EA's Need for Speed [App Store] racing game has finally made it into the App Store after months of delays, and the question on everyone's mind is... was it worth the wait? I don't think we can answer that question this early on, but here are some first impressions.

As with most EA games, the production quality of Need for Speed is top notch. The game includes cut scenes with real actors and a smuggling story line to drive the action forward. When you first launch the game, it nicely throws you straight into the tutorial mode to get you used to the game's controls. Tilt steering is offered with auto-acceleration. The game's controls seemed well tuned and natural to me on initial play, but some players won't like the fact there are no calibration settings offered. The game also includes a few other gesture-based actions including braking (tap), nitro (swipe up), and speedbreaker (swipe down).

The game is very much an "arcade" racer that feels a lot like I-Play/Firemint's Fast and Furious racing game. The game puts you into very specific racing tasks such as Highway Battle, Sprint and Cop Takeout. The embedded gameplay video shows a bit of a standard street race as well as Cop Takeout -- which requires you to take out a number of cops without getting caught.

Screenshot by qasim

Car enthusiasts will enjoy the fact that you can play in one of 20 of real-world cars such as the Porsche Carrera GT, Lamborghini Gallardo and many more. Money earned from individual races (there are 24 missions) can be used to buy new cards and upgrade features on existing cars. Aside from performance enhancements you can also upgrade the appearance of the cars with different wheels, paint jobs, spoilers, etc.

[ Full HD version | Low Bandwidth version ]

The game looks, sounds and feels great and most early impressions have been positive. Those hoping for a more authentic racing or free-roaming experience, however, may not like what they get. We'll spend some more time with the title and provide a full review in time.

Additional notes and impressions by our forum members: Screenshots by RaZrVIN and qasim, Impressions from slickninja, Rylin, dannys95, Auhron.

App Store Link: Need for Speed Undercover, $9.99

EA's long awaited Need for Speed racing game is now available in the App Store [link] for $9.99.

Feature list includes:

• Innovative touch controls activate tilt control steering and power boosters for a faster, tighter ride!
• Drive 20 of the world’s fastest and hottest cars!
• Realistic 3D graphics and sweeping camera angles intensify the ride.
• Engage in 24 covert ventures that lead to intricate secret missions.
• Choose 8 high-impact race modes: Highway Battle, Sprint, and Cop Takeout.
• Earn performance upgrades: Boost, Speed, Acceleration and Handling.
• Customize your vehicle with aftermarket spoilers, wheels, body kits, and paint schemes.
• Receive instructions through realistic, full-motion cinematics.

We'll provide a gameplay video and first impressions shortly.

App Store Link: Need for Speed Undercover, $9.99

LabPixie's Flood-It! [App Store] is a free ad-supported game that can offer you a surprisingly fun challenge.

The developer summarizes the gameplay:

Flood It! is a simple yet addictive strategy game in which you have to flood the whole game board with one color in less than the allowed steps. You start from the top left corner and progress by selecting one of the colored balls on the left. When you change your current area color, every adjacent square with the same color also changes, that way you can flood other areas on the board. Select from 3 sizes of the board and try to flood-it in the least amount of steps!

The basic game, of course, has been done before in Flash as well as in the App Store, but this is a free and well implemented version of the game.

App Store Link: Flood-It!, Free

EA released some of the first screenshots from the upcoming 'Sims 3' game for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

The #1 PC game franchise of all time comes to today's hottest gaming platform! The Sims 3 brings exciting new gameplay and endless possibilities all on your iPhone! Enjoy unexpected moments of surprise and mischief, as you choose whether (or not!) to fulfill your Sims' destinies and make their wishes come true. Create and customize your Sims appearance and personality, then take your Sims out of the house and into the neighborhood with all new open world gameplay. Make their world your own!

EA provides the following list of features to be found in the game:

• Over 10 hours of gameplay filled with hysterical antics and unexpected moments of surprise
• New beautiful 3D visuals
• Support for iPhone specific controls (touch and accelerometer)
• Explore an ever-changing neighborhood with new open world gameplay
• Enjoy smarter Sims with deeper personalities, wishes and goals
• Create your own Sim, complete with different hair styles, clothes, personalities and more
• Keep your Sims busy with 4 fun mini-games including fishing, gardening, cooking, and house repairs
• Develop complex relationships with other Sims as you fall in love, make friends or rebel against the neighborhood

No new word on release date, but we'll let you know when we hear.

