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‘Prices’ Category Articles

Freebie Alert - 'Babylonian Twins HD' for the iPad

Monday, January 30th, 2012

Originally developed for the Amiga, Babylonian Twins [99¢/HD] never made it to market but found life nearly 17 years later on the App Store. This platformer that has you swapping between two different characters, each with different abilities, in order to solve the many puzzles and progress through the game. It's a lengthy and satisfying trip too, and currently you can grab the iPad version for free for the first time ever.

You can read our thoughts on this Babylonian Twins reboot in our full review, and you can learn even more about the amazing history behind the game finally being finished and released. To summarize: Babylonian Twins is an excellent game and it's practically a miracle that we're able to finally play it. Suffice to say, if you own an iPad and have even a passing interest in puzzle games or platformers, you should download Babylonian Twins HD while it's still free. For iPhone and iPod touch owners, you should also consider dropping the 99¢ for the small version if you don't have it already.

App Store Link: Babylonian Twins HD Premium, $1.99 (iPad Only)

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'RoboHero' Review – A Challenging Turn Based Puzzler

Friday, January 27th, 2012

I used to think I had a knack for strategy games. Then I checked out RoboHero [Free], a turn-based tank puzzler from Bravado Waffle Studios. Now, I’m not so sure if I have the chops to handle a game of this difficulty. While the game incorporates relatively simple (and slow) gameplay, this is buttressed by a wide variety of weapons and puzzles, along with a difficulty that’ll either keep you coming back for more or giving up in frustration.

RoboHero places you in the role of Blue Robo, the last defense for Earth in its fight against an evil robot army. As a last resort, you’re sent to the robot ship in order to infiltrate and destroy all the forces. As you progress through the game’s story mode, you’ll unlock new weapons and face new enemies and obstacles. However, the goal of the game is always to either get to the other side of the level or take out a certain amount of enemies.

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TouchArcade Rating:

'Batman Arkham City Lockdown' is On Sale for $2.99

Friday, January 27th, 2012

Last month, after basically zero pre-release hype, we were pretty surprised to see Batman Arkham City Lockdown [$2.99] pop up in the App Store. Perhaps even more surprising was that NetherRealm Studios, developer of the recent (and excellent) Mortal Kombat reboot on consoles, was behind the iOS title.

And, even more surprising still, Batman Arkham City Lockdown was actually pretty freaking awesome. It was built using the Unreal Engine, so the graphics were definitely up to snuff. And the gameplay took a tiny page out of the Infinity Blade handbook, having you face off against baddies in one-on-one battles using swipe controls to dish out the pain. The combat didn't quite have the complexity of an Infinity Blade, but it was fun nonetheless.

Now, Batman Arkham City Lockdown has just received its first ever sale, dropping from its normal $5.99 price point down to $2.99 for a limited time. If you're wondering if this is the game for you, then be sure to give our full review a read for some insight. Personally, I had a ton of fun with Arkham City Lockdown, and thought it was well worth its original price. For $2.99 I think it's a steal, especially if you're a fan of the Batman, as the developers have done a wonderful job of making the game feel like a fully realized Batman experience. Definitely check it out and take advantage of the sale while it lasts.

App Store Link: Batman Arkham City Lockdown, $5.99 (Universal)

'Greedy Penguins' Review - Finally, a Bird-Based Physics Puzzler

Friday, January 27th, 2012

Did you know that penguins spend up to 75% of their time underwater, looking for food in the ocean? Or, if Chillingo’s recent Greedy Penguins [99¢/Lite] is to be believed, they spend 85% of their time on ice floes, waiting for you to feed them, 10% of their time playing guitar and burping, and 5% of their time getting eaten by ravenous Orcas.

Greedy Penguins is a bird-centric physics puzzler (what a concept!) that revolves around you finding ways to get incredibly stressed-out fish in the mouths of the correspondingly-colored penguins. You tap the fish to drop it from its hook and get it rolling, then through a combination of timing and obstacle-clearing, get it to the right-colored penguin. Once your penguin is successfully fed, he coughs up ice cream, which you tap to feed each level’s companion and get bonus points when completing the level, garnering a one, two, or three-fish rating.

