Feb 22, 2012

Once a dominant force of rainy days and lazy Sundays, board games have been around forever and have not changed much over the last 50 years or so. However, tablets are the perfect medium to play interactive board games . Gone are the days of lost pieces and cheating, replaced instead with visually striking, high tech games that can be played on separate tablets allowing for greater privacy. A great example of this is the iOS version of Scrabble that allows players to view their tiles with an iPhone or iPod touch while a single iPad sits in the middle as the game board.

For strategy conquest fans, the tablet is a welcomed portal to formerly impossible territories. One KickStarter project looks to take advantage of this opportunity by developing an aptly named tablet-only “board” game, Conquest. This is a Risk-style game that pits two or more players against each other in an effort to seize control of a small corner of the galaxy. Each player controls a small fleet and goes around conquering planets and obtaining resources. One great addition in Conquest is that moves are only shown after every player has selected their action. This makes the game more realistic and keeps all the action happening in real time. Another advantage to being on tablets is that the “board” isn’t restricted in size or depth. Conquest takes place on multiple planets, each with territories as in Risk, but also in space, and combat can be initiated in either. Think of Conquest as a sort of Risk-Star Wars hybrid.

Games of this ilk are going to become more and more popular in the near future as tablets become cheaper and more prevalent. A whole new genera of high tech board games will break into the forefront, moving off the Toys’R’ Us shelves and onto online marketplaces. That’s why Conquest is so exciting and ambitious; if funded it could represent a dramatic shift in the way we spend a rainy day with friends.

Feb 16, 2012

I’ve always been a sucker for clean, minimalist user interfaces. For me, a phone home screen should be something that can be shown off even if that might mean a subtle loss of convenience. For a while now my main home tile has been completely devoid of the usual assortment of widgets, containing instead purely aesthetic widgets that add a small layer of class onto an otherwise pragmatic piece of tech. In this week’s Theme Thursday I’m going to look at not just a basic theme, but two more additional widgets that can bestow incredible power in making a launcher its own small piece of art.

First and foremost is the GO Launcher theme called “Touch.” This is probably the weakest part of my home page right now as the custom icons are not spectacular and the great background could probably just be found on Google Images. Small touches are nice, such as a simple, white app drawer, but I would not declare this two dollar theme a great value. Touch puts a white border around every app on the home screen which does go a way to delivering some great continuity, but it would be nice to at least have the option to disable this feature. For those using GO Locker there is also a free locker theme that works well and goes a long way to tie everything together.

Two great widgets that really break the mold from the classic HTC Sense UI-style of plastic looking 3-D widgets are Minimalistic Text and BobClockD3. BobClockD3 is a clock app that displays the time vertically with flat san-serifed text. While the customization options are thin, there is ample room for creativity. For those looking for a simple way to give their phone a facelift I would highly recommend checking out BobClockD3, and it being free removes pretty much any argument against it.

In total contrast is Minimalistic Text, playing a legitimate “Linux” to BobClockD3’s “Windows” this app gives total control over text display on the home screen. There is a myriad of display options here, ranging from time as text, to battery percentage, and even RAM usage. After some practice of the initially confusing workspace it becomes easy and fun to add text to the home screen and give it the truly modern look that it has been lacking.

So give it a shot, regain aesthetic control of the cellular domain and create a modern minimalist masterpiece that will turn heads and draw compliments.

Feb 15, 2012

Most of the KickStarter projects done here are just applications looking to make the jump onto Android, but AppTag is something truly creative; it breaks the mold by creating a physical game that uses a smartphone as the brain as well as a visual enhancement. This idea, borne from the mind of Australian inventor Jon Atherton, is to make a game that combines augmented reality with laser tag. This is done by attaching a special clip onto the rail of most NERF or similar toy guns and clipping a pressure density pad onto the trigger. The phone is held on the top of the back of the gun and displays an augmented reality with real-time stats and overlays on top of whatever the camera can see. This idea of allowing the whole system to be quickly swapped between guns is nothing short of genius, because it also makes the whole system very inexpensive.