Sims 3 was also briefly demoed (YouTube) at Apple's iPhone 3.0 Preview event.

Paramount released the Freeverse-developed aerial shooter Top Gun [App Store] for the iPhone and iPod Touch tonight. The game is, of course, based on the 1986 movie starring Tom Cruise.

You take the role of an Navy training recruit in the Top Gun flying ace program. In the game, movie main characters Maverick and Iceman are instructors who lead the trainee through various flying scenarios, offering cutscene advice in a manner similar to the company's Days of Thunder.

Defend the skies in the most authentic first person jet shooter game on the iPhone and iPod Touch! Attempt to become one of the few to survive the “Highway to the Danger Zone”! Shoot down enemy jets, dodge incoming air-to-air and surface-to-air missiles, navigate dangerous environments and obliterate the enemy's air power.

Features listed by the developer include:

• Strap Yourself In – And scream through the skies in either an F-22 Raptor or a B-2 Spirit Stealth Bomber.
• Torch Your Enemy With Heavy Firepower – Fire target-locking missiles or strafe enemy positions and aircraft with Vulcan cannons.
• Avoid The Danger Zone – Incoming air-to-air and surface-to-air missiles as well as aerial and ground-based obstacles create multiple "Danger Zones" that must be avoided.
• Progress Through 10 In-Depth Missions – In a variety of environments, including oceans, deserts, canyons and city centers.
• Earn Medals and Achievements – While progressing through each mission.
• Blast To The Beat – Fly and battle to “Danger Zone” and other hard-hitting tracks.
• Classified Files Inside – featuring unlockable content and Easter eggs.

This video was shot during GDC and shows Freeverse talking through the features and gameplay:

App Store Link: Top Gun, $1.99

A few days ago we were invited by ngmoco:) to enter a competition against several other gaming sites by playing an early release of their highly anticipated tower defense game, Star Defense.

The rules are simple: ngmoco:) posts a challenge in the morning, we all survive as many rounds as we can, then post our high scores on Twitter. Each day the highest scoring competitors advance, and whoever does the best by Friday will be the Star Defense champion!

(To keep track on my progress as I represent Touch Arcade in the Mayday! Twitter Challenge, follow @hodapp. If you want to see how I'm comparing against other people competing, either check out the #StarDefense hash tag, or go to the ngmoco:) Star Defense site and click the "Mayday! Twitter Challenge" link.)

If you've already been following my Twitter feed, you've no doubt noticed I've been playing most of the day and I really like what I've seen so far. Star Defense takes the tried and true tower defense genre that many iPhone gamers have come to love and mixes things up by having your enemies path along a 3D sphere.

I'll admit, when I saw the first videos, I was undecided as to whether or not this would turn out to be an amazing gameplay element or merely a gimmick. But after already losing track of how many games I've played, I can safely say that it's going to be very hard to go back to my former non-3D tower defense favorites.

The camera controls are remarkably intuitive, and anyone familiar with the classic iPhone gestures will be right at home without any kind of tutorial. Everything works exactly how you would expect, complete with inward and outward pinching gestures to zoom, using two fingers to rotate, and dragging your finger to pan the camera. Your array of towers to choose from lines the right side of the screen, and the left side displays information about the current wave of enemies as well as how long until the next wave emerges.

Like most games in the genre, Star Defense features different damage types from each tower, such as the "Neo-Plasma Blaster" setting enemies on fire and the "Phase Coil" inflicting electrical damage. As you progress through the waves of enemies, you eventually encounter some that are resistant to certain types of damage. While it may seem like a good idea to amass "Gauss Turrets" since they're so cheap and seemingly effective early on, heavily armored enemies will later walk right by them without breaking a sweat.

The tower types and the variety of enemies, while being pretty cool, aren't what make Star Defense what it is. The 3D viewpoint, and only ever being able to see half of the world you're defending at a time, creates an amazingly hectic and fast paced experience. Between zooming in to precisely place towers and manage upgrades, and zooming out and quickly panning the camera around to see if any enemies got by your existing defenses, you rarely have a chance to rest between waves.

