A couple of weeks ago, we highlighted a new update for id Software's Rage [Free] and Rage HD [Free] that added several welcome new features, like a melee move, a virtual analog stick, and HDMI TV-Out support. We also mentioned that id was running a campaign on their Facebook page that if they received 100,000 "Likes" then both versions of the Rage game would go free for a week.

Today, they finally hit that mark, which is amazing to me considering that I can count the number of people that like me on one hand. As promised, both Rage and Rage HD have dropped to free for the next week. If you haven't yet picked up the game, then now is your chance to grab it gratis. Assuming you have the nearly 800 mb of free space that the HD version takes up, of course. Also, be sure to check out our original review of Rage if you need some help deciding if this free download is worth the bandwidth.

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It's Wednesday again, which aside from meaning that we're one day closer to Friday, it also means there's a whole heap of new iOS games appearing on the App Store tonight.

This works the same as it does every week, but since I love repeating myself I'll explain it again anyway: The App Store is a global market with many different regions which all have different local times. Developers are able to set future release dates for their games, and thanks to the modern marvel that is time zones, these releases slowly trickle out as it becomes that date in each region. Due to their proximity to the International Date Line, this means New Zealand comes first followed by Asian markets, then Europe, then North America at 11:00 PM Eastern time.

Here's what we have to look forward to:

Antiques Roadshow: Discovering America's Hidden Treasures, $4.99Forum Thread � Namco has apparently figured out that my parents own an iPad 2 and decided to craft the exact game they would be interested in. Apparently you hunt for antiques, then get them appraised via some kind of hidden object mechanic. There's even antique-centric mini-games.

Conan � Tower of the Elephant, $1.99Forum Thread � This quest-centric hack and slash follows the original tale by Robert E. Howard, The Tower of the Elephant. The gesture-based attacks seem like they could have potential, and hey, who doesn't love Conan?

Deo (Strapped to a Meteor), 99�Forum Thread � This game has some great visual flare to it, although I'm not entirely sure how the gameplay works. It seems like it focuses around hopping across each level, spreading life across all 96 of 'em.

Drawin' Growin', 99�Forum Thread � The latest game to come out of Taito seems sort of insane on the heels of Groove Coaster, but hey, maybe it's just the right kind of insane to catch on. You draw lines to grow plants, which seems simple enough.

Emissary of War, FreeForum Thread � We've had our eye on Emissary of War since it appear on our radar a while back, and we've even had its creator on our podcast. Needless to say, we're excited to finally see it released.

iBlast Moki 2, 99� / HDForum Thread � We loved the original iBlast Moki and it only stands to reason that the sequel will be just as good if not better. I'd definitely pick this up if you like physics-based puzzlers.

Rally-X Rumble, 99�Forum Thread � Namco's classic racing game is back, but this time with online multiplayer. If you didn't already think that the App Store was a retro gamer's paradise, here's even more evidence.

Rogue Sky, 99� / HDForum Thread � A precision balloon flying game, complete with weaponry that enables balloon to balloon combat. I'm digging the evil looking hot air balloons too, I'd be freaked out if I saw that coming.

Silly Owls, 99�Forum Thread � This physics puzzler features three different gameplay modes, utilizing each of the different owls. There's even talk of a banana skateboard which sounds oddly intriguing.

Solitaire by Backflip, Free / HDForum Thread � If you don't have a game of solitaire yet on your iOS device, this might be one to try. It's free with, um, unlockable prizes… Which seems like an interesting angle for a solitaire game.

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Management over at Atari continues to change as it re-positions itself as a mobile and casual games publisher. In the latest move, Atari has added a new senior vice president of digital publishing, Owais Farooqui, and has pegged Maria Pacheco as its vice president of mobile. Farooqui was previously with a tournament games company, King.com. Pacheco, on the other hand, last served Vivendi Games Mobile, which apparently existed at one point. The company apparently also has a new CFO: Robert Mattes, a former CFO of a market research company called Authentic Response.

In a press release announcing these moves, its stressed that these three will be behind a new mobile, social and online initiative that uses the company's old-school properties for gain in the social and mobile space. I guess we'll see the first fruits of this change a little later this fall with the release of Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes of Neverwinter for Facebook, but the company has already been dabbling on the mega-popular platform with�Asteroids Online and Fairies vs. Darklings.