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TouchArcade Rating:

'Fingle' iPad Review - Better Finger Games Than Mind Games

Thursday, January 26th, 2012

Fingle [$0.99] should come with a warning. Maybe "Caution: always bring protection"? I mean, sure the iPad is great for co-op games with the fam, but not this time. This time, things might just get a little... heavy.

Finger twister isn't new, but Fingle is a finger twister game with one purpose: flirtation. A cheesy soundtrack, suggestive backdrops and more than a few double entendres might be enough, but Fingle doesn't settle for enough. Your fingers will stroke hers, or his. You'll make terribly lewd gestures at one another. Fingle takes its premise all the way.

Here's how you play the game: there are squares, and there are boxes, and the two must meet. Some are yellow, some are white. Your fingers rest on one set, hers on another. And then you do as you're told.

At first this is simple. Drag a box here, hold it there. Your fingers might brush up against one another. Then things heat up. One player finds himself stroking his hand over the other's. It gets pretty steamy.

Sort of, anyhow. There are a few rules you have to follow to get the full effect. You can't really play solo, for, um, obvious reasons, and you need to use one hand each. Two hands is easier, but it's a lot less fun. Stick to those rules, and one of you will basically end up in the other's lap before long if you want to pull off some of the moves.

So you can see why you don't want to play with a stranger, or your Grandma. You might also not want to play for too long. While Fingle starts out very flirty, it actually gets pretty hard over time. If one of you has small hands, long fingernails or sweaty palms, you might find it a bit out of your league. Nothing kills the mood quite so much as frustrated failure.

There are over 50 levels to work through, so as long as you know your limit you'll be fine. If you're actually playing to tease, work through the first level pack or two. It starts out slightly subtle and gets suggestive quickly. If you're playing for a challenge, something that's totally possible, work your way through all the rest. Fingle is missing a lot of the traditional game structures we're used to -- scores, points, achievements and the like -- but it's certainly a good time for two people who are comfortable with a little touching. The design that has gone into this game is truly charming, so it's hard to say no.

In all seriousness, you need to know your audience if you're going to play. You can definitely go at it platonically for a laugh, but first be sure you both know where you stand. And you could certainly make someone extremely uncomfortable if you're not at the point where cheesy 70s-style music, suggestive sound effects and light touching is okay. Fingle is the sort of game that could start out funny and end up sexy, or start out cold and end up with a slap to the face. Judge carefully, and stop by our discussion thread to let us know how it goes - just keep it work safe, tiger.

App Store Link: Fingle, $0.99 (iPad Only)

TouchArcade Rating:

'One Epic Game' Review - Stick a fork in "Epic," folks. It's done.

Thursday, January 26th, 2012

Way back in 2010 when Monster Dash [$0.99] was released it felt a tiny bit lacking. Not that it wasn't a fantastic game, but it could have used a little more depth. You know, upgrades to earn, a complex mission system, maybe eventual retina support?

Now there's no need to worry about any of that. Not because One Epic Game [$0.99] brings any of that to the table, mind, but because Jetpack Joyride [Free] came out a year later and blew its predecessor out of the water. So why is it we're still seeing retreads of an older, lesser product? Could it be, she wonders, because Grip Games forgot their own game's roots when bringing it back from PlayStation Minis?

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TouchArcade Rating:

Clever Interactive Comic 'Meanwhile for iOS' Drops to 99¢ as High-Res Update Hits

Thursday, January 26th, 2012

Alright, so even though Meanwhile for iOS [99¢] isn't normally what would come to mind when you think of iOS games, it's something that I bet most people out there aren't aware of. Also, if you're the kind of person who likes Choose Your Own Adventure style books like the variety of gamebooks we've posted about in the past, this will be right up your alley. Maybe you've got kids that like comic books, Meanwhile would be equally perfect in that situation.

