(Insert stupid Blog name here)

I thought about getting DL iOS the other day. (I finished The Act and I'm not certain I'd recommend it unless you really like DL style art games.) But then I read the reviews and decided I'd stick with my DL BluRay.

There's a nice behind-the-scenes interview with the creators of WarGames: WOPR at Touch Arcade. Most iOS games tend to wear out their welcome fairly quickly, but I'm still really enjoying this one.

Finally beat WarGames: WOPR the other day. Excellent game, all the way through to the end.

 

Picked up Fix-it Felix Jr. for free - the tie-in to Disney's upcoming Wreck-it Ralph movie. It's pretty good. It's essentially a knock-off homage to several different classic video games. There's an online version as well, but that one doesn't seem quite as polished as the iOS version.

 

Also picked up Super Stickman Golf on sale for FREE (for a limited time). A mix of Artillery and, well, golf! It works very well. You try to gauge power and angle to thread your golf ball through various mazes in the fewest number of shots. Very addicting, and there are a ton of levels included. Be sure to take advantage of the practice mode - some of those holes are tough.

 

Finally, I downloaded the London 2012: Official Results App for the Olympic and Paralympic Games um... app. Really, the name is so long, do I need to describe what it does? Anyway, Olympic results on the go, without the half-day time delay. Beware spoilers!

FIFJ plays really well on the iPad with the iCade. I was surprised at the number of "reviews" that erroneously complain that it didn't support the iCade.

 

Dad picked up the new Retina iPad yesterday, mom's now set up with his old iPad 2. She hadn't been interested in the iPad before, but she'd been laid up in bed a few days so I'd set her up with my iPad to watch HGTV via the DirecTV app. After that she was quite interested in getting an iPad

 

We installed the DirecTV app on her iPad, then when we went to put Bejeweled on it she got hit with the outage.

It's too bad there isn't some sort of IQ test that people would have to take before writing a review for the app store. Fortunately, it's pretty easy to spot the ones written by stupid people and just ignore them.

Hurray, Amazon Instant Video app for the iPad dropped today! Not sure why they limited it to just the iPad though.

Because they're jerks.

 

Hulu Plus was added to Apple TV yesterday, but they only give you a one week free trial. After that, it's $8/month. Meh. I already don't use Netflix $8/month worth. It's not a matter of content, it's a matter of not having enough time to watch the stuff I'd like to watch.

Finally played Batman: Arkham City Lockdown which I'd picked up on sale for 99¢.

 

It was overpriced. The game looks good, but it's just a button-mashing beat-'em-up, without the buttons. The load times are ridiculously slow, the controls are sluggish and extremely unresponsive, the difficulty curve is frustrating, and when it started repeatedly crashing, I decided it wasn't worth having it chew up 1.64 GB of space on my phone. So...

 

Also, picked up two more Kairosoft sims: Pocket Academy (one of their earlier titles) and Cafeteria Nipponica (one of their newest). Pocket Academy is about setting up and running a school (seems appropriate, given my job), and Cafeteria Nipponica is about running a restaurant (or several). I haven't had time to dive into them yet, but previous titles of theirs (most notably Game Dev Story and Mega Mall Story) have been completely addictive, so I'm looking forward to playing them.

This looks like a good reason to consider getting an iPad.

That's cool! I've always wanted a Vectrex but haven't gotten around to getting one.

 

When my folks got here my dad was looking for an excuse to upgrade his iPad to the new retina model, but mom was talking him out of it. Then she hurt her back and was laid up in bed so I set her up with my iPad and the DirecTV app so she could watch HGTV in bed (I don't have a TV in the guest room). After that she decided he could buy a new iPad and give her his old one

 

My folks normally play cribbage everyday and my mom was missing it so I suggested they try Cribbage HD on the iPad. Seems to work well with mom here and dad in Nigeria. One thing they really like is the integrated chat feature - it's not text chat but voice.

Okay... this is a pretty cool project. And the idea of becoming an iOS developer to circumvent some of Apple's restrictions has merit too.

