Gameloft's port of Rayman 2: The Great Escape [App Store] launched this evening, and fans of the original will be in for a treat as it appears that very little, if anything, has been cut from the game in the process of squeezing it on to the iPhone.
Rayman 2 is a 3D platformer released in late 1999 that takes place in a world known as the "Glade of Dreams" that happens to be infested by robot pirates who, lamentably, invaded and destroyed the "Heart of the World". Now it's up to Rayman to seek out the four magic masks needed to awaken Polokus, the spirit of the world, and set things right.
In the graphics and sound department, Rayman 2 is great. It looks just as I remembered it on the Dreamcast, and the soundtrack does a great job of setting the mood of the game. Unfortunately, once you get past how cool it is to be playing a late 90's console classic on your phone, things start to quickly fall apart.
As a 3D platformer, the two most important things are the controls and the camera system. A virtual joystick on the left side of the screen controls Rayman's movements, while a set of buttons handle jumping and tossing orbs to attack. Additional buttons appear when needed, such as a third button to dive while swimming.
The camera can be moved left or right by swiping that direction on screen, and to lock on to enemies a confusing pinching gesture is used. There are also some portions of the game with an obligatory tilt gimmick thrown in for good measure.
I feel like there are a lot of similarities between what I think about Rayman 2 and how I felt about Earthworm Jim when Gameloft brought it to the iPhone last year. The game itself looks great, but even a fantastic looking port of a game I had a lot of fun with when it was first released in the late 90's doesn't outweigh the cumbersome controls that make even the simple tutorial levels much more difficult than they should be.
I can forgive Gameloft for yet another game that doesn't really fit the iPhone with a set of virtual controls plastered on top, because Rayman 2 with bad controls is still better than not having Rayman 2 at all. As you progress through the game, you even start to get used to the crazy camera system and end up falling off ledges much less than you were originally, but something as simple as character movement really shouldn't have a learning curve attached to it.
Where Gameloft completely loses me on this port is in the save system. If you need to answer a phone call, a text message, or quit the game for any reason, the next time you load it you're back at the level select screen and need to start the level you were on over, complete with skipping through any associated cut scenes.
Taking these flaws in to account, Rayman 2 is hard to recommend, especially as your first foray in to the Rayman universe. If you are willing to invest the time in to mastering the game's irritating controls, and can work around the ridiculous save system, you will be rewarded with a classic adventure across tons of unique levels that are loaded with oodles of different hidden collectables.
I'm not a big sports fan, in real life or on the consoles. But there is one exception: snowboarding titles. I can't get enough of them. 1080 Snowboarding on the N64, SSX on the PS2, SSX Blur on the Wii — I just love them. Sadly, none of the snowboarding games available in the App Store have really been able to do it for me. Compared to SSX on Tour for the PSP, they generally just look fairly weak.
Well, I'm happy to report that, at long last, a quality snowboarding title has landed on the iPhone. X2 Snowboarding [App Store] from Exient is a highly enjoyable romp on the slopes that sets itself apart from the crowd in a number of ways.
The first thing you'll notice about X2 Snowboarding is its stylized graphical presentation. The game features particularly detailed cel-shaded graphics reminiscent of the exceptional Jet Grind Radio for the Dreamcast. They give the game something of a cartoony rather than realistic look, but compared to its App Store contemporaries, it looks just great.
You've got a crowd of six boarders to choose from, each of a different nationality and with highly varied skill sets. Six different venues there are, as well, set in as many countries: USA, Switzerland, Japan, New Zealand, Canada, and Chile. Upon each set of slopes there are three different types of competitions: Freestyle, Race, and Trick-Race. The slopes are impressively long and more varied than one might expect, providing a satisfying chunk of gameplay across the available types of competitions.
Another thing that sets X2 Snowboarding apart is the feel of its controls. Oh, there's nothing unexpected about the configuration, with a combination of tilt and touch controls (that can be customized) — it's more the general feel I'm referring to. Everything just feels a little "looser" than one might expect. But it's not a bad thing, in fact, somehow it feels quite right combined with the game's stylized visuals. And speaking of visuals, a nice instant-replay system lets you see your best moves over and over from various camera angles.
Gameplay is solid and heavy on the tricks. On-screen buttons control jump, speed boost, and "wheelies" which can be used to tie together tricks — and the trick system works great. Once in the air, you can swipe (or tilt, depending on your settings) in any direction to rotate thus, and tap on the left and right board icons that just appeared to perform various grabs. The more tricks you can tie together, the higher your score, the more speed boosts you can trigger, and the better gear you can grab in the shop to tweak your game.
