One of my favorite Mac developers, and my favorite shareware game developer, Jeff Vogel of SpiderWeb Software, released a statement about plans to go mobile. Jeff does wonderful, old style RPG’s. If you’re a Dungeon crawl, hack and slash fan, or just enjoy a good story in your Mac gaming, then this news will make [...]
By Chris Marshall: According to the iTunes Store the Rugby Arena – The 2011 World Cup Guide (Unofficial) describes Alexandru Halmagean’s application like this: Rugby Arena is the ultimate app for rugby fans. This guide to the Rugby World Cup 2011 has a complete schedule, live scores, and boards. You’ll be well-prepared for the RWC [...]
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Gazmaz from the UK here. I was lucky enough to receive a code to try out an iPhone/iPod touch game from Chillingo called The Jim and Frank Mysteries – The Blood River. The game has more than 20 hours of engaging gameplay spread across 4 chapters, with over 60 different kinds of puzzles varying from [...]
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By Steve Beyer:
I just have to come clean because I have been playing a bit of hooky this week.
My Son is home on leave from the Army before he ships off oversees in late September. He is also a Mac lover so we have been spending way too much time discussing and playing with Mac Software. He brought his new unibody 17” MacBook Pro with a Solid State Drive. It a thing of beauty to behold and it created quite a bit of lust on my side.
After dealing with the all those numbers from my last Review, “Accounted” by Oranged Software, I have to admit that some game playing was defiantly in order and thus my review for this week an iPhone game called GloBall.
Globall is developed by Robot Super Brain. They can be found at www.robotsuperbrain.com. No information was available about the developers but they seem to specialize in game development. In addition to GlowBall they currently have another iphone game called Sly-Q and god forbid a windows series called Tropix.
Robot Super Brain describes GloBall as simple and addictive. Tilt to roll the ball and break blocks! Avoid or squish your enemies, and conquer the globe! As your score increases, so does your sphere of influence on the GloBall globe. Can you become the best player in your neighborhood, your city, or even the world?
Globall seems to be a hybrid of brick breaker and a maze game. The paid version of the game currently has 70 different levels with each getting progressively harder and more challenging. The goal is to hit all of the colored blocks and bonus squares with your rolling globall all the while trying to avoid obstacles along the way. You gain bonus points by completing each of level before the allotted time runs out. At the beginning of each level, You are given three lives to complete the maze. If you run into one of the obstacles you can lose one of these lives. You can gain more lives by collecting magnetic gold coins along your journey.
Globall uses iPhones built in accelerometer to control the movements of your globall through the maze. I normally am not that great at using tilt movements but I took to this setup instantly. Tilt makes the game much easier to control than standard buttons. I found that I was able to get better control by working on a table. I place two thumbs and two fingers on the four corners of the iphone each lightly resting on the table. This allowed me to obtain much finer moments and control
What really Sets this game apart from the others that I have tried is the additional use of location in the gameplay. Globall uses the iphone’s GPS which allows it to blow away the traditional leader board found in most games. Not only can you see the current rankings but you also find out where in the world the current leader resides and the area that your score dominates Globall tells you the feet or miles to next highest score for game totals and for each level .
This really add to the excitement of the game. It is fun to watch your rank grow and globall area of influence increase.
Glowball is a gorgeous game to behold. Its has real splashy colors and animation. It starts with an short video of the Robot Super Brain logo and then quickly moves to a menu with three menu items.
Play
Levels
Options
Levels presents you with a thumb nail of either a map or lock for each of the 70 levels. You can move through each level using a cover-flow style interface. Each level displays your current rank and number of miles of dominance. Clicking on a thumbnail moves you to the start of its corresponding
Back at the main menu,
The options item provides the user with four more menu items.
Viewed Saved Score
Reset game,
Help, and
Calibrate Tilt.
There are also two check boxes for Sound and Post Scores to Globe.
The Play Menu item returns you back to your last point in the game and provides the normal one level after another progression.