Haven't updated in a little while, but picked up a few more games/apps:

 

Mikey Shorts - a fun little retro-inspired platformer. At first I wasn't too keen on it, but it's grown on me, and I quite like it now.

Activision Anthology - Activision brings its (and some of Imagic's) games to iDevices. Nicely done, but inevitably suffers from the lack of tactile feedback with the controls. That's just a problem inherent in touchscreen devices though, and the collection is well-worth getting. Hopefully the games still absent will be added later.

Find My iPhone - Thought I might as well download this, in case I needed it. The trick is - you have to have another iDevice to find the one that's missing. You can't run an app from your computer to do it, which seems like a pretty huge omission. (You can, however, use an iDevice to find your Mac if it goes missing.)

YouTube - replaces the old YouTube app. The one thing I discovered about this is that I rarely ever watch YouTube on my iPhone. I mostly use my computer or AppleTV for that.

Bad Piggies - from the makers of Angry Birds. A twist on the Angry Birds theme, where you help the green piggies build contraptions to navigate through various levels. A very different game, but nicely tied into the franchise and a lot of fun.

 

Also, I checked out the iPhone 5 at the Apple Store the other day. Definitely want one. But they're sold out, so I can wait.

Find My iPhone - Thought I might as well download this, in case I needed it. The trick is - you have to have another iDevice to find the one that's missing. You can't run an app from your computer to do it, which seems like a pretty huge omission. (You can, however, use an iDevice to find your Mac if it goes missing.)

just log onto https://www.icloud.com

Ohhh... it's a cloud thing. I don't use iCloud, but it's good to know where to go if needed. Thanks.

This summer I tried Find My Phone - but it didn't find it. It slipped out of it's holster on a roller coaster. Fortunately the ride attendants found it during the next sweep of the area - unharmed!

Remember this?

 

 

Quite some years ago (mid-90's), there was an excellent series of pinball simulators for the Mac made by a company called LittleWing. Crystal Caliburn and Loony Labyrinth being the best of the lot, and I played them obsessively.

 

That is, until OS X came along. Once "Classic" mode was dropped, they didn't work anymore.

 

Until now.

 

 

Look familiar?

 

It's back baby! Crystal Caliburn 2 is now available from the App Store.

 

I didn't even check the price when I saw it. I just instantly hit "buy". And it's completely worth whatever price ends up showing up on my iTunes bill next month.

 

The game has been enhanced and freshened up for iDevices, but all of the original gameplay is still completely intact, and it's awesome!

 

The table follows the ball around zoomed-in, which feels completely natural. Then when you get multiball, the screen zooms back out. Admittedly, it's a little disconcerting at first, but it's probably something only needed on the iPhone, and you can shut it off it you want.

 

 

This is an absolute must-buy. I was never really that big of a pinball fan, but the original game made me a fan of pinball. So go buy it already! Why are you wasting time reading this when you could be playing it?

 

Oh, and while you're playing... beat this:

 

 

My second game. Just like being home again.

I got so busy playing Crystal Caliburn, the other app I picked up that day completely slipped my mind - Where's My Perry?

 

Basically, it's a slight-re-make of Where's My Water? (by the same developer) but themed after the Perry the Platypus segments from Phineas and Ferb (on Disney Channel/Disney XD).

 

Up until a couple of months ago, I never really gave Phineas and Ferb much of a look. My only real exposure to it was seeing the occasional commercial for it, and the goofy video for one of their songs.

 

However, either due to boredom (or absolutely nothing else being on TV at the time), I found myself watching an episode. And then another. And they were funny. I was hooked.

 

Long story short - I ended up working my way through every single episode on Netflix. If you haven't seen it, check it out. It's silly, satirical, slightly subversive, and extraordinarily well-written. It's the kind of show you look at and think, "I bet they have a lot of fun writing that."

 

So, I decided to download the game and give it a shot. And while it has very little to do with the TV show, it's still a fun enough puzzle game, especially if you liked Where's My Water?