Atari attempted to make the switch to digital distribution a couple of years ago, and I don't think many would say that it's been working out too well for the publisher. It'll be interesting to see if the casual, mobile, and social universes are kinder to the once-boxed retail competitor, especially with this new cast.

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Windows Phone 7 has a serious amount of catching up to do both in market share and with apps if it wants to seriously compete with the iPhone and the App Store, but we've always seen the handheld as a promising contender. Part of that reason has to do with its Games Hub, which is essentially a mobile take on Xbox Live. It's packed with promise, and Microsoft has continued to take the steps in the right direction. Today's news is a good example of that: the next release of Windows Phone 7, Mango, will allow in-app purchases and add-on content. This is huge, as we all know free-to-play is a meaningful mobile model.

There's more, of course. In the Fall-bound update, Microsoft will introduce badges that you can put on your avatar after earning certain achievements. Also, it's bulking up its network support, cleaning up the UI in a significant way by introducing sensible views and blades, and it's integrating a lot of Xbox Live "Extras" into the actual Hub. If you really want to dive into the nitty-gritty, this blog post and this earlier blog post on the Windows Phone Blog both break it all down pretty well, canned as it is.

In addition to the former stuff, Microsoft has also announced a bunch of new games slated to hit the platform within the next few months. Most of them are unknown to us, but if you have a 360 or a Kinect, these two brands might ring a bell: Toy Soldiers and Kinectimals. Yeah, mobile versions of these titles are coming. Can you hear me shrugging? I'm shrugging.

It strikes me as weird that we're still in a wait and watch stance on Windows Phone 7 a year or so out of release, but the platform still doesn't feel as robust as Microsoft wants it to be. Updates like this, though, are definitely a sign of solid progress.

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Housemarque, the creators of the entertaining and artistically gifted downloadable Outland and several other notable PSN-exclusive titles like Super Stardust HD and Dead Nation, is turning to the App Store for the release of its upcoming cutesy physics-based puzzle game, Furmins.

From what we gather, in Furmins you'll basically play God to a host of anthropomorphic and especially rubbery ball-like animals called Furmins. The goal in each level is to arrange several objects or items in specific ways that allow these bouncy creatures entry into a basket. As you'll see, it's not as mechanically dense as some of the studio's other titles:

The reason we don't know too much beyond its possible fall release date is due to some sort of marketing thing. Apparently, we'll learn much more about the game from the Finnish dev at gamescom, which is taking place right now in Cologne, Germany. Tell us more!

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Around this time last year, we were just about to get our hands on the Parrot AR.Drone quadricopter. It was (and still is) an incredibly cool remote control toy with some seriously advanced technology onboard that allows for control of the craft via an iOS device complete with a video feed captured from cameras onboard the AR.Drone all connected through a WiFi network served up by the quadricopter itself. Parrot later even expanded the AR.Drone's functionality to include a few different games that utilized the cameras in interesting ways.

Unfortunately, all of this tech came with a hefty price tag. $299.99 to be exact which put the AR.Drone far outside of impulse purchase range for most. Thankfully, acclaimed accessory manufacturer Griffin took note that people thought things like the AR.Drone are cool as hell, while building a similar product with a price point that falls comfortably inside "eh, what the hell" territory which I really think is vital for any gadgety toy.

Check out the HELO TC in action:

Griffin has taken a unique angle with the HELO TC and has made several obvious cost-cutting measures to hit that key $50 price point. First off, the HELO TC obviously lacks all the flight stabilization logic that powered the AR.Drone. The AR.Drone basically flies itself, while the HELO TC seems to be very similar to the barebones remote control helicopters that you can pick up for around $20 online, which leads me to believe that flying the HELO TC with the finesse seen in the above video is going to be very difficult.

Similarly, all of the WiFi connectivity options found in the AR.Drone have been replaced by a transmitter that clips on to your iOS device and plugs into your headphone jack. This takes AA batteries, and utilizing the free companion app sends tones out your headphone port to an IR transmitter, a technique that has been well documented and used by hobbyists to essentially create a playlist of sounds to do things like control a digital SLR camera, or in this case, fly a helicopter.

Of course Griffin hasn't mentioned the specifics of how the HELO TC works, so this is largely just a series of educated guesses on my part, but the logic seems sound. Either way, we're totally stoked for the device. I had a ton of fun with the AR.Drone, and it seems like the HELO TC should be equally fun, only for a sixth of the price.

