The Appcast #34: September 20, 2009 – Double the Apps

This week’s show: Double Your Fun. We take a double-dip into the newest applications released in the past week.

You can find the full show notes below the cut. Episodes can be downloaded by clicking the Episodes tab above.

Intro Music: Borderline D.U. Mix  from Mixter Two – I Don’t Know What I’m Doing by Brad Sucks.

Show Outline:

1. Introductions
2. Google Sync is here!
3. New Apps for the Week
4. Core Topic: Even More New Apps for the Week

New Apps Discussed on September 20, 2009:

1. Aera – $2.99 – A great-looking blend of flight simulator and arcade-action. You control a plane in flight on a 2.5D view. So the plane is still headed only backwards or forwards, but you feel like there’s more range of direction. Controls are tilt-based and the were a bit too sensitive for me. This could have just been because I was playing on the train, so I recommend you find a more stable play environment. Otherwise, it looked great, there was a good sense of flight and the challenges were basic from collecting balloons to shooting down enemies. There’s some great range of flips and loop-di-loops to give the player a crazy sensation. I’d also like to note the game has a great “reversal” element it adds to let you instantly retry if you die.
2. geoDefense Swarm – $0.99 – An excellent Tower Defense game involving mazing on a grid (imagine both Fieldrunners and 7 Cities). There’s 30 levels, each with different difficulty as well as endless levels where you just see how far you can go. There’s also OpenFeint capability for standardized online leaderboards and great retro vector-graphics look to it. Solid and recommended for the price.
3. Castle Warriors – $0.99 – Galcon is going to meet it’s match. Well, not yet, but Castle Warriors is a take on the same attack-defend quick-RTS gameplay. You control a castle and can send out half your men in order to take over more castles or attack enemy castles. You’re in it for the land-grab though. Each level is a series of days and the more castles you occupy by the end of the day, the more reinforcements you have for the next day. Simple, fun, quick, and addicting, Castle Warriors was a great experience and I really enjoyed the look and presentation of the game’s campaign. Hopefully we see some multiplayer in the future.
4. Mahjong Fishing - $1.99 – A disappointment for Bob, this Mahjong-based fishing game is just a bit too confusing and difficult to really make much of an impact. It’s an interesting twist, but it doesn’t do much in the fun department.
5. Let’s Tap: Tap Runner - $3.99 – Based on one of the minigames in the Wii’s Let’s Tap, this is a simple runner-racing game in which you tap on the iPhone to quicken the pace of your runner or do a hard tap to make him jump over obstacles. There’s also the Wii tapping in which you place your iPhone on a surface and you tap the surface as the controller, which I thought was very neat, but also disappointing because the tapping controls (despite me adjusting tap strength on the settings) just never worked out for me with the surface method. Pricey at $4, but this was the best of the games from the Wii’s Let’s Tap.
6. iTookOff – Free – Track your vacation days so that you know when and why you were out of the office several months back. Configure your sick and vacation day allotments to reset every year or carry over for the next year. Handy and simple.
7. iBlast Moki – $1.99 – A simple puzzle game in which you plant bombs and try to use the explosions to guide a blob to the exit of the level. Part platformer, part puzzler, this is a great physics-based game that involves a lot of trial-and-error as well as a good deal of thought in the later levels. Time-based trophies and collectible medals ensure there’s a decent amount of replay for completists.
8. Army of Darkness Soundboard, Free – The official soundboard for the film. Thus, the sounds are presented without the usual movie sounds in the background, which is just something that only the studio would be able to do. It also helps that it’s free (as a promotional ad for purchase of the film from iTunes).
9. Unify – $0.99 – Another puzzle game, right? But this one has smooth gameplay, great presentation, and a twist that I haven’t seen before. You place blocks coming from the left and right ends of the screen and must match and eliminate different colors in the middle where they will eventually connect. Sideways Tetris with a splash of Lumines feel? Sure. It looks great and is just so silky smooth. Easy in the beginning, but rough near the end.
10. CousinCalc, $0.99 – Determine the type of cousin you have based upon a family tree you enter into it. Simple, easy, and interesting if you have a large family to keep track of.
11. Robocalypse: Mobile Mayhem- $4.99 – Almost a port of the DS game, Robocalypse is a full RTS on the iPhone, but with a great presentation (brought to  you from the writers on Spongebob Squarepants). You control robots trying to defend or build up their base to fight the evil robots (think Starcraft or Command and Conquer). It’s got 17 campaign missions and 18 multiplayer maps, making it a big game for a small price. Multiplayer allows 1-4 players as well as co-op. It’s funny, quick, and very approachable, though I was a bit annoyed by not being able to group my units together, but the AI tends to keep them bundled quite well.

Apps of the Week:

A Monkey Party Lite – (Bob) – Free Lite version or $0.99 Premium – One of the first iPhone games that lets you share the game for free with three other friends as long as one person owns the full version of the game (with the other three playing the Lite version). There’s four minigames involving the accelerometer and touch screen. The AI is annoying and likely cheats, but the app is likely much better with real people around.

HYBRID: Eternal Whisper (Kevin) – $5.99 – From Gamevil, the makers of Zenonia, comes this anime-styled 2D combat game in which proper combos and timing help you feel like a badass slashing away at enemies. Presentation is excellent though the big plus is that there’s a lot to do and a lot to master. The combat system alone is pretty spectacular for an iPhone game and the RPG and adventure elements make it feel like you’re getting one hell of a package. Highly recommended, though I hope you have plenty of time to play.

Silly Apps of the Week:

What is this App? (Bob) – $0.99 – A puzzle of an app where you need to figure out a series of puzzles to figure out what the application does. It’s a huge mystery that could be very frustrating, but it’s also compelling and worth it just to figure out on your own.

SmileMaker (Kevin) – Free – From Kodak, you can take any photo and add a goofy smile over any person (or object). Simple, but very fun. You can also email or upload the photo to Facebook, Twitter, or Kodak’s sites.

sasamekisscomi (Bob) – Free – A disturbing game where you practice kissing an anime girl on your iPhone. Apparently this is an upcoming trend in Japan.

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