Are You Screening? » iPhone Apps

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 5 — Games 2

Marc Eastman — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 16:31:14 +0000

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 1

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 2

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 3

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games --- Part 4 - Games 1

Moving right along.

7. The Stone of Destiny

Yep, it's another one of those find little picture games. This one is a little easier to use, and has great pictures. To be honest, I don't know... they're wildly popular, and I suppose they do kill time. I've played this one quite a bit, and it's fairly entertaining in short bursts.

6. Enigmo

This one is a wild bit of fun that can get truly addicting. Sort of a spin on the old Wacky Machines idea, the object is to place tools in the path of the falling water drops so that they will make their way into the collection bucket.

You see in this screenshot that you have to maneuver the water drops around to the bottom left corner. Once you get a certain number in the jug, you move on to the next level. You can place your tools, then rotate them, stretch them, and in other ways get them to hopefully conform to your needs.

It's a simple game that gets very complicated, but it runs great, looks very sharp, and has never given me any problems. What's really great is that any particular level will only take a couple of minutes, and there are a lot of levels. You can eat up exactly as much time as your trying to waste.

5. MotoChaser

A fairly routine racing game, just with a motorcycle. I can't say that there is anything that absolutely recommends this one as significantly superior to CroMag Rally, I just like it better. It's a little slicker, and actually has a progression to it. You have to move up to the next race by doing well in the previous one, rather than just picking whatever you want.

It has pretty responsive steering, and the graphics are pretty good, but not great. It's very fun, and will give you a nice break with a little bit more to it than some of the simpler racing games, without going all the way to anything really complicated.

4. AuroraFeint

I actually don't have any idea why I like this game so much. Puzzle games are hit or miss for me, and if they're a hit I'm usually over them pretty quickly.

This one is a puzzle game with the suggestion of some story, and something else going on, and maybe that's it. At the heart of things it is your standard matching game. Get three or more in a row, and the boxes blow up, and then others fall into place to take up the space left behind.

That's only where this one starts though.

Playing the regular game is called mining, and as you mine, you collect points for getting rid of each of the elements. After you mine for a certain amount of time, you level up. This gets you the opportunity to go to the store and buy things which improve your ability to mine in various ways.

Some things will make each element worth more, so that you are collecting that element faster, and some things will cause special blocks to come into play which have different effects on the board. You might stop time, explode blocks around the ones you match, etc.

Buying these abilities isn't all there is to it though. Once buy the option, you have to go to either the smith or the tower to activate by solving a puzzle or mining a certain number of elements in a limited time.

Things move faster in the mine as you progress, but you've always got all these various game modifiers at work as you go.

Another feature that makes this game different is the ability to move the playing area. If things aren't lining up well for you at a certain point, just rotate your iPhone to the side, and all the blocks fall to that side, and then you can match them from that direction.

Completely addicting.

3. DeBlob

This is a game that is also available for the Wii. It's a very weird creature this game, but it's pretty fun and a great time waster.

You are a little blob, and your job is to return color to this strange world as you progress through more difficult levels.

You will run over little balls of paint, and then you turn that color, and get a little bigger. Run over another one, and you change colors, and get even bigger. Run over yellow then blue, and you turn green.

Collect points by adding color to objects by running into them. Run into the poor colorless residents of the world, and they will come back to life. But, watch out for the little bad guys who will suck the color out of you.

There's a good variety of things you have to do, and it's pretty simple, mindless fun, but it's really entertaining.

2. Field Runners

I don't even like that I like this game. The whole defend the castle genre has pretty well eluded me, but I can't deny that I keep playing this game. If you aren't familiar with the general concept, basically you build these little stations or turrets, and as bad guys try to run to the other end of the field your turrets shoot them. That's it really. You start with 20 hearts or life, and for each bad guy who gets all the way across you lose one life. Each round is some certain type of bad guy running across, whether its jeeps or grunts or helicopters, and if you make it past level 100 you win. It starts pretty simple, as you can see, and you have the choice of machine guns, rockets, some goo that slows them down, and an electric zapper. Each of these have varying costs, and each can be upgraded to be more powerful.

After a little while it turns into this--

and that's only round 29.

There are also three levels of difficulty.

I almost hate to admit it, because this is such a goofy concept, but I can't get past the hardest level, and it's driving me crazy. This is the ultimate time waster, and it is surprisingly fun.

