One of my very favorite recent releases is the Out Run-inspired arcade racer Highway Runners ($0.99) from developer Brownieless Games. It launched amidst the madness of the holiday rush mid-December, and once that craziness had finally cleared and the new year was upon us I was just about to pull the trigger on a “Hey guys check this out!" kind of article about it. As luck would have it, though, our own Chris Carter came through with a full review right at that same time, which is far better than my own silly ramblings would be. At any rate, the word was out! And I was very happy about that. While most who have ventured into Highway Runners have loved it, two major requests have arisen pretty frequently. One was for touch controls, as the game originally launched as tilt-only, and the developers added in a wonderful touch option just prior to us posting our review. So that took care of that. The second major request was for native iPad support, and as of today that’s officially a thing with a new Universal update for Highway Runners.

With those two major sticking points taken care of, there are certainly some more minor issues to address that could take Highway Runners fully to the next level. For instance, not being able to input my own name in the high scores table is driving me nuts! It’s not a huge deal though, and overall Highway Runners is one of the best Out Run-style driving games on the App Store. First of all because it truly captures that “pleasure of driving" feel that was the basis for Yu Suzuki creating Out Run all those years ago, but it also does some really interesting things with the formula, like the ability to “graze" cars for extra points as well as collect coins to go towards purchasing new rearview mirror trinkets which offer up new ways to play the game. If you’re a fan of Out Run type games, you really can’t go wrong with Highway Runners for $1.99 with no IAP, and as of today that’s especially true for owners of iPads. Check it out, and check out the player impressions in our forums, too.