Category Archives: Jacob Jones
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The Impossible Game
The Impossible Game is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website
You’ll pretty much suck no matter what.
The Bible says that on the seventh day God rested. Well I like to believe that on the eighth day he created The Impossible Game and then to fool everyone he jumped forward through time to present day and published it in the app store under the name Flukedude. But don’t let the title of this game fool you! This game is not impossible; just insanely difficult. It’s honestly more like The Insanely Difficult Game of Trial and Error. Trial and error with an awesome soundtrack. With that said, If you’re the type of gamer that is easily frustrated and discouraged by games then this is not the game for you. However, if you are the type of gamer that takes pleasure in the otherworldly challenges offered by difficult games, then this is the game for you.
The object of The Impossible Game is too keep your orange square moving forward for as long as you can until you reach the end of the game. To do this you must avoiding the spikes on the ground and jump from square to square to avoid the solid black pools. Just tap the screen to jump and hold your finger on the screen to keep jumping. What makes this game frustrating is that you have to start over from the very beginning when you “crash”. The thing is that you will fail within the first five seconds. I did it and ever single one of my room mates who played this game did too.
After the first 20 crashes, I was surprisingly not bored. It wasn’t until I crashed for the one hundredth and something time that I started getting pissed off. Anything other than pure luck or perfect timing will make you fail a hundred thousand times. Luckily, they included a practice mode. With this you can fail a hundred more times without having to go all the way back to the beginning! All in all this is a great party app but it’s extreme difficulty will turn a lot of casual gamers off.
iTunes Link – The Impossible Game
Version 1.0
Reviewed on iPhone 3G 3.1.3
Retro Paddle
Retro Paddle is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website
You have to respect the classics.
Retro Paddle is Richard Fennema’s tribute to Pong for the iPhone! Although insanely simplistic in nature, Retro Paddle serves more to remind to the world how far the gaming world has come since Pong’s console release in 1974 (roughly three years before home computers were available to the public). This ridiculously simple concept was something the world had never seen before: at home console gaming! Pong, with sales totaling over 40,000,000 in it’s first year, was a massive hit and the public ate it up. This simple game sparked a series of innovations that led to cartridge based gaming and the decision to port classics like Space Invaders from the arcade to the TV screen.
After the console gaming crash of 83′ and 84′, the general public avoided console gaming until gaming legends Nintendo and Sega hit the scene in the late 80’s with the NES and the SG-1000. From there, it’s all history and the world’s youth would never be the same because of it. In fact, Pong indirectly set in motion – albeit an extremely indirect set of motions- a line of events that would ultimately lead to the creation of IAR and for that we pay tribute! It’s hard to believe that the at home gaming phenomenon came with instructions that said: “Avoid missing ball for high score.”
Retro Paddle has the same basic rules. To win… you must not miss the ball. Simple and to the point. The only difference is that Retro Paddle has some cool new features; you can change the control settings from touch to tilt and adjust the difficulty! Not much in comparison to other games currently in the app store but enough to satisfy the retro gamer. So if you’re a nostalgic gamer like me, then chances are you’d probably enjoy Retro Paddle! You can purchase this game for $.99 in the app store.
Version 1.0
Reviewed on iPhone 3G 3.1.3
Doodle Cannon War
Doodle Cannon War is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website
Doodle Cannon Wars! Now with more vitamin D!
I’m going to start this review right off the bat by saying that I absolutely love Doodle Cannon War! I haven’t been this in engrossed in an iPhone game since I purchased Doodle Jump (a different game from a different developer) a couple months back. Anyone who’s ever played a video game can sense when a game just feels right when they play it. Doodle Cannon War has that tangible feel only a few games I’ve played on the iPhone have. The guys and gals at infiworks have truly created a game so fun and challenging that if it weren’t for the game crippling glitch in level nine, chances are, I probably would have bought it! I’ll tell you more about that later in the review.
The object of the game is to blow up the skulls in each level using the bombs in your cannon. It sounds simple but to get your bomb anywhere near the skulls in each level you’ll have to angle your cannon just right and make sure the power behind your shot doesn’t fire your bomb too hard or too soft. This requires a steady hand, logical thinking, and some luck. To get a good score you’ll have to blow up the skulls using the least amount of bombs in as little time as possible.
Like most games on the iPhone, Doodle Cannon Wars has a bit of a control problem. It only uses a single touch to control the power and angle of the cannon. This can be a bit of a pain when you’re trying really hard to get the angle just right because as long as your finger is pressed on the screen the power behind your shot will continue to go up. This means that you’ll have to quickly judge the angle and power when you’re taking a shot. For the sake of making the game less reliant on luck and more on skill, I think the game would benefit greatly from separating these two actions.
