Great iPod Touch/iPhone Apps

[A13x]

There's quite a few thousand iPod Touch and iPhone Applications available now, and I thought I'd share a few of my favourites, and hopefully, find out about some of the other PALGNers faves.

I'll be separating my choices into two categories, Apps and Games

Part One:

First up we will look at:

Applications

IGN Game Reviews
Store Link

This little baby is one of my most loved apps. In a convenient list view, it shows all the latest game reviews from IGN, with a rating. You can open each review into a summary, look at the score break down, read the full review, or in some cases, watch the video review.

There's the ability to find games based on genre or search results, and game guides are being added to it tomorrow. You can also filter content based on platforms if you don't want to read about certain releases.


Stanza
Store Link

I spoke about this app in the what are you reading thread.
Basically, it's a very easy to use and functional eBook reader, with the ability to transfer eBooks from your PC, or simply use the app itself to browse several large book stores for free or premium books.

The interface is very easy to use, you just tap the left or right side of the screen while reading a book to flip through the pages. Font size, brightness and invert options are all available based on gestures, and it's brought me back into reading in a big way after getting into a series based on one of the free eBooks listed in it (Persuader by Lee Child).


NodeInfo
Store Link

This one is good for Internode users, it will show stats about your current data usage, when your quota restarts and graphs showing your daily, weekly or monthly usage.

You can also read news from the ISP, view advisories and outages, and look at quick reference guides for email, ADSL, VOIP settings. Pretty handy.


Wikiamo
Store Link

This one is basically a portal to Wikipedia for your iPod/iPhone. Includes a cache for offline viewing of previously viewed articles. I'm happy with the interface and navigation of this one.

Games & Toys

Zen Bound
Store Link

A pretty relaxing title, ZenBound presents a Chinese themed "game" where the aim is to wrap your given model, in a limited length of rope, with as much of the surface covered as possible.

With your finger, you rotate the model around, and wrap it up in rope, wherever the rope touches on the model will be coated in a paint. You are awarded for reaching different levels of coverage, and there is a level of strategy involved in planning how you wrap the model so that you do not cut off sections from being wrapped, due to a rope blocking access to unpainted areas.

There's hundreds of different statues to wrap up in Zenbound, and they get unlocked as you progress. Well worth checking out.


Flight Control
Store Link

A pretty simple concept, but highly enjoyable, Flight Control puts you in charge of directing all manners of aircraft into an airport by dragging a path for them with your finger, to safely land at the appropriate position and avoid collisions with all the other aircraft on the screen.

Aircraft range from the large and fast moving jets, to small propellor planes, and slow moving helicopters, each with their own landing strips or pads. You need to be able to keep track of up to 15 or more aircraft at the one time, ensuring they all get to their destination safely. There's stats on your records, and medals to unlock based on your scores.

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I'll be posting a part 2 in the next couple of days, but I look forward to some other contributions to the thread.
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[G3ck0]

Underworlds: A Diablo 2 type game. Pretty fun and the developer keeps adding more stuff. It IS pretty short (around 3 hours I think) but you can replay to get better gear and on higher difficulties.



Car Jack Streets: A pretty good iPod Touch sandbox game, the developer just added tanks and helicopters. You have to pay back $5000 every week or you lose (you get 3 chances now), while you are playing you will keep getting random missions to do to get money. And it is on sale for $1.20 now! A great price for a huge game. And all of it's music is from unsigned artists.



Doodle Jump: A game where you have to get up as high as possible, quite a polished and fun game. It is addictive trying to get higher every time, a great game if you like high score based games.



Pocket God: A game about killing Pygmies on an island, I am a beta tester for it and every week they add new ways to kill them, it's quite fun to waste time on. There are tidal waves, volcanoes, tornadoes, dinosaurs, lightning etc, and even an online chat room to chat to other Pocket God players.



There are heaps more I could say, but I will end it here.

EDIT:

And for fans of music games there are 2 games to get.

Tap Tap Revenge: There is Tap Tap revenge 2 which is free and has heaps of songs to download, and games like Tap Tap Coldplay which you can export the songs to Tap Tap 2. It has online multiplayer, achievements and 2 players on the same iPod. If you have an iPod Touch or an iPhone there is no reason to not have Tap Tap 2. They also recently updated it and now the graphics and UI look different, better IMO. And some songs have themes which is pretty cool.



Beatrider: A game where you can have up to 20 songs uploaded and use them in game, or one song in the trial. It has 6 difficulties and is pretty hard even on very easy. This is a lot different to Tap Tap but still quite a lot of fun. I recommend downloading the trial, you can play the 5 songs that come with the game (though you have to download 3 or 4 I think), and can have one uploaded at time. You need wifi on your iPod Touch to play the songs you uploaded.

[ZeroX03]

Oh man, now I REALLY want to get a iTouch.
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b+2,1 mindgames

[adam_91vn]

One word = PEGGLE
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[El Taco]

Payback is a really good sandbox/GTA Ipod Touch app.


There's a Lite version.
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R.I.P Tanya

[grim-one]

I agree. Peggle and Bejeweled 2 are bargains at around $4 on the iPhone/Touch.

The eBay and Skype apps are also great
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[Bronze]

I just took a few screenshots of my favourite apps. You can do this by pressing the Home and Sleep buttons simultaneously.



Crystal Defenders

The first version of this game was total arse. It controlled terribly and as such, wasn't fun to play. Square Enix went back and totally overhauled the interface, and whaddaya know? There was an incredibly fun and addictive game in there.




Super Monkey Ball

It's as mercilessly difficult as the GCN versions, and uses only the tilt sensors in the iPhone for control. The game has 100 levels, plus five bonus levels for those who can collect all of the bananas in a level. It takes a while to adjust to the tilt sensitivity, but if you persist, you'll find an enjoyably frustrating experience.




