & Magic Clash of Heroes originally launched as a Nintendo DS title back in 2009, and was re-released and enhanced in HD for home consoles in 2011. The iOS game is based on the HD release, and because of that the file is nearly a full 2 gigs, so just a heads up. Other than that it appears to be a fairly decent touchscreen translation of an absolutely phenomenal original game, so check out our forums for more early impressions and watch this space for more on Clash of Heroes in the near future.
It seems it's a good day for good game design, as not only did the audio visual feast that is Wave Trip [$1.99] launch earlier today but we stumbled across another incredibly stylish little game called Wide Sky [$0.99] from developer and motion design specialist Marcus Eckert. In it you play as an adorable little hedgehog who must swing around each level trying to smash into an orb, breaking it into a bunch of shards, and then go around and collect those shards as quickly as possible. You're given a grappling hook-like rope that can attach to clouds and swing your hedgehog around to build momentum and launch yourself towards your targets. You tap and hold the screen to attach your rope and tilt your device to swing around.
They're really interesting mechanics, but also incredibly tricky. Like, I am terrible at this game so far. Unlike most other hooking games, in Wide Sky your rope will only launch from the top of your hedgehog, so you need to keep an eye on its rotation before launching so you can aim properly. It takes a certain kind of finesse that I just don't seem have yet to attach the rope where you're intending to. I'm just fumbling around at the moment, but I think it's one of those things that will eventually "click" and I'll improve. You can see Wide Sky in action in the trailer below, which I should add is one of the nicest game trailers I've ever seen in my life.
While I'm still figuring out the mechanics in Wide Sky, I can't help but marvel at just how thoughtfully everything else has been designed in the game. It reminds me of the kind of minimalism and ingenuity showcased in an app like Figure [$0.99] mixed with the whimsical audio and visual styles of companies like Simogo and Lucky Frame. It's also a hilarious game, as the description texts and tutorials are all colored with a ton of humorous dialogue.
Wide Sky is just oozing style all over the place, and while I'm still waiting to come around on the gameplay portion I'm enjoying myself a lot nonetheless. If you've got a spare buck lying around and can appreciate tremendous design, then I'd suggest giving Wide Sky a look and checking out our forums for more discussion and impressions while you're at it.
When Imangi Studios originally launched Temple Run [Free] in August of 2011, the small indie developer had no idea the kind of phenomenon it would go on to be. In fact it wasn't even a success right off the bat, and only after a switch to free-to-play about a month after release did it start to build up some momentum before flourishing late in the year and all throughout 2012. The latest tally is that Temple Run has been downloaded and played by more than 170 million people across all platforms. That's just insane.
Now with Temple Run a household name and the kind of bona fide success that can spawn a successful spinoff game with a major Disney movie in Temple Run Brave [$0.99], a proper sequel has stealthily landed in the App Store. Not a lot has changed in Temple Run 2 on a fundamental level, it still plays very much like the original game you know and love, but it has received a massive upgrade in the visual department along with a few new tweaks to the formula that make it a substantial improvement over the first game in just about every way. It feels like a fresh start, a new Temple Run that's geared towards the future.
I'm sure most everyone is familiar with how Temple Run works, but just for kicks let's go over the basics. You follow your perpetually running character from a third-person perspective as they're being chased by a humongous demonic primate. You see, your adventurer swiped the beast's precious idol and that didn't seem to go over too well, so now you've got to run for your life.
Control of your character is handled by swiping up or down to jump over or slide under obstacles, and swiping left or right to turn when necessary. Tilting your device moves the character back and forth inside the lane for collecting coins and avoiding additional hazards. That's about all there is to it, and it works great. Temple Run 2 is one of those perfect games to play with just a single free hand, for just a few minutes at a time or for hours on end as you tirelessly try to top your best run. Nothing has changed with the sequel in that regard.
The biggest improvement in Temple Run 2 is in the graphics department. The game has been built from scratch in Unity and boasts gorgeous lighting and colors as well as extremely fluid animations. My one gripe is that the draw distance isn't the best, which means environmental elements will pop-in right in front of your eyes. It doesn't really bother if you're focusing on not dying like you should be, but it's still kind of disappointing considering what iOS devices are capable of.