The AppTag devices supposedly communicate between one another by using sound frequencies as opposed to bluetooth or WiFi. This makes the game simpler but I cannot help but question how efficient and reliable this will be. Another concern is the augmented reality feature. I have played a lot with augmented reality before on devices such as the Nintendo 3DS and the effect, at the most, was barely convincing.

Unfortunately, I have a hard time believing that a few coders, even from Australia, can pull off a better augmented reality simulator then Nintendo. But if – and it’s a big “if” – Jon and his team can get the augmented reality to just work well enough, this project is very exciting. Imagine playing an intense game of laser tag with a full HUD displaying health, enemy positions, and medkits or weapons. This almost begs the question of where NERF was all these years with their vast sums of cash and immense R+D team.

I remain cautiously optimistic about AppTag, but if it pans out there is no doubt I may be one of the first in line to order myself a pair.

Feb 9, 2012

Most of the themes looked at in this Theme Thursday blog have been for ADWLaucher, but in keeping with last week’s idea, today we’ll be looking at a Honeycomb theme for GO Launcher. For those not familiar with GO Laucher, it’s not much different than its competitors, ADW and Launcher Pro, but it’s worth taking a look for those who support it. For those of us stuck with Gingerbread for the time being, the lust for those running the radically different Honeycomb and Ice Cream Sandwich is palpable. In the mean time the next best thing is to at least put your phone in its own slim, black dress.

The theme comes with a fairly decent set of great looking that are perfect copies of Honeycomb’s own. While there is no skin for the solid GO Widgets, a simple dark theme works just a well. As mentioned above, the included icon set is large enough and does give flexibility by including multiple icons for similar applications. A glaring omission is the lack of a Facebook icon in the free version even though a Twitter and YouTube one are included. The background is, unfortunately, a major disappointment as it was pixelated and stretched on my EVO 4G, and while easily fixed, it does not reflect well. The differences between the paid and free versions of this app are just the addition of more really great looking icons and extra backgrounds which can easily found for free within five minutes on Google Images.

This theme is at its best when it is used as primarily a modern, sleek icon set and application tray. The limitations are noticeable when too much is asked of it, but part of these are simply a reflection on GO Launcher itself and not so much the theme. For those already running GO Launcher I highly recommend checking this out, but seeing that there are similar themes on nearly every other launcher it is not going to make someone jump ship. All that said, I do love the style and as long as it is paired with the right colors and layouts this Honeycomb clone can really give an aging phone a small but sexy makeover.

Free Version Download Link
Pro Version Download Link

Feb 8, 2012

This week for our Kickstarter Spotlight we have a great game that is already in the final stages but just needs that final push across the finish line. Island of Diamonds is an indie game by first time programmers under the name Happymonitor Games Studio. It is very much akin to the immensely popular Super Monkey Ball franchise, and the main gameplay simply involves an user-controlled, spunky coconut named Seamus who is forced to navigate treacherous structures in his pursuit of diamonds. Based on early gameplay videos, Island of Diamonds looks visually striking and the slightly shell-shaded, fully 3-D environment fits well with the overall feel of the game. This level of quality is hardly seen from an initial launch for first time developers, but it is just another example of the great contribution that indie programmers make to the landscape of mobile gaming.

Seeing as Happymonitor Games Studio already has a working iOS version, they are not asking for much on Kickstarter, just enough to equip themselves with the minimum for a solid Android launch. The asking price is even more reasonable considering that, up until now, their entire endeavor has been self-funded which includes small but costly expenses such as buying software and hardware, registering licenses and good ol’ free time. A great feature in Kickstarter is overfunding, because a project never stops receiving funding even when the goal is reached, developers can provide overfunding goals. In the case of Island of Diamonds the developers promise a foray into multiply and global leaderboards as well as animated cutscenes for their coconut protagonist.