Touching the screen pauses the game. You can quickly reenter the game where you left off. This allows you to pick it up when time permits. That is assuming you have more willpower than me.
The Globall ricochets off each of the blocks in much the same manner as most brick breaking games. If you hit a power up block you gain special powers for a limited time. These power-up options are Fire Ball, Ice Ball, Bomb Ball, Lightning Ball, and Nuclear Ball. Each provides a different awesome super power that help you make it through the game faster and removes the normal ricocheting.
Each level contains one or more obstacles that can cause death and require you to restart at the beginning of the level. If you lose all of your lives you have to replay the level. Some of the obstacles can be destroyed for bonus points. The obstacles include
spike balls that grow as you approach,
Worms that eat your ball and require you to shake to escape,
Dragons that bounce across your path,
Money Bugs that contain extra gold coins but can also quickly become a deadly circular saw,
Fire Walls that turn on and off to bar your progress and
Deadly Lava fields that kill instantly on contact or cause you glowball to smoke if you get too close.
This game has a lot of action. Secret Doors open when you roll by.
Gates open when you turn a wheel.
Teleport Tubes move you quickly from one room to another.
Something is always going on and the action really draws you into the game.
The Light version of the game is a fully operational trial version but it is limited to 7 levels.
The paid version currently has 70 levels with more levels included with each update. These levels are more challenging and provide more opportunity for higher scores and Globall world domination.
The paid version of the game is currently priced at $2.99 which is a bit higher than many games. I think it is worth the entrance fee. I love the game play and the location features.
This is currently my favorite game. I love the bright colors, the fast action, and the different challenges. I am still having a hard time negotiating the lava fields.
I have a long way to go in order dominate the world but I have been able to move above 400th place. The location based Scoreboard is a feature I would love to see in more games. I would highly recommend that you give the light version a try and then decide for yourself if it is worth the $2.99 price.
If you have a favorite game that you would like to share, I can be reached by email at threetwo@me.com or via twitter at threetwo. I plan on getting back to work on the Studiometry review. No More game time honest…. Well maybe just a little more Globall. I really want to get above 300th place.
Hi everyone Gazmaz from the UK here.
So I was struggling to think what I could do for a review this week, and it suddenly struck me that I hadn’t heard anyone on the show talk about Flight Control for the iPhone and iPod touch. I know that this is the MAC Reviewcast, but I have done a couple of iPhone/iPod touch games in the past and no one moaned at me and as the OS on the devices is seen by many as a variation of the beautifully crafted OS X I thought that it would be acceptable.
So lots of people were talking about Flight Control some while ago now, and I’d resisted the temptation but then I started being challenged by some friends and thought OK as the game is only 0.59p why not just try it out, and at the present time the game is still only 0.59p in the UK, $.99 cents in the US and .79 euro cents in Europe. That said, it is still on a limited time offer it will go up to $2.99 when out of the offer period.
Over the past few years game consoles have aspired to become part of your home network and entertainment system. In addition to their role as gaming devices, they offer media playback and streaming. Out of the box, they function as so-called media extenders via Windows Media Center, and with the PS3 and Xbox360, this is really easily accomplished. The Mac has been a more recent admission to the party, but no less pleasurable a guest, though, as you’ll see, one that has to pay the price of admission to get the most functionality.
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I wonder if you’ve ever wondered how all of Tim’s reviewers find the software they review. Sometimes we find stuff on our own that we want to review, but frequently Tim sends out an email asking if someone wants to review a given product. Usually it’s like throwing a ham sandwich into a piranha tank as the feeding frenzy to fight for the cool stuff starts.
The strangest thing happened recently though – Tim offered up some software and the boys were SCARED to test it! the software is called GiantCrayon Sudoku from the folks over at PocketMac. Well why the heck would the boys be chicken? Perhaps the explanation had something to do with it. Tim from Pocketmac says GiantCrayon Sudoku is the first tool to translate Mac users’ lifting and tilting their Macintosh notebook to move falling sudoku blocks into place.
