iPhone Gaming

It's silly for me to even pretend that I'm not a big fan of my iPhone, every day it continues to improve and surprise me in what I can do with it, with the announcement of the iPhone OS 3.0 which will arrive this summer it will only get better. However what has surprised me more than anything is just how good of a game system the iPhone has become.

I'm a gamer, I've been for as long as I can remember, these days though I'm more of a casual gamer due to the current complexity of some games and the fact that I just don't have as much time (in a sense I've become my father). The iPhone has become the perfect place to play

When I first started using the iPhone I thought I wouldn't be loading it up with games. The first choice of games were ones I figured I'd have as "staples" maybe one to show off (Crash Kart Racing), one to try out the accelerometor (dizzy bee) and of course a card game (Solebon Solitare). Games like Crash Kart and Dizzy Bee showed much promise but it was more an exception than a rule, even games like Super Monkey Ball were good but not great. Eventually I played the free version of Solitaire enough that I finally ponied up and got the full version. One thing I never wanted to do and still hold true is that I don't fill up the phone with trial and free versions of games, its nice to grab one to try out but then I either buy or delete.

That was nice early on, but the more I browsed the iTunes app store the more I veered towards the game section, more and more. What I started to find however surprised me more than I thought it would.

The first games I came across were the free i games, iBowl, iGolf, iBaseball etc. These games were like the Wii Sports of the iPhone, although the only one that resides on the phone currently is iBowl (which I love, but still that 300 game evades me). Other casual games started making thier way to my phone such as Wurdle, Tic Tac Free, and Bejeweled. The first really big game I bought after Crash Kart however was Spore Origins. Spore Origins was pretty simple and enjoyable, yet I remain stuck on the last level!

While the holidays brought great games to my iPhone like Tiki Towers, Virtual Pool and Crazy Tanks lately some really big games have made thier way to my iPhone. These are the games that are really started to set the iPhone into motion as a serious gaming device.

First and foremost Tap Tap Revenge 2 is free and its ALOT better than Tap Tap Revenge, I love having a Guitar Heroish type game on the iPhone. Days of Thunder is a great racing game and Aqua Moto Racing is one of the best if not the best jet ski racing game on the app store (okay it may be the only jet ski racing game on the app store). The thing that sets a game like Aqua Moto Racing apart is the level of polish! Talking about polish Let's Golf is absolutely amazing. I am a big Hot Shots Golf type golf game fan and Let's Golf is perfect, even at version one its amazing. Other games do thing that even the PSP can't do, iDracula uses dual sticks to move and shoot, a recent update to the game added more levels etc and it is literally a blast to play. Recently I picked up Metal Gear Solid Touch, while respectively its priced a bit high and you do pay for the Metal Gear name its a great "duck hunt" like shooter and shows that developers are taking this device very seriously.

I even have a plateformer series on the iPhone with the Toy Bot series, I managed to get all 3 for $3 (just .99 each on sale). If your a fan of Skeeball and shooting baskets at the arcade then both ArcadeBowl and ArcadeHoops should be on your list. One of the coolest apps is Aqua Baller, play it and you'll be pleasently surprised and taken back if your say over 30.

This is just the beginning, there are two big games on my watch list Real Racing and Galaxy on Fire are set to push the limits of what anyone thought possible on the iPhone. I simply can't wait!

One caveat in buying games is that generally for me I cap at $7, I have bought a handful of $10 apps yet its not the price that bugs me its the up and down "stock market" pricing of apps that does annoy me. If you browse everyday you can get some pretty good deals on games.

While maybe gaming on the iPhone will not leave you much time to talk its certainly become something I can't do without. The iPhone has already been a much better portable gaming device for me than the DS and PSP ever have.

Now if you'll excuse me I have some gaming to do.

The Canon PowerShot and the Kindle App

I havn't blogged in a while but two recent tech things need to be blogged about, my new Canon PowerShot SD1100 IS, and the new Kindle iPhone application.

Although I have my main, big camera my Nikon D40 with all its photo taking power and multiple lenses I had a feeling that I needed something a bit more compact to have with me. Sure I have my iPhone and its great that it has a camera, but lets face it, its not a great camera. So I pretty much just checked Flickr to see what the best point and shoot camera was and low and behold the Canon PowerShot SD1100 IS was shooting up the charts, and lucky for me Best Buy had it on sale.

I took it for a test drive today and I'm liking it already. First of all I was glad to see it came with a lithium battery and I wasn't going to have to deal with batteries! Next up it was actually able to snap some of those moment shots and not the moments after the actual moment shots. The area I was most surprised with was the video capabilities, I was able to take some video with the camera and guess what not only does it capture audio but the video and audio came out pretty good. As a bonus the video is in AVI format so it'll transfer to Mac and PC alike, it won't stream to the 360 without some help being converted to WMV at least though there was a codec issue.

The next test is taking it on our trip this week, I really can't have the big Nikon with me and it may actually allow me to keep the video camera at home as well. So far its been a great camera and a great compliment to the D40.

Next up is the iPhone Kindle app. My biggest issue with the Kindle is the price, its way too expensive. I am pretty impressed and surprised that Amazon released the app for the iPhone and its free. Sure it doesn't have all the features the Kindle has and you can't order books directly from the app but its not bad to have to go to the Amazon web site and send the book to the iPhone. Although I'm guessing its MUCH easier on the eyes to use the Kindle than the iPhone for me right now I have an iPhone and a pretty good eBook reader! At this point I sent some sample books to the app to try it out, see how it goes. All in all after knocking the Kindle so much I'm glad Amazon gave me a free one!

Both of these little reviews are a bit early in both product lifecycles but I'm pretty confident that both will be used in the future, the camera probably ALOT more! Time will tell, for now its time to enjoy.