Hello everyone, and welcome to the week! It’s time once again for our look back at the noteworthy updates of the last seven days. As usual, lots of big and/or popular games got new content this week, along with a handful of less-frequently seen titles. I’ve gathered up a nice little bunch for you to scan over while you devour your Pop Tarts or Froot Loops or whatever the devil you kids are eating for breakfast these days. Of course, you can keep an eye out for updates yourself using AppShopper or by participating in the TouchArcade forums. This weekly summary is just here to fill you in on the things you might have missed. Let’s go for it!
Real Racing 3, Free Real Racing 3 has been around for a long while now. You can tell because this update touts itself as the fifth NASCAR update and the fourth year of returning to Daytona. New cars, of course! The NASCAR 2019 Chevy NASCAR, the Toyota NASCAR, and the Ford Mustang NASCAR all make the line-up. A limited time series gives you the chance to earn a 2017 Ferrari 812 Superfast, and the game celebrates its sixth birthday with a Time Trial Competition featuring the Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat. Still no Daytona song, though. C’mon EA, go hand SEGA a giant bag of money. It would be a better investment than Anthem.
Vainglory, Free Not going to lie, I’m genuinely surprised that Vainglory is still alive and getting content. The whole MOBA boom seems to have cooled off quite a bit, mobile gaming as esports has not taken off the way many hoped, and yet, Vainglory keeps on soldiering onward. This update has a new hero, San Feng, who uses martial arts in a very martial arts-like way. It also features new skins for Varya, Catherine, and Anka. Other than that, you’ve got a few balance tweaks, some UI improvements, and the requisite bug fixes.
Pokémon Duel, Free Ah, a Pokemon game for mobile that isn’t Pokemon GO. Certainly, such things do exist. And in the case of Pokemon Duel, such things get pretty chunky updates with lots of new stuff to mess around with. Now arriving in the game for the first time are Z-Moves, those wacky super-attacks that have trainers doing Power Ranger-esque arm chops and what-not. UX Necrozma and EX Celebi join the game, and some monthly point rewards have been added as well. Oh, and everyone gets a UX Pikachu who can bust out one of those fancy new Z-Moves. Not bad.
Disney Magic Kingdoms, Free I guess it’s the anniversary time of the year, because Disney Magic Kingdoms is also ringing the birthday bell. In its case, it’s three years old and still going strong, which is a pretty impressive achievement these days. Anyway, the latest event sees Tiana, Prince Naveen, and many others from The Princess and the Frog come to the Kingdom. Tiana also gets a Comfy Costume that you can pick up to add to her wardrobe. It’s good to see Disney acknowledging the last traditional animated film the company made. I really wish we’d see more, though.
Toon Blast, Free Oh hey, the requisite puzzle game update for this week. I’ve once again picked Toon Blast because the update notes at least give me something to riff off of. Let’s see what we’ve got this week. 50 new levels, yes that’s normal, some nonsense about skiing and snow, sure that’s topical for a good chunk of the world, and… and that’s it. Hm. Well, I guess I’ll at least give the game credit for making me imagine a bear trying to ski. Ha, that’s precious. Keep on trying, growly boy.
Guns of Glory: Lost Island, Free This game makes a ton of money but if you just went by its reviews you would think it was the most hated thing in the world. I don’t know. I am a simple man who is interested in neither guns nor glory, friends. But if you are different and like one or both of those things, you might be interested in this new update. It adds a new hero and some new challenges in the Royal Expeditions. It also makes a bunch of optimizations, improvements, and fixes. None of this will stop the bad reviews, I suspect. But it will probably keep the money flowing.
Golf Clash, Free This is another very, very popular game that makes a ton of money. Games like that are usually either stupidly complicated or stupidly simple. This is mostly the latter, but hey, not like anyone is properly stepping up on the golf game beat on mobile. This update doesn’t have a lot of excitement to it, but whatever, it’s golf. What do you want, clowns? This isn’t Hot Shots. No, you’ll take your shareable tournament scorecards, adjustments to the profile screen, UI adjustments, and performance improvements, and you’ll like them. Don’t make me take away dessert.
Fortnite, Free Is Fortnite cooling off? It kind of feels that way. But since the hot new games aren’t on mobile yet and Fortnite is, I suspect it will still have good times ahead of it around this neck of the woods. This update gives a free Season 8 Battle Pass to anyone who completes 13 free Overtime Challenges before February 27th. Nice. There’s a new Cobalt pack in the store for the buying types of players, and plenty of fixes and improvements for all types of players. There are also environmental campfires that let you chill out and heal with your chums. Maybe tell some scary stories?
Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, $4.99 Vice City is more than 16 years old. Just unreal to think about it. I remember when the game first released. Unlike GTA 3, which kind of surprised a lot of people, everyone knew Vice City was going to be huge. It was just a tremendous event, and if nothing else, I certainly didn’t mind the music that was blaring all over the place during its launch. Flock of Seagulls was cool again for, like, two minutes. What a time. If you want to relive those old days, sans a few music tracks of course, you can dig into the newly-updated GTA Vice City, which now has full-screen support for iPhone X/XS and iPad Pro. The developer also squished a few bugs while they were at it.
Star Traders: Frontiers, $6.99 This game. This game, friends. Ugh, it’s so good it practically hurts. I hope you all bought it. And like other Trese Brothers games, the post-release support is significant and frequent. The latest update adds a new option to skip animations in order to speed up gameplay, which is great. It also adds new talents, makes a bunch of game balance and difficulty adjustments, and smashes some of those pesky bugs. Such a great, great game. I will give it a lovely coveted UMMSotW award to show my appreciation.
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!