For those who use their phone as a portable gaming platform, I strongly endorse Island of Diamonds. Glancing through the screen shots and gameplay video, I am amazed with the level of quality here; both in the technically impressive graphics and rich, colorful levels. So take a look, and consider giving up that fatty lunch that would have been purchased today in order to help some deserving developers get the coconut rolling.

Feb 2, 2012

For this revival of Theme Thursdays I am going to take a look at a wholly different launcher theme. Really, it’s not a theme at all but an entirely different launcher that is a nearly exact port of the UI running on the current Windows Phone 7. Now, I usually am a Mac guy, and ask my PC toting friends I have been known to give Window’s some grief, but, as evidenced by my gushing review of the Zune-themed media player Uber Music, the Redmond giants have been making a style comeback. I was a big fan of the old Zune’s interface and was happy to see it brought over, conceptually at least, to Window’s line of smartphones.

For those out there not familiar with Microsoft’s Mango user interface, it replaces the typical sectioned, widget-based home screens that are customary on Android devices with one screen containing a grid of customizable tiles. These tiles can display web content and house smaller widgets and overall present a much simpler, cleaner display. The major drawback, especially with Launcher 7, is the lack of full widget support, which begs the question: how often are those battery draining widgets used? I would wager not as often as initially thought. Above, I said “full widget support” because Launcher 7 offers widgets within tiles and they work fine but they do appear stretched as to fit the tile’s limited size; therefore this works best on the smaller widgets only.

That aside, say cleaning up the home screen and trying something new sounds inviting, Launcher 7 is definitely worth the shot. I’ve had it on my phone for a while and it just get’s better with each update. The graphics and animations are crisp and excellent font choice adds a subtle grace. Launcher 7, like most custom launchers, is highly customizable, and playing with the tile color and transparencies with different backgrounds is a lot of fun. Beginners might have problems with a fairly steep learning curve, but this is nothing to be afraid of, as trial and error can sometimes be rewarding. Launcher 7 is split into two side-by-side panels, one containing the tiled home screen and the other is the app drawer. Like other launchers this app drawer is customizable and removing items from the list as well as adding them to the main panel couldn’t be simpler.

Overall, I would quickly recommend Launcher 7 to most Android users. Launcher 7 is a beautiful, professional launcher that is more than worth checking out due to its high level of quality and refreshing change of pace.

Feb 1, 2012

Editor’s Note: Kickstarter Spotlight is a new weekly column spotlighting promising Android-related Kickstarter projects. Have any suggestions for projects to be featured on Kickstarter Spotlight? Leave them in the comments or send an email to the author.

The great thing about Kickstarter is its ability to give under-funded app developers a chance to create great, innovative apps. Last week I wrote a blog post about a great website called Kickstarter, and in it I mentioned a developing app, Pixel Sand. There are a few “falling sand” games scattered around the internet, and for those unfamiliar with them, they are basically an open sandbox with small particles that react to gravity and to each other. These particles can be anything from water to fire to nitroglycerin. Here, take a look. The problem with these games, other then being a black hole to free-time, is that there has never been a foray into expanding these games from simple sandbox to full, story driven, co-op titles. As is probably obvious by now, one man, Trevor Sundberg, is trying to tackle this very thing. Already with a working game for the PC, Xbox, and Windows Phone 7, Trevor is trying to expand his game by adding a campaign and of course, expanding to iOS and the little green robot.

The proposed new game elements are genius and are sure to have users stretching the limits of the platform. As I stated in my earlier review of Apparatus, from prior experiences with games such as Little Big Planet, Halo, and Minecraft there are no limits to what the community can create if given the right tools. Seriously, click on those links, the Minecraft one specifically is that perfect internet mix of impressive and sad.

