Broadcasting live gameplay videos, posting videos of high-scores, strategy or just narrating while playing games has increasingly become very popular in the gaming community. Twitch is the leading platform when it comes to gaming videos. The service boasts 45 million gamers every month.
If you’ve ever gone through the most popular videos on YouTube you would’ve noticed that many times gaming videos rank very highly. YouTube understands that there is a very big market of users who love to watch or create gaming related videos and share with everyone.
With YouTube Gaming a dedicated service by Google, the company aims to compete with Twitch. It will be available this summer in the US and UK initially.
You will be able to view content through Games, Feed and Channels. The app will feature a live system to make chatting with your favourite YouTube creators easy and fast.
Google has highlighted that service will cater to the needs of all gamers and if they type “call” in the search field they can be rest assured to receive “Call of Duty” as a recommendation instead of “Call Me Maybe”.
Google has been hard at work to support video playback and lifestream at 60fps. Since this is essential to offer live gameplay broadcast. According to the company YouTube Gaming will provide “an improved live experience that makes it simpler to broadcast your gameplay to YouTube.”
Are you excited about YouTube Gaming? Let us know what you think in the comments below.
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Rovio have never been a company that rests on it’s laurels and that doesn’t appear to be changing as only a few days after they launched their leading brand on Facebook, that they teased their millions of avid followers with a teaser of Angry Birds Space.
Little is known about what this brand new version of Angry Birds Space will bring to the table as the only official information so far is a launch date of March 22nd, a teaser ad that can be seen on the official website and a short 20 second teaser video has also been posted on YouTube.
A quote from the Rovio blog however does promise the following:-
Angry Birds Space is a completely new game with innovative new gameplay, but with some of the familiar Angry Birds elements that fans already know and love — plus some surprises!
Gravity, or more specifically a lack of it, could be put to good use here and I imagine that we will get to see some more birds too, but it remains to be seen how innovative this is and whether it can keep them flying high.
What new features would you like to see in Angry Birds Space, leave your thoughts in the comments below of tweet me, @4forkssake.
The holiday season sends iOS Developers scrambling each year in order to finish up their apps for submission before Apple stops accepting new submissions for the year. However, over the last three years, its become obvious that during this time, app developers experience much higher sales. This could be due to one of two things, either people are downloading more of the old apps because there is less to choose from during this time or because of Apple’s App Gifting service, accessible directly through the App Store.
During this time, popular game devlopers such as Gameloft and EA push out as many apps as they can to flood the market, in order to increase the number of downloads. EA and Gameloft apps often show up under the featured list, claiming #1 and #2 spots, and even App of the Week on many occasions.
Camera+[App Store] developer’s TapTapTap revealed their download numbers with MacRumors early Thursday, describing a significant increase in sales. Camera+ moved up and down the list between 4-8 and settled at position #8 in the Top 200 list during the holiday freeze. Camera+ typically experiences about 18,000 downloads on any given day, but jumped to over 73,808 sales on Christmas day.
Camera+ sells for $0.99 in the App Store, which means that after Apple’s 30% cut, TapTapTap received $51,665 in revenue only for the day of Christmas. That’s a significant increase, but not surprising considering the number of iPod Touches, iPhones, and iTunes gift cards being activated and given as presents on Christmas. The App Store is the basis for numerous success stories, about small developers making a hit with their apps and becoming millionaires overnight, some making anywhere from 10,000 to 15,000 dollars in one day.
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Stick Golf [rating: 5/5]
Stick Golf is a unique golf platformer developed by Noodle Cake Games. An addictive game which will leave you saying ‘just one more level’!
The instructions are very easy to follow and well explained with picture based instructions. You use the left and right arrows at the bottom left to adjust your shot and this is the main button you will be using. Once you are all lined up you press the Go! button to start the power meter. It then powers up the level bar up and down. When it is in a postion where you think you have enough power behind it to hit your ball then press it again. To get the best powered shot then the bar needs to be full of the orange color.
If you want to see where the hole is if you can’t see it on screen then you can just drag your finger along to look, like you would really if you was flicking through your photo library. You can also reset the view by pressing the reset button in the middle. This aligns the view of the golfer.
