One of the most successful games on the iPhone/iPod Touch has been Tap Tap Revenge range of games which is now in it’s third incarnation of rhythm based addiction. What has helped make the Tap Tap Revenge games so successful is that the fact that not only is it a really great game but the fact that it is free, something that is always a plus point in any iPhone/iPod Touch game or application.
However, Tap Tap Revenge also has a range of premium versions where you get to play with some of the best tracks of specific artists, from Coldplay and Metallica to Lady Gaga and The Dave Mathews band and now they have released Kings of Leon [Tapulous.com]
For those of you who haven’t played Tap Tap Revenge before in any of it’s forms let me tell you a little bit about it. The game is played by tapping along to the music of a given track and you score points for accuracy and consistency. In this version of the game though your choice of track come from 10 of the Kings of Leon’s best tracks, at first I thought there were only 4 tracks available but I soon found out that the other 6 were available via download for free. I imagine this was to keep the initial download relatively small.
There are some games that can take over peoples lives, cause sleepless nights and take up all of your though of all your waking hours. One of those games for many people are sports management simulations and for fans of football, or soccer as it’s know here in the USA, there have been to versions of the genre that have dominated the market and they are Football Manager and Championship Manager. This two titles have dominated the PC football management genres for years and years and now Championship Manager are looking to take the obsession one step further with the release of Championship Manager 2010 Express the iPhone/iPod touch version of their football management simulator.
For those of you unfamiliar with this genre of game you take the role of the manager of your chosen club and manage everything from team selection, transfers, press conferences not to mention your relationship with your players, media, fans and the board. If you’ve ever shouted at your team on TV claiming that you could do a better job then this is your chance to step up to the plate and prove yourself.
You’ll need to set up your manager profile including name, age and 3 attributes/qualities that will aid you in your quest for success. While you may only start with 3 attributes the others can be gained throughout your managerial career which adds a nice side line to the main concept of taking your team to the top of their respective league and various cups that they will participate in.
Many anticipate new iPhone hardware this summer in conjunction with new software. While Apple has done very well for itself performing incremental hardware upgrades from the first generation iPhone to the current 3GS model, it is interesting to note device design has hardly changed. The basic appearance and function of the user-facing hardware has been consistent throughout the iPhone’s life.
It’s with this in mind that an article from iPhoneWorld becomes very interesting. A video has been found on YouTube using the same visual style and musical synchronization we have come to know from Apple’s iPhone commercials. It displays a completely redesigned iPhone with a larger screen and rectangular speaker and home button. As the phone flips around through the course of the commercial we see the rear of the device has two openings where one would assume is a camera and flash. Probably one of the most interesting aspects of the commercial though starts at the 19 second where it purports to show a video call. If you pause the commercial and look closely you see a small opening embedded in the far right hand side of the reshaped speaker. Front facing camera perhaps? If they’re demonstrating video calling it would be a must. It all ends by informing us the new device will be called the iPhone HD and that it’s “The most social iPhone yet”. Watch the full video below. More after the break.
We Rule is developed by Ngmoco and New Toy and is a great Kingdom building, social interactive game. The game play is simple you farm and harvest crops, build shops and houses and rule your own kingdom. The game is relatively easy to play but here is a detailed run through and tips to help you along.
When you first launch the app you sign into your Plus+ account. If you don’t have one already it is very straight forward to set up via your iPhone. Then the first thing you will see is a picture of your kingdom and if you already have some plus+ friends you will see their kingdoms too, all nicely lined up together. Each kingdom will have their name above it and a number next to it, that number is the level they are on.
iPad Developers have one week to get their app into Apple for a chance at making the iPad App Store Grand Opening. Apple plans to sell around 13 million iPads in the next few years. “Elite” iPad Devs get iPads to test on. HTC hits back at Apple’s lawsuit against them, while more lines are drawn in the virtual sand in the growing Google v Apple mobile cyberwar! Apple decides it doesn’t like screen protectors anymore, apparently. And some random iPad Developer bits and pieces..
Developers Developers Developers! iPad Developers that is…
Apple sent out a rousing call to all it’s iPhone, iPod and iPad Developers as the week closed, informing them that they have until the 27th of March to get their iPad apps in for review, or risk missing the iPad App Store Grand Opening. Apps submitted in time are not guaranteed a place in launch offerings, but Apple promise to get back to devs who have submitted stuff with more info after the 27th.
