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iPhone Roundup Review
iPhone Review by Christian Donlan
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59p might be the most important price point in gaming at the moment. It's the cost of a gamble - the exact amount of money that App Store shoppers are willing to spend on a title that might turn out to be rubbish, but has a tempting icon - and something developers may well view as curse as well as a blessing. 59p can send a game racing up the charts on a platform where the charts mean everything, but it can also cripple a designer's ambitions, holding teams back from working too hard or too long on a product they know is unlikely to bring them huge returns, no matter how well it sells.
But what will 59p actually buy you? The answer, of course, is anything from a buggy ill-conceived mess to a polished mini-marvel. In the App Store, the cost of a Mars Bar can equate to a surprising amount of entertainment if you shop wisely. Below, you can find a few of our low-cost favourites.
Parking Mania
- Developer: Clickgamer.com
- Price: 59p
Few game titles can tell you how much the App Store has helped to change the face of the industry quite as concisely as Parking Mania. That's right: Parking Mania. It's an unlikely-sounding malady, perhaps, but it translates into a likeable game, with reasonable tilt-controlled steering and a decent range of different vehicles for you to manoeuvre into tricky spots.
With a sprinkling of hidden tokens to collect en route, Clickgamer's homage to the fender bender feels a little bit like one of Burnout's Crash Junctions played at half speed and with no pyrotechnics. So, although it's fairly short and the art is hideous, taken as a whole, Parking Mania can be quietly satisfying. Rather worrying, really.
6/10
Minigore
- Developer: Mountain Sheep
- Price: 59p
At the moment, Minigore is an extremely basic - but still pretty stylish - twin-stick shooter, in which a box-headed beardy fends off endless waves of weird bitey things until the 187 to Camberwell arrives, your iPhone runs out of battery, or the existential horror of it all sweeps over you like a frosty tidal wave and you hurl yourself in the whirling cogs of some nearby machinery.
There's a single power-up at the moment, and one or two different weapons to use as the game grinds on, but the reason this is so playable is that, for me at least, it's the first offering on the App Store to really nail the controls for this kind of game. The virtual thumbsticks manage to be precise yet forgiving and your fingers never cover the most vital parts of the screen, while the promise of regular content updates (following the Pocket God model), taken alongside the quirky vinyl toy art, could see Minigore gradually transformed into something really special.
A solid basis for Mountain Sheep to build on, them, and an ideal framework for other developers to start ripping off.
7/10
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cianchristopher
21/10/09 @ 10:49
+4
Backbreaker looks real cool!
But these games should be padded out to having 40 hour quests, with lengthy text-filled conversations with NPCs and 100s of hours of grind to get your character to level-up! |
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Rev. Stuart Campbell
21/10/09 @ 10:58
+1
"and one or two different weapons to use as the game grinds on"
One OR two? You can't tell, or did you lose count? |
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Prodigy_BE
21/10/09 @ 11:12
-1
Two titles that beat all of these:
Mystery Mania Squareball Check 'em both out NOW. (no seriously, check 'm, you won't regret it) |
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Dark_Stranger
21/10/09 @ 11:37
+3
the sequel to "BackBreaker Football" will be "BrokeBack Football" and will contain lots of hugging!
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Pac-man ate my wife
21/10/09 @ 11:48
0
If you like Flight Control (or even if you don't) then get Harbour Master. It's a far better game along the same lines.
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Pac-man ate my wife
21/10/09 @ 11:49
0
Is there a chance for a full Beneath A Steel Sky: Remastered review? The interviews with the creators were great and it'd be nice to have a review to go with it.
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actionfitz
21/10/09 @ 11:56
+1
minigore is the muts nuts.
Edited 1 times,
most recently on 21/10/09 @ 12:58
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+1
Another mention for Sky Smash, awesome game, my first page of iPhone games currently consists of...
- Fling - iBlast Moki - FlightControl - DrawRace - geoDefense - geoDefense Swarm - iShoot - Sky Smash - Run - Mr AahH! I think all of those were 59p when purchased, love them all. Jump between several of them on the average journey, high-score and puzzle gaming is shockingly addictive. |
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+2
Flight Control is absolute shite. The reason I can say this with such authority is that so many non-gamers are addicted to it, which basically puts it on a par with Wii games.
Seriously it's crap. /has managed an all time high of 40-something. Then you're crap, not the game. Oh and thanks for the collosally retarded sweeping generalisation. |
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-1
@ MrED209
Yes I was suggesting that very thing. Though your passionate retort suggests I am not looking deeper than the mix of coloured balls and wierdy sharp glowy things. Shame on me. Coloured balls? Weirdy sharp glowy things? What are you talking about? Just buy it, and if you hate it, bill me. I won't pay it and you'll have to take me to the Small Claims Court, and you'll lose. Because it's awesome. |
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-4
Then you're crap, not the game. Oh and thanks for the collosally retarded sweeping generalisation.
No shit, you THINK? Wow. I'd never considered the fact I was crap at the game, that NEVER occurred to me. And I never considered the fact that adding the remark that proves I'm shit actually undermines the 'retarded sweeping generalisation' in an amusing context at my own expense. And I certainly never considered that there are people on the interwebs who don't understand humour and take things oh so personally oh poor wickle you getting upset that the nasty man didn't like the game you like? Aww diddums! WAAAH WAAAAAH WAAAAAAAAAAH! To be clear: I was poking fun at myself - but I do think it's crap. After all - why would I play geoDefense so much despite it being hard as effing nails and for the last MONTH preventing me from completing the Hatch level on Medium? Hmm? Because it's good, that's why. I personally find FLight Control to be 'not good' so I had little patience for its difficulty spikes. Perhaps I have a more sophisticated tastes, who knows? I await a torrent of guffstorm replies that completely miss the point :D
Edited 1 times,
most recently on 21/10/09 @ 13:11
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+1
Yes I was suggesting that very thing. Though your passionate retort suggests I am not looking deeper than the mix of coloured balls and wierdy sharp glowy things.
Shame on me. That's alright. Not everyone can appreciate abstraction and style. For those who can, GeoDefense is probably the prettiest game on the Appstore. It's also the best TD game, or probably the best game in the whole Appstore.
Edited 2 times,
most recently on 21/10/09 @ 13:13
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0
If it makes you feel better MrED (sorry if that abbreviation makes you sound like a talking horse) I understood your post. For the record I disagree, Flight Control is a very good game but oh boy, I am truly crap at it. Indeed, my high [sic] score is 44.
geoDefense is an awesome game, both of them but there are so many great games out there. Draw Race is great when you are gaming on the go but need to keep your attention on the real world too as it doesn't demand your constant attention. Just picked up Meteor Blitz which is a great space based Berzerk* style shooter. *Actually it is more like another game of old where there was a big scary face and sampled speech but the name escapes me at the moment... |
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0
I find it tremendously heartening that everyone is shit at Flight Control. I thought I might have educationally subnormal fingers because 62 is my high score, but your tales of superior shititude have buffed my conkers a treat.
I've probably spent more time playing geoDefence than any Xbox 360 game this year. All in ten-minute bites. The hard levels have proven to be my Waterloo. But when you're beating it - when your turrets are all maxed out and every creep that wanders into your web of ultimate death is atomized and your missiles are making that special whooshy sound - not many games have made me feel like that. |
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Hurleybird
21/10/09 @ 18:48
+1
GeoDefense Swarm is the best game I've played on iPhone, some levels are a genuine challenge, but it allows you to skip past and keep coming back to try another tactic.
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