For more information, check out the HELO TC web site, or if you're totally sold on the device swing over to the Griffin store to pre-order. No specific release dates have been mentioned yet, although the PR Griffin blasted out this morning repeatedly mentions the holiday season. It seems every year the window for what the "holiday season" actually is broadens even wider, so we could be seeing the HELO TC sooner than we expect. I've got my fingers crossed, at least.

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In case you're not familiar, Azkend [$2.99] is an awesome puzzle game. It's ancient in App Store terms, originally released in mid-2009, but the game has held up remarkably well since then and still is amongst my favorite matching games available on the platform. Azkend seems to strike an almost perfect balance between strategic matching and massive (often accidental) combos that utilizing whichever one of the many in-game powers you can have active at a time. Playing through the game unlocks more of these powers, and they'll do things like rain down massive amounts of lightning to clear tiles, or even just have a huge hammer appear to knock the tiles off the board (among many others).

Recently Azkend 2 was announced, and… Yeah, that's all we've got. They're currently directing traffic to their Facebook page for updates which is equally devoid of information. Surely this will be good news to fellow Azkend fans, and I'm going to be keeping a close eye on things for future details.

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Digital Chocolate, the social games publisher probably best known for getting legally rowdy with Zynga over the Mafia Wars name, has just acquired Sandlot Games, the studio responsible for Cake Mania and an assortment of other weird social or casual flings. This news comes on the heels of tons of various other acquisitions in the social space. EA's moves are the most notable due to the sheer size and scale, but other publishers are snagging dudes up with the quickness as the social digital social games market emerges into a substantial force.

In a press release, Digital Chocolate made this move sound like it was an attempt to expand into social and expand its own development team.

"Sandlot has built a great reputation in casual games," Trip Hawkins, CEO of Digital Chocolate said in a statement. "We love their development teams and we can now expand further in Seattle and Eastern Europe. We expect to be the leading game company in at least 5 of the 7 cities where we now have development studios."

Our take on this is, simply, that it's definitely a funky market right now. We have big publishers like Zynga and EA scooping up whatever has a decent name attached to it, while others like Warner Bros, Activision, or THQ are shuttering studios right and left. Economic unease and the fact the gaming landscape is indeed changing are certainly factors in these developments, but we're a little to close to it all to see how everything is shaking up. We wonder how we'll look back at 2011 once everything settles.

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Well, we kinda know what "VidRhythm" is now. Chatting with Gamasutra about the mysterious trademark spotted by Internet sleuths earlier this July, Rock Band creator Harmonix confirmed that VidRhythm is a real project and it's coming to iOS soon-ish. It also divulged that it's more app than game, but stopped short of delivering mechanical or system-level details. Neat.

"It will actually be our first iOS release as a studio, coming out relatively soon," Harmonix CEO Alex Rigopulos said in the interview. "I can't say anything yet about what it is, but in parallel with all these huge console game productions we have underway, we're commencing our first iOS development project."

These are screens from Rock Band, FYI.

Harmonix has been responsible for, or in part responsible for, a couple of App Store games. Naturally, it helped create Rock Band [$4.99] for iOS, but it's also the studio behind the Guitar Hero-like click-wheel game, Phase for the iPod. I suppose the distinction Rigopulos is making is that this is the first in-house title completely made by the studio? Something like that.

Provided VidRhythm does appear soon, it will be among the first projects the studio has put out since regaining its independent status. Viacom, who picked up the studio in 2006, dumped the studio in 2010 after the release of, roughly, eight billion Rock Band titles not named Rock Band: KMFDM.

Another Dance Central and several other titles are in the works at Harmonix in addition to this iOS app / game.

[Via Gamasutra]

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Old-school RPG enthusiasts have something to look forward to coming soon on their iOS devices. Indie studio Geppetto Games is currently in production on Descend, a grid-based first-person role-playing game that is influenced by classics like the Dungeon Masters and Eye of the Beholder series.

If the mention of those two classics has stirred up some excitement in your belly, keep in mind that Descend is merely influenced by them, and will look to do some things differently than those titles. The combat will be fully turn-based, similar to Doom II RPG [$2.99], and feature a party system. Also, instead of the typical flat textures and faux 3D scaling techniques used back in the day to make games appear three dimensional, the world of Descend will actually be rendered entirely in 3D.