Adding to the experience is a great soundtrack with songs that can be purchased through iTunes. Another feature we're glad to see is local, Bluetooth and WiFi multiplayer — for now — with online multiplayer to come in the game's first update, which will be in the App Store soon.
All of the aspects of X2 Snowboarding come together to deliver a highly enjoyable game with a surprising sense of speed and immersion. I've spent much time with this one so far, and I don't see that trend changing anytime soon. If you're a gamer that likes to tear up the slopes on occasion, do not let this one pass you by.
Action RPGs on the App Store have been steadily improving with the release of each new game. The first, The Chronicles of Inotia, was received with mixed feelings. Later, Zenonia was greeted as a vast improvement (albeit with its own flaws) and most recently Inotia 2 stole the crown upon its release last November. Now FDG Entertainment has upped the ante once again with Across Age [App Store], an RPG that explores time travel and simultaneous management of multiple characters.
The story of Across Age is standard fare for the genre, falling cleanly into a long line of RPGs in which the goal is to save the world from an evil magician. Unlike certain other similar games on the App Store, however, the writing and translation is extremely well done, with no noticeable spelling or grammatical gaffes. These high quality production values show in the soundtrack and crisp art style as well; each environment is colorful and carries its own unique and catchy background music.
Across Age's big hook is that players control two separate characters at once, switching between them and separating them at will by touching on their icons located at the bottom of the screen. The male character, a knight named Ales, can pick up the female mage character, Ceska, and throw her to otherwise unreachable areas. This creates opportunities for fun puzzles that might require Ceska to reach a switch to open a door for Ales, or simply lead to hidden treasure.
The character separation and cooperation element works quite well to create good puzzle variation. One puzzle might require Ales to separate and engage in a simple block pushing minigame, while others could turn into a complex maze that requires the two characters to separate and help each other progress. New mechanics (like a "boat" that can be used to navigate watery environments) are introduced at a fairly consistent rate throughout the game, effectively preventing things from becoming boring and repetitive.
Across Age's other big gameplay gimmick is the ability for Ceska to time travel through the use of sparsely-located panels. This opens up plenty of possibilities, and often forces players to think creatively. In one instance, Ceska has to go back in time to drop off a wine bottle, only to return years in the future to harvest the now priceless aged wine. Special items called rebirth stones can be left along with a normal item in a magic pool located in the game's central city and returned to in the future to create special items and weapons. This system can often add special attributes to weapons and other items, and experimentation is encouraged to discover the best possible results.
Combat in Across Age might take a while to get fully acquainted with, but it works quite well after a bit of practice. Ales attacks by running directly into enemies (which looks quite stupid at first but makes sense if you think about it; why do you need hit a button to do something that can be done automatically?) and Ceska attacks with a variety of spells, usually long range attacks. Her spells can be cast by tapping the big button in the bottom right, and the game is pretty forgiving with the hit area around attacks to make up for the game's rather limiting eight-way directional movement scheme.
Boss battles might be one of the best parts of Across Age. Unlike many RPGs, which simply force players to mindlessly attack boss characters until they die, this game demands a sound strategy to earn a victory. In one instance I was faced with a giant plant monster which had to first be weakened with Ceska's recently learned fireball attack before Ales could rush in to attack in its weakened state.
Across Age does have its fair share of problems, most of which probably can't be fixed in a simple update. The equipment screen takes a fair bit of getting used to due to the small text size that makes it rather unresponsive to touch, and the game's zoomed-in camera makes some enemies lurking in the southern regions of the screen difficult to detect before running directly into them. The most glaring flaw rears its head early in the game: some areas must be revisited far too many times to progress through the story.
The lack of multiplayer might be berated by some, but since only one character can attack at once as according to the intentional design of the game, I don't think of it as a missing feature. A great combination of fun combat and good puzzle variation allows Across Age to swiftly avoid the problems that many RPGs run into, and its high production values only serve to increase the already substantial attractive nature of the game for fans of the genre. Zenonia 2 has a lot to prove if it's going to continue the trend of ever-increasingly great action RPGs being released on the App Store.
Well that was fast. X2 Snowboarding [App Store] just showed up for download mere moments ago, and only a couple hours after our hands-on preview.
We'll have an in-depth review soon, but currently this is the snowboarding game for future games in the genre to beat. X2 Snowboarding has great tilt controls, awesome cell shaded graphics, a single player game mode with unlockables, a licensed soundtrack, and even local multiplayer via Bluetooth and WiFi.
