With only one more day before Thanksgiving, get into the spirit with Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, the official app of the New York City parade, with lots of information about both the parade and New York, so you can see it in person. After that, you can get ready for the day after Thanksgiving with SaleLocator, an app that makes it easy to find the sales you’re looking for on Black Friday. Arcade shooter Major Mayhem leads our games selection today, pitting you as a lone soldier against hordes of ninjas that you’ll have to tap to kill. It’s followed by Infinity Blade-alike Blood & Glory, a gladiator title that scores extra points by being free-to-play.
Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade (iPhone, iPad) Free
For the first time, the Thanksgiving Day Parade has its own official iPhone app. You get everything you might want to know about the parade before and during the event. Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade packs all kinds of information about both the parade and New York City in general. But it’s not just information. The app also let you tie into NYC’s traffic cameras to get the best seats possible for the parade as it happens.
Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade includes a listing of all the participants with floats in the event, the parade route mapped out so you can track it as it moves through New York, information on the parade’s history and a shop where you can buy parade merchandise. You also get handy info about NYC’s subway system, nearby popular coffee shops and restaurants, and more that will help you enjoy the parade in person.
SaleLocator (iPhone, iPad) Free
Black Friday is just two days away: Get a leg up on the competition with the help of SaleLocator, an app that helps you find the best deals in your area using your iOS device’s GPS capabilities. SaleLocator finds the nearest in-store sales and presents them to you in either a list or on a map, and gives you a rundown of just what’s covered by each store so you can plan your attack.
StoreLocator will run down nearby sales by category so you can skip the sales that don’t interest you, and it’ll aggregate especially for holidays, making it handy for events like Black Friday. You can also share sales with your friends using Facebook or Twitter, and bookmark your favorite sales so you can check them out later.
Major Mayhem (iPhone, iPad) $0.99
Taking a page from arcade shooting games in which players take cover from enemy fire, then stand up and shoot back, Major Mayhem puts you in the shoes of a lone soldier tasked with shooting approximately 1 million evil ninjas. The simple touch controls have players tapping at ninjas as quickly as they can to shoot them down, then taking a finger off the screen to allow Major Mayhem to drop back into cover to avoid getting shot.
You’re scored in Major Mayhem by how much mayhem you can cause – the more shots you put in a bad guy, for example, the bigger your combo score. You’ll also shotguns, rifles, grenades and other weapons to turn the tide of war in your favor. The more enemies you blast (and friendlies you save) without taking a hit, the higher the combo you can put together. And Game Center support means you can share your best scores on the game’s online leaderboards.
Blood & Glory (iPhone, iPad) Free
Put ChAIR and Epic Games’ Infinity Blade in the Roman Coliseum and Blood & Glory is what you get. It might be lifting much of its gameplay from the very popular and award-winning sword-fighting title, but Blood & Glory brings its own vibe, with the Roman setting and quite a bit of blood and gore. This one isn’t for children – enemies look like they’re really taking injuries from your sword strikes – but if you’re into a more hardcore style, Blood & Glory is for you.
With its simple and effective touch controls in which you’ll block, parry or dodge enemy attacks before following up with your own, you’ll also need to gather weapons and equipment to better your character and purchase potions to make sure you can save your life when an enemy gets the upper hand.