I'm excited to see how Descend ends up turning out, and what kind of impact modern visuals will have on the old-school game design. Admittedly, I wasn't ever that into games like this growing up, but I did have a blast with Undercroft [Free] which appears to be the closest analog to Descend that's currently available in the App Store. The game is slated for release sometime next month if everything goes smoothly, and until then you can drop by the thread in our forums for some discussion on Descend.

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My mom's experience with videogames largely consists of watching me play Final Fantasy IX and X and offering such helpful advice as, "Why don't you just cut his head off with that big sword?" and, "Don't you have a gun? You could just shoot him and be done with it." Her own gaming career came to an abrupt halt several years earlier when she learned that jerking the controller left, right, up, and down doesn't actually make Sonic move. There's a level of abstraction necessary to make the correlation between a button-press and on-screen action, a bridge we were never able to cross together.

The impulse to cross that bridge is currently driving the home console market and has been doing the same in the mobile gaming space for years. In a blissful marriage of concept and execution, it's an impulse that Esquilax Games have nailed with Climber Brothers [$0.99/Lite], a delightful little puzzle-platformer in which players are tasked with guiding the titular brother-climbers to safety through a set of increasingly difficult physics- and momentum-driven levels.

Esquilax wisely pared Climber Brothers down to one mechanic: when your right and left thumbs are touching the screen, Greg and Jeff (respectively) jam their picks into the rock face. When you let go, they let go.

It's not just that the controls are responsive and precise or that the physics in Climber Brothers feel spot-on, it's that the catch-and-release mechanic takes full advantage of the iPad's tactile interface to match an extremely basic input (thumb touching the screen) with a physically analogous output (climber touching the rock). The result: one brother serves as a fulcrum as the other swings around, carried by his momentum, to his next anchor point; from there, repeat ad infinitum, or until you've reached the safe zone.

I'm tempted to situate Climber Brothers somewhere between the ice climbing section of Modern Warfare 2 and full-blown Kinect gameplay. In the Call of Duty level, the right and left triggers replace your thumbs as input devices, but the emotions are the same � the tension in your hands, the mounting desperation coupled with the tactile joy of progress: right, left, right, left. What makes the physics-based Climber Brothers more interesting, though, is heat death � when you run out of potential and kinetic energy with which to create momentum, no matter how desperately the Brothers cling, the game stops: players have no choice but to let go.

"[H]e reflected that when one gets properly wearied, drowning must really be a comfortable arrangement, a cessation of hostilities accompanied by a large degree of relief, and he was glad of it, for the main thing in his mind for some months had been horror of the temporary agony. He did not wish to be hurt."

That passage, from the end of Stephen Crane's "The Open Boat," is about drowning, but it could just as easily be about climbing. Back in Climber Brothers: your thumbs begin to cramp and your mind races, searching for some way to violate the laws of conservation of momentum, but you realize that Jeff and Greg are truly lost. After that split second of fatalistic anguish, letting them drop comes as a relief and the Brothers carry a morbid grin as they plummet.

At least Esquilax Games has a sense of humor.

And so there's a certain pathos to maneuvering the Brothers around, plotting your course, solving puzzles. You realize acutely that you hold the Brothers' lives in your hands more directly than usual, thanks to that tiny, incremental step in physicality.

But there's a secondary pleasure, borne out of Climber Brothers' finely-tuned physics engine: flight. Climber Brothers has a fantastic learning curve that introduces its physics organically and unobtrusively. Esquilax doesn't teach you how to slingshot your beleiderhosened avatar around so much as its level design ingratiates the concept into your subconscious. I don't remember when I�learned how to do it, but I know now and I didn't earlier.

And once the baseline mechanics have been laid out, Esquilax iterates in several different ways � some levels require the Brothers to use their momentum to hook around sharp angles and ledges; others are about maximizing speed without sacrificing height; others still are about freefalling through gaps just so.�Don't get me wrong � there's something empowering about solving puzzles, but the avian joy of through the air � like a duo of portly, vaguely Teutonic Spider-Mans � particularly underscores the simple grace of Climber Brothers.