SimCity

What can I say? It's an almost perfect port of SimCity 3000, minus the neighbouring regions. It controls fantastically, and despite some lengthy initial loading times, it performs really well on the iPhone.




Bloom

Okay, so screenshots won't do this justice. It's a music generator. Think along the lines of Electroplankton's 'Sun Animalcule' stage , and you're close to understanding what's going on here. The soundscape was engineered with the help of ambient music pioneer Brian Eno, and it sounds wonderful.






Kotoba

My most used app on the iPhone. It's a free dictionary based on Jim Breen's wwwjdict. It has a comprehensive collection of words and phrases, and has stroke order diagrams and readings for most of the kanji contained within. I use it for study, and also use it in everyday situations where I would otherwise be lost for words. I'd consider it absolutely essential for people learning Japanese.

That's about it.
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[Zhou]

Good topic Alex, with soooo many apps and games out already, and still coming, this could make for a really good thread to sort the cream from the crop.

My suggestions:

Peggle

Uno

Pocket Tanks

Galcon

Zombieville

Katamari
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[grim-one]

Oh and if anyone wants to try Rockstars Live, join my band for some benefits. My band code is R3NUMS, enter that on the recruit tab. It's a time based, battle game.
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[Adam]

Here are some games that are surprisingly good, as in, "I can't believe this game actually works on an iPhone and I'm actually having fun playing it."

Terminator Salvation



This one has some nice graphics. Graphics that are probably better than some DS games out there. And guess what? It moves at a decent clip and the controls actually work. Left thumb controls the 'analogue stick' while the right thumb can be used anywhere on the screen for aiming, and hitting the fire button in the bottom right. It works. The game itself is average action fare, but it's enjoyable enough for short bursts. John Connor looks nothing like Christian Bale. Maybe that's a good thing.

Silent Hill: The Escape



Again, an interesting control scheme to this one, that I think works. You aim using the iPhone's tilt sensor, which gives the impression that you are actually using your iPhone as a 'window' into the game, even though your movements aren't exactly replicated 1:1. You strafe with your thumb on the touch screen and fire by either tapping the touchscreen, or tapping the back of the device. The game itself is a very basic 'navigate a maze, find a key' affair, while you kill Silent Hill-ish monsters along the way. But, surprisingly it can be quite scary at times, mostly due to the Pyramid Head-clone 'Butcher' who prowls the labyrinths later in the game.

Myst



A match made in heaven, the touch screen is perfect for the style of gameplay, the game looks great thanks to an increased resolution (although the videos are still a little grainy), you have four save slots and an auto-save slot. Plus the game is still a great puzzler. Marks against it are the massive file size, and the fact that many of the game's puzzles require you to take notes, which there is no in-game facility for (so an notepad is required presumably).[/img]
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[mclinton92]

yeah some of the apps these days are amazing, im still yet to get an iphone

i was playing my mates the other day and it was a skateboarding one, sort of like a tech deck and for the simplicity its such an amazing game!
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[G3ck0]

The bad thing about Myst is that it is 727 megs, so if it ever gets updated you have to download the whole thing again.

[Buttmouth]

My friend has an app which emulates a Tenori-On, which is an instrument all the cool bands are using.

I spent about 3 hours playing with his iPhone on that App. So if you get addicted to making little musical patterns I recommend it.

Unfortunately I can't remember the name of it... "Music Box" or something.
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[mclinton92]

[rushinoca]

Spanc edit: Please don't advertise on PALGN.

[arbok]

I didnt want to start a new topic - but any idea if the iPhone can be or will be able to be purchased outright in the future... i think its really stupid of Apple to tie this to a plan... surely more people would buy an iphone if it wasn't!!

Right now I have a Nokia n81 - a useless pain in the bum... but its still a great phone... just not a very good gaming phone ($15 games!! yikes!). I'm on a $10 TPG plan (discounted from $20) and I get $300 worth of calls - why would I want to move?

But I am desperate to play some of these iphone games!! But I dont want to spend the money on a touch or carry a touch and a phone on me at the same time! Dilemmas Dilemmas!!

So any word on an iphone outright or do i have to go through ebay - i really don't like ebay!
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[Zhou]

Just buy one and get it "unlocked." The reason why they're tied to plans is the plans made for them usually have data allowances bundled in.
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[Jellyfish]

You're looking at $700-800 + $160 unlocking fee from Optus.

[arbok]

[B3NBO]

Yep the touch is your next best bet. I had a touch and it's a great device too. But the advantage of the iPhone is internet on the go and you have everything in one neat device.

The $49 cap deal which Optus had where you get the 8gb for free was great. Quite a few people from my school took that deal up.

[G3ck0]

[mattstep]

Grabbed Stanza today. Pretty awesome. So many free books to read...
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ALL THINGS PILKINGTON

[Zhou]

^ Does that allow you to read .pdf files of your own? If not, can anyone suggest a good pdf reader with a nice interface?

As for recommended games:

Towerbloxx. Plays exactly like the version I used to have on my nokia 6300, but at a higher res and touch screen interface. Bliss.

Also should mention Flight control (as mentioned in A1ex's first post) recently got some new updates. new maps and planes. Good stuff.
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[A13x]

Yep Zhou, Stanza can download your computer pdf files, or any ebook format for that matter from Stanza Desktop.

All you need is to open the PDF in stanza desktop, enable sharing, and go to the shared ebooks category on your ipod/iphone to download it over.
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[Masauron]

I wouldn't bother with PDF files and Stanza, the way it converts it mucks up all the line/paragraph breaks which makes stuff pretty hard to read.
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