The original Zombieville USA [$1.99 / Lite] hit very early in the life of the App Store and was one of the many initial indie success stories that helped to spur the whole iOS development gold rush. Heck, it wasn't even called iOS back then. Since then, Mika Mobile has gone on to release OMG Pirates! [$1.99] and the absolutely fabulous Battleheart [$2.99]. In fact, if you haven't played or heard of Battleheart, you really need to take a time out and our review of it.

Anyway, Zombieville USA 2 [99�] seems to be a great sequel so far in every way. It takes the formula from the original, adds tons of unlockable content, full Game Center integration, iCloud support for cross-device syncing… And best yet, co-op multiplayer either locally via Bluetooth or online via WiFi.

We're going to give the game a thorough once over in our upcoming review, but our initial impressions are remarkably positive, folks on the forums like it, and the developer is already talking about tweaks for the first update.

It's becoming more and more difficult to get excited for social games these days, especially as everyone and their second cousin jumps on the free to play bandwagon, but the guys from Appy Entertainment just announced their next title, SpellCraft School of Magic utilizing some key words that almost never fail to pique my interest. According to Appy, the gameplay will a mixture between Magic: The Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons. I'm skeptical, but that's one glorious combination.

Anyway, the game seems to revolve around tricking out your avatar while raising various magical plants which serve as the reagents for crafting spells which seems to involve a potion brewing mechanic of sorts. From there, you'll explore the dungeons beneath your wizard school and battle monsters that take the form of cards. Defeating monsters results in gold and experience, and leveling up progresses the game through unlocking spells, new plants, and more.

Details aside from what I've already mentioned are few and far between at the moment, but I'm always willing to try out a new social game that at least sounds like it's trying to do something to differentiate itself from your typical Farmville clone. Appy has had a good track record of releases, so I'm anxious to see how they take on the whole social game phenomenon taking the App Store by storm. If all goes as planned, SpellCraft should be available next month.

Back in May, we reviewed a clever little game called Foodies [99�] from developer Nano Titans. It featured a rotund little creature named Sam who was in love with his best gal Pam, and proposed marriage to her. Unfortunately, Sam wasn't quite rotund enough for Pam's taste. She gives Sam exactly one week to eat everything in sight and gain enough weight to appease her before she would agree to marry him. Ah, unhealthy eating and forced obesity, the signs of true love.

While the story is certainly silly, and the graphics and presentation are appropriately adorable, the thing that really stood out in Foodies was the clever mechanics and controls. Each level in Foodies is littered with different kinds of food items, and the goal is to bounce Sam around the screen to collect them all. This is accomplished in an intuitive way by placing both thumbs on the screen which creates a bouncy platform in the space in-between them. You can change the size and angle of this platform by adjusting the placement of your thumbs, and the whole system just works incredibly well as you bounce Sam around the levels in the game.

One thing many players were asking after Foodies was released was whether or not an iPad version was in the cards. The developers responded that if they could find a way to make the game work on the larger screen, then they would look into bringing the game out for the iPad. Well, it appears that they've cracked that particular nut, as Foodies HD [$1.99] made a surprise appearance in the App Store this week.

One of the things that made the original Foodies so great was that it just felt perfect in regards to where your thumbs went when holding an iPhone or iPod touch. Very natural. It was hard to imagine how that could translate to a device that was more than four times the size, but I think Nano Titans has pulled it off about as well as you could expect. I still prefer to play the game on the iPhone, but it's still quite successful on the iPad, and if that's the only device that you own it's well worth checking out Foodies HD.

One nice feature of Foodies HD is that it can be played in either portrait or landscape mode. In portrait, you can somewhat get away with using your thumbs to play like you normally would, though you still have to stretch them pretty far to do so. Still, it works pretty well. The sacrifice for this is that the game is then rendered on only the bottom portion of the screen, with the top portion being filled with static game artwork and your current score and online leaderboard position, as well as the top online score overall. I'm not a big fan of having games rendered in a smaller window within the screen of the iPad, but it isn't too bad here, and at least they put the empty space up top to good use.

(Video from the iPhone version)

However, in landscape orientation, the game plays in full screen, and it looks especially crisp and vibrant on the iPad. The trouble here though is that it's basically impossible to play with your two thumbs with any degree of proficiency, and instead the game recommends that you use your two index fingers to play. This of course means you'll need to lay the iPad down in your lap or onto a table in order to have both hands free. I experimented with using the thumb and index finger of one hand to play while holding the iPad with my other hand, but it was just too awkward to really be of any use. Still, with a properly positioned iPad, I felt that using two index fingers and having the larger screen actually helped me play better than I normally do on the iPhone, which is pretty cool.

So, the bottom line is that Foodies is a clever, intuitive, and unique experience on the iPhone, and that all remains fairly true with Foodies HD on the iPad. As long as you know the sacrifices that need to be made with the larger device, then you should have a great time playing through the many levels in Foodies HD, and every iPad owner should definitely check it out. If you own the game on the iPhone or iPod touch already, then you aren't really missing out on anything by just sticking with that version.