There are certainly some issues: the music loop is short and taken from a collection of stock tunes (our forums point out that the same music is used in Storm in a Teacup [$2.99]), and some elements of the map have special properties (can be landed on, can't be grappled, will kill you,�etc.) that aren't always clear. But Climber Brothers is remarkable in its ability to match its core conceit to both its mechanics and interface, and then to mix, match, recontextualize, and refine as needed. It's finely crafted, well presented, and precisely executed.

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While in the mood for anything but productivity the other morning, I stumbled upon Dino Run SE [$2.99] on the Mac App Store. Dino Run is another lo-fi runner with a seriously bent and brilliant artistic direction. It started out as a web-based game. This version, according to creator PixelJAM, is an 'expanded' offering on the flash title, as it boasts new hats, new levels, and a fancy-schmancy new full-screen mode that I think makes the entire Canabalt-meets-Jurassic Park For Babies experience pop.

Since I write about iOS games, the first thing that popped into my head as I raced my little yellow dino through a land of the lost rife with flaming rocks, head-butting triceratops, side passages, and swooping pterodactyls, was if it would ever see the light of day on the iPad or iPhone. After an ill-timed e-mail, I learned that it is.

In a May interview with Slide2Play, PixelJAM's Miles Tilmann said that development of an iOS version was going slow, but steady. He elaborated on the technical side, stating that it's a "re-write" of the original game and not a direct port.

"[Dino Run iOS is] a ground-up re-write with a new physics engine and new levels. It's not a sequel, but more like a re-do. It's going to have most of the other levels and features of the original, plus some new stuff thrown in, just because we have the opportunity to improve it a bit," he said.

An outfit named Spiralstorm Studios is handling the coding, while PixelJAM is wrapping up the presentation side of things.

I caught up with PixelJAM for a little update via e-mail. Progress is still being described as slow and steady. A representative tells me that this version uses Box2D as its engine, which is a colossal switch from the old flash-based engine PixelJAM created for the game that we see on the web and on the Mac App Store. Plus, there's the whole "new content" thing: new levels, new terrain, and new puzzles will be a part of the package.

In addition to Dino Run for iOS, PixelJAM is also working on Glorkian Warrior, a new IP that it raised the money to produce via Kickstarter. It looks like a cool project, but it's not currently slated to grace iOS.

Actually,�PixelJAM has a lot of fantastic flash games not slated for iOS. Cream Wolf jumps to mind as one of its best. In a recent follow-up e-mail I asked if there's a chance we'll see more of its titles on touch devices. In the subsequent reply, I got the feeling that�Cream Wolf looks grim since it's Adult Swim's property, but overall the studio seems open to iOS possibilities.

Regardless, Dino Run is still on the way, but doesn't appear to have a firm launch timetable. It was suggested to me that we might see something from the project in about two or so months, which I hope means we might see the full game within that window. Time will tell.

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If you're a Minecraft addict like myself, you're not alone, in fact you're part of over 11 million registered players, you may recall that at E3, Minecraft announced the news that they would soon be making its way into the mobile world.

Yesterday, that news was realised as Minecraft: Pocket Edition has just been launched on the Android Market.

The first version (Alpha 0.1) will focus on the creative aspects of Minecraft. We have tried to put in the features that make sense for playing on a mobile device while still keeping the core of the Minecraft experience. You will be able to select blocks on the touchscreen or just scroll through them with the circle and square buttons on the Xperia Play device. The first version also supports multi-player on a local wireless network allowing you to create a world and invite friends to build together.

Some of the features in this release include:

  • Randomized worlds
  • Build anything you can imagine
  • Build with 36 different kinds of blocks
  • Invite and play with friends to your world (local wireless network)
  • Save multi-player worlds on your own phone

Here comes the bad news, if you're an Android user with a Droid handset that is anything but the Xperia Play then unfortunately you're going to need to wait, as the new release itself is for now 'Xperia PLAY Optimized' only, meaning that its yours (at a price of $6.99), provided you have the Xperia PLAY.

For the rest of us Minecraft fans in the Android camp, although there's thus far no word on an official non-Xperia PLAY release anytime soon, we'd be happy to place a bet that the app won't stay Xperia PLAY exclusive for long, whether that be an official release or a download of the less legitimate variety.

[via Neowin]

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It's no secret to anyone that the App Store is crammed with word games � they're hard to miss. Considering how simplistic the genre is and how it appeals to such a wide variety of different types of gamers, it's no surprise everyone wants to make the word game that people can't seem to stop playing. To do that, you either have to execute the original formula very well, or find a way to give it a twist. With DooWaru [99�/Lite], it's the latter, and I'm happy to report that the experiment was a great success.

As with most word games, DooWaru makes it simple to jump right in and play. You'll start off with a grid of letters and a field up top which acts simultaneously as the space where the words you type appear and as the button you submit your word with. Your score racks up in the bottom right corner, and your time ticks away in the bottom left. As you successfully spell words, you fill up a progress bar at the top, and once it's full, you've completed a level. It's all standard, actually … so what's the twist?

What makes things get all wacky is that the letters in the grid are on 3D blocks. And they rotate and reveal new letters. Oh, you think to yourself, I get it … I just have to think a bit faster! And then as soon as you get that learning curve down, the blocks start to speed up. Soon enough, two new blocks are introduced: one that blows up the blocks surrounding it, and one that freezes them. You can tap the latter whenever you like to buy yourself a few moments to think, but you can't control the bomb blocks, only race to beat them before they blow up that letter that you need. When I tell you that by the time you pass level ten you're going to have to be quick to spell anything longer than three or four letters, believe it. This is where the challenge and the fun come in. Think fast!

There's also an additional mode called Quick Play that gives you two minutes to spell as many words as you can, and adds a few precious seconds to the clock for each word you spell. Whether you play in this mode or in arcade mode, the game keeps track of your scores, so you can aim to beat your own scores or those of others if you like (no Game Center compatibility though � boo!).

DooWaru is very simple, but what it does, it does very well. I found that I enjoyed it more than most word games I play because the constantly changing board gave me more options. Sure, you have to learn to play fast because of the bombs, but I also found myself coming up with more creative, longer words because I had a large board to choose from, and if the letter I needed to complete a word wasn't there when I needed it, it might turn up in a second or two once the board changed again. It also didn't increase in difficulty to the point where it became frustrating, offering accessible gameplay �that I imagine a wide range of people could get down with.

The only negative thing I can say about DooWaru is about the music. It's some sort of frenzied Indian melody that sounds as if you've stumbled into a bad Bollywood video and repeats over and over, and it doesn't fit the game at all. Luckily, you can hop in the menu and turn it off with a single tap. Unless you're into the whole Bollywood thing, that is, and then maybe you can practice your belly dancing in circles around the kitchen while you get your spell on.

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Word Fighter is a cool upcoming � wait for it � word fighting game from the wonderful dudes over at Feel Every Yummy. We went hands-on with an alpha build earlier this year at GDC, and now you can see the game in its more finished glory. Feel Every Yummy has just released a new look teaser showing off its next-level Street Fighter-Meets-Scrabble action and also a few of its new-look characters. Depressingly, none of them are TIME-award winning Brad Nicholson, but what can you do, eh?

In case you missed our earlier coverage, basically the game goes like this: you spell a word from jumbled letters on a 5�5 grid over the course of three timed and turn-based rounds. Letters have point values, so the more points, the more possibility that you'll live through the man-on-man conflict.

If you're going to be around at PAX Prime, you'll be able to go hands-on with the game, too before its eventual Fall 2011 release on the iPad, iPhone, and the Android operating system. If you won't be in attendance, well, you'll just have to wait like the rest of us.

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It's not very often that I manage to play a game that not only offers an enjoyable and compelling gameplay experience, but also manages to make me laugh at the same time. FlyBoy [$0.99 / Lite / HD / HD Lite], a whimsical skydiving simulator, manages to do just that.

Gameplay in FlyBoy is relatively simple: you choose from one of six different stages (and three different difficulties), stabilize your iOS device, and then use the accelerometer to steer your skydiver past a variety of barriers while racing against the clock towards the finish line. Tap on your screen to dive and shave off a few seconds at the cost of control. Should you go splat by hitting something, you are taken back to the last checkpoint, which definitely loses �you valuable seconds. �In addition to avoiding obstacles, a variety of power-ups are littered throughout the path which can do everything from give you a burst of speed to making you temporarily invincible, allowing you to dive right through any barriers. At the end of every level, you are rated based on your completion time.

