Category Archives: game center

‘Fruit Ninja’ Version 1.4 Update Brings Online Multiplayer Through Game Center

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‘Fruit Ninja’ Version 1.4 Update Brings Online Multiplayer Through Game Center is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

Today developer Halfbrick Studios unleashed the newest update to its wildly popular fruit slicing game Fruit Ninja [99¢]. In version 1.4 a brand new multiplayer mode allows you to square off against players online using Apple's Game Center. Upon starting a game, a new option for multiplayer can be chosen which takes you to the Game Center online lobby. From here you can choose to start a new game which will match you up with a random player or you can pick a friend from your Game Center friend list to send them out a request to join a game. As with other Game Center online multiplayer games, matching up is simple, quick, and basically lag-free.

The Fruit Ninja multiplayer mode is also really simple to understand. A series of fruits are tossed up just like they are in a normal game. All of the fruit either have a red, white, or blue border. The blue fruit are your own, and you will gain points including bonuses for combos by slicing them. The red fruit are your opponent's, and if you accidentally slice them it will deduct points from your score. The white fruit are fair game for either party and if you can slice them before your opponent does you'll earn some bonus points for your score. Multiplayer rounds last for one minute, and whoever has the highest score at the end wins. When the round is over you're taken to a post-game lobby where you can choose to rematch against the same opponent or quit back to the menu. It really is very simple but also a tremendous amount of fun. Things get hectic with so much fruit flying around and trying to slice your own while avoiding your opponents.

The Game Center online multiplayer is pretty much all that is in the Fruit Ninja version 1.4 update, but Halfbrick is planning on bringing even more new features soon. Leaderboards and achievements will be added for Game Center, and according to one of the devs in our forums so will post-game lobby voice chat. Halfbrick also hints that the long-awaited "banana mode" is nearing completion and should be made available in the near future. Another interesting point is that the new Game Center functionality runs in tandem with the existing OpenFeint integration. So upon starting the game you'll get a welcome pop-up from each service, and all of the OpenFeint options are still available from the menu just as they were before. Conceivably, you could disable one or the other and just use a single social service, but the online multiplayer only works with Game Center enabled.

At any rate, this new update to Fruit Ninja is a ton of fun, and I've been pleasantly surprised with how well Game Center multiplayer works and how much it can add to a game. If you own a copy of Fruit Ninja for your iPhone, make sure and grab this latest update and head over to the Game Center username trading thread in our forums to add some friends to your list and partake in some competitive online fruit slicing.

App Store Link: Fruit Ninja, $0.99


The Portable Podcast, Episode 50: An Interview with OpenFeint’s Jason Citron About The Future of OpenFeint

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The Portable Podcast, Episode 50: An Interview with OpenFeint’s Jason Citron About The Future of OpenFeint is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

On This Episode:
OpenFeint currently stands at a crossroads – with Apple taking on OpenFeint in the metagaming space on iOS, they find themselves trying to remain relevant in the long-term. And as of today, it appears as if OpenFeint is looking beyond iOS for the future of their products. Today, OpenFeint is announcing that they are launching their service and Feint Spotlight app for the Android Marketplace, along with launch month titles such as Fruit Ninja from Halfbrick, MiniSquadron from MrFungFung, Flick Kick Football from PikPok, and Mega Jump from Get Set Games.

The CEO of OpenFeint, Jason Citron, was kind enough to sit down and speak with me about this announcement and what OpenFeint is doing in the future on iOS. According to Jason, OpenFeint’s goal is to unify the various platforms – for people to be able to play games with their friends on other phones, to bridge the gap between the various hardware that people have. As well as their future on Android, OpenFeint is launching tools for developers to let their OpenFeint scoring and achievement systems work with Game Center easily while still taking advantage of OpenFeint features that Game Center does not provide, such as replays, asynchronous multiplayer services, and the upcoming voice chat feature PlayTime, launching with OpenFeint 3.0.

Jason Citron spoke at length with me on the new episode of The Portable Podcast to discuss what they’re doing on Android, the challenges that Android’s various devices bring, and the perception of the Android market versus the reality of the situation. On the iOS side, we talk about how Game Center and OpenFeint can coexist (including Jason recommending that developers take advantage of Game Center), and how iOS fits in the future of OpenFeint.

Who Are We:

  • Host: Carter Dotson
  • Guest: Jason Citron, OpenFeint

    • Music:

  • “Beatnes7 (Theme to The Portable Podcast)” by The Eternal – Download on iTunes here:
  • “Nanocarp” by The Eternal

    • How to Listen:

  • Click Here to Subscribe in iTunes:

  • Click Here to Subscribe via RSS.
  • Listen on WRGT Radio every Friday at 4pm Central
  • Listen Here:

    • Apps Mentioned on This Episode:

    FREE!