The original Temple Run didn't have that great of a draw distance either, but it was masked quite ingeniously using a fog effect that worked well with the dank jungle theme. In Temple Run 2 you're running in a temple in the sky, so everything is right out there in the open. This new sky temple is great though, offering a much more dynamic feel to the level design. The track will curve, dip and elevate in ways that the rigid straightaways of the first game never did. It feels like a more organic environment, and it also keeps you on your toes just a tad bit more since you never really know what's coming around the next bend.
Like I said before Temple Run 2 is a beautiful game, and there's a greater variety to the types of scenery you'll see, like various temple ruins architecture and forests with sunbeams poking through the leaves. There's a couple of new environmental elements too, like a zip line to ride and mine cart sections. These parts aren't drastically different from the rest of the game's normal running, but they do add some additional drama and excitement to your adventure.
Temple Run 2 brings back 4 playable characters from the original, and each one is associated with a specific power-up. As you unlock the additional characters beyond the default Guy Dangerous, their associated power-ups become unlocked too for any character. There's the standard set of upgradeable attributes too, like a Head Start boost and a coin value increaser, which are also shared across all characters.
The power-up you choose for your character can be activated with a double tap once you've collected enough coins to fill up the associated meter on your screen. The power-up itself can be upgraded too, using the game's premium gem currency. Both coins and gems are available as IAP and are also earned through play. The coins come at a relatively fast clip, especially if you splurge on the IAP coin doubler, but the gems are typically few and far between. It still feels balanced though as the number of gems needed for normal upgrading is gradual.
One other use for the premium gems and something that's a huge change in Temple Run 2 from its predecessor (as well as a point of contention with some of its fans) is the ability to continue your run after a death by spending gems. This essentially sullies the scoring as in theory you could drop enough cash on IAP gems that you could just continue on forever.
The cost to continue doubles in gems each time, and it's possible there's a limit to how much you can continue that I just haven't seen yet. Even so I'm not super interested in the leaderboards anyway so it doesn't really bother me, I just have fun playing for the sake of it. Still, adding a special "sudden death" leaderboard where continuing with gems isn't allowed would be a nice compromise. Really what's more annoying to me is the un-skippable continue countdown that plays after a run ends. It would be nice to be able to immediately retry.
If you weren't a huge fan of the first Temple Run then I doubt the sequel will drastically change your mind. Though, it's free, so I'd say just try it anyway just in case it clicks differently for you this time around. You don't have anything to lose. If you loved the original game then I think you'll love Temple Run 2 just as much or more so. Granted the continuing aspect is kind of suspect and there's some minor technical issues, but Temple Run 2's improvements far outweigh its flaws.
There are plenty of more complex runners out there, and the beauty of the App Store is that you're free to play any and all of them to suit your tastes. But Temple Run 2's simplicity and intangible "something" is what made its predecessor a game that I always went back to even in the face of a smorgasbord of alternatives, and it's what will keep this on my device easily within thumb's reach for a long time to come.
We've been waiting for Lucky Frame's follow-up to Bad Hotel [$0.99] since the studio announced its existence back in November, and as of today Wave Trip [$1.99] has finally arrived in the App Store. Like the developer's previous titles, Wave Trip has a clean aesthetic and game mechanics tied closely with music creation.
This is essentially a cave flyer like many you've no doubt played before, but every element in the game has a musical sound attached to it. So as you fly through a level collecting items and avoiding obstacles, a song is slowly and progressively building up until you reach the end of the level. By that time you've got yourself a reasonably complex, funky little tune. It's really beautiful as an audio/visual experience, but it's quite fun and challenging too with its 3-star system for each of the 25 song levels.
What's more is that Wave Trip comes with an extremely easy to use grid-based level creator, so you can make levels and upload them to share with the world or conversely download levels created by others to play yourself. You can even remix any of the included levels using the editor just to put your own spin on the default setups. It's pretty sweet actually.
Right now we are definitely digging Wave Trip in our brief time with it, and we'll continue to dig in to see how well the game parts of it stand up. When it comes to the visuals and sounds though, it's already easy to see Lucky Frame has totally nailed it. You can get more early impressions in our forums and you can snag your own copy of Wave Trip for $1.99 with the link below.
We're finally settling back into a pretty normal routine of App Store activity since the dreadfully boring holiday freeze that began just before Christmas. It's still a bit slow in the iOS world news-wise, but at least there was a good selection of new releases that came out this week. However, a few games slipped under our radar, so without further ado here's a quick rundown of some new games that you might have missed too.
