1st Impressions

Jules Verne’s Return To Mysterious Island is the best of old and new. It reminds me of the old point and click games like Kings Quest. Not the early ones that were text based, but the later ones once the computer mouse made it’s debut. I know I’m dating myself here, but at least it isn’t a Zork reference. So think of that kind of game, but with incredible 3D photo-realistic 360-degree graphics.

When I say the graphics are incredible, I’m serious. As you explore, you can tilt up and down, as well as rotate in a full circle. It really is an incredible and unique iPhone experience and justifies the 260+ MB download.

Game play as you explore is very simple. If you can go to a different location, an icon shows up. If you can pick it up, an icon shows up. In other words, you don’t wast your time tapping on items that don’t matter. This removes a lot of the frustration from similar and older style games and makes this one more enjoyable.

Another thing that sets this game apart is the fact that as you find and pick things up to add to your inventory, there is an option to combine them in make things that you need.  Finding all the things that you need and figuring out how to combine them is part of the puzzle nature of the game. If you get stuck, you can find one of a number of a walk-through available online to assist you. It would be nice if this was built in to the game, but at least it is available.

My sole concern about the game is that once you finish it, there isn’t much more to do. This limits game play to a single time through. The good news is that it will take many hours to do this. As such, I have to look at this as the amount of entertainment I will get for the cost. If I am going to be willing to pay $10 for a 2-hour movie, that comes our to $5/hour.  So a $5 game that takes 20-hours or so to get through isn’t a bad deal.  In fact, it is 20-times a better deal.  For a movie-quality game, it’s a steal.  So run and get this title before they’ve figured out that it may be under-priced.  I think you’ll have a great time exploring Mysterious Island.

Knights Onrush is one of the latest quality releases by a company that is quickly becoming a favorite of mine, Chillingo.  Think of it as the game play of Stick Wars married with the graphics of Pocket God.   It is a fast paced game and pausing long enough to take a screenshot isn’t really an option if you want to do well, so I gave up on the ones I took and “borrowed” the screenshot here from the iTunes store.  Trust me, if I have this much going on on the screen at one time, I wouldn’t be taking a break for a screen shot. LOL  Even with this shot though, you really need to see it in action to appreciate it.  A free/light version is available for download, and you can also watch this YouTube video to get a feel for it.

As I mentioned, the game play is very fast paced.  I think it is even more challenging than Stick Wars.  Since I typically don’t too far in games like this, I pried it out of my teen son’s hands long enough to get his thoughts on the game as well.  A lot of the following comments are from him.

The gameplay itself is a simple concept of touching your finger to the desired enemy (or in this case, un-desired) and flicking him off the screen so he can make the trip back to the ground where he can meet his graphic demise.  The goal of the game is to keep the enemies away from the door to your castle and survive the  waves untill you reach the next level.   Tradition holds true that you get money for each gravity assisted death you incur however what makes this game unique in its own right is the aspect of being able to hang your enemies on a hook to offer to the dragon of the land, you may also drop your enemies one-by-one into the gates of Hell where after a short cooking period they are “burped” up as skeletons!

Various weapons (fireballs, boulders, and so forth) as well as upgraded/enhanced doors to protect your castle can be purchased with money from your kills, but expect a strategic aspect throughout the game. Fast paced gameplay, a classic concept as well as a casual feeling promise hours of entertainment for  the village idiot and hardcore gamer alike.

Overall the game is great as is but it could use some of the RPG feel of “Defender Chronicles“.  There are plenty of of creative ways to send the hordes to their doom but the single defensive option to upgrade the door to your castle seems a bit limited, perhaps a mote or archers will arrive to this mythical kingdom?  What would be really sweet is if these two titles were married together somehow.  Playing “Defender Chronicles” with the ability to “flick” attackers and such and take a personal and active role in the defense would be pretty cool.  And adding the RPG aspect of “Defender Chronicles” to this title would really set this apart from its competitors.

What will happen when rival armies gather at the doorstep of your kingdom and threaten your castle?  Buy it and find out…And if you do it soon, you can catch this fine title while it is on sale for $2.99.  After June 22nd, the price goes up to the $4.99 price point.   At $2.99, it gets a high recommendation from me.  At $4.99, I’d recommend checking out the free version first.

When I started this review site, I promised short reviews.  So in short, WOW! This game is incredible!  It is the Must-Have new Fieldrunners.  If I were going to give stars out, I’d give it six out of five.  Yeah, that’s right.  As much as I was looking forward to this game, it exceeded all expectations.  I will go so far as to say if you are only going to have one tower defense game on your iPhone, make it this one.

Defender Chronicles is another is a string of quality releases by Chillingo.  It takes tower defense type games (like Fieldrunners and others of that type) to a whole new, and much better, level.  The first thing that strikes you as you launch the game is that it is not the typical top down perspective.   It is a 2D side view.  This alone makes it fresh.  But it doesn’t stop there.  Besides the numerous types of attackers and defenders and the different levels at different skill levels (about five of each), the game offers classic, campaign, and endless modes.  And, just for the added twist, it throws in a twist of a role-playing game.  You can not only use gold earned by killing attackers for purchase or upgrades of different types of defenders, but can also use it to customize your hero/leader so that you can concentrate on different character attributes, skills, armor strengths, and so forth.  By changing these attributes and difficulty levels, this game offers endless play at a very low $2.99 price point.

