Endless Runner/Whipper 'Jack B. Nimble' Updated with Game Center and New Winter Level Posted: 30 Dec 2014 12:38 PM PST Endless runners are a dime a dozen on the App Store, but there's one that's unique enough that it's been holding my attention ever since it released in late September. That game is Jack B. Nimble [$1.99] from indie developer Sean Noonan. Obviously it's an auto-runner where the speed gradually increases as you jump from platform to platform and try to avoid falling to your death, but it adds a clever Castlevania-inspired whipping mechanic into the mix which also has you trying to whip candlesticks to increase your score multiplier while simultaneously avoiding falling to your death. The added mechanic adds an extra layer of franticness and a risk/reward proposition as sometimes going for those candlesticks can seriously throw off your running and jumping rhythm. This is all tied together with visuals that are a very faithful homage to the original Game Boy and a killer soundtrack. We quite enjoyed the initial release of Jack B. Nimble in our review, and in late October the game was updated for Halloween with a new playable character, the pumpkin-headed Jack O. Lantern, and an Old London themed new level with a tweaked color palette. Over the weekend, another new update landed for Jack B. Nimble, this time adding in a Winter themed level called Bitter Bluffs. It features a more grayscale color palette and falling snow, as you can see in this animated .gif.
In addition to the new Bitter Bluffs level, this update also includes Game Center leaderboard support, something that was sorely missing in a high-scoring game like this. Over in our forums, the developer has stated that work has already begun on yet another new update that will include "a new level (or two), a new character (or two), new colour schemes and the addition of Game Center Achievements!" That update is planned for some point in the new year, so if you enjoy endless runners with a twist and haven't checked out Jack B. Nimble, I'd definitely recommend giving it a look. |
Dungeon Crawler Golf Game 'Wizard Golf RPG' Just Soft Launched Posted: 30 Dec 2014 11:20 AM PST Wizard Golf RPG has been a strong blip on our radar since the first time we saw it at... GDC, I believe? Anyway, what we saw of it at the time was ultra-clever. It's a mini golf game (which historically have been fun on iOS devices) combined with a thick coating of RPG elements (which again historically makes everything better). This screenshot gloriously sums up basically everything you need to know about the premise of the game:
It just soft launched in what seems to be limited to New Zealand and Canada, so if you've got an iTunes account in either of those two regions (or you actually live in either of those two reasons) be sure to give this game a shot. It's free, and I'm anxious to see how the free to play elements work out, as that's really the only thing I could see potentially spoiling the game from what we saw before. Anyway, if you want to hang out with other people who are excited about the game, check out our forums. |
'Drawn to Life' Inks Up a $0.99 Sale Posted: 30 Dec 2014 11:00 AM PST Everyone knows and loves Scribblenauts, which made a welcome iOS appearance in Scribblenauts Remix [$0.99] a few years ago. Well, that series' creator 5th Cell made another game with creative elements on the Nintendo DS, called Drawn to Life [$0.99], which 505 Games ported to iOS and released earlier this year. If you've never gotten a chance to play it, then good news: 505 Games has put this creative platformer on sale for $0.99.
Drawn to Life's hook is that you are tasked with drawing practically everything that you can control and use in the game. You can draw your own hero, the weapons they use, the vehicles they travel in, and more. It's possible to use templates for the items as well as just drawing them yourself. The game supports MFi gamepads, and they may be the ideal way to play the game, as the virtual controls in the original version were harshly rebuked by our Shaun Musgrave. However, an August update claims to improve the virtual controls, so the experience might be better, though this is still a pretty direct port from the original DS version. Still, you're likely to get great value for your dollar here. |
Whoa, 'Hyper Maze Arcade' Looks Spiffy Posted: 30 Dec 2014 10:00 AM PST They say that you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but what if the cover is really awesome? You can't take that away from the book. The book may be dreadful, but you can never take away that awesome cover. What I'm trying to say is that Hyper Maze Arcade is looking all sorts of rad even just based on these spiffy gifs that the developer posted in our forums:
Seriously, if that doesn't look rad, I don't know what to do with you. Hyper Maze Arcade promises to be a modern take on a maze survival game, where it will be key to keep advancing, not getting scrolled off screen, and picking up gems along the way. It actually sounds like a pretty neat gameplay concept for a high score chaser. Obviously, the question will be how the game's structure and feel will go into making this fun to play, but the production values are already getting there. Hyper Maze Arcade is currently in alpha, and is planned to release when finished on iOS as well as to web portals. |
'Magic' Pro Brian Kibler on "Free to Play, Pay to Win, and the Challenges of Collectible Games" Posted: 30 Dec 2014 09:02 AM PST If you're at all into collectable card games of any form, you likely already know who Brian Kibler. If not, he's a professional Magic the Gathering player who has won over a quarter of a million dollars in competitive play over the years. Recently, he's taken to developing his own games, most notably the digital collectable card game SolForge [Free]. He's been big into Hearthstone [Free (HD)] as well, and writes tons of interesting stuff about these kind of things on his blog. Most recently, he discussed how free to play, play to win, and the various challenges that go into collectible games. If you've been following along with the free to play trends for a while, a lot of it might be obvious to you, but I thought his discussion on what does and doesn't constitute "pay to win," which is an accusation thrown around quite often in the free to play world, was pretty great.
Brian then goes on to discuss card rotation in digital card games, which is something that I find to be fascinating as all of these new digital card games will inevitably go through the same growing pains as Magic did which resulted in the variety of formats players can play (essentially meaning, which cards you're allowed to use). All around super interesting stuff, particularly if you've been following along with the development of Hearthstone and similar games as they're maturing into their own solid free to play ecosystems. I don't want to steal too much of Brian Kibler's thunder by excessively quoting everything here, but seriously, give his article a read. |
'The Witcher Adventure Game' Review - Video Game of a Board Game of a Video Game Posted: 30 Dec 2014 07:58 AM PST The tag line for The Witcher AG[$5.99 (HD)] says a lot. "The Witcher Adventure Game is CD PROJEKT RED's board game set in the brutal, dark fantasy universe of monster slayer Geralt of Rivia!." I don't know if its intentional that one hero gets top billing over the other three that are involved in the game, but after playing some rounds, I think we have a pretty obvious Mary Sue case on our hands. Geralt is the guy that right off the bat is best in combat. No one fights like Geralt, rolls his dice like Geralt, In a wrestling match nobody bites like Geralt. If you are ok with a slower start, the other characters are ok to play too though. The Witcher AG is a board game in which you are competing with up to 3 other players to finish a set amount of quests first. This number is set at the beginning of each game. The winner is the individual with the most number of points once someone completes that number of quests. Points are accrued in various ways including defeating monsters, accepting and completing side tasks and of course, completing quest objectives. Your character develops over time, gaining new abilities and sustaining injuries along the way. Resting is required to recover from injuries and will delay the speed at which you complete quests and gain victory points.
As turns pass, the difficulty of the game begins to ramp up. Monster spawns become more dangerous with more dire consequences for a failed battle. Defeating monsters is a dice rolling affair in which you usually must meet both an attack value and defense value with the same roll of dice. At the start of the game I feel like Geralt is probably the most proficient at combat, with the other 3 characters requiring considerably more luck in order to successfully defeat an opponent. Heavy investment into development will eventually level the playing field and creates a pretty decent balance after a while. This PC port has some peculiar issues not usually seen with a game that seems to boast high production qualities. Lack of a true tutorial and reports of lag(at least from some accounts and my own iPad 3) are concerning. The inability to save a game in between gameplay sessions is especially strange. I can see how slow performance and the lack of a save could impede someone from getting into this game. I didn't let it really stop me but it was definitely worth note. The Witcher AG has some components of various types of board games that don't really capture the qualities that make them functional and intriguing in other games. When I play Ticket to Ride[$2.99 (HD)], there is a thrill and excitement about the risk and reward involved in choosing different courses. I know that if I make the wrong choice I might end up scoring too few points or I may end up having them count against me if I fail to complete. The analogue to Witcher AG is the quest system, which has very little penalty for choosing the highest cost quest as you do not suffer a negative from not completing.