1. Asphalt 4

Part of me really doesn't want this to be my number one game, based purely on the popularity the thing already has, but it's just that cool. Just a driving game, but with an unbelievable number of options and advancements, and variety. Many different cars and tracks, and too many different things going on to even mention.

You steer with your iPhone like you'd expect, but there isn't a gas, which is very weird when you first play. It just goes. It's all about taking turns, not hitting things so that your speed will build up, and using the nitrous for boosts.

The graphics are great, and there is so much going on that it really pushes the envelope of what can be done as a mobile game. It's really incredible.

You've made it through the whole thing!

To cap this off, I've created a buzzbite poll which will be seen here, but also wherever buzzbite users may put it throughout the web. If you look at all the apps and games on this list there is a wide range of prices. A lot of them are free, but some of them cost a bit, and there are others out there that are even more expensive. As things progress with the technology, and even bigger and better things come out, prices will go up, assuming there turns out to be a market for it.

So, I'm curious to know how much people will spend.

Cheers, and thanks for reading.

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 1

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 2

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 3

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games --- Part 4 - Games 1

Are You Screening?

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 3

Marc Eastman — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 02:10:50 +0000

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games -- Part 2

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games -- Part 1

Moving right along.

10. Wikipanion

You could call this one Wikiamo as well, because I don't know that there is a relevant difference between the two. They have a slightly different feel, but I can't see that it matters. It's Wikipedia on your iPhone, and it comes in pretty handy. Yes, you could just go to Wikipedia through your browser, but it doesn't function exactly the same. These slick things up a bit, and give you a mobile-enhanced result to your search.

9. AP News

Now, when it comes right down to it, this is just a glorified version of subscribing to Associated Press feeds, but it's pretty cool.

It's a handy one-stop for all sorts of news, and it gives you a lot of options for selecting what you want to get.

It's also free, so what more do you want?

Don't ask me about the picture.

8. WordPress

I have to admit this one is slightly theoretical for me. I have it on pretty strong authority that this works great.

I haven't quite come up with an excuse to use it myself though, and unless you have a WordPress website this is doing nothing for you.

But...

Theoretically it is really cool. Publish to your blog from your iPhone. Like I said, I do actually know a couple of bloggers who use this, and think its cool. Your blog entry, of course, is going to be very simple. But, on the go reporting/rambling is one click away, pictures included.

7. Evernote

Evernote is probably the handiest App I'm ever going to find. Does that mean you'll think so? I have no idea. Lots of people like Lightsaber... now new and improved.

For me, this is just about it. Type a note, take a picture to use as a note, take a picture and put some text with it to remind of whatever specifics are interesting, and even record voice notes.

Never fumble around for a notepad again, and never lose anything again. It works great, and your notes are stored online.

Now, you'll see at the AppStore that there is some rumbling that Evernote is going to charge to use the service at some point. Maybe, but they don't so far, and I don't see how they could since there are competing products. I don't like them as much, but they aren't so bad that I'd start paying to take notes.

6. Zenbe Lists

I know. How fun is that. Two straight list Apps. This one is just a fairly straightforward note system with an online counterpart, and the interesting feature it has is the ability to share lists. Just email it to anyone else using Zenbe lists, and when they get the email they only need one click to add the list directly to their Zenbe.

It's worth considering whether there is any point to both of these. If the sharing seems like a good idea for you, and you only need your run-of-the-mill text notes, this one is good enough. The note system is more than adequate for any needs. I like the photo notes, and the voice notes, so there you are.

5. Stanza

As far as I'm concerned you can call this one eReader as well if you like. They are both book readers, but Stanza focuses on what you can get for free, while eReader is selling you books. They are both cool, they both work very well, and if you can stand reading a book on a little screen, you should absolutely get them both.

For me, I'm all about Stanza. I have too many books to count already, and you'd be amazed how many great things you can get free. eReader works great, and there are a lot of people who are going to love the idea, just like there are a lot of people using Kindle and loving it. But, if I pay for a book, I want the book. But, not to let my bias sway me, eReader is great little App as well, and reading is actually not a bad experience on either.

I could give you a screenshot, but come on, it's a page of text.

4. Goodrec

There are too many versions of this to even guess at a number, and I'd give you a screenshot here as well, but one more picture of a map with pins in it won't tell anyone anything.

I pick this one only because it is the only one I've gotten to work. It's a relatively new one, and I don't know what's different, or where they are getting their information that is somehow better, but all the others know about four restaurants in a 500-mile radius of me. This one gives me a decent number of options, and I've seen it growing over the last several days.

