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A Roundup of Weekend App Store Sales

Posted on by Blake Patterson

It’s the weekend and that means sales. Here is a quick roundup of several stand-out offerings we think are worth a look.

• Aralon: Sword and Shadow HD — $9.99 → $4.99 [ review ]

Crescent Moon Games is, for a limited time, offering their superb iOS Universal RPG Aralon: Sword and Shadow HD at 50% its normal price. One of the most anticipated titles of 2010, the game gained the distinction of being TouchArcade Forum’s Game of the Year.

The story of Aralon follows a tale of betrayal and a Kingdom on the brink of collapse. As fate would have it, you are the key element to solving these problems and restoring The Kingdom of Aralon to its previous state of peace and harmony.

The real fun begins when you are let loose into the world of Aralon to explore and complete quests. The expansiveness and detail of the lands is jaw-dropping. There are main quests that pertain to the storyline as well as a number of side quests to complete, all of which are neatly tracked through a helpful quest log. During your exploits you will run into countless enemies roaming the land. There is just so much more to Aralon that it isn’t even funny, like joining guilds, combining and creating items, or becoming an outlaw

We gave the game five stars in our December review and consider it one of the most magnificent titles in the App Store and a must-have for any sort of RPG fan. Aralon: Sword and Shadow HD [App Store] puts a fully realized, living and breathing universe snugly in your pocket.

• Death Rally — $2.99 → $0.99 [ review ]

Remedy Entertainment’s gorgeous top-down Universal racer Death Rally is 66% off for the weekend.

Remedy, who brought us the likes of Max Payne and Alan Wake, took their first ever PC game (originally released in 1996) and brought it to the App Store in March. And we’re quite glad they did. This one got five stars in our in-depth review.

The thing that sets Death Rally apart from most racers is its focus on combat. Each vehicle is equipped with a standard machine gun and a second stronger weapon of your choosing. These weapons, along with the vehicles beyond the first one, are unlocked by collecting items spread along the track while you’re racing. Money is earned with every race you enter, with more money awarded based on what place you finish, how many cars you destroy, and other performance factors. Your winnings go towards upgrading the 5 available vehicles in the game in the areas of speed, handling, armor, and weapons.

Upgrading your cars and equipment is the real hook of Death Rally, and the combat is also very satisfying. There’s nothing better than blowing the snot out of the car ahead of you in order to surpass them and win a race at the last moment.

The highlight of Death Rally [App Store] is the fantastic visuals, with support for Retina Display devices and full screen anti-aliasing on the iPad 2. The levels are incredibly detailed, as are the vehicle models which display damage during the course of a race.

This is one not to be missed — sale or no.

• Plants vs. Zombies — $2.99 → $0.99 [ review ]

PopCap Games has dropped the price on their excellent simplified tower defense title, Plants vs. Zombies.

This is a game that just oozes character. Rather than placing defenses along a winding path, Plants vs. Zombies is an exercise in seeding your lawn in order to grow various armed plants in order to fend of an encroaching hoard of zombies.

Plants vs. Zombies [App Store] is absolutely loaded with high quality animations, excellent cartoonish zombies, and silly dialog between your neighbor/shopkeeper Crazy Dave and even notes from the zombies themselves. Throughout the game you’ll defend your front lawn during the day, at night, then defend your back yard which introduces water plants that can only be planted in your pool.

If you don’t have this one yet, now’s the time to get that taken care of.

• Baseball Superstars 2011 Pro — $4.99 → $0.99 [ review ]

In anticipation of the release of Baseball Superstars II, Gamevil has knocked 80% off of Baseball Superstars 2011 Pro [App Store].

If you’ve never heard of this game series, here’s the gist: Gamevil has made the perfect baseball game for those of us who normally don’t care at all about baseball games. Sports games typically don’t do too much for me, and the closer they get to the “simulation" side of the spectrum, the less I’m interested in them. Gamevil takes things to the complete opposite end of that scale with Baseball Superstars via the integration of equally ridiculous super batters and pitchers, RPG elements, and tons of items to boost the aspects of your player’s performance.

We love this one and now’s the time to grab it if you haven’t. Just be warned, once you get sucked in the game is almost impossible to put down. You’ll find yourself playing “just one more game" for hours.

Baseball Superstars 2010 [App Store] is also on sale, from $2.99 down to $0.99.

• Gameloft iPad Game Sale

For a limited time Gameloft has reduced the price of several iPad titles: