Outland Games is a new iOS game from Uber Entertainment, creators of the popular Monday Night Combat series of MOBA games on Xbox 360 and PC. It’s available now as a $0.99 download from the App Store, with additional in-app purchases of in-game currency and booster items.
Outland Games is an endless runner set in the Monday Night Combat universe, in which players take on the role of the series’ Assassin character as she attempts to traverse a perilous obstacle course and win her freedom. Gameplay is very simple, consisting of only two controls — tapping on the left side of the screen causes the Assassin to jump while tapping on the right side causes her to attack. The Assassin can “double jump” by tapping the jump button in mid-air, and using an attack while in the air allows her to suspend herself for a moment — a technique that is sometimes necessary to clear large gaps.
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Gun Bros 2 is a new iOS release from Glu Mobile, and the sequel to the company’s successful Gun Bros game from 2010. It’s available now as a free download from the App Store with additional in-app purchases of in-game currency.
Gun Bros 2, like its predecessor, is a top-down perspective action game in which players take on the role of one of two obnoxiously masculine “bros” and then work their way through a series of missions in which the aim is to obliterate waves of attacking enemy forces as quickly and efficiently as possible. The game is controlled via a virtual twin-stick system, with the left stick handling movement and the right stick handling firing in an independent direction to movement. As the player acquires additional equipment, extra buttons may appear on screen which unleash special abilities when tapped, and these generally have a short “cooldown” period before they may be used again. (more…)
Worm Run is a new iOS game from Golden Ruby Games. It’s available now as a $0.99 download from the App Store.
Worm Run is ostensibly an “endless runner” game, but rather than following the autorunning Canabalt or Temple Run mold, it instead takes the form of a randomly-generated retro-style platform game in which the player, cast in the role of space janitor Zeke Tallahassee, must escape from the unwanted attentions of a gigantic slobbering space worm who wants nothing more than to chow down on our hero.
Unlike most endless runners, Zeke does not automatically run forwards and is instead controlled by swiping in any direction on the screen. The reason for this is that levels do not simply follow a straight line with obstacles to jump over and duck under — instead, they twist and turn, frequently double back on themselves and are designed much more along the lines of those you would see in a NES-era platform game. Their randomly-generated nature means that each game is a different experience, giving Worm Run potentially limitless replayability. (more…)
Race Track Rivals is a new Facebook game from Digital Chocolate. Unlike many of Digital Chocolate’s other recent titles, it is not a strategy game; rather, it is a 3D racing game featuring the opportunity for users to create their own content, and is available now in open beta on the social network.
Race Track Rivals is a simplistic racing game designed to provide quick, accessible automotive thrills and asynchronous competition to its players. It is split into three main components: the races themselves, the pit lane and the track editor. The track editor does not become available to players until they have reached experience level 4, but this does not take very long.
In a race, players simply have to use the directional keys on their keyboard to steer their car, the spacebar to brake and one of several different keys depending on the configuration to trigger a nitro boost for a sudden burst of acceleration. Nitro is only available in limited quantities, but can be replenished by driving over glowing blue powerups on the track. Each race sees players competing against three other opponents and unfolds over three different laps. The player’s opponents are “ghost” cars based on other players’ best recorded times around the track rather than live opponents, and as such this means that there are no collisions between cars — driving into another car simply causes one to pass through the other. The reason for this implementation rather than live synchronous multiplayer is to ensure players can always immediately get into a game. There is no sitting around waiting for matchmaking with online opponents — players are able to get into a race immediately, regardless of the time of day and the number of people online. After a race, players may optionally make any of their opponents a “rival,” which allows them to more easily keep track of their performance and even compete in custom competitions designed by them. (more…)
Cordy 2 is a new iOS game from SilverTree Media. It’s available now in a free, limited “demo” format on the App Store, with a wide variety of in-app purchases including the ability to unlock the full version of the game for $4.99.
Cordy 2 is a platform game that stars the titular TV-headed robotic hero and tasks the player with ensuring he stays alive while attempting to rescue their friends from the evil Boogaloo. Basic gameplay involves running and jumping, collecting the game’s currency of Gears — which are used throughout the game to unlock new content such as levels and costumes — and trying to find the hidden Zap Drops before Boogaloo’s forces do.
You control Cordy is with on-screen button that move him left and right and jump. Depending on the context, a fourth button also sometimes appears, allowing Cordy to use teleporters, swing from special platforms and speak to characters to learn new techniques. Although the on-screen controls suffer from the usual flaws inherent in such a control scheme — blocking the action with thumbs on the small screen of the iPhone, and a lack of tactile feedback making it sometimes difficult to know if your fingers are in the right place — they are, for the most part, responsive and tight, meaning you normally feel like you’re in full control of Cordy. There are a few exceptions — guiding him in the air is sometimes a little errative, for example — but for the most part it’s a tight control scheme that works well within the limitations of the iOS platform. (more…)
Game developer Nekki today announced the release of its endless runner Vector for Android.