I'm really blown away with Star Defense, and what I've seen so far is only a fraction of what the complete game is going to be. This early build is not a full release and only allows access to the designated challenge levels. With any luck, I'll fare pretty well in the tournament. I'm currently holding the highest score having survived 49 rounds, with the second best only coming in at 34.

With a little refinement to my defense strategies, I think I stand a good chance at bringing home fame and fortune to Touch Arcade! Wish me luck!

BeatRider is an upcoming iPhone and iPod Touch rhythm game (like DDR or Tap Tap Revenge) that actually allows you to use your own MP3s.

The app accomplishes this by allowing you to upload your music to their servers. You can then play these songs from within the game, itself. The reason for the convoluted process is that existing App Store apps can not directly access your music library. As a result, the server upload is their solution to this issue.

The announced iPhone 3.0 firmware reportedly does allow access to your iPhone's music library so this may not be an issue in the future.

The developers have posted this video which shows the game in action, and walks through the uploading process. Note, we started the video at the beginning of actual gameplay, if you would like to see the upload process, rewind the video.

Once you get past the uploading demonstration, the game itself actually looks quite nice. The game has been submitted to the App Store and is awaiting approval.

FORMation Alliance seems to be carving out quite an interesting niche for themselves with their "Games for Creatives" series. We previously looked at their KERN [App Store] game which we described as a typographer's dream (or nightmare).

KERN's gameplay involved properly aligning a letter into its proper place in a specific word or font. The game generated a lot of interest amongst a certain audience.

Two other games from the same developer might appeal to the same individuals.

EYE vs EYE

This one has been around for a while but focuses on color recognition in head-to-head competition. You are briefly shown a color and your job is to try to match that color as accurate as possible using red, green, and blue sliders.

EYE vs. EYE Is an intense color-matching duel that pits you against an opponent in a race of color accuracy. Challenge all comers and build your reputation for chromatic perfection.

The focus seems to be on 2-player simultaneous mode but solo practice mode is also available. Watch the embedded gameplay video (right) to see it in action.

App Store Link: EYE vs EYE, $0.99

PRESS CHECK

The latest release in the "Games for Creatives" is PRESS CHECK. This app replicates printing plate alignment tasks but with accuracy and speed rankings.

PRESS CHECK is a designer ode to the old-school art of print plate alignment re-imagined as a challenge of speed and accuracy on your iPhone/iPod Touch. Show off your non-digital skills with levels ranging from the beginner 2-color set-ups to the expert 5-color jobs.

This game also offers a global leaderboard so you can compare your scores against others who share your strange idea of fun. See the embedded video (right).

App Store Link: PRESS CHECK, $1.99

I generally don’t like tap-to-shoot games because I've found little satisfaction in the ones I’ve tried... until I came across WWII Alone [App Store]. This crazy and addicting game caught me by surprise in terms of the fun and downright entertaining gameplay, and those that aspire to develop future tap-to-shoot games should look at WWII Alone and how its structured.

Set in WWII, you’re a lone soldier that must battle through six missions filled with a barrage of enemy troops and attack vehicles with three boss battles mixed in. The objective of the game is to clear the missions and earn money to upgrade weapons with WWII Alone’s perk system. Visually, the devs have created an effective layout that allows the player to take full advantage of the chaos that occurs in the game.

Available perks (or upgrades) include additional grenades, life, machine gun and rifle damage, and shooting distance. The game keeps a running tally of the money earned even in failed missions so you will gradually add to your total. Part of the replayability with WWII Alone is that you can go back to previously completed missions and earn additional money there as well as improving your time.

In terms of controls, everything is done by touch, and they are very responsive. Simply tap the target to shoot, and tap along the bottom of the screen to move your soldier left to right. Everything in the screen can be destroyed so buildings, planes and submarines are fair game.

WWII Alone is done well because the devs paid attention to the details. While the game could use additional levels, the graphics are done well, and the perk system offers a good incentive for replayability. The game is entertaining in both short and more engaging gaming sessions, and you’ll find it offers really does offer addictive gameplay. It’s definitely one that I hope rises above the noise of the iTunes store.