The game is affected by wind speed also, if you play in hard mode then the strength of the wind will be shown on the bar at the top left hand side. In the middle of the game at the top it will tell you the number of strokes you have attempted and then at the top right is the par amount for that game. Now this may all sound complicated but as soon as you start playing you will realize it isn’t, it is very easy to pick up and play.
There are 6 different courses to play on, the first one is available to play but the rest have to be unlocked first before you can play them. To unlock them all you have to do is complete the previous game on par. When you start your course it will tell you how many holes there are and what the par is, you can then choose either easy with no wind or hard with wind.
Here is then when the fun starts, all you have to do is aim your stick man to hit his ball into the hole at the other side of the screen. You do this by working out with the arrows that are guiding you where to move the aim button and where the ball will land. When you have it in postion hit the go button decide on the power level and hit it again and the golfer hits the ball. Where ever the ball ends up if it doesnt get in the hole thats where you carry on from. Just like the real thing!
Now don’t be put off if you don’t like golf. I am not at all a golf fan but I can honestly say I loved this game. It becomes very addictive the more you play. The graphics are simple and very good. It is a great game for any age and one that you will want to keep on playing.
Pros
The Not So Good
The game will be released on May 31!
Stick Golf iPhone Game Trailer
Screenshots
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Doodle Swipe [rating: 3.5/5]
Doodle swipe developed by HafizAwangPon is all about the fun loving character Bubba, the little blue blob. Guide him along the platforms jumping from one to the other without falling.
If you have ever played Doodle Jump, which I am sure most of you have, this game seems to be inspired from it but features completely new gameplay. The idea is the same the little blob has got to jump from platform to platform without falling to his death on the ground. Where it differs is to do this you have to draw a line with your finger for him to bounce on. When you do, he will then bounce on it and move slightly along so you then draw him another one.
Now if you draw a level line he won’t go any where he will just keep bouncing up and down. So you need to do it at a slight angle then he will bounce with a little push forward. Once he moves and whilst he is in mid air it is then you draw another line for him. The more of an angle you draw your line the faster he will move so make sure you can keep up to him.
On some of the platforms there are springboards which if Bubba bounces on them it gives him a gentle boost and also new in the latest update a jet pack. All quite helpful to get you a bit further in the game. It does take some time getting used to the controls and drawing the line at the right angle. After a few attempts though you should get the hang of it. If you draw the line too high on the screen Bubba jumps above off the screen and you have to then guess where he is going to come back down at. The best thing is to draw it as near to the middle as you can.
Your score is recorded for your own records but also for the online leader boards should you wish to add it there. At any time you can check them to see how high up on the board you are. You can also submit your scores to Facebook and share them with your friends and family.
The sound effects fit in well with the cute blob, lots of boings and jet pack noises. The graphics are quite basic, in the style of doodle sketching with colourful details.
It is a good game and quite hard at times to get far so it becomes quite addictive. The game is a good time killer, perfect for picking up and having some quick fun.
Doodle Swipe is recommended for any Doodle Jump fan!
The Good
The Not So Good
Price: $0.99 (iTunes Store)
Updated: May 03, 2010
Reviewed Version: 1.1
1.1 (iPhone OS 3.0 Tested)
Size: 4.3 MB
Language: English
Seller: Hafiz Awang Pon
© 2010 Hafiz Pon
Rated 4+
Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iPhone OS 2.2 or later
FaceFighter [rating: 3.5/5]
Flex your thumb and get ready to rumble with this comic boxing game
If it has a face, you can fight it … friends, pets, even cartoon characters can be your boxing opponents. Give your foe black eyes, a busted nose, and swollen lips, and laugh at their expressions and reactions as you beat the crap out of them. But be careful — your FaceFighter opponent is a cagey boxer who will be trying to do the same thing to YOU!
On starting this game you are immediately prompted to create a profile which is a nice start as it saves you time entering your name every time you want to enter your score, however if you are the “what does this button do” type don’t press the ominous looking [X] button, it deletes your profile which is just one of a few design flaws I’ve found in the otherwise slick UI.
With bright eastern style graphics which feels nicely solid to look at and navigate through, immediately sets the scene for some crazy oriental fighting arena along with the nicely fitting single soundtrack.
On choosing your opponent (out of 4 built in characters), the difficulty and a brief loading screen later, your ready to fight. On the left you have block, light punch above it, on the right you have hard punch and kick and between them a special meter which as you fight fills up and glows when ready to activate “Legendary Fury” and replacing your regular attacks with a random comical weapon, either a rubber chicken or a frying pan.