That is what makes the stunningly simple inclusion of electricity so smart; it is such a simple yet absent addition in the few other “games” in this genre. Other great elements include power-ups and doors that only open after a select number of coins has been collected. I personally am excited to see some of the user-generated content, and one thing that is a definite is that someone, somewhere will re-create the iconic first Super Mario Bros. level.

Unfortunately, as of now, Pixel Sand still needs funding. There is still time, however, and I strongly encourage everyone to click on the link in this post, head over to Kickstarter and help this game out because it deserves to be realized to its full potential.

Jan 27, 2012

I will admit that I am a nerd. I’m an engineering student who grew up on the first version of The Incredible Machine and free-form puzzle games are some of my favorites. That being said, I expected a lot from Apparatus, and fortunately for me it delivered, and it was one of the few apps where I was actually amazed while playing it. The first thing I have to say about this app is that it is gorgeous and it runs smooth to boot. This was tested on my quickly aging EVO 4G, so even non-feature phones should have no problem running this app.

For those not familiar with the premise of games like The Incredible Machine, the game gives a simple objective and a set amount of materials for the player to gerry-rig up into their own special Rube Goldberg machine. Games like these thrive on the user’s creativity, and Apparatus is no different; however, I would have liked to have seen some more open-ended gameplay as some levels seemed very linear. There is also an excellent free-play mode where the player is given no restrictions and allowed to let their creativity roam.

Going well with this free mode is the fairly fleshed out community that comes with the game. Downloading user-made levels could not be easier, and it only takes a few seconds to get a level and start playing. This sense of community is a huge addition for a game like Apparatus as the game aspires to be a kind of Little Big Planet for the mobile device. As we’ve seen with games like Minecraft, Halo, and the aforementioned Little Big Planet, what the public is capable of doing has no bounds, and giving them a way to share their magnum opus with the rest of humanity is an essential feature for any game nowadays.

And by "no bounds" we mean THIS.

One gripe with Apparatus is the lack of a tutorial to explain some of the features of the game. The first few minutes here will be frustrating due to seemingly random actions that become more clear the longer the game is played. Also the controls can be a bit touchy, but like above, they too work themselves out as the player becomes familiar with them. All that aside, Apparatus is a great game that impresses both graphically and fundamentally; a definite pick up for those who long for the days of The Incredible Machine on Windows 98.

Jan 27, 2012

The hardest part of creating a breakout app from your great idea is finding funding. Let’s face it, if you’re independently wealthy the odds of you going out of your way to create the next Angry Birds are small. Most of the greatest games on the Xbox Live Arcade, Apple App Store, and, of course, the Android Market are indie games: pet projects of people risking a lot on the success of these innovative games. Competition necessitates innovation; this is what drives the gaming industry. Sure, EA can manufacture hundreds of sub-par mobile puzzle games, but the real innovation comes from startups; young college kids looking to get their foot in the door with some novel idea. A quick look at the top 24 paid games in the Android Market shows just 9 titles by the traditional big players in gaming: EA, Gameloft, and Rockstar. Of these nine titles, six of them are remakes of classic games like UNO, Monopoly, the Sims, and GTA III. Look up the Wikipedia page for EA and then look at the Wiki for the developer of one of the most popular games on the Market, ‘Cut the Rope’. That’s right. Two whole sentences.

What I’m saying is that people love fresh, indie games, but getting backing for indie games – similar to movies – is hard and usually frustrating. That’s where an increasingly popular start-up called KickStarter comes in. You’ve probably seen them on the news or read about them online; they’re a great tool for anyone looking to get an idea off the ground. What KickStarter does is provides a place for normal people to help fund a startup. Instead of getting one company to invest $10,000 into the next Braid, KickStarter allows 1000 people to each invest 10 dollars. For your payment there are tiered rewards that are chosen by the developer. For donating over $5.00 you might get a personalized hand-written letter, and for going over $25, maybe an advanced copy of the product. These tiers go all the way up to $1,000 which could include a trip out to the launch party (not that I have $1000 to throw at a cool project). The way KickStarter regulates this system is by a.) Approving every application that is submitted and b.) Making it that if a project doesn’t reach its target amount in it’s allotted time then no money is given and the backers don’t pay anything. It’s kind of a cutthroat system, but it is a necessity.

