GameSpasm

This is Portabliss, a column about downloadable games that can be played on the go.

There was a time when the beat-em-up was king, a time when Streets of Rage, Final Fight and Golden Axe were at the top of the heap. Combo Crew on iOS and Android looks to return to those days, offering several unique fighters, lots of combos and plenty of bosses to bruise, clobber and otherwise pummel.

The impressive part is that it does all of that with just two fingers.

Continue reading Combo Crew lets you beat 'em up with two fingers

Combo Crew lets you beat 'em up with two fingers originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 18 Jun 2013 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments Tags: android, Combo Crew, game-bakers, iOS, ipad, iPhone, Mobile, portabliss, the-game-bakers

This is Portabliss, a column about downloadable games that can be played on the go.

There was a time when the beat-em-up was king, a time when Streets of Rage, Final Fight and Golden Axe were at the top of the heap. Combo Crew on iOS and Android looks to return to those days, offering several unique fighters, lots of combos and plenty of bosses to bruise, clobber and otherwise pummel.

The impressive part is that it does all of that with just two fingers.

Continue reading Combo Crew lets you beat 'em up with two fingers

Combo Crew lets you beat 'em up with two fingers originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 18 Jun 2013 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments Tags: android, Combo Crew, game-bakers, iOS, ipad, iPhone, Mobile, portabliss, the-game-bakers

This is Portabliss, a column about downloadable games that can be played on the go.

There was a time when the beat-em-up was king, a time when Streets of Rage, Final Fight and Golden Axe were at the top of the heap. Combo Crew on iOS and Android looks to return to those days, offering several unique fighters, lots of combos and plenty of bosses to bruise, clobber and otherwise pummel.

The impressive part is that it does all of that with just two fingers.

Continue reading Combo Crew lets you beat 'em up with two fingers

Combo Crew lets you beat 'em up with two fingers originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 18 Jun 2013 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments Tags: android, Combo Crew, game-bakers, iOS, ipad, iPhone, Mobile, portabliss, the-game-bakers

Vlambeer founders Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijman didn't think Ridiculous Fishing would win an Apple Design Award. Sure, it was in the running, but it was a long shot, and they had other places to be during the ceremony at WWDC on June 10 (E3, anyone?). Just in case, they asked Ridiculous Fishing collaborator and indie extraordinaire Zach Gage to go to the show, and he did. In flip flops. And shorts. And Ridiculous Fishing won.

"Holy shit," Ismail laughed during our chat at E3. He was still getting over the fact that Ridiculous Fishing won an Apple Design Award, and that Gage collected it in what's commonly considered summer beach attire.

So far Ridiculous Fishing sales have hit the "hundreds of thousands," Ismail said, and after the Design Award, sales spiked again. Even Elijah Wood got hooked on Ridiculous Fishing - or, as Ismail put it, "The Hobbit played it!"

Continue reading Ridiculous Fishing creator reeling from Apple Design Award, talks TU

Ridiculous Fishing creator reeling from Apple Design Award, talks TU originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 18 Jun 2013 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments Tags: Apple design awards, e3-2013, iOS, ipad, iPhone, Mobile, rami-ismail, ridiculous-fishing, title-update, vlambeer

Vlambeer founders Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijman didn't think Ridiculous Fishing would win an Apple Design Award. Sure, it was in the running, but it was a long shot, and they had other places to be during the ceremony at WWDC on June 10 (E3, anyone?). Just in case, they asked Ridiculous Fishing collaborator and indie extraordinaire Zach Gage to go to the show, and he did. In flip flops. And shorts. And Ridiculous Fishing won.

"Holy shit," Ismail laughed during our chat at E3. He was still getting over the fact that Ridiculous Fishing won an Apple Design Award, and that Gage collected it in what's commonly considered summer beach attire.