I was extremely impressed with the game in our preview, and look forward to it soaking up a good deal of my spare time in the future. In case you missed it the first time around, here is a brief gameplay video again:
About a week back I had a chance to visit Gameloft's Manhattan studios and have a look at their upcoming racing simulator GT Racing: Motor Academy [App Store] for iPhone. Tonight, GT Racing has gone live in the App Store and we've got a chance to take a closer look.
GT Racing is a driving simulation as opposed to an arcade racer. Gameloft likens the title to Real Racing, which it considers the only other driving simulation in the App Store. Being a simulation-style racer, it starts off much like the definitive driving sim, Gran Turismo. You are presented with a few initial challenges (accelerate to maximum speed and then come to a stop between the lines, etc.) that must be completed before your achieve your first racing license. From there it's a Campaign journey through a variety of tracks around the world. Though, I will say the game is rather more forgiving than Gran Turismo, partially due to the integrated Break Assist system (like Real Racing), but more due to the overall control scenario.
The game features over 100 cars from 24 different manufacturers to choose from for a race to the finish against up to nine on-track opponents. There are 14 different worldwide tracks in all, comprised of raceway, urban, and rally-style runs. The better you rank, the more credits you accumulate, and the fancier cars and equipment you can purchase. Progressive tracks are unlocked in Campaign mode, and any unlocked track can be used for a quick spin in the game's Arcade mode.
GT Racing features three different control methods: accelerometer (default), screen keys (think Vector Tanks – kinda), and wheel. I find accelerometer to be my preferred method that, for what it is, really leaves little room for control improvement. Score tracking is handled through the integrated Gameloft LIVE network. Like Asphalt 5, Gameloft also offers an online multi-player component that we were unable to test at launch, but it's an important feature we're certainly glad to see.
GT Racing is one of the most visually impressive racers in the App Store. On my iPhone 3GS test unit, the game exhibits an impressive, but subtle, HDR effect to the rendered scene and runs at a very smooth frame rate. Six different driving views are provided — three outside, three inside — to allow for the view that bests fits your driving sensibilities. All races can be seen in Replay mode which is, as well, an impressive thing to behold, and videos can also be uploaded to YouTube (example video). One notable issue with the visuals, however, is a noticeably short draw distance resulting in buildings abruptly popping into view which can be distracting.
There are a few other issues we ran across with the initial version. On occasion, my car appeared to aburbtly jolt into a nose-up position, half embedded in the track, with a warning of "wrong way" presented. (One of these incidents is recorded in our demo video.) As well, in-game language suggested that I had access to a particular track before it was supposed to be unlocked. Neither game breaking, but notable for early adopters.
See our brief gameplay video for a closer look.
Overall, GT Racer is probably one of the best racers on the App Store. In particular, racing fans looking for a realistic racer that offers nicely varied racing action wrapped up in a very pretty package should enjoy Gameloft's latest offering.
Impressions from early adopters on the forum have been similarly positive, but similar caveats:
tadad1 – lots of control adjustments, including driving aids, amazingly crisp graphics, but short draw distance, no crash damage, massive content
morphman – Lots of options, good but not stellar framerate on 3GS, pop-in apparent, graphics look amazing
From Revolution Software, the same people who brought the iPhone the fantastic remake of Beneath a Steel Sky, comes Broken Sword: Shadow of the Templars: The Director's Cut [$6.99], a remake of a point-and-click adventure from '96 that many consider to be one of the greatest games within its genre. As we covered in our preview two different versions of this remake were already published on the DS and Wii in March of 2009, and the new iPhone version is a bit of a mixture of the two, adding full voice acting and other features that the DS version lacked.
Broken Sword, which was renamed Circle of Blood for its release in the USA, has been given a significant facelift. Whereas the original version of the game focused almost solely on the male character, George Stobbart, The Director's Cut does a better job of fleshing out the back story of the game's female protagonist, Nicole Collard. The game opens as Nicole prepares for an interview that unexpectedly becomes a murder investigation when the man she was set to interview is shot by a mysterious mime. Other modifications to the game include new puzzles that are specific to the iPhone platform and new art and animation from Dave Gibbons, who you might be familiar with through his work on Watchmen.
The story in Broken Sword, as in most point-and-click adventure games, is the most important element of the game, so those who haven't played a version of the game before will be pleased to find that Broken Sword's writing is excellent, and the story is quite gripping. I particularly enjoyed the self-depreciating sense of humor that Nicole occasionally displays with her commentary, and George is a comedic parody of an American from a European perspective, making him a fairly amusing character as well.