    OpenFeint Game Spotlight

    iPhone App – Designed for the iPhone, compatible with the iPad
    Released: 2010-01-08 :: Category: Entertainment

    [ The Portable Podcast, Episode 50: An Interview with OpenFeint’s Jason Citron About The Future of OpenFeint is a post from 148Apps ]


    Game Center Is A Go – Now With Games

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    Game Center Is A Go – Now With Games is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

    So I, like everyone else in this great country of ours, downloaded 4.1 today. For some, including owners of the previously thought dead 2nd gen iPod Touch, the 2 hour download couldn’t come fast enough, but for owners of the iPhone 3G, there is no GameCenter. Sorry iPhone 3G owners.

    After going through the setup process, I was greeted with the green gym-like screen that we all had seen only in screenshots. The obvious next step was to click on the “Games” tab and download some games, but alas, the link just sends you to apple.com/game-center, a site with no games listed. Discouraged, I set up my status as “Waiting for games”, and then went on my merry way taking pictures with the new HDR feature. It turns out that the only game available was Ms. PAC-MAN, and anyone who has played Ms. PAC-MAN on the iPhone before knows that it… has its quirks.

    Fortunately, since then a few notable games have added support, such as Real Racing, Flight Control, and Fieldrunners, so get playing! My Game Center SN is chris148apps, and I expect to have 10,000 friends by midnight.

    [ Game Center Is A Go – Now With Games is a post from 148Apps ]


    First Online Multiplayer Game Center Updates – 3 Titles from Pangea Software

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    First Online Multiplayer Game Center Updates – 3 Titles from Pangea Software is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

    With the iOS 4.1 update that added Game Center out in the wild today, we're seeing an avalanche of new updates for older games that are utilizing these new features. Previously we've only seen games that received achievements and leaderboards, but now it seems that three games from Pangea Software are the first to offer real-time multiplayer. Here is the information for each game provided in the press release from Pangea:


    Nanosaur 2


    Nanosaur 2, $3.99     Nanosaur 2 is a 3D action-adventure game where you pilot a time traveling pteradactyl from the future.  Previously, Nanosaur 2 was just a single player game, but new in version 2.0 are six new levels and three new multiplayer modes including Capture the Eggs, Battle, and Race.  Thanks to iOS 4.1, users with Game Center enabled devices can now play against each other by inviting friends or using Auto-Match to play against people around the world.  In Capture the Eggs mode players are on teams, and they have to retrieve all of their team’s dinosaur eggs before the other team.  Battle mode, on the other hand, is pure excitement as players collect weapons and blast each other out of the sky.  The race mode also involves a lot of heat seeking missiles, blasters, and cluster grenades, but your primary goal is to race around a track.  Up to four players can play together in Nanosaur 2, and the game uses the Voice Chat feature of iOS so you can smack-talk your opponents while you unleash a barrage of firepower on them.


    Cro-Mag Rally


    Cro-Mag Rally, $2.99     Cro-Mag Rally is Pangea Software’s caveman racing game where you race primitive vehicles such as the Bone Buggy, Geode Cruiser, Logmobile, etc. around prehistoric and ancient racetracks.  The new 2.0 version of Cro-Mag Rally now supports multiplayer networked racing thanks to Game Center, so up to four players can race against each other using any of the vehicles in the game.  Additionally, version 2.0 is now a Universal Binary app so it runs on the iPhone / iPod Touch and the iPad.


    Enigmo


    Enigmo, $2.99     Enigmo is one of the all-time best selling iPhone games with well over a million units sold, and it is the winner of an Apple Design Award for Best iPhone Game.  Enigmo is a physics based game where you try to direct flowing streams of liquids to solve puzzles.  Version 4.0 of Enigmo adds a new multiplayer mode where up to 3 players can compete to solve puzzles.  Like Nanosaur 2 and Cro-Mag Rally, Enigmo also supports Voice Chat.

    We've had a chance to try out these new multiplayer features and are really happy with the results. Connecting into an online game is incredibly simple as you can choose to search out a game against random people or very easily invite one of your Game Center friends. The voice chat also works really well, and trash talking while racing against forum moderator Zincous in Cro-Mag Rally was a ton of fun indeed. Voices are clear and there is a mute button if you get tired of hearing how badly you are getting beaten by your opponent.

    We didn't experience any lag while playing, but this could be due to Game Center being so new, and it will be interesting to see how the experience holds up in the coming weeks as more and more games get online multiplayer. As of right now, the Game Center integration in these three titles breaths new life into the experience, and they are definitely worth checking out for the multiplayer and voice chat functionality. We'll be anxiously awaiting to see what other titles receive the Game Center online multiplayer treatment down the line.


