Pangea Software, the developer behind the iPhone games Cro-Mag Rally [App Store] and Enigmo [App Store] has put up an info page for a forthcoming 3D iPhone game called Billy Frontier that features mixed-mode gameplay with a “cowboys in space” theme.

As Pangea describes it,

Billy Frontier is a space cowboy who’s mission is to rid the galaxy of alien outlaws. This is the most diverse 3D game you’ll find for the Apple iPhone / iPod Touch - it is a combination of adventure game and arcade game with a whole lot of blood spewing action in-between! You’ll test your reflexes in Duels, see if you can outrun a stampeding herd of Kanga-Cows (half kangaroo, half cow), hunt down alien bandits in gun battles, and blast catapulted critters out of the sky in the Shooting Gallery! Billy Frontier is really four games in one: Dueling, Shootout, Stampede, and Target Practice. The graphics and audio are the best there is for an iPhone game, and if you like spaghetti westerns then you’ll love Billy Frontier because it is a spaghetti space western with all the fixins!

Billy Frontier for the iPhone is a port of Pangea’s Macintosh title of the same name, released in 2003.  The Billy Frontier page features an extensive screenshot gallery but provides no indication of release date or App Store pricing for the title.  Stay tuned for more information on this.

( Thanks James Foote! )

Chaonic has recently released iPhone puzzler Go! [App Store] through the iTunes App Store.

Go! is a geometrically inspired puzzle game that is basically a cross between the classic jigsaw puzzle and Tetris.  The Go! gameboard consists a puzzle map of colored blocks above three wells of puzzle pieces, each of a different color and each containing Tetris-like block shapes (there are nine in all).  Clicking on any well rotates the presented shape.  The goal of the game is to fill the puzzle map with pieces from the wells by strategically placing the puzzle pieces on map blocks of a corresponding color before the timer runs out.  Once a puzzle piece is placed on the map, the well from which it came fills with another piece until all pieces of that color are used.  Exactly the number of puzzle pieces needed to fill the map are provided in the wells–no more, no less.  This makes it important to place each piece wisely.  Each well has a reset button that, when tapped once, puts the last placed piece back in the well or resets all placed pieces of that well’s color if tapped twice.  You will get to know the reset button well.

See the gameplay video for a better look at how it all comes together.

Go! features 50 different puzzle maps with difficulty ranging from “child’s play” to “insane.”  Game progress is saved with the successful completion of each puzzle.

Go! has a polished feel and features clean, colorful graphics on a scrolling backdrop. The game is pleasantly challenging, requiring strategy on the part of the player, and is a solid pick-up puzzler.  The only real complaint I can offer is the lack of any audio in the current version.

Freeverse has provided us with some preview videos of their upcoming titles, including Flick Sports Bowling and Big Bang Chess.

Flick Sports Bowling

This title is still in the early stages of development, but fulfills an earlier promise from the company that we would see a series of Flick Sports games including Baseball, Soccer, Bowling, and Golf.

Big Bang Chess

Big Bang Chess is just one of several board games planned for an early September release. Other titles are expected to include Chess, Checkers, Mancala, 4-In-a-Row and Tic-Tac-Toe. Freeverse expects to support Apple’s Push feature (background tasks) as a free update to provide online multiplayer capabilities.

Freeverse currently offers four iPhone titles in the App Store including MotoRacer [$9.99], Big Bang Sudoku [$4.99], Jared [Free], and SimStapler [Free].

Exit Games has announced that its cross platform toolset for multiplayer online gaming is now available for the iPhone. For developers, this provides a toolset that allows them to more easily integrate online multiplayer and social gaming features to their games. Possible features include:

Developers would have to specifically license and use this toolset to take advantage of the features, but this does open up the possibility that we will see more robust online gaming features in future iPhone games.

Thanks Raphael Salgado (BeyondtheTech)

Brian Wurster has released Tangrams [App Store] to the App Store. The $2.99 puzzle game brings a classic Chinese puzzle to the iPhone. The game involves seven geometric shapes which you must arrange to match the silhouette shown. No pieces may overlap and all pieces must be used.

Here’s a sample of one of the early puzzles. Before and after:

   

Tangrams offers over 400 puzzles and naturally uses the iPhone’s touch capability to drag pieces around on the screen. When all the pieces are in place, the game confirms the solution.

Another Tangram game that has been in the App Store for a bit longer is TanZen [App Store]. This version of the game is also $2.99 and offers “over 100 puzzles” but with promises of more to come in future updates.

TanZen offers a free form rotation with two thumbs while Tangrams allows you to rotate in 45 degree increments with a single tap. In the end, I found the Tangrams single-tap interface easier to use, though TanZen was more visually appealing. It seems I wasn’t the only one as the TanZen developer notes that “due to popular demand”, the next version will have single finger rotation.

Fortunately, Little White Bear Studies does offer a Lite version of their game called TanZen Lite [Free, App Store] so you can try before you buy.