KickStarter is the perfect opportunity for Android developers, building a fan base while also funding your project. One promising Android project that needs your help is Pixel Sand. As you can see with their video, this developer is attempting to revolutionize the relatively new falling-sand genre by adding unprecedented RPG, puzzle, and mulitiplayer elements to it. Other, non-app products include an initially impressive phone grip, iSLIC and the already funded phone platform/tripod adaptor Capta. KickStarter also allows developers to expand their business and work on developing for multiple platforms. A perfect example is an already-profitable PC game Hexxaxix XXI. Reaching the goal on KickStarter would allow for this game to be available for download across a large range of platforms including Sony’s new Play Station Vita.

So I encourage all of you to check out all the projects on KickStarter, not just Android ones. There are plenty of great projects out there that just need a little “kick” to get “started.”

Jan 24, 2012

While I personally have never been a major fan of games like Bejeweled, I do find them fun for a while, but their repetitive nature wears on me. The whole connect-3 genre is hard-pressed for innovation, which is part of what makes Zoo Keeper DX a very intriguing game. To start off, if you’re not a fan of Bejeweled then I am not sure Zoo Keeper DX will do enough to make you change your opinion, but I found it to be a more enjoyable and intense experience than Bejeweled.

If you’re not familiar, Zoo Keeper DX is the mobile port of a fairly popular Japanese puzzle game that originated on the GameBoy Advance with subsequent releases on the PS2 and Nintendo’s DS. The biggest difference between Zoo Keeper and other games of its genre is that for the main mode you are instructed to collect certain amounts of animals, and when you have secured ‘x’ number of each animal that round is over and another one starts with a slightly higher objective. This twist adds a nice layer of depth and because you’re timed, makes for a much more intense game. Frantically scanning the board for that last chain of pandas is certainly an unique experience. This is aided by the changing facial expressions of the animals who do not like to be kept waiting. Other than the running counter above the playing field, the angry expressions of the animals you’ve neglected to capture remind you of your objective and also give the game more heart.

Unfortunately, I found myself playing this game on silent a lot because the the repetitive soundtrack gets very annoying very quickly, and the decent sound effects don’t do enough to make up for this. The graphics are your typical pixel art, which look great, and all the menu’s are local and well implemented. Overall, Zoo Keeper DX is a solid puzzle game for anyone looking, but if you’re not a fan of similar titles there just isn’t enough here to warrant a change.

Jan 17, 2012

A while back I sat down and did a blog post on three of the most popular traditional “soft” keyboards on the Market. There’s no question that a hard keyboard is better than their virtual cousins, but the sacrifice of a smaller screen and larger profile are just something that most people aren’t willing to make. A few weeks after doing that blog post I found that the honeymoon was over and I was just not entirely satisfied with my choice. So I started wondering about some of the more radical keyboard apps out there, and maybe, given some time to adjust I could find a diamond in the rough.

The three keyboards I looked at all broke the molds of traditional static keyboards. My early favorite was throwback to the days of the Palm Pilot’s gesture based text input system called Graffiti Pro. I was a huge fan of this way of typing back in the day when Palm owned the PDA market, and for those who are unfamiliar with Palm’s Graffiti input system it removes the keyboard entirely, having you instead just write the letters inside of a blank area. This allows you to basically write what you want instead of tapping on a virtual keyboard. I loved the Palm version but this port falls short. Laggy on-screen gesture tracing and slow recognition and overall performance dooms this app. I was very disappointed because this app doesn’t do what’s promised: making entering text faster and more efficient.

