The iFriday Roundup, No. 40

Friday Freebies

One of the things we love to see at iFanzine is the resurrection of long-lost game designs. That’s why it’s worth checking out Hope’s Quest, available for free on iDevices large and small: it recalls the style of an obscure PlayStation classic called Intelligent Qube.

Our latest interview this week touched on the subject of “gamification.” We might have found a good example of that in The Dictator: Wadiyan Games, a free tie-in to the upcoming Sacha Baron Cohen flick.

And here are some freebies that score high on the style-o-meter: the Lite version of Gravity Maze, Raccoon Rising, Cannon Cat, and Smash Cops.

Sales Roundup

SEGA’s card game/Tower Defense mashup Samurai Bloodshow has been a huge hit by any measure, and now you can snatch it up for one-fifth the price at $0.99!

Also going for $0.99 is Anomaly: Warzone Earth (Our Review), which you totally need to grab if you’re a strategy fan of any stripe. Owners of the New iPad will want to opt for the super-high-res HD version, on sale at $1.99.

Finally, Galaxy on Fire 2 HD (Our Non-HD Review) is half off at $4.99 this weekend.

CAVE to Throw Golden Week Party

If you didn’t win Bug Princess 2 in our giveaway a few weeks back, keep an eye on it and all of CAVE’s other titles starting tomorrow — we hear their iOS lineup will be discounted in honor of Japan’s Golden Week, which runs April 28 to May 6.

Bag It! Update in the Works

Hidden Variable Studios were in touch this week to let us know their critically acclaimed grocery puzzler Bag It! will be receiving 16 new levels, three additional endless modes, and a new exploding(!) grocery item to handle on May 18. Even though it’s still a few weeks off, it’s never too early to throw a sale, so Hidden Variable have made the HD version two-thirds off for a while. Also check out the Lite if you haven’t picked up this indie gem yet.

SHADOWGUN Gets HD-ified

Quick on the draw as always, MADFINGER Games dropped in this week to let us know their masterpiece third-person shooter (Our Review) just got extra glossy for the New iPad. “Even supporting Native 2048×1536 iPad resolution and 4x MSAA, the updated game version is running perfectly smoothly,” and the update also fixes some technical issues on the iPod Touch and iPad.

Ask Me (to Draw, and Put Music to) Anything

Jeff Matsuda, co-founder of Massive Joe Studios and Creative Director of The Batman cartoon, is doing an AMA at reddit today to help promote the release of Escape From Age of Monsters. This isn’t just any AMA — he’s drawing whatever redditors ask him to and getting The Binges, a heavy metal band, to blast tunes for the drawings. Here’s a video of The Binges with the reddit alien recast as a superhero. Um, wow?

Hero Mages Returns to its Roots

When we interviewed D20Studios lead Ross Przybylski, he told us that the online multiplayer TBS (Our Review) was originally intended to be a tabletop board game. He got back in touch with us this week to let us know it’s finally happening! Game Salute just announced that they’ll be doing the publishing honors.

Rodeo Games Release Hunters 2 Sales Breakdown

Rodeo Games made the rounds this week with a breakdown of Hunters 2’s performance during its first month on the App Store. Some fun facts: it took three weeks for Hunters 2 to recoup its production budget, TBS fans have collectively spent forty-five years glued to the game, and the number of in-game enemies wiped out is greater than the populations of some countries.

Killer Trailers Hit YouTube

If the Amiga was your favorite system growing up, you’d better sit down for this one: Microïds and Anuman Interactive are reviving Infogrames’ classic strategy/action mashup North & South on May 10! Find out what the remake – Blue Coats: North vs. South – will look like as the first video in this week’s gallery, and we hope to bring you an interview with the devs soon. Check out the Microïds Facebook page in the meantime!

Also back in action are Infinite Dreams, developers of the hit Tower Defense game Jelly Defense. Their next title will be the zany shoot ’em up Shoot the Zombirds, and you can find a teaser trailer as the second video in this week’s gallery below.


Are you an iOS videogame developer or publisher with a cool update, video, or other news that you want to get out to the masses? iFanzine probably has an eye on you already, but don’t hesitate to get in touch via our Twitter feed or Contact page. We want to fill our iFriday Roundups with all your beautiful stuff!