Don’t they say an Englishman’s home is his Castle? Well, unfortunately over here at Chez Rolfe the builders have been in. So we moved out for a few days – to another castle. Yes we headed under the channel and across France to the Dream Castle. Yes, le house of mouse, was our new home for the next few days.
So what better device to entertain us on our trip? Of course my iPod Touch. Loaded up with a couple of cracking new apps. If you search for “Blackjack” on the iTunes App Store you will get a list as long as your arm of titles. We all know the basic idea behind Blackjack. Try and get “21″ or as close as possible with your hand of cards.
I don’t know why I happened to pick this particular incarnation but I’m so, so glad that I did. This has got to be one of the best applications that I’ve played so far. What makes this stand out for me is that it has been put together so well. The graphics are gorgeous. From the moodily lit table top, the brightly coloured chips and even the minute detail on the back of the cards.
How many times have you pulled out an old board game, only to find the dice missing? That exact same thing happened to me the other day and my iPod Touch came in rather handy.
Picture it if you can, a rain sodden day. Well why would it do anything else, it is here Summer after all! I decided, as it was wet out, to stay inside and get the board games out! So I dusted off the Mr Men Board Game Compendium a relic of my wife’s 1970’s childhood days. Ella and I slowly popped the lid. Shock, horror, no dice! I had to think fast, time was against me, and I could immediately see the disappointment rapidly welling up in little Ella’s face. She was going to blow.
If you’ve been a regular reader of Surfbits for the past years, you’ll remember that once or twice I mentioned my love for Flight Sims. It started from my PC days when I was working for AOL in their gaming department, specifically in the Flight Sims. In those days we would clear all the add-on planes and scenery files that AOL members would create and upload for Microsoft’s Flight Sim. Those days are long gone for me, but I still remember the hours I’d spend with a flight stick, throttle and rudder pedals trying to land on a bobbing carrier in the North Atlantic.
I thought those days would be lost forever until I recently discovered Austin Meyer’s X-Plane 9 by Laminar Research. They tell you that X-Plane is the world’s most comprehensive, powerful flight simulator, and has the most realistic flight model available for personal computers. After spending a couple weeks with the sim, I think I agree. Let’s look at the list of features and then you’ll understand what makes X-Plane 9 a truly jaw-dropping experience for an old “simmer” like myself.
On long trips, pre-iPod, pre-Sega Game Gear, etc., I used to bring along this handheld electronic Nintendo game – part of the Game and Watch series – called FIRE (youtube clip) . The objective was to rescue victims jumping out of a burning building by moving a stretcher back and forth to bounce the jumpers into an ambulance. Like other small potable games, this could easily fit in a pocket as well. It took two LR-43 or SR-43 batteries, was the size of a playing card, like the iPod Classic, but half the thickness. It had an “old skool” LCD screen and basically sported one game and a clock with an alarm. I played that game for hours during several long-haul road trips through the states, and a couple of times on flights overseas. I carried it right up until I got my first video iPod, and though I don’t take it with me everywhere now, I still have it because it’s completely addictive and wonderfully portable.
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I’m what you would call an “old school” gamer which means while I’m generally cannon fodder in Halo, put me on a 25 year old stand-up Tempest game and watch out! So I’ll admit I’m not the most up to date gamer out there but I’m also a parent. When I saw Freeverse’s Big Bang Brain Games I was immediately interested. This looked like something that would be fun for my family to do together.
It’s hard to imagine that it is almost twenty five years since I sat down and played a game on my first personal computer. I was a child of the early 70’s and like every other boy in my class was fascinated by the personal computer phenomenon.
Fast forward to the early 80’s and I was fully into handhelds, consoles and of course my beloved ZX Spectrum 48k. Yes you did hear me correctly, 48k!
So, I’m guessing that by now you’re thinking what is he wittering on about?