Crash Cam, Free - [Forum Thread] - Super Squawk Software released The Creeps [Free / Free (HD)], a classic iOS tower defense title, all the way back in December of 2008. They are just about as O.G. as you can get, but have been relatively quiet since then. That is, until this week with the release of Crash Cam, a cave flyer that we got a really early glimpse of at GDC last year. It's highly reminiscent of Jetpack Joyride [Free], but here you're actually playing a movie director following an action star in your camera crane filming him through a ton of wacky movie set environments. I love the visual style and variety, and I've found myself becoming pretty obsessed with trying to best my high score.
Gunslugs, $1.99 - [Forum Thread] - Master of such pixel platformers as Meganoid 2 [$1.99] and Stardash [$1.99] developer Orange Pixel's newest game is called Gunslugs [$1.99], and it's a run 'n gun shooter with a heavy emphasis on action. There's a huge cast of playable characters to unlock inspired by all your favorite action movie stars, like a retro platforming version of The Expendables. One of the big features in Gunslugs is randomly generated levels, and it sounds like it's packed to the gills with cool secrets too. I've only spent a short amount of time with the game so far, but it's a total riot.
Kingdom Conquest II, Free - [Forum Thread] - Sega released a pretty unique title back in November of 2010 called Kingdom Conquest. It blended elements of real-time strategy, 3rd-person hack 'n slash dungeon crawling, card battling, and massively multiplayer online connectivity, and despite mashing so many different elements together it managed to work pretty well. After 2 years and millions of downloads, a sequel has quietly snuck into the App Store. Kingdom Conquest II [Free] offers more of the same assortment of gameplay types, but with new content and updated for current hardware.
Fans of the Myst series should clear their plans for this weekend as Riven: The Sequel to Myst [$3.99 / $5.99 (HD)] for iPad just hit the App Store. We posted recent details from Cyan on this enhanced version last month. Also, in the event that this is also news to you, Myst [$4.99] has been available on the iPhone for quite a while as well as realMyst [$6.99 (HD)] for the iPad which abandons the slideshow nature of the game in exchange for a real fluid 3D world.
Forum user Candykiller dug up this really awesome "Making Of" video which I hadn't seen before of Riven, and really, this serves as a fabulous introduction into the game even if the video quality is a little low. Check it out if you're into what went into developing these classic games-
Riven is a huge game, clocking in at over 1GB for the iPhone and 2GB for the iPad once fully installed, so if you've got a smaller device you might need to clear some room.
As mobile hardware reaches the point of being comparable to consoles, we're seeing less and less "Game Boy" versions of popular gaming franchises. That is, it's no longer becoming necessary to dumb down or limit a version of a console or PC game just to create a mobile version. In fact we've seen plenty of straight up ports of console and PC games that sacrifice very little technically in order to work on the iOS platform.
That's all well and good, and I love taking carrying games likeGTA: Vice City [$4.99] and Bastion [$4.99] around in my pocket wherever I go, but there's almost always some sort of compromise you'll need to be willing to deal with when shoehorning virtual controls onto a game that wasn't meant for it. I'm fine with that for the most part, but it also makes me really appreciate those games that try to reinvent themselves with touchscreens in mind when transitioning to iOS.
One of the more recent and excellent examples of doing just that is Ubisoft's Rayman Jungle Run [$2.99]. It took the assets of Rayman Origins, a fantastic and critically acclaimed platforming game on traditional gaming systems, and repurposed them into an auto-running platformer built specifically for mobile touchscreen devices. We thought it was a hit because of how thoughtfully it was brought to iOS, and I'm pretty sure Apple liked it too. It definitely makes a difference when something is tailored for mobile.
When Growtopia first popped up on our radar at the beginning of this month, we thought it looked pretty darn cool. It looked like one of those 2D Minecraft-y games that seem to be all the rage lately, and we were excited to try it out. Well as of today Growtopia [Free] is officially in the App Store courtesy of a collaboration between developers Robinson Technologies and Hamumu Software. After spending just a short amount of time with Growtopia I have to say it's completely awesome so far.