App Store Link: WWII Alone, $0.99

This review was written by Big Albie, a guest contributor at TouchArcade. Big Albie is a regular on our forums who provides the community his first impressions on many of the new games being released in the App Store. Slightly more in-depth notes on this game can be found here.

Last week we reported that news of an upcoming iPhone installment of Mass Effect had surfaced.  We pointed to a Joystiq story indicating that one of their readers had taken a survey containing questions concerning an upcoming iPhone version of the popular console action role-playing series.

It turns out that BioWare was preparing to announce the title, but one of the testers in a focus testing group broke the NDA and word got out earlier than planned.  In an effort to dispell rumors and clarify the somewhat vague information surrounding the game, BioWare's Chris Priestly, forum Community Coordinator, posted a few details in the company's forums.

1 - Yes, this is not a hoax or fake story. BioWare is making a game for the iPhone and iPod Touch based in the Mass Effect universe.

2 - We were going to announce this, but one of the testers at a focus testing group broke the NDA (non-disclosure agreement) and things were revealed before we had the chance.

3 - The game is going to be available for the iPhone AND the iPod Touch.

4 - The story of the game is not a "bridging" story between Mass Effect 1 and Mass Effect 2. It is a cool little side-story about one of the upcoming Mass Effect 2 characters. It is not "required reading" to enjoy the core trilogy, but if a fun optional "extra" game.

5 - The development on this game is being done by a separate, dedicated team with no connection to any Mass Effect DLC development or patches so this is not "the reason there hasn’t been new DLC or patches".

6 - BioWare and the Mass Effect team want to branch out in a number of ways with the ME universe, and this is just one example of such branching out. We think the iPhone and iPod Touch are exciting new platforms for games, and this game was designed for these platforms from the ground up.

7 - More information about the this game is coming later this month. None of the info that was leaked is ‘official’ by any means – it was research. We'll have much more information in the future.

Priestly indicates that much more information on this upcoming iPhone title will be coming soon.  We'll bring further details on this as they surface.

[ thanks killercow ]

A few of days ago we posted our first impressions of Tiger Woods PGA Tour [App Store] from Electronic Arts.  Since then, we've spent more time putting around this latest installment in EA's 11 year old golf franchise and can provide further reactions.

As mentioned in our previous post, Tiger Woods PGA Tour is a golf game of the realistic, simulation sort as opposed to the more casual golf titles, such as one can readily find on the Nintendo Wii platform.  If realism, as opposed to bouncy music, rainbow colors, and enlarged heads is your thing, then you're in EA's target audience on this one.  (And that's not to say that the more festive variety of golf titles are to be discounted -- we love Gameloft's Let's Golf, for instance.)

Tiger Woods PGA Tour lets you create your own players and customize them through attributes such as sex, skin color, and color and style of attire.  The game tracks deep performance statistics and course records for each player, which can be browsed in the Options area.  In the game's Play Now mode, you can choose to take the role of any of your own characters, or to choose from the on-board big names: Tiger Woods (surprise!), Vijay Singh, Retief Goosen, or Annika Sorenstam.  In this mode, up to four players (you and three AI opponents) compete for top spot on the leaderboard.  There is also a PGA Tour mode where your character strives to emerge the best of the best.

Gameplay takes place across seven of the most famous PGA courses in the world -- 120 holes in all: Pebble Beach, St. Andrews, TPC Sawgrass, The K Club, Doral, Fancourt, and TPC Boston.  The various courses, naturally, each have their own, distinct layout and also feature a variety of weather settings, as indicated by the nice looking, animated cloud systems in the sky.

While the courses, as rendered, well convey a "large" feel to the simulated golf experience, the polygon count and texture quality of the various flora, as well as the character models, are rather low.  This was clearly a decision made in order to allow for the impressive framerate and smooth animation (as tested on an iPhone 3G and 2G iPod touch) that adds so greatly to the game's realistic feel.  The end result is a game with nice looking visuals and a quality of motion that is suggestive of a sports TV network rather than a typical mobile golf game, even if the most intricate 3D rendering ever seen on the iPhone is not to be found here.