The general idea of the game is to punch and kick (not the most responsive controls) your opponent while blocking as many incoming hits at possible (indicated by red rings) until your opponent doesn’t get up. Tap the symbol(s) flashing around your controls to execute a grand finishing move ala Mortal Kombat only funny and not gory.
Graphically everything is very smooth, with well animated opponents and attacks from both sides however the range of facial damage is limited and ends up going round in circles where it would have been better if the damage was harder to make, letting the range of damage graphics last the entire match. The in-game sound effects are comical, it does get a little boring after a while with a distinct lack of variety.
Somewhat making up for the lack of built-in characters is a feature to create your own, on choosing the create fighter option from the main menu you are given the option to select a picture from your device’s photo library or from your iPhone’s camera. The game however does not offer in game hair styles so that you could try and match it to your subject.
My major gripes with this game for iPhone/iPod touch is there’s no story mode, just singular fights which certainly effects the longevity of the game. There is also no two player mode as I think hooking up with friend for a comic fight especially with the free version sure would help promote this game and as usual there is no online highscore board.
Price $0.99
(Ver 1.3 18.08.09)
The Good
The Not So Good
Reviewed by: TylerDurdan
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Garfield – Train Your Brain [rating: 2.5/5]
The brain training market continues to grow across all platforms and the iPhone/iPod Touch is no different, search the app store and you’ll find pages of apps claiming to boost you memory power or at the very minimum stop it from decreasing. The latest to join the crowded market is Garfield – Train Your Brain which does exactly what you’d expect, it provides the usual brain training tasks presented to you by America’s, if not the worlds, favorite cat.
Features
• A brain exercising game dipped in Garfield’s comical sarcastic humor.
• A ‘Training Mode’ with more than 20 fun-filled and immersive games under major brain trainFing categories like Math, Logic, Visual and Memory.
• Unlockable bonuses achieved with high score and outstanding performances.
• A ‘Test Mode’ to have a quick challenge with your family and friends.
• Comical art deco enhances your gameplay experience in Garfield’s comical world.
If you’ve played brain training style games before you’ll be on familiar ground. The areas of competency are Math, Visual, Logic and Memory and each set is broken down into 5 separate areas, some of which are only unlocked when a gold medal on early levels are completed to a satisfactory level. Each test or challenge is introduced with a sly and sarcastic one liner from Garfield which after a while can become a little bit tiresome.
The game is broken down into three areas, Training where you can hone your skills in the fours areas, Challenges which are quick fire tests to compare with your family and friends and finally the Test area where all your training is scored to give you an overall rating. However, there is no ability to review the progress that you have made over time so the results can be pretty meaningless without anything to compare them too. While multiple profiles can be used so family and friends can all keep track of their progress, although there is no ability to compare your scores or upload them online which would have been a nice addition esp. to compare by same sex, age, location etc.
The graphics and sound would feel more at home on an old 64 bit console rather than the polished graphics that iPhone and iPod Touch usually have these days and it gives the game an overall dated feel . Although if your are used to the simple graphics of the Garfield cartoon then you won’t feel out of place.
Overall the game doesn’t add anything to the Brain Training genre and while it can be entertaining initially the lack of options and tracking will make it’s lasting appeal limited. Perhaps this game is for Garfield, Odie and Nermal fans only?
[Update] Garfield – Train your brain has been temporarily removed from the App Store and we got an update about the game status from the publisher – Indiagames
“The game is down now and soon the game will go live with some tech changes,…” – Head of Marketing, Indiagames Ltd.
Price $2.99
The Good
The Not So Good
Reviewed By: Craig Willis
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Word Solitaire puts a brilliant new spin on a classic favorite. The clever blend of word creation and traditional solitaire will hook you immediately!
Drag letters onto each other to arrange them into words. Flip over cards to expose more letters and complete the level by using all provided letters in the creation of words. The longer your words, the higher your score. Then, brag to your friends by tweeting your highest scores and fastest times right from the app!
♣ 25 beautiful levels, each with a high-resolution classical art background.
♥ Intelligent decks that increase difficulty slightly with each level.
♦ Customizable color themes.
♠ Complete Twitter integration.