Levels in FlyBoy range from volcanoes to Mayan temples to the inside of a fish. While each �level is well done and definitely offers some variety and increased difficulty, in the end the core gameplay changes very little. Thankfully, harder difficulties are balanced well and actually require a good deal of concentration in order to beat them in record time. Still, I really wish FlyBoy offered more levels, as the limited selection means you're going to run out of content very quickly. Also, the lack of Game Center support is surprising, as I imagine folks would love to compete with their friends in speed runs.

One of the things that I think FlyBoy nails is its sense of humor. If you manage to only nick the side of a wall while diving, odds are you'll end up decapitating a limb (instead of dying instantly). You can continue to play, but you lose a bit of control as your unfortunate diver starts bleeding out. You can actually continue playing with multiple decapitated limbs, which is both hilarious and�horrifying�at the same time. In fact, you can even earn an achievement for having your skydiver survive as nothing but a torso flying towards the finish line.

Maybe it's simply my juvenile tendencies, but I just thought this decapitation feature added a whole lot of personality to the game as a whole. However, it's not all just fun and gore, as the more limbs you lose, the easier it is to dodge the myriad of barriers coming at you. If you collect one of the many health packs littered along the path, you can regenerate any limbs lost. If bloodied limbs are too much for you (or your child), an option exists to turn off some of the gory content.

Despite the relatively light amount of content, I still think FlyBoy does a pretty good job creating a well-rounded 'quickie' game. There's enough strategy within each of the levels in order to keep you coming back, as well as all the usual competitive features to make sure that you aren't simply playing against yourself. Sure, FlyBoy isn't going to win any rewards for deep gameplay, but if you're looking for an amusing game to kill some time, FlyBoy is worth checking out.

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Xbox fans � get ready to play your favourite games anywhere, anytime on your Windows Phone 7 mobile with Xbox LIVE, check it out in this Gamescom 2011 video trailer.

Many thanks to Kim for the tip!

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Combination of retro looks and modern technology has always been a successful dual, and if you're looking for such a device, Grace Digital has something for you.
Grace Digital has recently announced a unique radio that combines the retro looks of the 40's and the power of internet into one unusual device called the Victori Nostalgic Internet Radio. Besides the vintage looks, Victoria Nostalgic Internet Radio has a lot more to offer, and one of those things is Class D digital 16 watt RMS amplifier (50 watt peak), so that this radio can fill an entire room with quality sound. This radio also comes with a 4-line adjustable backlit display, five alarm settings, 110 station presets, built-in 802.11n wireless and Pandora controls on a special remote. In addition, you can also download Grace Digital's remote control app for iOS and Android devices.

As for the supported internet radio stations, the list includes Pandora Radio, SiriusXM, Rhapsody, NPR, Live365, DAR.fm, WeatherBug, and more than 50,000 AM/FM/HD radio stations. As for the price, Victoria Nostalgic Internet Radio will be priced at $229.99.

[via �Coolest Gadgets]

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Google Maps for Android has been updated to version 5.9.0. This version brings Bubble Buttons lab feature, Transit Navigation support for Tablets and Voice and Ringtone Notification for Transit navigation.�Previous Google Maps update v5.8.0 last month had features like photo uploading for places and My Places.

New Features in Google Maps v5.9.0 for Android

  • Now you can add voice and custom ringtone for the Transit navigation (beta) from the transit notification options
  • Transit Navigation (beta) is now supported in Android tablets
  • Enable Bubble Buttons lab feature to call or navigate to the places on the map easily

Download Google Maps v5.9.0 for Android phones from the�Android Market for free.

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Idea Cellular has launched new festival offers for prepaid subscribers in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh�called�Rim Jhim�Mein Idea ke saath manao "Har Din Diwali". �This gives an exiting opportunity for the Idea prepaid customers to win�exciting prizes like a�Bike, Laptop, Refrigerator, mobile phone, Idea 3G data cards, DVD players and much more. They also offer�Full Talk time on recharges.

To take part in the contest the prepaid subscribers need to know their Full Talk time lucky recharge by dialing�50505 (Toll-free) and recharge for the same amount. They would automatically be part of the contest and also would be offered�Full Talk time on their recharge.

There are also daily offers for the prepaid subscribers and they could know the special offer of the day by dialing�50707 (Toll-free) from the Idea connection.

This monsoon offer is available for all the Idea prepaid customers in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh till 30th September 2011. The winners would be announced after the offer�period.

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