Monday, September 8, 2008

Touchgrind - First Multi-touch Skate Game For iPhone

Swedish game developer, Illusion Labs created world’s first a multi-touch skate game for the iPhone. The game is known as Touchgrind and will be available on the App Store this October.

The new game is very different from all the other skating games as it is played only by a specific finger gestures that are swiped in a similar manner as that of legs and feet on a real skateboard.

The player rides freely in a skatepark and performs tricks on ramps, boxes and rails.

Apart from the natural controls, Illusion Labs has developed an online level editor open to the community to create and publish their own skateparks.

Illusion Labs was founded in autumn 2007 and is located in Malmö, Sweden.

Illusion Labs focuses on two areas; Game 2.0 apps such as Labyrinth and Touchgrind and branded apps for select advertisers such as the iPint which was awarded a Cannes Silver Lion in 2008.

References:
http://www.illusionlabs.se/index.html

http://prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=ind_focus.story&STORY=/www/story/09
-08-2008/0004880901&EDATE=MON+Sep+08+2008,+01:12+PM

Saturday, September 6, 2008

iPhone Gets EA's Spore Origins

EA Mobile has just announced a raft of games for the iPod touch and the iPhone. The EA announcement Friday focused on the release of Spore Origins for the Apple mobile market.

It's not the full-blown evolutionary strategy game you'll find on the PC and Mac, but EA's Spore Origins gives iPhone users a taste of "survival of the fittest" by incorporating two modes of play in the mobile version. In evolution mode, players create, edit, tweak and customize their creatures and explore strange worlds. In survival mode, players are prey and predator, advancing through 35 levels of eat-or-be-eaten action.

According to EA Mobile, the game incorporates the motion-sensing capabilities of the iPhone, so gamers can navigate creatures by tilting and moving the handset. In a statement released by the company, Travis Boatman, vice president of worldwide studios at EA Mobile, said, "We're really excited to bring Spore Origins to the iPhone and iPod touch. By leveraging the unique capabilities of these devices, players can customize their own creatures and shape their destiny in an exciting evolutionary journey."

In contrast, EA's full-blown Spore allows for nearly total customization of the worlds and creatures that inhabit them, providing ample opportunity to tweak environment and evolutionary features. Supposedly there are millions of worlds to explore and populate.

While the mobile version certainly can't contain all the features of the full version of Spore, EA is hoping it can dominate nearly every game platform with versions of Spore. In addition to Apple's iPhone and iPod touch, Spore Origins is available for the PC, Mac and Nintendo DS, with versions for other platforms no doubt in the works.

Also check out here.

Reference:

http://investor.ea.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=88189&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1194127&highlight=

Friday, September 5, 2008

iPhone Sales In Eastern Europe Are Quite Low

T-Mobile and Vodafone the Eastern European carriers for the Czech Republic have sold only about 5,000 iPhone 3G each since its launch on August 22. So the sales figures are not that positive.

O2 is also a Czech Republic carrier, but its sales info was not available at the moment.

Despite that small number, the iPhone 3G is still selling well in other parts of the world, particularly in the U.S, the U.K. and in Germany.

References:
http://www.moconews.net/entry/419-iphone-sales-in-eatern-europe-not-so-good/