♣ Millions of letter arrangements. No two games are ever the same.
♥ AutoSave – Pick up your game where you left off, anytime.What’s new
☆ Global high scores!
☆ Minimized risk of accidentally burning a card when building a long word in the far right columns
☆ Tweaked vowel/consonant ratio
☆ Did we miss anything? Email us: support@wordsolitaire.com
Price $.99
Paid App for Free?
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Touch [rating: 4.5/5]
Puzzlings is a storyline based puzzle game with the cartoon look of Ronaldo and the game-play of a cross between Tetris and the Window classic Bubble Breaker and so it’s in pretty good company.
Puzzlings is an adventure game that delivers a twist on match 3. Flip, swap, and spin blocks using your fingers. Solve puzzles and fit pieces of a talisman together to unlock items. Find over 120 items. Customize your avatar with a myriad of outfits, features, and accessories. Take pics of your avatar and email to friends.
So who or what are Puzzlings? They are sad little creatures who live in the boring land of Wardrobia. However, one day, one Puzzling, who you get to name, dreams of 8 enchanted talismans hidden throughout a land of sunlight and color. And there is your task, travel through the lands and complete puzzles to find the 8 talismans.
The puzzles are all variations on the same theme, a tower of colored blocks (with color specific symbols on them for the color sight afflicted amongst us), fill the screen and your task is to complete chains of three or more to make them disappear. Moving the blocks around is simple, either flip a row of blocks by selecting a single line or rotate a block by select a group of squares. As you clear the blocks you will fill your combometer and you’ll need to do this complete each stage, complete it quickly enough though and you’ll also win a speed bonus item.
At the end of each puzzle though you will need to clear a special item block before the stage is complete. At this point though the combometer will run down much quicker so you are under extra pressure to put the special item block together and complete the stage. The final stage you can attempt is the Puzzle House where you are challenged to clear the whole playing area in as few moves as possible. While the early levels are fairly straight forward the later levels crank up the difficulty and pressure just enough to keep the puzzles interesting and not too far out of reach.
Completing the numerous levels will not only reward you with unlocking more levels and the much lauded talismen but will also unlock multiple clothes and accessories for you to dress your Puzzling in. These extra items can take your Puzzling from a cute looking creature that you’d be happy to take home to show your mother to a crazy, mad eyed freak that any right-minded person would want lock in a box, throw away the key before burying it mobster style in 8 feet of concrete. However your Puzzling looks though you can also take snapshots of your good-looking creature for prosperity and review the pictures at your leisure.
But this is your Puzzling and so however they look you’ll want to move them through the 8 locations to complete the game with you. If you want to find out how you are progressing there are plenty of statistics via the computer icon including high scores, speed bonuses and overall completion status all of which are local only.
The only frustrating thing about the game I could find was the music which more often than not I turned down, luckily the game allows you to play your own music so even that small problem could be remedied. While the game is a single player game only there is enough here to keep you coming back for more, the game is cutesy enough for the kids and challenging enough for the grown-ups, so it’s a win-win situation for everyone.
Price $1.99
The Good
The Not So Good
Reviewed By: Craig Willis
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Video
Puzzlings Screenshots
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So you’ve started your own taxi cab business but no sooner have you dropped off your first passengers some others are getting extremely angry to the extent that they glow red, throb and ultimately explode, in addition your cars start crashing into each other and not to mention head on collisions with the emergency services! Luckily all this is via the new iPhone/iPod Touch app Taxi Jam and therefore there’s no risk that you are going to be getting a visit from multiple lawyers with multiple lawsuits.
So how do you avoid all these potential hazards in Taxi Jam opening up the new cities and ultimately climb that high score table.
1. During the early stages where there’s not much going on, you can make directing your cab easy by simply dragging your finger from point A to point B and let the cab direct itself. As the game heats up though being more specific with your directions are definitely required.
2. Try to keep the number of cars for passengers around them same for as long as you can. Moving multiple cars when you don’t need to is just hard work.
3. Keep your cars off of the drop off points if they are waiting for another pickup. This way you don’t need to move them if another cab needs to drop off.
4. When directing cabs to drop off passengers drag the car through the drop off point and onto another parking location or if available straight to another passenger. The cab will then drop the passenger off and go straight on to it’s next location.