I first heard about its physical book form, which is worth checking out just so you can see the clever way its all laid out. You make decisions in the comic book, then follow colored lines to the next panel you should be reading. The amount of decisions included is just silly, as the book boasts 3,856 different possibilities. The plot follows a kid named Jimmy who goes from deciding if he (or, you, as the reader) wants vanilla or chocolate ice cream to deciding the fate of the world after encountering mad scientists, time machines, robots, and tons more.

The comic is targeted at kids in grades 4-6, so if you're an adult looking for some hard-hitting plot points, you'll likely be disappointed. If, however, you're just into comic books and want to check out a really clever implementation of a Choose Your Own Adventure style comic, this is 99¢ you have to spend. The way they adapted the actual book to iOS devices is fantastic. I particularly enjoy how you still see irrelevant (to your particular story path) panels as you read through the comic, which really just makes you want to replay it over and over again to figure out how to get to something you saw that was particularly crazy.

It's on sale today only, due to an update landing which adds completely re-mastered high resolution art. So, don't wait too long or it'll be back up to $4.99.

App Store Link: Meanwhile for iOS, $4.99 (Universal)

'RAGE HD' Updated With New Levels, Better Models

Thursday, January 26th, 2012

Surprise! RAGE HD [$1.99], id Software's graphically off-the-walls tie-in shooter to RAGE, has been updated with two additional levels in a brand new update that also throws in higher resolution models, video output support, and various other enhancements and bug fixes. The house cleaning additions are free as always, but these levels, Kraken and Aqueduct, come at a cost: $.99, to be exact, via in-app purchase through the in-game Store.

We've spent a few minutes with each and can happily report that they are, indeed, levels that have been added to RAGE HD. One thing we didn't expect, though, is to be floored all over again by this game's look. Goodness, it's gorgeous. Get the same feeling below by glancing at some of the new levels:

App Store Link: RAGE HD, $1.99 (Universal)

'Paper Monsters' Review - A Straightforward and Visually Stunning Platformer

Thursday, January 26th, 2012

The just-released Paper Monsters [99¢], co-developed by Robots Vs Wizards and Crescent Moon Games, has been in the works for a long time. In fact, development originally began way back in mid-2010, and we didn’t learn until well into 2011 that Crescent Moon had actually jumped into the project to give it a graphical makeover (as they’ve been known to do from time to time).

With such a long development cycle, it’s easy for the hype over a game to do one of two things: either people start to lose interest as the months drag along, or the hype builds up to the kind of level that would be hard for any game to deliver on. Well, Paper Monsters finally has reached the App Store, so if you’re part of that first group then it’s time to start paying attention again.

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TouchArcade Rating:

'Epoch' Gets Hard Mode, More Story In New Content Update

Wednesday, January 25th, 2012

That Epoch [$.99] update that Uppercut Games teased on our show a couple of weeks back is on its way out and will be available at the generous price of $0, while the game itself is celebrating the new update by going on sale for $.99. That's dollars off, y'all -- the usual price is $4.99.

In brief, the update rolls in an "ultra difficulty" mode that introduces harder to kill dudes as well as "trickier enemy variants." It also adds some needed visual tweaks that show off your robot's armor and weaponry and introduces new story content via new in-game pick-ups. Uppercut has updated the game's trailer to reflect all of this, so check it out if you don't dig the word picture we're painting you. Lookin' good!

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'Triple Town' Updated and On Sale for $3.99

Wednesday, January 25th, 2012

Last week, Spry Fox released an iOS version of Triple Town [Free], their hugely popular match-3 town builder for the Amazon Kindle, and more recently for Google+ and Facebook. We really liked Triple Town in our review, and it’s personally been my biggest obsession of the past week. The ability to upgrade the game tiles by making matches and the limited amount of space to work within added a tremendous amount of depth to the gameplay far beyond your typical matching game.

Today the first update has hit for Triple Town, which mostly focuses on fixing bugs. Things like broken Game Center achievements, the inability to restart games sometimes, and tons of other quirks that come with a version 1.0 release have now been taken care of. The update description also goes on to say that there are several other known bugs that are currently in the process of being hunted down and fixed, one of which includes a problem with turns regenerating after exiting the app.