So far Ridiculous Fishing sales have hit the "hundreds of thousands," Ismail said, and after the Design Award, sales spiked again. Even Elijah Wood got hooked on Ridiculous Fishing - or, as Ismail put it, "The Hobbit played it!"

Continue reading Ridiculous Fishing creator reeling from Apple Design Award, talks TU

Ridiculous Fishing creator reeling from Apple Design Award, talks TU originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 18 Jun 2013 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments Tags: Apple design awards, e3-2013, iOS, ipad, iPhone, Mobile, rami-ismail, ridiculous-fishing, title-update, vlambeer

Vlambeer founders Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijman didn't think Ridiculous Fishing would win an Apple Design Award. Sure, it was in the running, but it was a long shot, and they had other places to be during the ceremony at WWDC on June 10 (E3, anyone?). Just in case, they asked Ridiculous Fishing collaborator and indie extraordinaire Zach Gage to go to the show, and he did. In flip flops. And shorts. And Ridiculous Fishing won.

"Holy shit," Ismail laughed during our chat at E3. He was still getting over the fact that Ridiculous Fishing won an Apple Design Award, and that Gage collected it in what's commonly considered summer beach attire.

So far Ridiculous Fishing sales have hit the "hundreds of thousands," Ismail said, and after the Design Award, sales spiked again. Even Elijah Wood got hooked on Ridiculous Fishing - or, as Ismail put it, "The Hobbit played it!"

Continue reading Ridiculous Fishing creator reeling from Apple Design Award, talks TU

Ridiculous Fishing creator reeling from Apple Design Award, talks TU originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 18 Jun 2013 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments Tags: Apple design awards, e3-2013, iOS, ipad, iPhone, Mobile, rami-ismail, ridiculous-fishing, title-update, vlambeer

One-man indie development studio Benjamin Rivers' side-scrolling pixel art horror game Home will be available for iOS devices this Thursday, June 20. The Universal App will cost $2.99 and feature new content, new terrifying environments to explore and updated story elements.

Rivers has also established a website to showcase the spooky real-world environments people play his game in - anyone who Tweets, Instagrams or Vines their eerie gaming location of choice using the hashtag #homehorror has a chance of making it into the collection.

Meanwhile, the OSX version of Home should be released sometime this summer, Rivers announced, adding that the improvements made for the iOS version of the game will be transferred to existing and future desktop versions at some point in the future.

Continue reading Benjamin Rivers' Home spooking up iOS this Thursday, OSX this summer

Benjamin Rivers' Home spooking up iOS this Thursday, OSX this summer originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 18 Jun 2013 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments Tags: benjamin-rivers, Home, home-horror, horror, indie, iOS, ipad, iPhone, mac, Mobile

Apple’s iWork for iCloud is now out in beta, as promised at the company’s annual developers’ conference, WWDC. Apple started giving staged early access to developers this week.

The new web-based apps — Pages, Numbers, and Keynote — are intended to be usable by virtually anyone on any platform, and will compete with Google Docs and other web-based productivity suites such as Office 365 from Microsoft. Critically, any documents created on iWork for iCloud are immediately synced to all of your Apple devices … iPads, iPhones, and iPod touches. In addition, any changes to the documents are reflected on those devices immediately.

Here are some screenshots a developer took for me:

I took some time to play with the iCloud apps, creating and editing a few documents in each of Pages, Numbers, and Keynote.

Despite the fact that they’re in beta, everything feels solid, complete, and fast. Google is all about speed, and I use Google Docs every day, but these documents felt just as fast to me, despite the fact that they include the signature Apple design and are therefore have far more images and backgrounds than Google Docs.

The templates are rich and simple to use, and working on cloud-based documents felt pretty much like working on a desktop application. As soon as you create or edit a document, iCloud displays it and syncs it, which does take some time. But there’s no need to wait for it — iCloud will happily work in the background, or when you’re offline.

One thing that it’s important to keep in mind: deleting from iCloud deletes documents from all your devices simultaneously.