So, you probably know the drill. This thing will find out where you are, and then pop up a bunch of pins all around for restaurants and bars, and then you can see what's close to you, and get more info about them. The general idea is handy, if it works, and this is the one for me.

I will say this though, there are others that have far cooler features. Who can argue with UrbanSpoon and the slot machine of restaurant recommendations? Lots of Apps can do all sorts of neat tricks. This one's neat trick is actually telling me something.

3. NYTimes

The only problem I can tell you about is the one you will see at the AppStore over and over. This one can be rather slow. I can't say that it has been quite as slow as what I was led to expect by all the hollering I heard about it, but it is a bit slow.

On the other hand, it's downloading a whole newspaper at you.

It's The New York Times on your iPhone, and I don't really know what else to say. A lot of options, every section, story after story.

Your subscription at this point is only because you want the ads.

2. Pandora

Your own personalized radio station on your iPhone. You probably know how this sort of thing works, but this is a radio station that is going to send you music which you rate. It then learns what you like, and over time your station becomes a better and better you-specific radio station.

That's the theory. It actually works too, but there is a bit of a catch. When you first start this thing it is going to ask you for an artist. You select your favorite artist, and then it is going to try to build from there. If you hate a song you skip it, but you only get six skips in an hour... because apparently that's the copyright deal they have... I don't know.

Now, you can't go this route. It's insane. You're going to be listening to just that one artist, maybe something else you like occasionally, and a bunch of garbage that you're going to skip, and then boom you can't skip for an hour. That's nonsense.

You have to sign up, then go to the Pandora website where you can pick as many artists as you want and add them to your station. I suggest choosing at least twenty of your favorites, but the more the better. Now you go back to your phone and start listening to your station, and you should be set. If you aren't quite at a good enough mix, go back and add five or six more. It won't take that long. Once you're set there, the thing is genius. It plays great songs that you love, and it throws in things you never heard of, but will love.

I hear the last.fm screams. Everyone tells me about last.fm like it was a freakin religion. Well, guess what, the thing doesn't work on my iPhone. If it works for you, more power to you, and you have another option that does the same general thing, which lots of people say is better. Go for it. Through about five different updates, the last.fm still has never worked for me. It sits and loads, it starts playing a song and then kicks me out to the iPhone menu, it starts a song and skips to another one for no reason... whatever, it's done about everything possible apart from just work.

1. Google

This is actually a really weird one for me, because I just spent my whole day hating Google. You know if you have any kind of problem with any service Google offers (that you aren't paying to use) you can't contact them, and you can generally just go drop dead. Seriously, there is no way to email them, or otherwise get any help. Unless you can't sign into your account, then there is a form. Other than that, there is absolutely no one to contact at Google, no matter what your problem is. I even called their offices, and was in fact told, and I quote, "No. There is no one you can contact to help you." Swear to God.

But, well, it's a cool App that has a lot of helpful functionality. Reader alone is pretty much worth... well free... because the other RSS readers available are buggy little Apps that work most of the time, but will kick you out or crash once in a while.

If you normally use Google features like iGoogle or Calendar, this is really cool. Plus you throw in Blogger down there, news, Goog411, and the rest, and you have a lot going on in one simple App which really works far better than a lot of things you'll find.

And, hot off the presses, you can now get Google Earth for the iPhone. And, well, it does the same thing it does on the internet, except it finds you through your phone.

That's the shebang there. I hope somewhere in these 30 Apps you found something you didn't expect, got a little information, or at least had a good time. Feel free to ask me any questions about the Apps, or others that aren't this list. I have more pages of Apps than I'll admit, and I tried an awful lot of them out before I put this list together.

In the next day or two I'll have the first of two installments dedicated to the games that will complete this list.

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games -- Part 2

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games -- Part 1

Are You Screening? » iPhone Apps

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 5 — Games 2

7. The Stone of Destiny

6. Enigmo

5. MotoChaser

4. AuroraFeint

3. DeBlob

2. Field Runners

1. Asphalt 4

You've made it through the whole thing!

Are You Screening?

Related articles by Zemanta

The 30 Best iPhone Apps + 14 Games — Part 3

10. Wikipanion

9. AP News

8. WordPress

7. Evernote

6. Zenbe Lists

5. Stanza

4. Goodrec

3. NYTimes

2. Pandora

1. Google

Are You Screening?

Related articles by Zemanta