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Kairosoft's Ninja Village stealthily appears out of nowhere for iPhone and iPad
After almost a year on Android devices, Kairosoft's Ninja Village finally reached the App Store yesterday. As you might expect, it’s quite different from Kairosoft’s most successful game, Game Dev Story, in that it has more ninjas. As the leader of a ninja clan, you must train and gear up your recruits to fight other armies, with the intention of unifying all of Japan. Most of your time will be spent managing your village and taking on battles. Oh, and taking part in the age-old Japanese tradition of recruiting ninja animals. To improve your infantry, archers, gunners, and cavalry, you’ll need money. This means starting up businesses to get the cash flowing in, and…
Breed dragons and create an empire in Doodle Kingdom, out now on the App Store
Descending from the clouds into a medieval world of dragons and castles, Doodle Kingdom - which hit the App Store today - promises something a little more down and dirty than its omnipotent predecessor Doodle God. Still utilising the series' algebraic gameplay, Doodle Kingdom will encourage you to add X to Y in order to make Z. In Doodle God, you could use this formula to create life. As the ruler of your own Doodle Kingdom, however, you get to add such delicious sums as "castle + dragon = burning castle." Where its predecessor offered a single path through all of creation, Doodle Kingdom offers more decisions for would-be rulers. You can return your kingdom to prosperity, breed dra…
Doodle KingdomAssist the world's greatest detective from your iPhone in Sherlock: The Network
Having just finished its third season, the BBC's modern take on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Baker Street detective will have probably left fans itching for something to keep their wits sharp till the next adventure. Luckily The Project Factory's Sherlock: The Network is here to keep you amateur sleuths occupied in the meantime. Drawing its inspiration from Sherlock's collection of underground communities, The Network asks you to become a member of the Baker Street Irregulars. This group of homeless helpers unearth information to aid the detective in solving the case. Taking cues from fellow private investigator Professor Layton, the game has you gathering data by solving puzzles o…
RoboCop Review
Everything has gotten smaller since the eighties. Mobile phones don't need their own suitcases. You can fit a whole arcade in your pocket, and cyber policeman RoboCop has been transformed from a lumbering tank into a sleek, ninja-style killing machine. Developer Glu has taken advantage of all of these facts in its latest movie tie-in, RoboCop. In terms of gameplay RoboCop owes more than a little to the arcade classic Time Crisis. Though the camera perspective has shifted to third…
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Magnetized Review
During your first few minutes with Magnetized, you could be forgiven for thinking that it is going to be a basic puzzler with a single mechanic. Instead, the developer Rocky Hong slowly introduces three different spins on the maze-navigating formula which layer to produce something both addictive and dynamic. As with all time-gobbling puzzlers, the core of Magnetized is simple. You must guide a small block through a colourful maze, ideally picking up three collectibles en route. The…
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Darkly comic PC hit Surgeon Simulator coming to iPad 'soon'
Get ready to don your surgical gown and anaesthetise the morality centre of your brain: Macabre medical game Surgeon Simulator is officially coming to the App Store. Bossa Studios, the developer behind the sadistically humorous Surgeon Simulator 2013 has been toying around with the idea of porting a version of the game to iPad since last year. Speaking to sister site Pocket Gamer in 2013, developer Tom Jackson said that the team had been working in a new control system to allow players to slice and dice efficiently on touchscreen devices. It looks like they must have cracked it, as Bossa Studios has just posted a teaser trailer (above) confirming that Surgeon Simulator is "coming s…
Movie referencing puzzle adventure Ferris Mueller's Day Off out now on iPhone and iPad
If you were to draw a Venn diagram depicting fans of '80s movies and fans of classic point-and-click adventure games, we're pretty sure you would see a significant overlap. If you happen to fall in this catch-all catagory, Glitch Games' Ferris Mueller's Day Off SD - which hit the App Store yesterday - might be of interest to you. Ferris is a mule on the run. As the headteacher of the local school - and owner of the wayward donkey - it is up to you to hunt him down. To do this, you'll need to talk to the townfolk, and solve puzzles which play out in classic point-and-click adventure style. As the referencial title suggests, Ferris Mueller's Day Off SD is filled to the brim with…
Sly Cooper tie-in Bentley's Hackpack sneaks onto the iPad
An iPad port of PS Vita and PS3 game Bentley's Hackpack made an unexpected appearance on the App Store yesterday. Bentley's Hackpack is a collection of the three hacking mini-games from Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time. The initial download is free, and offers demos of all of the three mini-game types: Spark Runner, Alter Ego, and System Cracker. Each of these games takes clear inspiration from an arcade classic. Spark Runner is a maze style game where you must gather collectibles on your way to the exit. Alter Ego harkens back to classic side scrolling shoot-'em-ups, and System Cracker is essentially gallery-shooter Combat with a neon coat of paint. While Sony certa…
Fluid-puzzler Feed Me Oil 2 gets 15 new levels in latest update
Gooey liquid-based puzzler Feed Me Oil 2 has just been updated with 15 new levels. Players who download the game's first free content update will unlock the previously inaccessible fifth island. Provided you've collected the 170 stars required to gain entry, you'll be able to explore the island and tackle a brand new batch of fluid-centric conundrums. Also, according to developer Holy Water Games, you can now share your high scores via Facebook if you want. Just bear in mind that most of your friends will probably hate you for it if you do. We thought Feed Me Oil 2 was an agreeably slick package, calling it "another tight and satisfying puzzle experience" in our review. You can dow…
Mega Jump 2 Review
Game development is all about making tweaks. A change here, an improvement there, and pretty soon a bare-bones idea is transformed into a stunning game. Thus, having already built a solid foundation with vertical platformer Mega Jump, you'd hope that Get Set Games could perfect is monster-centric take on the genre with the sequel. Mega Jump 2's tilt-based action is as responsive as ever, with you directing tiny hero Redford back-and-forth across the screen with subtle hand moveme…
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Build a kingdom, train an army, and battle other players from around the world in free-to-play MMO Empire: Four Kingdoms [Sponsored]
![Build a kingdom, train an army, and battle other players from around the world in free-to-play MMO Empire: Four Kingdoms [Sponsored]](https://images.appspy.com/articles/8115/fourkingdomsiphone5_jpeg_240x140_q85.jpg "Build a kingdom, train an army, and battle other players from around the world in free-to-play MMO Empire: Four Kingdoms [Sponsored]")
Back in March 2013, developer Goodgame Studios launched an action-packed strategy title named Empire: Four Kingdoms. Fire up Empire: Four Kingdoms, and you're thrust into a dangerous fantasy world that plays home to millions of real-world players from around the globe. Your aim in this massively multiplayer strategy title, then, is to craft your very own empire from the ground up. How? By establishing a flourishing economy and, in turn, improving various aspects of your kingdom. Naturally, as you continue to thrive, you'll attract unwanted attention from other players, who'll send out large armies to attempt to halt your advances. This means you'll have to construct defensive fortresses;…
Retro RPG sequel Across Age 2 HD slashes its way onto iPad
Things have changed since FDG's nostalgic RPG Across Age was released on the App Store back in 2010. Though old-skool Zelda-alikes were relatively thin on the ground four years ago, iOS gamer have since been drowned in a tidal wave of similarly styled retro-JRPG experiences. Unlike many of these one-shot copy / paste efforts, however, the newly released Across Age 2 HD - which is now available on iPad - does build on an established RPG franchise. And, to its credit, it doesn't seem to stick as closely to the cookie-cutter approach of some of its peers. The basic premise remains unchanged. You're cast as returning heroes Ales and Ceska, and must jump headfirst into another ti…
Apple ordered to refund $32.5 million to parents over in-app purchase policy
Apple has agreed to pay no less than $32.5 million in refunds to parents who were billed after their children made in-app purchases on the App Store without their consent. The original class action lawsuit, which saw parents seeking compensation after claiming that Apple's in-app purchase policy failed to prevent their kids from making unauthorized purchases, was actually settled by a US judge last year. However, it turns out that the promise of a $5 iTunes voucher for each affected customer (or up to $30 cash) wasn't enough for the Federal Trade Commission. By failing to alert parents to the 15 minute window of additional purchases their kids could make after entering a password, the Cup…
Revisit RPG history in Bioware classic Baldur's Gate II, out now on iPad
Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition appeared iPad just over a year ago. A remake of Bioware's point-and-click RPG classic, the Overhaul Games-developed port was a collector's dream, cramming in all of the game's original expansions, and running on an improved version of the Infinity Engine. Now, the team has brought the Baldur's Gate II, a game widely regarded as one of the best RPGs of its time, to Apple tablets. Much like the iOS port of its predecessor, Baldur's Gate II will take advantage of an improved graphics engine, and contain all of the game's expansion packs. These include Throne of Bahaal and Fist of the Fallen, two self-contained adventures that…
Strike from the shadows in impressive new ninja platformer Shadow Blade
Slick ninja platformer Shadow Blade has just sprung from the shadows of the App Store to deal a killing blow to your spare time. Nailing platforming mechanics on touchscreen devices is a tricky feat, one which many fail to accomplish. For every decent mobile platformer like League of Evil, there's an army of Duke Nukem: Manhattan Projects waiting in the wings. However, after a quick hands-on, we can report that the newly-released Shadow Blade from developer Dead Mage appears to be one of the good ones. Taking control of a wall-leaping, sword-swinging ninja, you have to run, jump, and swipe your way through a series of treacherous environments and enemies. There are goons at every…