There’s no trash can, so be careful what you do throw out. Once you delete a document, it’s gone for good. I’m wondering if Apple will change this as the app exits beta, but to do so would be to add organization such as folders to iCloud documents, which Apple has resisted doing so far. Still, it’d be important to protect users from accidental deletions.

One oddity: To open an app or a document, you double-click it, just like on the desktop.

That feels a little odd on the web, but I suppose it’s Apple’s little reminder that you’re still home sweet home in iWork, no matter where you’re opening a document from.

Images credit: Apple

Filed under: Business, Cloud, Enterprise, Mobile

Tags: Apple, beta, business, Cloud, Developers, enterprise, Gallery, iCloud, ipad, iPhone, iWork, iWork for iCloud, keynote, Mobile, Numbers, Pages

Apple’s iWork for iCloud is now out in beta, as promised at the company’s annual developers’ conference, WWDC. Apple started giving staged early access to developers this week.

The new web-based apps — Pages, Numbers, and Keynote — are intended to be usable by virtually anyone on any platform and will compete with Google Docs and other web-based productivity suites such as Office 365 from Microsoft. Critically, any documents created on iWork for iCloud are immediately synced to all of your Apple devices — iPads, iPhones, and iPod touches. In addition, any changes to the documents are reflected on those devices immediately.

Here are some screenshots a developer took for me:

I took some time to play with the iCloud apps, creating and editing a few documents each in Pages, Numbers, and Keynote.

Despite the fact that they’re in beta, everything feels solid, complete, and fast. Google is all about speed, and I use Google Docs every day, but these documents felt just as fast to me even though they include the signature Apple design and therefore have far more images and backgrounds than Google Docs.

The templates are rich and simple to use, and working on cloud-based documents felt pretty much like working on a desktop application. As soon as you create or edit a document, iCloud displays it and syncs it, which does take some time. But there’s no need to wait for it — iCloud will happily work in the background or when you’re offline.

One thing that’s important to keep in mind: deleting from iCloud deletes documents from all your devices simultaneously.

There’s no trash can, so be careful what you do throw out. Once you delete a document, it’s gone for good. I’m wondering if Apple will change this as the apps exit beta, but to do so would be to add organization such as folders to iCloud documents, which Apple has resisted doing so far. Still, it’d be important to protect users from accidental deletions.

One oddity: To open an app or a document, you double-click it, just like on the desktop.

That feels a little odd on the web, but I suppose it’s Apple’s little reminder that you’re still home sweet home in iWork no matter where you’re opening a document from.

Images credit: Apple

Filed under: Business, Cloud, Enterprise, Mobile

Tags: Apple, beta, business, Cloud, Developers, enterprise, Gallery, iCloud, ipad, iPhone, iWork, iWork for iCloud, keynote, Mobile, Numbers, Pages

PopCap Games is known for making games that appeal to a mass audience, and perhaps none are more so than Plants vs. Zombies. The cute 'n clever tower defense game has connected with players of all ages and origins. A sequel, then, was inevitable, and after an announcement last year we finally got to see the game in action at E3 last week.

It's unfortunate, however, that much of the discussion around Plants vs. Zombies 2: It's About Time, at least during the game's iOS launch, probably won't be around any of the great new content. There are new zombie enemies, new plants, three new worlds set in different time periods, touchscreen-centric powerups that allow you to throw zombies around or pinch them apart, and even a new "plant food" buff that gives each plant an extra burst of ability when used.

At launch, they'll probably all get lost in the mix, because there's one other big difference between the first Plants vs. Zombies and its sequel: PvZ 2 is a freemium game.

Continue reading Plants vs. Zombies 2: it's about time we talked freemium vs. premium

Plants vs. Zombies 2: it's about time we talked freemium vs. premium originally appeared on Joystiq on Tue, 18 Jun 2013 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments Tags: e3-2013, Ea, Freemium, iOS, ipad, iPhone, Mobile, plants vs. zombies 2, Popcap, popcap games