Of course, separating the angle control from the power control will do absolutely nothing as long as the glitch in level nine is still there crippling this game! As soon as level nine starts, the frame rate slows down to a crawl, making the game virtually unplayable. That’s over 40 levels of Doodle Cannon War that won’t be able to be played! I would wait until infiworks fixes this bug before purchasing this app.
iTunes Link – Doodle Cannon Wars
Version 1.0
Reviewed on iPhone 3G 3.1.3
Perfetto
Luna Story
Luna Story is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website
I’ve been enamored by the concept of gaming since before I could read; Zelda on the NES being the first game I ever played. Back in the day, a half-way decent story and a sword was all that was need to make a good RPG but the genre has come a long way since the early days of Zelda and even earlier days of ROGUE. Today’s standards have forced developers to push the limits of their thinking to create a living and breathing world. As a result, a lot of mediocre RPGs flood the market with only a select few shoving their way to gaming greatness. Njoy’s Luna Story doesn’t quite make the cut for gaming greatness… but don’t let that fool you. Luna Story is pretty solid RPG. In Luna Story, you play as Ray, a village kid that’s been saddled with the intense responsibility of saving his fellow Bohemians from a tyrannical ruler. The only way for Ray to do this is to gather the 5 elixirs scattered through out time. While the story isn’t much to begin with, the game was poorly translated from Korean to English, resulting in a lot of hilariously bad dialog. If you can read Korean, I’d recommend getting this game in it’s original format. If not, you’ll probably be WTFing every time Ray or anyone else talks.
The controls and HUD are also equally as difficult to get used to. Unlike most of the RPGs on the iPhone platform, Luna Story uses the portrait setting instead of the landscape setting. The obvious disadvantage to the portrait setting are that the all the controls are squeezed together at the bottom of the screen. Anyone with large fingers would have a very difficult time playing this game while trying to keep a grip on their iPhone. I heard from the rumor mill that they are working on a fix for this design problem as we speak. Hopefully they follow through because I’m tired of playing a decent game like this in portrait mode.
A control update would more than likely solve this game’s HUD problem. For some strange reason, Njoy decided to place all the HUD stuff right under the controls and right beneath your thumbs. Whenever I was in a big fight, I would have to move my thumbs out of the way to get a good look at my health. This was a pain in the ass because on several occasions I was too busy fighting off a whole horde of enemies to even bother to move my fingers to see my health. Which brings me to my next big issue with Luna Story! Some areas had so many enemies that once I started swinging my sword around half the map started to attack me. This wouldn’t have been such a big deal if they all didn’t respawn three seconds after I had killed them. This is good for grinding but when I actually want to get on with the story it’s a pain to have to kill thirty or so monsters to be able to move and advance to the next screen.
All in all, Luna Story is a pretty solid game with only a few technical shortcomings. The graphics are good and the dialog is pretty freaking hilarious. If it weren’t for the control problem I would suggest buying this right away but unfortunately I found it hard to enjoy the game when I had to concentrate on keeping a grip on my iphone
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iTunes Link – Luna Story Version 1.2 Reviewed on iPhone 3G 3.1.3
Giant Leap
Giant Leap is a post from: Best Iphone Apps Review Website
In the game Giant Leap, you take the role of Hero, a lone marine with a convenient case of amnesia. With all his marine and scientist buddies killed in a freak alien attack, Hero is forced to wander the bloody halls of his ships fighting off hordes of Xoranid killers while retaining his lost memories. What happened on the ship? Are there any survivors? How did he lose his memories? If you can fight through the mountains of cliches, you’ll find that the basic game play in Giant Leap is quite enjoyable in the retro sense.
In each level, you are tasked with killing aliens and finding the little green glowing circle to advance to the next level. Sounds easy right? Well it most certainly is not. For one, there aren’t any save points in this game. So if you were to die after spending ten minutes on a level you’d have to start over from the very beginning. Secondly, Calculator Games employs a control design that makes moving and attacking frustrating to say the least. To move, you tap an area on the map. To attack, you tap an enemy on the map. Simple enough but to be successful in this game you’ll need to be able to move and attack at the same time. This is made difficult solely on the fact that the game engine can not differentiate between a “move here” tap and an “attack this guy” tap. On several occasions, I found myself running toward a group of aliens instead of running away and attacking them. Use of the multitouch system can easily remedy this problem.
Control problems aside, Giant Leap is a great game to play if you’ve got a couple minutes to burn. It’s got a ton of levels to mess around on and plenty of weapons to keep the average person happy. On the flipside, I can’t imagine spending six dollars on a game like this. The price tag alone is enough for most people to give this app the cold shoulder. I’d wait for this app to drop in price before forking over the six bucks to play.
Version 1.0
Reviewed on iPhone 3G 3.1.3