Growtopia is an online only game, meaning you connect to its servers and create or join a world with other players. From here you can "mine" the blocks in a world to discover different items and seeds, which are the basis of creating everything in the game. Each type of seed grows a specific item, but seeds can be spliced together and combined to grow a huge variety of things. This is basically the "crafting" of the game.
And that's kind of the gist of things. You cruise around to different worlds, mining and planting seeds to grow items, and generally just building cool things and interacting with the other players in the game. It's really fun, even more so than I thought it would be. There is a 'TouchArcade' world that seems to be the pretty popular and active.
With online games like this that take place in persistent worlds where everyone can interact, you'll no doubt get some people trying to destroy things and generally make life tough for everyone else. In Growtopia you can avoid this issue by purchasing locks that allow you to rope off a portion of the world or even an entire world itself so that only you or anyone you designate can access it.
You buy things in the in-game store using gems that are discovered through mining or that can be purchased in packs of IAP. The game feels pretty generous so far in doling out gems naturally, but if you do decide to splurge on an IAP pack these are also very generous, giving you a ton of gems for the price. You can also earn free gems through TapJoy, if you're into that sort of thing.
Besides the privacy locks you can buy other cool things in the store like clothing items, seeds, environmental items like doors and signs, and an increased inventory so you can carry around more stuff.
I've really just scratched the surface of Growtopia, and I'm looking forward to spending some more time playing around in the game. It's free to download and try, and you don't even have to sign up for an account or anything to play online, though you can if you wish. It's free to do so and allows you to transfer your progress between devices.
There's an active Growtopia discussion going on in our forums, and there's a Seed Recipe Wiki page that will show you the types of things you can grow in the game if you need a bit of guidance. The game is free, so definitely worth the download to give it a look.
It looks like we're off to kind of a slow start in 2013 in terms of weekly releases. That's not to say there weren't a few interesting looking games in our weekly Coming Tonight post (and all of those games should be out in the US App Store now, by the way), but I guess it just doesn't have the same impact as the usual onslaught of new games that typically hit in the weeks that aren't so close to the holidays.
However, I think the most notable new release has to be the puzzle game Hundreds [$4.99]. It's notable for one just by being the collaborative effort of Canabalt [$2.99] creator Adam Saltsman of Semi Secret Software and Greg Wohlwend of Solipskier [$0.99] and Gasketball [Free (HD)] developer Mikengreg. Both are well-respected indie developers and basically anything they're a part of is something to be interested in. Beyond just good game developer pedigree though, Hundreds is also fantastic. I spent the better portion of the day playing the original Flash version, and became completely hooked. Adam and Greg have spent the last year improving on that initial version for Hundreds on iOS, adding new mechanics, modes, and more.
It should be a winner, and although I've literally only spent a few minutes with the just-released iOS version of Hundreds I can already tell it's head and shoulders above its Flash counterpart. If you're on the fence though, give that Flash version a go because it should give you a good idea of what you're getting yourself into. It's the kind of game that once it "clicks" there's no turning back. Check it out, and give our forums a look too for more impressions from early adopters of Hundreds.
This weekend Microsoft released an iPhone version of a popular Windows Phone game through the App Store. Originally a pet project developed by a couple of Windows Live developers, Wordament [Free] is a word game that presents a real-time, two-minute word-finding challenge against on-line players. It's a quick race against the clock to swipe out any words you can find in the 4x4 letter grid presented.
Wordament is amusing enough, but it is most noatable for being the first game in the App Store that features, not Game Center, but Xbox Live Achievements.
When you sign in with your free Microsoft account, you can earn up to 50 Gamerscore from our 10 achievements and you’ll have access to all of your Xbox Friends and Wordament Frenemies. If you’ve played on Windows Phone or Window 8 and jump to the iOS version, all of your player stats and friends will follow your account automatically.
Microsoft released their official Xbox Live app, My Xbox Live, in the App Store one year ago, which becameXbox Smartglass [Free] last month.
In case you haven't noticed, we've really been awaiting the release of Crescent Moon Games' follow-up to their 2009 open-world RPG Ravensword[$2.99] (and so have you, if our anticipated games list is any indication). After years of waiting, including the launch of a new label as well as another excellent RPG, Ravensword: Shadowlands [$6.99] is finally here. Just as the original Ravensword made its mark for bringing a sought-after genre to iOS, Shadowlands demonstrates just how far the genre has come on the platform, making it one of the most ambitious and enjoyable RPGs of the year.
