Hello everyone, and welcome to Tuesday! It’s time once again for our look back at the noteworthy updates of the last eight days. Yes, we took yesterday off. I’d like to say it was because of the July 4th, but regular readers know that I live in Japan. To tell the truth, the Olympic torch relay was passing through my town and I wanted to watch it with my family. Well, worry not. We’re here today, and we’ve got some good games for you to look at. Of course, you can keep an eye out for updates yourself 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!
Hearthstone, Free Ah, Hearthstone. Remember when this game was so popular that we were doing stories about it almost every day? That was many years ago now, but the game continues to grow over time. This latest update in part is seeding the upcoming United in Stormwind expansion, which you can now pre-purchase so you can be sure the store doesn’t run out before you get there. There’s also a significant update to Battlegrounds here, bringing back Darkmoon Prizes, new content, and some balance adjustments.
Man Vs. Missiles, Free The classic struggle, eh? Generally speaking, this one rarely ends well for Man. Maybe this time, though. In the latest update for Man Vs Missiles, the game celebrates that holiday from a couple days ago. You can buy a pack of five Flares in-game, but you have to use them within that game as they will not carry over. You also get 1000 free Coins, a USA-themed plane, and ten brand new levels to try out. That brings the total number of levels up to a nice round one hundred. Go forth and see if you can defy the odds, just as the Americans did that one time. You know the time. That one.
Star Traders: Frontiers, $6.99 This game could really be here every single week. I’m not exaggerating, I don’t think a week ever goes by without some kind of update to Star Traders: Frontiers. For variety’s sake, I don’t always include it, but please be aware: it’s always updating. It’s updating even as you read this. The latest update adds a new Nomadic Defender mission type, the new Mercantile Negotiation, an adjustment to crew behavior in mutiny conditions, and a number of bug fixes. Nothing absolutely game-changing by any means, but nice little cookies to nibble on. Yes. We like cookies.
Gangstar Vegas - Mafia action, Free I should probably check in on Gameloft’s games more often, but if I’m going to be really honest I have to admit that I sometimes forget that many of them are still active. Like hey, Gangstar Vegas is still getting pretty big updates. Who knew? Besides the many people still playing it, I suppose. The big news in this update is that you can now play as a female Gangstar. I’m surprised it took this long, but there you go. There’s a Portals event going on that is exactly what it sounds like. Aside from that stuff, there are some other UI adjustments and so on, but I’ll leave those to you to sort out.
Gardenscapes, Free Our obligatory free-to-play matching puzzle game update this time around is our old pal Gardenscapes. Only one Smash character slot left, and I am doing everything I can to campaign for Austin. He hasn’t been made a Mii Fighter costume yet, so I think the odds are good. Better than Dante’s, anyway. Right, this update. It’s setting up a couple of events for the month. Rodeo Season is the first one coming up, and it involves a mechanical bull. Oh boy! In the latter part of the month, there’s something involving Egyptian themes. I’d imagine that’s more the ancient Egypt stuff. Mummies and what-not. There’s a bit more of the core story added in here, and a new puzzle element in the form of Snails.
LEGO® Brawls, LEGO Brawls time. A new event is upon the game, this time involving an Alien Villainess. Is that her name? It’s all properly capitalized, so I can’t be sure. I’ll leave it like that just in case. Anyway, she kidnaps you and takes you to her Imperial Throneworld where you have to battle for her amusement. You’ll have some fancy tech at your disposal to help you do that, but do keep in mind you aren’t the only one that can use it. If you fail, you die. If you win? Assimilation! Yay! I guess this is the end of the game, and also the world. Well, it had a good run.
Spire Blast, Well, let’s look in on an Apple Arcade game that isn’t in the usual rotation. For funsies, you know. I like to mix it up around here now and then to keep you all awake. Orbital Knight’s Spire Blast is an enjoyable little puzzle game, and with this version there’s more of it to dig into. The new Skylands aerial world provides you with twenty-seven new levels to play. There’s a new Alchemist Shop where you can pick up some permanent upgrades. And perhaps most joyous of all, bug fixes! What? I know they aren’t the most exciting things, but I love them. Every bug fix saves someone’s day.
AFK Arena, Free Away From Keyboard Arena is apparently back to being the best RPG for busy you, and I guess that’s a good thing because ME AM VERY BUSY. As with most AFK Arena updates, there’s a new hero here in the form of the Dimensional Hero Merlin: Seer of Destiny. Also as usual, there’s a Bountiful Trials event to go with the new character. There are some new adventures, new artifacts, new campaign chapters, some UI adjustments, a bunch of balance tweaks, and those beautiful bug fixes. A standard update for this game, then. It’s just wild what qualifies as standard in this case, I think.
MARVEL Realm of Champions, Free Thors, friends. They are constantly turning up Unworthy these days. Which is, like, the one thing a Thor really needs to avoid being. Well, one particular Unworthy Thor is the focus of the latest event in Marvel Realm of Champions. He’s trying to earn his Mjolnir by going on a quest, which is as good a plan as any. In terms of new content, there’s a Transmog that allows you to swap the appearance of your gear, some new Odinforce and Unworthy gear sets for Thor, a new Wing Shield weapon for Hulk, and a few other bits and bobs. Some UI changes, balance adjustments, performance optimizations, and bug fixes round out our update Bingo card for this game.
MARVEL Future Fight, Free Hmm, can’t decide if this update is late or if they just wanted to hold it so that the ending of the show wouldn’t be spoiled. Well, at any rate, the latest update for Marvel Future Fight is based on the hit Disney Plus show The Falcon and The Winter Soldier. It introduces new uniforms for Sam Wilson, Winter Soldier, and Baron Zemo to correspond with their looks from the show. Sam’s final form, in this case. No Smiling Tiger outfit this time. There are also some new Tier-3 versions of Falcon and Taskmaster, plus a Potential Transcended version of Yelena Belova. You’ll know all about her very soon. In spite of a couple of episodes, I liked this show a lot. With that in mind, I will award this show with the coveted UMMSotW prize for this week.
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!