    Firemint’s ‘Flight Control’ and ‘Real Racing’ Game Center Updates Now Available

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    Firemint’s ‘Flight Control’ and ‘Real Racing’ Game Center Updates Now Available is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

    Following the fairly underwhelming first Game Center game Ms. Pac-Man, we're now starting to get into some of the good stuff. Updates with Game Center support for both Flight Control and Real Racing from Firemint have just gone live in the App Store. Each game will take advantage of achievements and leaderboards offered with Game Center integration.

    Firemint's previous Cloudcell online integration will still remain, so even if you can't access Game Center you'll still be able to access achievements and leaderboards like before. If you can possibly tear yourself away from playing Ms. Pac-Man for a few minutes, make sure you grab these latest updates and check out the Game Center functionality in Flight Control and Real Racing. More Game Center updates are slowly trickling out, and you can follow this thread in our forums where a current list of Game Center enabled games is being maintained.

    App Store Links:
        Flight Control, $0.99
        Real Racing, $4.99


    OpenFeint 2.6 Introduces Out-of-Network Invites, Cross-Platform Play

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    OpenFeint 2.6 Introduces Out-of-Network Invites, Cross-Platform Play is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

    Social gaming infrastructure developer Aurora Feint announced that the latest version of its OpenFeint network allows users to send SMS and e-mail game invites to any contact listed in their smartphone’s address book.

    While out-of-network invites will be available first to iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad users, OpenFeint positions the feature as key to its upcoming Android expansion. The company notes that both Android and App Store developers will benefit from increased promotion through users of the OpenFeint network.

    “With [Apple's social gaming network] Game Center just around the corner and thousands more games coming on the market every year, effective and unique promotion is more important than ever,” says Jason Citron, CEO of Aurora Feint.

    “By creating this out-of-network invite system, we’ll help players give more organic game endorsements shedding light on the best games out there and resulting in more game downloads.”

    Aurora Feint also revealed plans to promote cross-platform play for supported applications.

    “One glaring problem with today’s mobile gaming community is how fractured it is across platforms, OpenFeint is bridging the gap between gamers,” said Peter Relan, Executive Chairman of Aurora Feint. “As we expand cross platform this summer, we’re going to roll out services that will help friends that use different device platforms play against each other.”


    Game Center Drops Older iDevice Support? Maybe.

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    Game Center Drops Older iDevice Support? Maybe. is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

    With iOS 4.1 coming out soon, gamers have been prepping for the launch of Game Center, an X-Box Live-like center for the unification of Apple gaming. Early versions of the 4.1 beta included Game Center support on all devices, but the newest version, 4.1 beta 3, dropped iPhone 3G Game Center support altogether. Apple states that the 3G, as well the original iPhone, are simply too slow to run the service.

    I’m not exactly sure about the amount of people that are still using iDevices older than 3GS, but I assume that the number is quite large. Adding no support for older devices could be a huge blow to Apple’s dreams of iDevice gaming unification, but I guess that Apple’s message is clear, upgrade or be left behind.

    Or who knows, maybe Apple will bring Game Center back to the older iDevices for the 4.1 launch or a later release. We’ll just have to wait and see.

    [Source: ZDNet]

    [ Game Center Drops Older iDevice Support? Maybe. is a post from 148Apps ]


    Apple Narrows Hardware Support for Game Center Social Network

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    Apple Narrows Hardware Support for Game Center Social Network is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website

    Members of the iPhone Developer Program report that the latest beta of iOS 4.1 has dropped Game Center social networking support for earlier generations of iPhone and iPod Touch devices.

    Announced earlier this year, Apple’s Game Center is a unified social networking platform for App Store gaming applications. The Xbox Live-like infrastructure adds matchmaking, leaderboards, achievements, and other social features to supported games for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

    Consumer weblog Engadget notes that beta 3 of the iOS 4.1 firmware update limits Game Center support to iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, and third-generation iPod Touch devices. Previously, Game Center support was included for all iOS 4-equipped devices, excluding only first- and second-generation iPhones and first-generation iPod Touch devices.

    User speculation suggests that Game Center’s infrastructure proved too taxing for earlier generations of iPhone and iPod Touch hardware. Many features introduced in iOS 4.0 — including multitasking — were exclusive to iPhone 3GS and third-generation iPod Touch devices.

    Though Apple has not commented regarding the possibility of Game Center for the iPad, future support for the device remains likely, pending the release of an iPad-specific iOS 4.0 firmware.