The other two keyboards were the strangely polarizing MessagEase and the more traditional Thick Buttons. MessagEase is a very fresh take on the keyboard and takes away everything you thought you knew about typing. It reconfigures the keyboard into a 3×3 grid and combines tapping and swiping. If this sounds confusing, it’s because it is. Describing this wouldn’t do it justice, so here.

As you can see, if you want an ‘e’ you simply tap the ‘e’ square, and if you want a ‘c’ you would swipe to the left on the middle ‘o’ tile. I will give the creators of this high scores for creativity and efficiency. Unfortunately, by using this keyboard you are trying to suppress decades of typing practice. I gave this app a shot, I really tried for a few days to adjust, but ultimately I found that I could not get the hang of it and spent too much time searching for letters in the cluttered middle tile. If the letters were more evenly distributed and arranged more like a keyboard this app would be a little easier to grasp, but trying to quickly locate keys that are suddenly in a radically different arrangement proved to be much more challenging than I initially thought. If you can master MessagEase then it is a very powerful app that, due to large key size, can be very accurate. Also, MessagEase comes with plenty of customization options to keep those perfectionists happy.

Rounding out our list is Thick Buttons. Now, a first look at Thick Buttoms shows just a normal keyboard, but once you start typing that’s where all hell breaks loose. As you type, the mostly accurate text prediction resizes the keys making it easier to hit the ones you want. For example, if you wan to type the word ‘noodle’ as soon as you hit the letter ’n’ letter such as ‘c’ immediately shrink down and your ‘o’s and ‘e’s get bigger. On paper, this seems like a great idea, but in practice the rapid resizing can become total chaos causing you to subconsciously move your thumbs to adjust to the moving keys. While the keys aren’t actually shifting their base position the resizing is strangely unsettling and gives an illusion of floating, shifting keys. Type just one letter wrong at the very beginning of a word and you are doomed to end up with a something drastically different.

My conclusions after this week of hanging with the hipsters of the keyboard world is that, for better or worse, keyboards are here to stay, simply because they are so engrained into our brains that forcing a totally different arrangement of letters is just so mind-blowing that we can’t handle it. I would love to see the makers of MessagEase meet us half way here, because the tapping and dragging combo has real promise.

Jan 16, 2012

The tower defense genre has been well worn, and new ideas are generally very thin. When a new game comes out it generally follows the same pattern: survive a round, then upgrade and add new hardware. The Android Market is flooded with bland, cookie-cutter tower defense games, leaving those looking for something new at a loss. Incredibly, Siegebreaker actually manages to bring something different to the tower defense genre. Instead of an infinite number of low leveled pawns, you begin the game with a horribly stereotyped “Rock God” who was playing at a show and was magically transported to a land run by identical looking brothers for kings. As the story progresses you gain companions to help you with your wave annihilating quest.

These differences add a new layer of strategy, instead of just slamming a ton of static towers in a row; Siegebreakers’ allows its ‘towers’ to be fluid and part of the strategy is actively moving them around to give you the biggest advantage over the immediate onslaught. Also different than most tower defense games is that you have the ability to move the target, and your main character has a power that lets you roll a large stone around the battlefield, crushing or injuring your opponents. These additions, combined with the ability to move your player, forge a game that makes the rounds more involving and exciting. The limited number of towers makes this game much more challenging than the norm, but the painful dialogue when these new characters enter is laughable at best. This goes for all of the dialogue in the game; “Cringeworthy” puts it nicely as overplayed “rocker” stereotypes freely flow.

Unfortunately, the dialogue isn’t the only disappointment outside of the core gameplay. Spotty animation and repetitive sounds mar this game, but because of the solid, innovative gameplay these sins are easily overlooked. If you’re not a fan of freemium apps like I am, the constant ads telling you to buy more “orbs” to level up can be annoying. It’s so hard collecting them in the game that the offer to buy seems unfair because the difficulty ramps up very quickly. Siegebreakers is a fun and fresh game, but the basic reliance for expensive upgrades can ruin this game quickly.