Steve Jobs teamed up with the California governer Arnold Schwarzenegger to discuss the recent liver transplant he has had to try help push for change in the organ donar process.
The bill, SB 1395 by state Sen. Elaine Alquist, D-San Jose, makes it mandatory for Californian residents to accept or decline the option of becoming an organ donor when they renew their drivers licenses, according to San Jose Mercury News. Under the current system, residents are free to affix a pink sticker to their license if they remember to do so.
Guessing what Apple will do next has been a cottage industry for the mainstream media and tech punditry since the introduction of the original iPod started its reputation for radical, game-changing moves. One need only look back on the media frenzy in the six months leading up to the introduction of the iPad to understand how much predicting Apple’s strategy has become a news area in of itself. Sites like MacRumors and AppleInsider have made a name for themselves on just that one subject alone.
CultofMac brings an interesting perspective to the table with an article on Apple’s post-iPad plans. Anyone familiar with the history of the personal computer will recognize the name Xerox PARC. The Xerox Palo Alto Research Center was at the forefront of computing research and development during the late 1970s and 1980s. Among the many accomplishments of PARC in the 1970s were the creation of the first graphical user interface, the modern two button mouse, Ethernet, and a precursor to what we know today as email. Most of the GUI design incorporated into both Mac OS and Windows is derived from work started at Xerox PARC.
The CultofMac article discusses a Scientific American article from 1991 by researchers at Xerox PARC. The 1991 articles describes how the researchers feel the future is in three classes of computing devices: Tabs, Pads, and Boards. If you think about it for a moment you can guess what the Tabs and Pads are in Apple’s strategy; the iPhone/iPod Touch and the iPad. Is the next step for Apple the “Board”? The researcher describes the Board form factor as follows:
Businessweek is reporting a rather bizarre rumour that “elite developers” have been given early access to iPad hardware for testing and development of Apps prior to the official debut of the device. Colour me officially jealous!
The conditions for these loans is straight out of Mission Impossible:
Yesterday we told you about a new Apple patent for a native social application called iGroups. Today, brings word of Apple’s move to bring native support to a strong application market; turn-by-turn navigation. An article in Patently Apple describes Cupertino’s plans for this as yet unnamed native navigation app.
While the app described is said to focus on alleviating the frustration of commuting workers, it of course could be used in any traveling circumstance. The user of the application would log in before departing in the morning and enter their forthcoming trip. Conceivably, regular movement like a morning commute along an established route could be saved or scheduled as a sort of recurring event. Along the way the application would analyse the route to suggest deviations that avoid traffic congestion. If the user did find themselves unavoidably trapped in gridlock, the application would reschedule appointments and meetings in the iPhone calendar to coincide with the adjusted arrival time it has calculated.
Gameloft have just released a Sports Bundle [$4.99, iTunes Store] of three of their hugely popular games. Now there is no deciding which one to download, you can have all three of them and for a reduced price! This is a Perfect application to choose if you love many sports. The three games are:
Let’s Golf!
A 3D golf game with 63 holes in 4 different locations. There are 4 characters to choose from that you can customize and each one has their own individual skills.
Surviving in the iPhone Wild Wild West. Marketing Part 01 : The bogus App Review site.
In a short series of three articles I am attempting to expose some of the more seedier practices which are going on to promote apps in the sub-culture which surrounds the App Store marketplace today. Part 03 is probably the most explosive. Every app developer, and user, should be aware of how they are potentially being manipulated. If Apple are not already aware of these things they should be, and they need to come down on them hard!
There is a Weekend Market in Bangkok called Chatuchak, where any number of vendors small and large hawk a variety of goods, ranging from semi-illegal pets & exotic fish to clothing and furniture, right up to fine arts and specialist foods. Most stalls are roughly the same size. Some peddle crap and some sell little nik-naks that you probably never knew you wanted, but once you find, wonder how you did without. The odd few traders have “made it” and have brighter newer signs, more space and much better “footfalls” past their door. Scattered amongst the traders and the stalls, both permanent and transient, are con men, pickpockets, thieves and the odd information booth. Overseeing it all is a rather overworked police office which has a shiny glass and metal air-conditioned base close to the entrance. It’s kind of like a medieval bizarre in some ways. In other ways it reminds me of The App Store.
