Hello everyone, and welcome to the week! It’s time once again for our look back at the most noteworthy updates of the last seven days. Lots of good stuff to pick from, but I think I’ve found a bag of excellent updates we can mostly agree on. Of course, you can keep an eye out for updates yourself using AppShopper Social (Free), the watchlist in the TouchArcade App (Free), or by participating in the TouchArcade forums, but this weekly summary is here to fill in the things you might have missed. Let’s dig in!
Minecraft, $6.99 Minecraft got a relatively major update in the last week, adding the Marketplace to the game among other things. Also added were llamas, forest mansions, illagers, cartographers you can trade with for treasure maps, and shulker boxes. Concrete and glazed terracotta blocks are now in the game, and to top it all off, there’s a Skyrim mash-up pack available. Probably the least-buggy Skyrim experience ever!
King Rabbit - Classic, Free Do you love King Rabbit? Have you already finished off all of the levels introduced in the Emerald Collection? Well, worry not. There’s another pack of levels ready to go in the form of the Ruby Collection. Pick up the $1.99 IAP to get a whole bunch of tricky new levels to romp through. If the developer keeps at this long enough, we might one day see a Musgravite Collection. Let’s keep our fingers crossed.
Crazy Taxi Classic, Free What a mess this situation ended up being. Crazy Taxi got a nice update that brought it up to modern spec last week, but it also went free with ads. In the past, SEGA has been reliable for two things when this kind of thing happens. One, completely screwing up the messaging and initial delivery for previous paying customers. Two, eventually making it right, and that’s what happened this time. First it had ads, then it didn’t. Then it needed to be online, but now it doesn’t. In the end, if you bought the game before, you should be fine now. And if you didn’t, you can still IAP your way into the old paid set-up.
RayForce, $6.99 Taito seems to be taking a renewed interest in their mobile gaming line-up of late. The most recent effort sees the excellent shooter RayForce get its first update in almost a half-decade. In addition to major performance improvements, the game also supports MFi controllers and larger iPhone screen sizes. It also has a new music track courtesy of Shohei Tsuchiya from Zuntata. An update for RayStorm will follow in the lead-up to this summer’s launch of RayCrisis. That’s good enough for this week’s UMMSMotW award, I think!
Phoenix 2, Free Speaking of awesome updates to equally-awesome shoot-em-ups, here’s Phoenix 2 with some good stuff you’re sure to love. A classic ship from Phoenix HD, the Corsair, has been added to the game. It features a Rocket Pod, a Missile Swarm, and a Tracking Minigun in its arsenal. The old world of Ceres Major is the latest setting for blasting action, while those who fail and don’t want to continue can now hammer away at the screen to make the timer count down more quickly. There will be one more update of a similar size to this later this month, followed by the giant 3.0 update in July when the game hits its first anniversary. I don’t know about you, friends, but I’m looking forward to it!
Subway Surfers, Free Ah, Subway Surfers. Wherever I go, there you are. But also, wherever you go, there I am. With updates notes, that is. The Surfers are making their way through Peru this time around, so hop on your Tumi board and try to unlock the new Poncho outfit for Carlos. You can also get some nice rewards by collecting Inca statues, which are apparently just all over the place in South America? Not sure. I’m not really good about places where there’s no hockey.
Vainglory, Free You’re so Vainglory, you probably think this entry’s about you. Oh wait, it is. Um, some new skins! Good luck with those. Perhaps more importantly, a new feature called Talents have been added to the Brawl-flavored gameplay modes. These are special abilities that you can find and use to give yourself the edge in battle. I’m guess these unbalance the game quite a bit, because they’re not accessible in the classic MOBA modes of Vainglory. Do the thing you have to do, friends.
Hearthstone, Free Mmm, it’s one of those updates that has a bunch of things that I think players will appreciate but will be almost indecipherable to those who don’t play it. Deck importing! Golden card stacking in decklists! Being able to complete quests with friends all the time! A new card back! And much, much more! I can only guess at the significance of some of these things, because playing RPGs all the time means no time for card games like this one. But App Store reviews never lie, except when they do, and they say this update continues the game’s streak of being the bee’s pajamas.
Shooty Skies, Free Okay, so there seems to be some special daily missions now where you can get gold versions of existing pilots. They are gold so of course you have to covet them. On top of that, there are ten new pilots, six of which are standard and four of which are secret. They are secret so of course you have to covet them. Finally, there are new mission objectives, a new boss, some new terrain, and a new shield thing that you do not have to covet if you do not want.
Stickman Skate Battle, Free The latest Stickman sports game puts the familiar characters in a skate park to do their sticky, sporty thing. That… that sounds dirtier than I intended. Anyway, these games are always pretty popular, and this one seems to be no exception. The latest update adds some new skaters and boards to the mix, along with bug fixes and other improvements. Bacon in the pan!
The Sandbox Evolution, Free Another month sees another add-on for The Sandbox Evolution. For $2.99, you can pick up the Brainiac Pack, which apparently allows you to build some rather complex and advanced contraptions. The pack comes with seven new textures you can use to make your new stuff, and two new campaigns that will show you the ropes of using the Brainiac.
Real Racing 3, Free It’s time once again for Le Mans, where you can take a Mazda 787B to the track in an attempt to win fame and glory. This update also adds an improved Porsche 911 RSR that you can win in the Rennsport Redefined event, returning events from the past such as Scuderia Ferrari Championship and Retro Rivals, and some limited time series with sweet rides as the prizes. You could win the Jaguar XJR-9, the Porsche 962C, and Caterham Seven. You probably won’t, mind you. But you could. And that makes all the difference, apparently.
That about wraps it up for last week’s significant updates. I’m sure I’ve missed some, though, so please feel free to comment below and let everyone know if you think something should be mentioned. As usual, major updates will likely get their own news stories throughout this week, and I’ll be back next Monday to summarize and fill in the blanks. Have a great week!
