Jake How do you choose a game from the baffling variety on offer on the App Store? When it’s only 69p at stake, the name is as good a reason as any to splash the pennies. Let’s Eat Sweets! – that’s Temporal Games’ exclamation mark, but I like it – definitely falls into the ‘good name, …
This week saw the release of Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode II, a mere 19 months after Episode I. Can Sega really get away with calling that episodic? It’s a bit of a stretch. Perhaps Sonic the Hedgehog 4: It’s Not Long and Sonic the Hedgehog 4 v2: Let’s Have Another Go would have been …
I’ve been playing Don’t Run With A Plasma Sword recently. It’s been hard to put my finger on why it’s not entirely satisfactory, but I’ve got there: it’s a packet of Party Rings. It’s unarguably a great name for a game. The sense of humour is carried through to the loading screens, where you’re given …
I can’t imagine why I’ve never been asked to contribute to Thought For The Day on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. I’d totally base one around iPhone game Crow. It’s got moral choices, you see. Really unsophisticated ones, which do little but switch the game into hard mode if you try to be good. I …
Nintendo made the real news this week, with news that they’ve made their first ever annual loss. Ever the helpful sort, I thought I’d employ Street Viewtiful – out vaguely regular jaunt around the gaming globe via Google Street View – to look around their properties to see where they might be able to save …
I imagine that, after playing Square-Enix’s 774 Deaths, most people would be comfortably able to describe it in one word. Not necessarily the same word, mind. In my case, that word is BRUTAL. The difficulty is brutal. Each death, usually on a blood-splattered blade, is brutal. The graphics and sound are brutally retro – though …
It’s remarkable that Rayman Origins won the BAFTA for Artistic Achievement. Not because it isn’t a thing of beauty – it is, even on the distinctly standard definition Wii – but because of what it is. It’s a 2D platformer, with levels based around fire, ice, water, desert and so on. In the 16-bit heyday, …
Interesting tales at both ends of the App Store this week. Angry Birds Space achieved 10 million downloads in three days, a story so important that literally every site on the internet reported it. At the other extreme, one-man developer Mr Qwak had his well-received iOS game Retro Racing removed from the App Store for …
They say that there are five stages of grief. Well, in my experience, there are three stages of Angry Birds Space. 1. Anticipation Fuelled by the NASA association, endless tie-ins and ceaseless media attention, the impression that this is a Big Deal built and built. With it came an assumption that it must be a …
You may have noticed a few news stories floating around about Game Group lately. Just a few. Not stocking various big releases, share price plummeting, not stocking another big release, rumours of impending administration, not stocking some more big releases, not stocking another big release, potential buyers – and apparently they’re not stocking some big …
I have to admit, I’ve outsourced this review of Puzzler World 2012 for Nintendo DS to my girlfriend. Is that generosity – she enjoys a good puzzle book on holiday, that sort of thing? Conscientious – seeking an expert opinion for you, the valued reader? Or plain, bone-idle laziness? Take your pick. Let’s find out …
It’s hard to predict what’s going to make something stand out on the App Store. In the case of Gluddle, it was the screenshot above faintly recalling some Lemon Jelly album artwork. It’s quite the stylish game, to my eye. It’s more physics-based fun, in this case launching bouncy balls (‘Gluddle’) to knock into targets …
Beat Hazard Ultra looks fantastic, with its neon explosions and swirling backgrounds, and sounds – well, it sounds as good as your iTunes library. Which in my case is excellent, I’ll have you know. Here’s the twist: the soundtrack you choose is used to generate the on-screen action. More going on aurally means more going …
The nominations for March’s BAFTA Games Awards were announced yesterday, and the portable category makes interesting reading. What was previously referred to as the Handheld award is now Mobile & Handheld, which neatly reflects the shift that seems to have occurred. In 2009 and 2010 it was all PSP and DS. In 2011, one mobile …
Some games are dangerous. There was no mobile round-up last week, because Triple Town monopolised my time to the point that I’d not played the rest of the games I was intending to write about. Actually, that’s not quite true, because I did get around to writing about Kimi Raikkonen ICEONE Racing elsewhere. (It’s not …