After a magical gambit in the war against the dark elves goes awry, you wake up at a local guild in the city of Aven, wondering how you got there and why you managed to survive. After a few initial quests, you end up at the door of the Archmage, keeper of magical lore and mastermind of the magical spell that nearly killed you. Upon learning of a deeper threat, the Archmage sends you on a quest to recover three Ravenstones, powerful artifacts that will allow you to enter into the Shadowlands and destroy a demon bent on destroying the entire world. In terms of narrative, Ravensword: Shadowlands weaves a tale appropriate for the grandiose scale of the game. While it probably won't be winning any awards for originality, I was satisfied with the game's lore which was apparent in the quests, characters, and books.
One of the very best gaming moments in my life took place 28 years ago, yet I remember it as vividly as if it happened yesterday.
One evening in 1984, my mother and I drove out to meet my father after work for dinner, after a quick stop at the mall to visit the local Games 'n' Gadgets. On this night, I wasn't just browsing again. No, I had been granted the rare opportunity to actually take a title off the shelf and buy it. On arrival, I wasted no time dilly dallying; I walked right over to the Apple II section, grabbed the game of my desire, and took it to the cash register where dear old mom kindly pulled out the plastic and paid the $39.95. A short while later, over at the restaurant, I excused my 12-year-old self from the table and walked to the pay phone on the wall by the bathrooms. I put in my quarter, dialed my best friend, and when he answered, I looked down at the box in my hands and proudly proclaimed, "I got it! I have it right here! I got Karateka!"
Ahh, Karateka. It wasn't a game so much as a living story that you, the player, were a part of. Within the severe constraints of the technology of the early '80s, designer Jordan Mechner pulled the player into the tragic tale of Princess Mariko, captured by the evil warlord Akuma and held in his fortress high atop a craggy cliff. It was up to you, and you alone, to fight your way through Akuma's warrior defenses in order to save the princess. Your only weapon was your skill at Karate, and there were no second chances -- as in the real world, death came but once, and finally. The game was beautifully executed and wrung true emotion from the player who was often at the edge of his or her seat. For these reasons, Karateka is widely considered to be one of the greatest 8-bit home computer games ever created.
Flash forward 30 years to a time where the machines we all use daily are thousands of times more powerful than the Apple II on which Karateka was originally written. Mechner, who created Karateka out of an interest in film and animation and a desire to convey a story, began to consider how his 30-year-old idea might be realized on today's flat panel displays. To bring this about, he teamed up with Liquid Entertainment early this year and the team set to work re-envisioning the 8-bit classic. The fruits of their labor went live first on the Xbox 360 early last month, and the iOS version [$1.99] has just landed in the App Store.
Back in March we reported that Mike Singleton's expansive 1984 adventure game The Lords of Midnight, which brought a rich and incredible fantasy world to the meager ZX Spectrum home computer, would be making its way to iOS. Singleton teamed up with developer Chris Wild in early 2011 to begin the effort of bringing this true classic to modern platforms, and after much labor, the (universal) iOS version has finally landed in the App Store [$4.99].
The Lords of Midnight sets your band of four adventurers on a quest through the land of Midnight to defeat the evil Doomdark, the Witchking of Midnight. This goal can be reached in several ways; victory can be achieved by successfully destroying the source of Doomdark's power, the Ice Crown, or by recruiting other lords and their forces in a bid to destroy the armies of Doomdark, or by successfully carrying out both efforts simultaneously for the largest victory of all.
The original title was praised not only for its vastness but also for the its use of a clever graphical technique known as "landscaping" to render the game world with pre-scaled sprites in a fashion that delivered a more immersive experience than perhaps any other game of the day. The iOS adaptation features the same rendering style, with graphics that are enhanced, but just as simple as the original.
A sequel, Doomdark's Revenge, followed The Lords of Midnight in 1985, and it is slated for eventual release in the App Store, as well.
Sadly, noted developer and creator of The Lords of Midnight, Mike Singleton, died in October of this year.
When Zen Studios originally announced Star Wars Pinball in early February, they had stated the three new tables based on the iconic series would hit as both DLC for the existing Zen Pinball [Free] app and as a brand new standalone game. Then when the Star Wars DLC finally hit Zen Pinball towards the end of the month, there was no sight of said standalone game.