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'Star Warfare: Alien Invasion' Review - A Competent Shooter Hampered By Its Upgrade System

Wednesday, January 25th, 2012

Star Warfare: Alien Invasion [99¢] is a first-person arena-shooter from Freyr Games, which features wave after wave of relentless attacking alien creatures. The aliens emerge from holes in the wall and from underground, or come flying, bounding or waddling straight towards you from all sides. And once you've shot them, the next wave arrives immediately. It's almost as if you don't even need to explore, as the aliens will come straight for you.

The single player campaign includes five maps, each with six levels of increasing difficulty to unlock (30 levels in total). A progress bar indicates how many of the enemies have spawned and if you survive to the end, your reward is currency to spend in an in-game store. The sixth level of each map is a "survival" level.

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TouchArcade Rating:

Zynga Shamelessly Rips Off 'Tiny Tower' With Canadian Release of 'Dream Heights'

Tuesday, January 24th, 2012

Per the nearly standard operating procedure of "beta testing" wide-scale free to play titles, Canadians and "Canadians" can now get their hands on Zynga's latest iOS game, Dream Heights [Free]. It doesn't take more than a few quick glances at the screenshots and iTunes text to realize that Zynga has firmly focused their copy machines on NimbleBit's Tiny Tower [Free]. It's really incredibly just how blatant of a clone this is, as Zynga has gone far beyond just copying the premise of the game- They even directly lifted the restocking mechanics, elevator upgrades, UI elements, and more.

NimbleBit's Ian Marsh has taken to twitter with an image that perfectly exhibits just how shamelessly Zynga's "inspiration" is for this new free to play title of theirs with side by side screenshots and a hefty amount of trademarked NimbleBit snark.

Take a look:


(Click for full size, with many more comparisons.)

It'll be interesting to see how this all shakes out. Historically speaking, Apple has had a very hands-off approach to even the most blatant of clones on the App Store. But, we are talking their very own game of the year last year that's being mercilessly knocked-off here, by Zynga of all companies. I doubt much if anything will actually happen, but I'm not sure how Zynga couldn't stir up a hefty helping of bad blood amongst anyone who realizes that such a large company is lifting ideas straight from a three (3) man development studio.

We'll have to see how Dream Heights does once it eventually sees its worldwide release. The amusing (and sad, to be honest) part of all this is that per another tweet, Zynga once attempted to acquire NimbleBit. If you can't buy 'em, clone 'em?

Canadian App Store Link: Dream Heights, Free

Cooking Meets JRPG In 'Adventure Bar Story'

Tuesday, January 24th, 2012

Buckle up; Adventure Bar Story appears to be pretty radical. I just spent a good chunk of time with a pre-release build of the PSP port, and while I do have a reservation or two about its virtual controls, I couldn't be happier with the overall port job and its core play, which is satisfyingly genre-bending.

Imagine if your everyday 16-bit JRPG hooked up with a management sim. In Adventure Bar Story, you control a young girl attempting to save her bar from being stolen or bought out by a renowned and rival neighborhood restaurant. In order to prevent this, she'll need to learn how to cook, buy or gather ingredients in RPG-like zones complimented by random battles, assemble the ingredients into a dish, and then profit.

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'Order Up!! To Go' Review - Flipping Burgers Doesn't Seem So Bad

Tuesday, January 24th, 2012

Are your time-management titles missing the hands-on charm of cooking sims, and your cooking sims missing too much restaurant management? If so, you'll want to take a look at Order Up!! To Go [Free]. A combination between a time-management restaurant game and a touch-screen heavy cooking sim, Order Up is filled with great stuff: charming characters, varied locations, fun recipes and surprisingly decent voice acting, for starters.

Order Up!! was first released for Wii in 2008, and is due to come out soon for PS3 and 3DS at full retail price. I haven't played the console version of the game, but it sounds as though To Go is essentially the same game. For the mobile outing, Supervillian Studios has added advertisements, removable with IAP, and taken away certain goals to encourage players to purchase currency. Aside from that, it looks like everything else is intact. Intact, and downright entertaining.

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TouchArcade Rating:

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