Another mechanic that just seems shallower than in other genres is the action system. Actions are a little bit like worker placement, with up to 6 selectable actions and only 2 action points per turn you get a bite sized taste of a system that in other instances, one of my favorites being Lords of Waterdeep[$5.99], really takes the concept much deeper. In The Witcher AG, you have a number of systems that are basically just a thin veil over semi-random occurances. The biggest draw of the game is the fact that they have actually incorporated these systems, along with 4 different character classes and dice rolling mechanics into a game that surprisingly enough didn't turn into Bamboozled. At each step, you are given at least enough information to know what you need to do to succeed and progress. Maybe I play too many board games, but I never felt lost even if I wasn't given each and every bit of info that maybe I should have gotten.
I like The Witcher AG. It took maybe a few too many systems but managed to wrangle them under their pre-existing universe to keep a thematically consistent experience. The ramping difficulty unnecessarily lengthens all but the shortest duration games, but the overall gameplay gives you just enough control over random elements that most board gamers won't lose focus. It's an exercise in excess that tumbles unceremoniously over the finish line in a genre where many contestants don't even get half way. My most wanted improvements would include performance optimizations and a save feature. Pick it up if you have a good attention span. |
An Update to 'Goat Simulator' on Mobile Likely Coming in Late January or February Posted: 29 Dec 2014 07:00 PM PST This news flew under the radar a bit, but a few weeks back Coffee Stain Studios spelled out their plans for Goat Simulator [$4.99] on mobile, and fans of the wacky sandbox game should be pretty excited about it. As they explain in a post on their blog, they're currently working on bringing a new level, Goat City Bay, as well as "a ton of new goats" to the iOS and Android versions of Goat Simulator. Even though this is content that's already in the PC version of the game, they have to essentially build everything from scratch in order to make it work in the mobile version, which is then followed by ""months of optimizing, building and testing in a cycle that takes a really long time." So it's not like they're ignoring you, mobile goat enthusiasts, it's just time-consuming work.
The team is shooting for having this mobile patch done sometime in late January, but they aren't making any guarantees since they want to make sure the new content is as bug-free as possible. Yes, I realize the irony in shooting for a bug-free patch in a game that's all about weird bugs and glitches, but nobody likes a crash-prone game experience so let's just let them do their thing. They liken this upcoming mobile patch to the big 1.1 update that was added to the PC version over the summer, but they also state "it might differ on some parts too. You'll just have to wait and see." I don't know about you, but I'm super excited, as Goat Simulator is some of the most fun I've had on my iPhone. We'll bring you any more news on the update as it gets closer to completion. |
'Bounce On Back' Updated with Game Center and Challenge Levels, New Lite Version Released Posted: 29 Dec 2014 05:54 PM PST The end of November saw the return of one of iOS's first platforming game mascots with the release of Bounce On Back [$2.99 / ], the third entry in the Bounce On series. This week Bounce On Back received its first content update. The update includes Game Center leaderboard integration, so you can compete with the world on level completion times. The game also received its first batch of Challenge levels with more planned for future updates. In addition to the new content, this update also includes a screen-flip option, improved touch controls, and some minor graphical fixes. If you are on the fence about Bounce On Back, a new lite version has also been released which includes four regular levels and two challenge levels so you can get a taste of what the game is all about.
Developer Iddy Biddy Games has plans for a second world too, but how soon that will be coming all depends on how well the game sells. So if you liked previous Bounce On games, at the very least check out the new lite version of Bounce On Back as this is one of the better platforming series available on mobile. |
'Ace Ferrara and the Dino Menace' Republished by Developer and Temporarily Free Posted: 29 Dec 2014 02:20 PM PST A few months ago, we reviewed developer Philipp Seifried's Ace Ferrara and the Dino Menace [Free], a game he created all the art and code for. The game was published by BulkyPix, and Seifried's publishing deal with them was recently ended and the rights returned to him. Because the app uses iCloud, he allegedly couldn't have the app's rights transferred to him through iTunes directly, so he's decided to republish the game under his own name. And in order to help smooth the transition, the game is currently free until January 2nd under the new iTunes listing.
This is a good time to check out this dinosaur-filled space shooter if you haven't yet. Our Shaun Musgrave gave the game four stars in his review, saying that while it's a simpler take on space shooters, it "packs in enough self-awareness, charm, and humor, it's easy to forgive some of the failings in its gameplay." Plus, the game has MFi gamepad support, and you could always use a new game that supports them, right? |
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