For a point-and-click adventure, Broken Sword does a lot to make itself easily accessible. In an intelligent move by the developers, a simple finger swipe will reveal everything that George or Nicole can interact within a single screen, preventing players from having to poke around the screen randomly until they find something that they can interact with. The game's many puzzles range from brain games wherein an abstract combination of collected items must be used to progress to a lock-picking game that's nearly identical to the iPhone's own Blocked to a ridiculously complex cypher that players must harness incredible code-breaking skills to crack.
Luckily, the game has a built-in walkthrough in the form of a hint system that can be easily accessed if players want to give up and find the answer to a puzzle. For each puzzle there are several hints, each one more explicit than the last, with the last one usually being a straight-up answer to the puzzle for players who just couldn't figure things out. The genius of both the "swipe-to-reveal" mechanic and the hint system is that it's possible to never use either if a player doesn't want to. Some of the hardcore fans of the original PC version of the game that're picking up the iPhone version will want a more "pure" experience, and that option is available to them, but softies like myself can still enjoy the game without having to resort to an online walkthrough.
Broken Sword's creative touch interface works like a charm on the iPhone screen, but it was the one-two punch of the game's fantastic soundtrack and art that really hooked me. The piano-heavy orchestral soundtrack is so good that I purchased it from the iTunes store so I could listen to it later, and the fact that every line of dialogue in the game is voiced makes this a game that must be experienced with headphones. Dave Gibbon's contribution to the art and animation was an invaluable addition, as the painted backgrounds and the fluid animation adds a certain appealing touch to the game.
Even though I've never been a huge fan of point-and-click adventure games, the story and all around high-quality production values of Broken Sword sucked me in like a good book. Whether you're an old fan of the original game, a newcomer to the series, or even someone who's never played a point-and-click adventure before, Broken Sword is a game with mass appeal that will draw you in.
The Spore series started as a PC game by Will Wright and has since spawned several other games and a line of t-shirts, posters, and other swag. Plans for the future include expansion packs for the original Spore, a Spore card game, and even a Spore movie by the director of Ice Age. But where do the iPhone games fit in to all of this?
The first Spore game released on the App Store, Spore Origins [$1.99 / Free], arrived in early September of '08. At the time, it was an amazing game compared to the other games available in the infancy of the App Store, especially with how few "name brand" game franchises there were available at the time. Sadly, the game has not aged well, and the enhancements made in the sequel, Spore Creatures [$6.99], don't bring much to the table.
Much like the original, the goal in Spore Creatures is to eat everything lower on the food chain than you are to collect DNA which is then used to evolve, improving existing abilities and granting new ones to your creature. You control your creature (this time on land) by tilting, and the heart of the game mostly involves tilting your phone to steer your creature in to anything that moves.
Spore Creatures attempts to add some much-needed depth to the game by adding different obstacles in the game world that require certain creature upgrades to overcome. For instance, one of the first things blocking your progress to the next area of the game is a rock which can only be moved once you've added legs to your creature, giving it the power to move the rock out of the way. Farther in to the game you will come across boss monsters, and other creatures that you can socialize with.
The one thing that is a lot of fun in Spore Creatures is the actual creature editor itself. With 45 unique body parts, body shape, and colors to be tweaked the iTunes description claims that there are billions of possible combinations. Making silly looking creatures is much more fun than tilting your phone to have them randomly bump in to things, and I really hope that EA brings something similar to the Spore Creature Creator to the iPhone some day.
Spore Origins was released at a time when a ton of people were completely engrossed in Spore mania. Now that the Spore franchise is getting stale, I doubt the sequel will have the same allure. Quite simply, there are both better tilting games and better adventure games on the App Store right now, and unless you're in love with the crazy creatures of the Spore universe, there aren't many reasons to spend much time with Spore Creatures.
iPhone developer Ryan Mitchell has just released Necromancer Rising [App Store], a large-scale, first-person RPG with an air of the macabre that should appeal to fans of dark and dank dungeon crawlers.
Necromancer Rising places you in the unenviable position of the last surviving Battle Priest of the king's army with a wife and child that were recently slaughtered and buried, and — as if that wasn't enough — robbed from their graves by the minions of the evil Necromancer, tunneling in caverns below. Your goal is to regain your former strength and visit grave vengeance upon the aforementioned Necromancer in the name of your beloved family.
The game features a highly detailed stats and equip system; your person features 16 equipment locations for weapons and armor allowing for a great many battle configurations. The author indicates that the game includes tens of thousands of items as well as 50,000 different weapons, in all. (All items are freely available to those who spend the time to find them, but for those who don't mind paying for a bit of a short-cut, certain particularly useful items are also available as in-app purchases.) There are 50 different levels to explore (with 49 end-bosses) and each is dynamically generated upon entrance, so no level is ever the twice the same.
