This week has been a bit of a strange one for iOS games, with the iTunes App Store lacking in big, involved game releases. That has allowed smaller, more concise game experiences to shine, like iQuarterback 2, in which players try to hit targets with footballs, and Marvel KAPOW!, a game that uses mechanics like swiping at enemies and bouncing their attacks back at them, wrapped in a comic book veneer. And leading the pack today is a game I’ve been waiting for for a while now: Evil Dead, an action game that has players following the course of the cult classic film and killing undead demons along the way. Read about all these, and more, below.
Evil Dead ($0.99)
I’ll admit, this is a bit of a bias choice, but I love Sam Raimi’s film The Evil Dead, and the iOS game gives me a chance to geek-out over the movie a little more than usual. A top-down action-adventure game, Evil Dead lets you play as Ash (cool) and kill Deadites (cooler), the film’s name for demon-possessed people. It’s also gory and has a great huge-head art style, and follows the events of the movie for about 15 levels. After that, it starts an entirely new campaign for another 15 levels, adding in a little variety. You’ll squash plants and monsters with axes and shotguns, among other cool things, but mostly, the bobblehead-like Deadites are just plain cool-looking. Plus it’s only a buck for a limited time.
iQuarterback 2 Pocket Edition ($0.99)
A little like Icebreaker Hockey a couple weeks ago, iQuarterback 2 takes some of the best aspects of football – carefully planned and executed passes – and distills a game down to just that one element, which is kind of perfect for the bite-size consumption iPhone users often enjoy. You’re in training camp in iQuarterback 2, running passing drills with targets in two game modes. One mode has you hitting stationary targets, another requires you to lead moving ones. The more accurate and fast you are, the higher your score, which earns you additional fame. This lets you unlock hats and stadiums and other additional content. It’s fun and challenging, with leaderboard support so you can face off against friends for high scores, and iQuarterback 2 only requires your attention for about two minutes: a perfect mobile title.
Marvel KAPOW! ($0.99)
You get to take on the powers of four different Marvel comic book mutants in Marvel KAPOW!, and in a way that makes the game a bit like playing four different games, at least for a minute or two. Each different power (Wolverine’s claws, Captain America’s shield, Thor’s hammer and Spider-Man’s webs) pertain to a different floating enemy that appears on the screen and tries to accost you. These floating enemies will stop and basically headbutt the glass of your iPhone, doing damage to you unless you use the right power to deal with them. For example, Wolverine’s claws are basically a swiping blade similar to the mechanic of Fruit Ninja. Cap’s shield lets you reflect laser beams from enemies back at them. And so on. KAPOW! is a fun little arcade game that gets interesting when you have to start combining the powers in the same stages, and when you take on the game’s bosses, you’ll have to use all four. It makes things challenging and frantic, which is good, but KAPOW! is always easy to pick up, figure out and have fun playing.
Match Panic ($0.99)
Simplicity is nice. When a game can execute a simple premise with a simple means, it can often be very fun without requiring a lot of work on the part of the player. Match Panic nails simplicity. It has two buttons and one mandate: Match the animals in the middle of the screen with the animals next to each button. Down the center of the screen march several different symbols, like pandas and squids, and next to each button will be a matching symbol. As quickly as you can, you need to hit the left or right button to match the symbols and score points. The faster you go and the fewer mistakes you make, the better your score. Match Panic steps things up by throwing in additional symbols and adding more than one to each button, driving up the challenge while still keeping things beautifully simple. You’ll have some fast-paced fun here, and the barrier for entry is next to nothing.
Rocket Bunnies ($0.99)
A great art style and easy gameplay make Rocket Bunnies fun. It’s one of those games in which you send a character bouncing from one round object to another. In this case, it’s a rabbit in a rocket, looking to feed other space bunnies stranded on little planetoids all over the screen. Orbiting any of those planetoids feeds the bunnies there automatically, so the skill comes in timing jumps from one planet to the other. Having the right timing gives a speed boost, which is good for keeping the time you spend in each level to a minimum, thus maximizing your score. Rocket Bunnies manages to be challenging and fun without needing to be extremely deep, adding challenge by throwing up obstacles in each level to be dodged.
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