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Hidden Gem of the Week: Toast Time
Beneath Toast Time’s absurd premise of toast-shooting warrior against time-stealing inter-dimensional enemies lies a hectic arcade game with controls and action designed to suit mobile perfectly. Reminiscent of Super Crate Box, Toast Time’s action revolves around a pool of different weapon types, tight arenas, and projectile-changing crates to grab. One touch controls combat and movent, as each shot fired propels in the opposite direction; these simple mechanics allow for varied scenarios as walls, platforms, and special items like jump pads get added to the arenas and forcing you to make more precise shots. You could fire randomly, but for the best scores, you’ll need t…
AndroidDeath Coming brings cute-yet-violent puzzles to the App Store next week
The Final Destination series grossed out audiences with elaborate gory deaths for over a decade, but Death Coming takes a decidedly more charming approach to fatal Rube Goldberg scenarios when it released on iOS on March 13th. In this pixel-art puzzler, you are an agent of Death, orchestrating elaborate fatalities within sandbox levels where unsuspecting victims roam. Through observation, you must figure how to set up death traps. From crowded downtown streets to missile facilities where accident-prone scientists work, you’ll need to solve those bloody puzzles by manipulating the environment and altering people‘s behaviors, all while avoiding the watchful gaze of the angels th…
Fantasy board game Armello launches on iOS on March 15th
Three years after our hands-on with this animal kingdom board game, Armello is finally releasing on the App Store this month, slated for March 15th. Choosing from a selection of woodland warriors, you‘ll explore and fight across Armello’s kingdom turn-by-turn, drawing event cards, rolling dice, and engaging in battles with other clans and combatants. With each decision - performing quests for kings, hiring agents to aid in your conquests, plot betrayals and backstabbings - you gain prestige and influence over the King’s rulings. While traversing the board is largely a game of resource management and making use of tile buffs such as stealth bonuses from forests, combat re…
Uncover a sci-fi conspiracy in cyberpunk adventure Read Only Memories: Type-M
Many cyberpunk games present their worlds through a dark Blade Runner-inspired lens, all towering neon-lit skyscrapers and moody rain-drenched streets. Thus, Read Only Memories: Type-M‘s colorful pixel art characters and environments offer a different take on the cyberpunk adventure game, available now on the App Store. Set on the streets of Neo-San Franciso, Read Only Memories follows a sentient machine and a journalist as they team up to investigate a conspiracy that shakes the foundation of their society. Inspired by the point-n-clicks of the 90s, your adventure is one of solving puzzles and questioning locals throughout the city; who you question and the choices you make wi…
Sam Barlow’s #WarGames heads to iOS on March 14th
Sam Barlow started a full-notion resurgence with his unique detective mystery Her Story, where you pieced together the truth of a crime through dozens of interview video clips; his next project #WarGames explores FMV from a different angle and is bringing a techno thriller game to iOS later this month. As the title suggests, #WarGames is a modernized reimagining of the 80s film of the same name. While the movie was product of Cold War era fears of nuclear war, the game updates the tale to one of modern-day “hacktivists”, episonage, and digital technology. Following the story of Kelly and her international group of hackers, #WarGames is presented through various webcams,…
A Steel Media round-up for the week of February 26th
Here’s another weekly round-up of news, previews, and features from Pocket Gamer, 148Apps, and the rest of our sister sites. On our Youtube page, James Gilmour reviews the colorful physics-puzzler Part Time UFO, praising its perfect-for-mobile design, intuitive controls, and addicting gameplay. Over on Pocket Gamer, Harry Slater presents a patented Harry’s hot take arguing that the best way to create a faithful Harry Potter game is through the magic of FMV. Tre Lawrence on Android Rundown writes a retrospective on the Android port of Sonic CD, revisiting its unique time travel mechanic and great soundtrack, although its controls may not match the quality…
Childhood fairy-tales meet papercraft worlds in PAPER Anne, the new puzzle platformer featured by Apple
iOS users can now dive into the pages of their own papercraft storybook as PAPER Anne, the new fairy-tale inspired platformer, arrives on the App Store. Assuming the role of the titular Anne, your story begins when you find yourself swept into a paper-based world that’s been torn asunder by the Queen of Hearts. Alice is nowhere to be found, leaving Anne to take up the mantle as this immersive realm’s saviour. And only through intricate puzzle-solving guided by responsive drag and drop controls can the day be saved. PAPER Anne makes it easy for you to assume the role of Anne, transporting you into a world of elegantly hand-drawn graphics, populated throughout with some of chil…
Quirky javelin-flinging action game Lichtspeer is now available on the App Store
A single javelin may not seem like enough to hold back an army of towering giants, sharply-dressed zombies, and glasses-wearing walruses, but that javelin probably isn’t the Lichtspeer. Armed with the powerful laser spear, this new iOS arcade-action game pits you against waves of weird foes and much more. Across this odd sci-fi fantasy landscape and over 60 stages, you fight at the behest of the Licht gods, talking aim with your titular weapon against varied encroaching monsters. With familiar slingshot controls, your graceful throws pierce eyes and heads and other weak points, requiring precision and timing to defeat deadlier enemies and looming bosses. A single enemy reaching you…
Evoland 2 offers a genre-hopping adventure through the history of games
The first Evoland revolved an interesting premise, an RPG that jumped between gameplay style and formats. Evoland 2 returns to that concept but expands upon on it by adding more genres and more varied gameplay shifts, all framed within a story of time travel and saving the world. Starting with a classic GBA aesthetic and old-school RPG design, Evoland 2 grows more sophisticated with each loop through time, progressing from 2D pixel art overworlds and Suikoden-style sprites to 3D characters, dungeons, and environments. While the first game explored the history of RPGs, the sequels leaps between genres alongside its focus on being a humor RPG adventure, containing side-scrolling platforming…
Hidden Gem of the Week: Knotmania
The zen puzzler is somewhat rare on mobile. Often many of the more minimalist games that avoid timers or other pressure still revolve around mechanics that can be challenging or tricky. The figurine winding of Zenbound and the silhouette construction of Shadowmatic fall into the category of simple, calmly paced puzzlers and so does this week’s hidden gem Knotmania. Rather than untying ropes or threads, Knotmania takes a more quirky approach: untangling living creatures, a twisted knot of squirming textured worms. Begin tugging and dragging and, as expected, they resist and twist away, moving in slow graceful movements as if through water or in zero gravity. With both a single worm o…
GameSpire’s Grand Battle Royale is a new, PUBG-style free-for-all
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG) was a runaway success in 2017, taking the premise of cult Japanese film Battle Royale and using it as the basis for a competitive shooter. A game genre was born overnight. Now Chinese developer GameSpire has thrown its hat into the battle royale ring, releasing Grand Battle Royale for the mobile. Unlike most PUBG-like games, Grand Battle Royale stands out visually. Instead of realistic graphics, the in-game world is a jumble of blocky pixels, like a landscape of Lego. The simple graphics of this Minecraftian world mean it shouldn’t be quite as memory intensive as more realistic MMO games, promising quick-fire antics with minimal lag. You s…
Inkle's sci-fi archaeological adventure Heaven's Vault receives a gameplay trailer
Inkle has been at the forefront of the interactive fiction genre on mobile, with their Sorcery series and 80 Days. But while those games were adaptations and reinventions of existing works, Inkle’s next game Heaven’s Vault is completely original, and the archaeology-based adventure finally has a trailer showcasing its gameplay and mechanics. Traveling the stellar rivers of the Nebula, Aliya Elasra and her robot companion Six are on a mission to uncover the secrets of the worlds that make up the Nebula. Through your choices, you guide the duo between alien ruins and events throughout open environments, learning and decoding an extraterrestrial language to gathe…
Sine Requie: Snake Eyes combines alternate history mystery with horror RPG
It’s 1954 and Tuscany is in the grip of an undead apocalypse. As Inquisitor Rossano Mazzoni, your job in the upcoming RPG Sine Requie: Snake Eyes is to track down a dangerous cult, as you put together an investigation team and battle zombies. Set in an alternate 1950s, a decade after the dead began to rise during World War 2, Snake Eyes challenges you to explore the Italian countryside and towns through a 3D map, managing hunger, exhaustio, and sanity and talking with individuals in interactive fiction sections. Combat encounters and random events are drawn from a tarot deck of scenarios; while events might be handled through choices and more decisions, fighting is turn-ba…
Asphalt 9: Legends soft-launches its gorgeous arcade racing on the Philippines app store
The Asphalt series has been bringing impressive arcade racing to mobile for over a decade and its latest, and ninth, game Legends looks like it might be the fastest and prettiest entry yet. While the worldwide release is still in the works, the game is currently available through a soft launch in the Philippines. Featuring over fifty cars to unlock, Legends once again unleashed you on twisting tracks in hectic Burnout-inspired races, complete with huge jumps and crashing rival racers. Tracks take you from the tornado-threatened roads of the Midwest to the narrow mountain passes of the Himalayas, with each successful finish letting you upgrade and customize your favorite vehicle…
Plan planet-wide conflicts in sci-fi real-time strategy game Element
Real time strategy games often revolve flat battlefields, managing bases and your army along frontlines. Element takes that idea and gives it a global twist, challenging you to wage war on land, sea, and space. Across low-poly planets, Element places you in the role of a commander in a futuristic conflict. The solar system is dying and each planet is another foothold to gather resources in your race for interstellar expansion. As you expand your network of mines and capture useful territory on planet surfaces, your options grow, letting you unleash supply drones and low-orbit artillery strikes that streak around the planet towards targets. Improve your tech enough and you can even harvest…