See the developer's trailer video for a look at the game in play.
As yet, I've spent but a brief while with the title and find that what it lacks in polish in some areas (menu system, look controls, etc.), it makes up for with a pleasantly ghoulish atmosphere thanks to the creepy level and creature design, as well as the superb, moaning sound effects and evocative background score. The whole thing has a nice sort of campy Evil Dead feel to it that lends it a particular sort of charm that I find myself enjoying.
Our forum members have had a lot to say about this one. Hitch enjoyed it, while noting the lack of polish in some areas.
This is a hardcore RPG. If you're a casual gamer, I'd probably pass as of now. It has good graphics, sounds, and gameplay elements/length, but a crappy menu system and messy controls keep the game from living up to it's potential. Great game, but hard to work with.
8/10- Must have for PATIENT RPG fans, but needs quite a few updates to make it a must have for everyone.
Overall, it's scratching my dungeon crawl itch. There's random loot in varying levels of quality with random affixes (just found a helmet that increases my intelligence). It runs smoothly on my 3GS. And it SEEMS like there's a lot of game here. The dungeon is 50 levels deep, and if there continues to be several quests per level, it'll take quite a while to burn through them.
Have a look at the game trailer (this early version of the bundled tutorial video might be helpful as well) to aid in your decision.
If you're a fan of racing games, and were holding back on picking up EA's recently released Need For Speed: Shift [App Store] for some kind of sale, now is your chance. The price was dropped from $9.99 to $6.99 yesterday, and since then Shift has been rocketing up the iTunes charts.
If this is the first you've heard of this game, we got a great deal of hands-on time before its release and posted an in-depth preview. Shift departs from the Need For Speed arcade style gameplay which has become standard over the years to include more simulation elements including the ability to customize cars in many different ways, buy new ones, and the game even constantly tracks your performance to determine what kind of driver you are– Aggressive or precise.
There's a lot to like about Need For Speed: Shift and we think it can easily hang with the best racing games on the platform. Shift sports licensed cars and music, great graphics, and a great control system with settings that make the game approachable for casual players as well as technical enough for hardcore players.
If you've enjoyed racing games on the iPhone, this isn't one you will want to pass up… And if you haven't yet played a racing game on the platform, Need For Speed: Shift is a great starting point.
Emulation has long been the forbidden fruit that has lured many iPhone gamers in to jailbreaking. None of the emulators on Cydia that I've tried have been that impressive, providing gameplay experiences that range from poor to mediocre. But for some people (myself included to an extent), being able to just barely play The Legend of Zelda is good enough.
Nescaline [App Store] was released on to the App Store this evening by Jonathan Zdziarski, creator of NES v3 available on Cydia. Nescaline comes with a basic load out of free games, but to play the games you actually want to play you will need to point the emulator to a .nes ROM file URL. It then downloads the ROM in to the emulator, and you can play it whenever you want.
Multitouch on-screen controls make up the D-Pad and controller buttons, and as you probably could guess, the controls aren't that great. They work, but don't expect to be making your way through Battletoads or any other game that requires fast reactions or the precise controls that come from a physical controller.
When you rotate the orientation of your phone the emulator flips from portrait to landscape, which seems to make controlling games much easier. The performance of the emulated games I've tried ranged from decent to slightly laggy on my 3GS, with some odd bugs such as musical glitches in Zelda and the title screen not displaying correctly in Super Mario Bros.
If you've been looking for a basic NES emulator for the iPhone, but haven't wanted to jailbreak, now is your chance– It's hard to say how long Nescaline will remain on the App Store, especially considering Apple's stance on emulators in the past, its questionable icon, and Nescaline's ability to both download and execute third party code that hasn't been approved by Apple.
Update: And just as fast as Nescaline appeared it was removed from the App Store. If you were lucky enough to grab it while it was available, be sure to back up the .ipa file as you won't be able to download it again until it reappears on the App Store.
Gameloft's port of Rayman 2: The Great Escape [App Store] launched this evening, and fans of the original will be in for a treat as it appears that very little, if anything, has been cut from the game in the process of squeezing it on to the iPhone.
I can forgive Gameloft for yet another game that doesn't really fit the iPhone with a set of virtual controls plastered on top, because Rayman 2 with bad controls is still better than not having Rayman 2 at all. As you progress through the game, you even start to get used to the crazy camera system and end up falling off ledges much less than you were originally, but something as simple as character movement really shouldn't have a learning curve attached to it.
Well that was fast. X2 Snowboarding [
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