App store links: Tangrams ($2.99), TanZen ($2.99), TanZen Lite (Free)

Game developer IUGO has been in the spotlight lately thanks to their release of Toy Bot Diaries [App Store] for the iPhone last week.  Perhaps the best example yet of a true iPhone game, Toy Bot Diaries with its natural control system delivers highly enjoyable gameplay that’s hard to put down.

iPwnGames recently interviewed Sarah Thomson, IUGO’s Business Development executive regarding the company’s thoughts on the iPhone, the recently released Toy Bot Diaries, and the company’s upcoming titles Re-Volt and Shaky Summit.

When asked how IUGO has liked working on the iPhone, Thomson concealed little of the company’s enthusiasm for Apple’s mobile platform.

Yes, this device is a pleasure to work on. The iPhone is currently the number one mobile platform by a mile not just in gaming, but verticals, music, social networking and it is also catching up rapidly on corporate functionalities. John Carmack sums it up pretty well: “It is more powerful than the Nintendo DS and PSP combined.” The ARM11 processor and dedicated MBX-lite graphics core [TA: more details] can work wonders, if you know how to push them. All that said, it is still a low-powered mobile device which presents several unique development challenges even for experienced mobile developers like IUGO. We suspect developers taking the leap from PC/console/handheld might be in for some surprises and may need to change the way they usually do things. Overall, we like how the device is pushing the envelope for gaming and IUGO’s immense mobile development experiences actually allow us to assimilate the iPhone platform painlessly.

Thomson indicated that the company likes the notion of episodic content and, as such, Toy Bot Diaries, as it sits in the App Store currently, is only the first title in a trilogy of games.  She revealed that a free demo version of the game will soon appear in the App Store to allow users a taste of the gameplay before committing to buy.

Thomson also spoke of the company’s up-coming accelerometer-controlled first person shooter (FPS) Re-Volt which targets the more experienced, hardcore gamer.

Re-Volt is going to be our high-impact, earth shattering FPS for the iPhone. This game is definitely geared towards the more experienced player. That’s not to say beginners won’t love this game too. The beauty of the iPhone is the simplistic and just plain fun controls that make a game like Re-Volt a real form of entertainment for a broader audience. Because it is an FPS, I think it will initially strike a chord with the hard core gamers. But, I think word will spread and its popularity will be wide spread.

Re-Volt gameplay video

See the full interview for more details from this promising iPhone developer.

Reporting from GCDC 2008, PocketGamer.co.uk was demoed a new iPhone racing game called Real Racing. Australian developer Firemint shows off what appears to be a very promising accelerometer-based iPhone game:

PocketGamer.co.uk had a hands on and described the graphics as “spiffing” and claims the tilt controls “knock spots off other iPhone racing games so far.” Head-to-head multiplayer over network or Wi-Fi is also available. What most impressed them, however, was the community features which allow you to upload you best times to a central website. This lap data can then be converted into replay videos that are send to YouTube.

A sample of this replay “footage” is also provided:

The company expects Real Racing to be out before Christmas of this year.

Swedish game developer Resolution Interactive has posted another preview video of their forthcoming flight / action / sports hybrid Clusterball 2.

The new video offers a clearer look at the gameplay along with sound effects and music. The gameplay is described as follows:

Clusterball is a high-paced, adrenaline pumping flight sport demanding skill, tactics and ball control - designed as a first person shooter but without the splatter and gore. Played in midair with high tech aircraft, your objective is to gather and score as many balls as possible while trying your best to keep your opponents from doing the same. As your tail grows longer, your ship will gradually slow down, making you more vulnerable to attacks. Thus, each extra ball gathered involves a calculated risk.

The developers are planning on demoing the title at this week’s Games Convention in Leipzig Germany. No expected release date has been announced.

Apple released a 2.0.2 update to the iPhone and iPod Touch firmware tonight. The update is available through iTunes and provides “bug fixes”. Apple generally provides very few specific about each firmware update. There are no obvious new features in the latest firmware.

Apple last released a firmware update (2.0.1) just over two weeks ago.

After TouchArcade forum user ReformatPlanet pointed out a particularly polished new word game called Lexitron [$1.99, App Store], we sat down and went to work on evaluating this promising title. We quickly realized, however, that Lexitron was just one of several versions of the popular web-based TextTwist game.

TextTwist is a simple game where the player is given 6 jumbled letters and is expected to make as many words out of them as possible. The player is given the total number of possible words as well as the number of letters in each word. There’s no penalty for guessing but you are on a time-limit. Words can be anywhere from 3 to 6 letters long.

We found the following TextTwist clones in the App Store:

• Word Warp v1.01 [$0.99] - not recommended
• Muddled v1.0.1 [$1.99] - not recommended
• Word Whirl v2 [$2.99] - global high scores, multiplayer
• Sextuple Word Challenge v1.0.0.1 [$0.99] - best overall pick
• Lexitron v1.0[$1.99] - visually impressive, multiple languages

Read the rest of this entry »