5. As the numbers of cabs and passengers progress try to keep the cabs to a specific area of the map, that way there is unnecessary criss-crossing of paths. Obviously if the passenger you pick up needs to be dropped off on the other side of town you’ll have no choice.
6. You don’t lose anything for picking up and dropping of an angry customer, so if it’s easier to send a close cab after they’ve dropped another passenger off then do so, as long as you do catch them before they explode!
7. Watch out of exclamation marks over your cabs as this means there paths collide. However as long as you time it right there’s no need to re-direct all potential collisions.
8. Although the emergency vehicle will display their route on the map the side of the map they originate from varies so do hesitate in moving cars that are in it’s path out of the way starting with the cars on the edge of the map.
9. Keeping the right amount of cabs out on the streets is key but if you find yourself with too many cabs out on the road all at the same time simply drag them back into the taxi rank on the left hand side to park them safely away.
10. If you are wondering what you have to do to get to open up the later levels it’s this, simply pick up and drop off 100 passengers in each city. And with these tips and some practice you shouldn’t have any problems
Tips By: Craig Willis
Share Your Tips!
[rating: 4.5/5]
SIZZ is an addictive puzzler that will have you claiming, “Just one more go…..”
Your aim is to build closed paths by moving and rotating
the tiles which the computer offers you.
The more tiles you use, the higher is the score.
Building three large figures in a line starts the triple score mode, which will push your earnings to really high values.
When I first picked up SIZZ from The App Dojo I was a little skeptical. Puzzle games have a lot to live up to they need to get the balance just right between simplicity and addictiveness. Simplicity should be easy to do…addictiveness on the other hand is a mysterious beast that everyone knows exists but few have been able to tame.
So how does SIZZ compare to these two standards? SIZZ has a very simple and challenging gameplay after a quick read of the instructions, which were clear and concise, I delved back into the playing arena.
The play area consists of 19 hexagons in a honeycomb configuration. The playing area looks good but is not graphically exciting and it would have been nice to be rewarded as you progress with more colors and styles but that being said it doesn’t take anything away from the game play. The layout of the screen works well and the playing pieces are easily navigated.
As soon as you click start the first piece is added to the board ready for placement and as you would expect time is not your friend here. Your task is to place the pieces to complete closed paths which will in turn explode, clear the pieces and gain you much needed points.
Doing this at speed initially is not easy though. The pieces come in a variety of forms and angles and it can take a while before you can quickly view a piece and place it correctly at pace. Eventually though the shapes and forms become more recognizable and before long you will be working out strategies and planning your moves well in advance which is a necessity as the pace of the game speeds up as you progress through the levels.
As is standard with most puzzle games the bigger the closed paths are the more points you get and when you reach 10,000 you get the ability to play a Joker which will clear the whole playing area and can come as a significant relief to get rid of some of the stubborn unplayable pieces that have been placed.
As I mentioned before time and placement is the key and one wrong move can result in the whole playing area becoming unplayable and a swift end to the game, this is one change I would like to see. It’s not possible to replace any piece once it’s been placed and while you wouldn’t want the ability to do this indefinitely a 3 strike rule per level would make the game more playable.
The game is for one player and has only a local high score table which doesn’t even allow adding your name. Options are also limited to the standard Sound and Music volume controls plus the addition of being able to control the placement of the rotation buttons to the bottom left, right or center of the screen.
After a few plays SIZZ is already showing signs of having one of the most important qualities of any game, the quality of “Oh, just one more try”.
Price $.99
The Good
The Not So Good
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Features:
– Intense levels that will get your adrenaline going.
– Connect the pipes to lead the water to the end.
– Automatically saves the last level you were playing.
Joey Susbilla has been developing some great Social Networking, Entertainment and News apps. Pipleine is a very simple game which requires high level of concentration, the ability to be quick and plan your next move.
The game presents you with a grid which is covered with blocks and your objective is to connect the pipes to flow water from the start to end by revealing the right pipes. As you tap on different blocks you can swap one pipe from one position to the other by first revealing and then tap on the position where you want to connect it.
As you progress through the levels the the speed with which water flows will increse and force you to think quick and pre-plan your next move. The best strategy is to quickly reveal all the pipes and then try to connect the right ones.
Pipeline is a must have puzzle game for those who have the patience to try again and again till they succeed.
Price $.99
The Good
The Not So Good