In Vector, players take on the role of a silhouetted figure who is constantly being pursued by another shadowy figure. No context is given for why these two are chasing each other despite the fact that the game refers to its main sequence of levels are “story” mode, but it doesn’t really matter — Vector isn’t a game that’s attempting to tell a complex story. Rather, it’s a game that attempts to get players wrapped up in the thrill of a movie-style rooftop chase scene — and in that respect, it succeeds admirably. You can read our full and favorable review of the game here.
Nekki, which also developed the impressive and visually-striking one-on-one combat game Shadow Fight, originally released Vector on Facebook, iOS and other social networks. According to Nekki, more than 10 million players have played Vector since its release.
The Android bersion of the game features 40 levels, with Survival and Player-vs-Player modes coming soon. You can download a free version from Google Play here, and upgrade to “Vector Delux” version (which includes all the levels) for $0.99.
Frog Orbs is a new iOS game from Uruguayan studio Ballpit Monster. It’s available now as a free download from the App Store, and carries additional in-app purchases of the in-game “flies” currency.
Frog Orbs’ basic gameplay is essentially that of the classic ’80s Atari arcade game Missile Command. Players control a frog who sits in a static location in the center of the screen. The player may cause the frog to fire magic blasts at specific points on screen simply by tapping. The blast takes a moment to fly from the frog to the point which was tapped, and subsequently detonates. Any of the incoming “Bengling” enemies who are caught in the blast will also detonate, and this allows for the possibility of chain reactions as a string of detonating enemies all set each other off.
Four magic orbs sit either side of the frog at the base of the screen, replacing Missile Command’s cities. These gradually fill up with magic as a single game progresses, and can be triggered by pressing and holding on them, at which point the game slows down as the orb “charges.” Each orb has a specific effect and elemental affinity — a fire orb causes fireballs to randomly rain down, hopefully on to enemies; an ice orb shoots out an icy bolt that can freeze any enemy it hits; a wind orb temporarily protects the magic orbs from harm; and an earth orb summons rocky spikes from the ground which will destroy any enemies that run into them. If a Bengling enemy hits an orb, the amount of magic in it is reduced slightly. If an empty orb is hit several times, it is broken and becomes unusable. (more…)
Lyroke is a Facebook game from We R Interactive, last seen with the excellent, well-presented and highly original first-person “soccer life” game I AM PLAYR, which we reviewed here. The new game, which is available on both Facebook and iOS, continues the developer’s pattern of producing high-quality, universally appealing games that are simple to understand but hard to master. This review is based on the Facebook version.
Lyroke is a music-based game, but rather than testing players’ sense of rhythm or song-identification skills, it instead tests their knowledge of song lyrics in a fast-paced “fill in the blank” challenge. Players select a song from the modestly-sized library of available tracks and are then presented with the official video, with lyrics overlaid. Every few lines, the lyrics will have a gap in them and the player will be presented with three possible words to go in the space. The player must pick what they think is the correct answer either by clicking on it or by using the number keys 1, 2 or 3. The faster they choose, the more points they will score, and the more correct answers they score in succession, the higher their score multiplier will climb — but missing a lyric or choosing the incorrect answer will reset their multiplier. (more…)
Red Crucible 2 is a Facebook game from Rocketeer Games Studio that is also available on the open Web. It’s been showing activity since October of 2010, but has recently been showing strong growth thanks to a successful standalone launch on the Mac App Store, and also due to a feature spot in the new “3D Unity Games” section of Facebook’s App Center.
Red Crucible 2 is a Unity-powered synchronous multiplayer first-person shooter in which players can compete in large-scale battles on sprawling, open maps in an attempt to prove their skills. The game offers five different modes — Free for All, Last Man Standing, Team Deathmatch, Attack & Defend and Demolition — and 11 different maps on which to play. There is also a full in-game store allowing players to customize their character with new skins, weapons and consumable items.
The game’s main menu is a no-frills affair which looks rather drab and uninteresting, but which is at least accompanied by some stirring (if repetitive) background music. From here, players may quickly join the first available game, search for a game by specific type and map, create their own new game or browse all the currently available games. They may also look at their profile — though this did not appear to update correctly and accurately reflect win/loss statistics and gained experience at the time of writing — and browse the store. (more…)
Temple Run 2 is a new mobile game from Imangi, out now on iOS and due next week on Android. It’s a sequel to the developer’s previous runaway (no pun intended) success, but the “endless runner” genre has become increasingly crowded since the first game’s release, so can Imangi still keep pace?
Temple Run 2 doesn’t deviate significantly from its predecessor’s formula. The player character — now selectable from a set of four, though three of them have to be unlocked with in-game currency — is constantly fleeing from a pursuing demon monkey down an endless labyrinth of clifftop pathways, ziplines, minecart tracks and other perilous obstacles. Players control the hero by swiping up or down to jump over or slide under obstacles, swiping left or right to turn around 90-degree corners and tilting left or right to move laterally and pick up coins or perhaps avoid holes in the pathway.
The most obvious difference between Temple Run 2 and its predecessor is in presentation. The sequel features much more detailed graphics, but this has the unfortunate side-effect of making some obstacles much more difficult to parse at speed. For example, a new obstacle features a 90-degree turn at the edge of a cliff which the player can fall off if they don’t follow it around, but the corner is almost impossible to discern until you are right on top of it, meaning it can look suspiciously like there is nowhere to go.
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