I took a load of screenshots as I played through this game.  Picking the right one to post that would give an accurate representation of the game was impossible though.  None really do the smooth graphics and soundtrack justice.  So here is a link to a video of the game in action.  If you haven’t watched this yet, and my recommendation above doesn’t have you clicking that purchase button yet, you owe it to yourself to check it out.  The game is every bit as impressive as the video makes it appear.

As great as the game is, I do have some suggestions.  First, I’d love for there to be different player profiles.  My son is going to love this when he sees it and I know I’d like to keep my progress and such separate from his – if I can get my iPhone back from him.  Being able to save a particular place in the game and come back to it with a different hero configuration would be cool as well.  Second, while I enjoyed the accent of the voice-overs, some of the text in the tips and help need just a tad bit of polish.  The grammar makes it appear (in a couple of cases) that English was/is not the first language of the folks doing it.  I hate that an application of such quality in every other way suffers in the grammar department.  Third, while the sound effects are great, I’d love some kind of sound effect as each attacker died.  If you are zoomed in to a particular part of the screen (and yes, you can zoom and scroll around), you can still see deaths indicated in change to your gold, but an auditory indication would be nice as well.  I’d also love an auditory “ding” or something to let me know when I have an archer or other defender selected and achieve enough gold for an upgrade.  And speaking of sound, I’d also like volume sliders for the music versus other sounds as opposed to just on/off.

Overall, I’m very pleased with this game.  I can’t wait to see what the future holds for it.  There is already a community forum devoted to the game, and version 1.1 is waiting for Apple’s approval with improved memory requirements, a new “novice” level, and “additional bug fixes”.  I haven’t come across any bugs myself, but I’m sure a game with this level of complexity must have had something slip through.  The fact that it is quickly being addressed is a huge plus.

Zooloretto is a new release from the Chillingo Ltd collection of games.  As with their other titles, the graphics and sound are top quality.  If you are familiar with the Zooloretto board game, you know what this is.  If not, and you are expecting something like Zoo Tycoon, this isn’t it.  Zooloretto is a turn-based and card-based zoo building game.  The goal is to fill your zoo and gain more visitors than your opponants.  A game has between three and five players.  At least one, yourself, has to be human.  The others can be either human or computer.  Game play allows for the picking of a card containing an animal, vending machines, or money to be spent.  Animals are loaded on trucks and, if you choose to select one of the trucks instead of a card, you can unload it’s content of up to three items in your zoo.  The more animals you have in an enclosure, the more visitors you draw.

While there is a bit of strategy to be employed here, it is a simple enough game that kids should be able to master it to play against each other and/or a parent.  I am not sure that it will hold the attention of an adult for a long period of time though as a solo entertainment option.  As such, it is something I’d recommend for the iPhone user with children, but not as something to challenge your IQ.  Hopefully they can release a lite version to try it and see before spending $4.99 on it though.

As a retro style arcade game, this one ports perfectly to the iPhone. I typically find adventure and puzzle type games more my style, but this was not as fast paced and frenzied as I expected and had more of a puzzle nature to it than I expected as well. The game consists of 16 caves, each with 5 different difficulty levels. This, in effect, gives you 80 levels to play through and promises tons of play time. That is important at this $4.99 price point. The goal is to collect gems and dig your way to the exit without having the boulders fall on you as you dig under them. It’s not easy. Overall, this game was a nice surprise. Another quality release from the folks at Chillingo Ltd.

Quick News is my new Must-Have $0.99 application. It is a basic interface to ten mobile-friendly national news sites. A default can be chosen, and selections can be made from TV networks, cable news networks, national newspapers, and news services. A little bit for everyone.

I have one suggestion that would make this app perfect. I would love for it to use your local location and include the closest local stations in the mix as well. I prefer to get my local news from local sources. One other thing they could add is links to audio versions of some of these sources.

Even without these wish list items, it is a great and simple app that will stay on my iPhone for some time to come.

This game impressed me. The graphics anyway. I didn’t find the game play itself up to the same level. Let me explain. This is a card based game. Each turn, you can select different actions or items from the available cards. The problem for me is that I didn’t really know what I was purchasing, and could not really see much change in the screen graphics once the purchase was complete. Based on the level of the other graphics, I really expected more. Not sure exactly what, but those are my honest first impressions. But, since I am new to this type of game, I am more than willing to chalk up any disconnect to user error as opposed to design flaw.

Lifecasting is the new name for a really cool app formerly called FunSlides. In fact, the app icon and main scren still use that name. If you like to share photos, this app has a feature set that you are definately going to want to check out. What it does is allow you to create stand-alone slide shows with optional narration from either stored photos or your iPhone camera. The standard mp4 format file can then be viewed on your iPhone, emailed, copied to your computer via wifi, and even uploaded directly to YouTube. Lifecasting offers a lot of functionality for a small $0.99 price. An excelent bargain.

Dodge is a simple game that is just as the name says. You move your little blob guy around to keep it from getting hit by the ever increasing number of little balls that bounce around the screen. No rocket science here. Just dodge them as long as possible. Not much else to say. It is $0.99 in the iTunes store.