Another positive aspect of the game is the audio.  The whole presentation here shines with big studio polish.  The ambient "course sounds" (wind, realistic ball thud, etc.) convey a nice sense of being out on the fairway.  Adding to this, and again bringing to mind a TV sports network, is the voiceover commentary from former pro golfer Sam Torrance and The Golf Channel's Kelly Tilghman.  The interplay and appropriate placement of the many quips from both commentators is well done and adds quite nicely to the game.  It's worth noting that in-game commentary can be harsh and, frankly, annoying when you are just learning the game, however, now that I've hit my stride, I feel that Kelly, Sam, and I are becoming close friends."  If it's too much to bare, the commentary can be optionally disabled.

One of the most notable features of the game is its swing system.  Golf games on the iPhone, like any other platform, offer widely varying methods of simulating the act of swinging a club to drive the ball down the course.  Getting it "right" is a tall order.  I consider TW's innovative swing system to be the best I've seen on any golf game.  The game presents an onscreen swing meter that's graded with an ascending, marked distance scale.  To swing, the player drags the golf ball at the top of the swing meter downwards to the desired distance marker (the backswing), and then slides it back up through the top of the meter to deliver the swing.  Keeping the golf ball centered on the swing meter during the sliding process delivers a straight and true swing, while adding a bit of curve to the left or right while sliding lends a degree of fade or draw to the ball.  It gives a much more "involved" feeling to the swing process than the standard multi-tap/click scenario and is the most satisfying arrangement I've encountered.  (And, while PC versions of the Tiger Woods franchise offer similar, mouse-based controls, swiping the screen directly takes the mechanic to, really, another level.)  Once the ball is in the air, a ball icon appears at the bottom of the screen.  Swiping the icon repeatedly in any direction adds English to the ball to affect its behavior upon landing.

Well executed actions on the course result in a cash prize accumulation.  The money can be used to take part in PGA events and to enhance various aspects of your player's game in the Equipment section. The prize cash can be used to enhance Power, Power Boost, Drive Control, Impact, Approach, Putting, Recovery, and Spin.

See our extended gameplay video (taken since our "first impressions" post):

[ Full HD version | Low Bandwidth version ]

I am not, in real life, a golf player.  As such, I'm pretty open as far as what makes for a fun game of golf on a computer.  And so, I enjoy playing a few rounds of most any quality golf game.  My favorite of late has been Gameloft's Let's Golf.  How does Tiger Woods PGA Tour compare on my list?  It's, in my opinion, a pretty close call, with a slight lean towards Tiger Woods PGA Tour because of its uncommonly solid swing system.  It would seem that any true golf fan who spends actual time on a fairway will find the realistic Tiger Woods PGA Tour to be a most satisfying mobile golf game, worth the price of admission.

We've come a long way since Mean 18...

Glu Mobile's (foot) racing / acrobatic game Cops and Robbers [App Store], has gone live in the App Store.

Cops and Robbers involves running through a series of city levels that have a Crash Bandicoot feel and involve parkour-like moves, while collecting diamonds to pay the landlord.

Features listed by the developer:

• Run and rob your way through a beautiful city filled with back alleys, high rise rooftops, and other dangerous environments
• Complete 9 unique levels, each with 3 challenges: Grab all the loot, Steal the diamond, Evade the cops before time runs out!
• Find the most direct path to escape the cops by pulling off well-timed acrobatic running moves
• After you beat each level play as the policeman and try to catch the ghost of your former criminal self.
• Change the appearance of the playable male and female robbers.
• Steal the diamond by cracking the safe in a lock-picking mini-game.

We spent some time with the game at GDC 2009 and found it to be a rather solid looking title and were impressed by its unique role-switching ghost mechanic (mentioned above).

See our video of a development build of the game in action. (Due to the loud ambient noise, we simply muted the audio. The game, of course, has appropriate sound effects.)

[ Full HD version | Low Bandwidth version ]

We'll post a closer look at Cops and Robbers, shortly.  Stay tuned.

App Store Link: Cops and Robbers, $2.99

We first reported on Cyan's iPhone Myst port back in August of last year. The game was released to the App Store tonight for $5.99. [link]

For those not familiar with Myst, the game was first published for the Mac in 1993 and was both a critical and commercial success. While technologically rather simple from today's standpoint (mostly static images), the game's graphics and soundtrack were remarkably immersive. The game starts you on a strange island where you must explore your surroundings, solve puzzles and figure out the backstory.

The interface is entirely point-and-click driven. Switches, clues and other hints are explored by tapping on interesting items on the screen. There are also many puzzle elements that must be solved in order to complete the game.

I've included a video of the iPhone version of the game. Rather than going straight to the gameplay itself, however, I've started the video at launch, as the Cyan logo animation itself brought back many a memory. Video of the game itself starts around 2 minutes 25 seconds in. (Note that subsequent launches bring you straight into the game.)

The game naturally uses the touch-screen as the interface which seems perfect for the game. Back in the day, simple mouse clicks were all that was required to play.

It's hard to predict what gamers without any Myst background will think of the game, but I'd like to think the iPhone version of the game will breath new life and interest into this ground-breaking game. A 1994 Wired article describes the phenomenon:

The reason for all the success was stunning in its simplicity: Myst was good. Myst was better than anything anyone had ever seen. Myst was beautiful, complicated, emotional, dark, intelligent, absorbing. It was the only thing like itself; it had invented its own category.

Note that the game is 727MB in size due to all the artwork, video and sound effects.

Perhaps of interest to Myst veterans as well as those new to the game is Cyan's "Making of Myst" video, which was part of the 1993 CD-ROM release. See the 13-minute video in two parts: part 1, part 2.

App Store Link: Myst, $5.99

First Star Software and Chillingo have released the first screenshots of Boulder Dash for the iPhone. This classic game includes all 80 levels of the original as well as 4 additional bonus levels.

We were big fans of the 1984 original title, which I first played on an Apple //c. First Star Software has re-engineered Boulder Dash for the iPhone and iPod Touch to make use of "multi-touch; ‘pinch’ zoom; the ability to switch between portrait and landscape modes on the fly".

The major hurdle for this game to make it to the iPhone is one of controls. Past iPhone Boulder Dash clones have failed to successfully make this transition. In the original version, quick joystick control was required to navigate some of the more complicated mazes. First Star Software has chosen to go with a variety of control options to accommodate different players.

There are two virtual pad controls and one swipe control. Virtual control pads offer the up/down/left/right buttons in a standard plus-sign configuration (screenshot) or divided (screenshot) into separate up/down or left/right controls. Meanwhile, the swipe controls allow you to swipe anywhere in the direction you want to go. Swiping and holding allows you to continue moving in that direction.

As shown in the screenshots below, the game offers both portrait and landscape configurations by turning your iPhone as well as different zoom levels through pinch gestures. We've been given a preview copy of the game and found the virtual pad controls to be surprisingly functional -- allaying one of our biggest fears for this port. Many other iPhone ports have suffered from poor virtual button mapping resulting in a poor experience. We'll provide a much closer look at the game once the game is released (which should be soon).

Independent developer Elecorn's third person shooter Caster has made its appearance on the App Store. The game comes with both a full version [$4.99] and a lite version [Free].

The game has been a project of his since college and has taken him just over five years to release. It finally came out in January of this year for PC and Mac and seems to have gotten positive reviews.

Caster involves running, jumping and shooting your way around the environments while collecting energy balls and destroying enemies. The game includes deformable landscapes as well as an upgrade system for movement and weapons.

Features listed by the developer include:

• Use Natural and Intuitive Controls!
• Listen to Pulse Pounding Music by Trance Emerson (www.tranceemerson.com)
• Dash across 15 Scenic Landscapes!
• Destroy enemy Flanx and cause Massive Terrain Deformation using 6 Unique Attacks!
• Heal the infected land and Bring Trees Back to Life!
• Upgrade your abilities to become an ALL POWERFUL HARBINGER OF LIFE AND DESTRUCTION.
• Play at 3 difficulty levels, Casual, Normal, and EXTREME!

This developer gameplay video shows the action and controls:

With a free lite version available, there's no reason not to try this impressive looking title.

Update: First impressions from TouchArcade's Big Albie:

When I look at Caster, I can’t believe that one independent developer accomplished all this. Caster is the epitome of what a 3D game with full 360 degree movement should be on a mobile device. From the visuals to the controls, this game is spot on, and you’ll find the gameplay requires every bit of your strategic prowess.

App Store Link: Caster, $4.99, Caster Lite, Free