Super Shock Football is a throwback to the old electric football tabletop games from Steamroller Studios and Chillingo.

Super Shock Football is a pretty strange game. Being based off of the table-top electric football games that originated in 1947 and reached the height of their popularity in the 50’s and 60’s it can be assumed that a large percentage of people with iPhones and iPod touches have never actually played the game.  The premise is simple enough, arrange your little players in formations (which have very little impact on the outcome of each play) and then press a button that makes the field start vibrating and moves your players in whatever direction possible, passing the ball when you feel it’s necessary.

Overall the game plays very well.  The controls felt very precise and other than the occasional bout of lag they were very responsive.  My only real major gripe with the gameplay is with the whole vibrating football mechanic.  When I say that your players will run anywhere I really mean ANYWHERE.  More often than not the majority of your team will immediately head for the sides and get stuck on the stadium walls, leaving the game to actually be played by 3 or 4 players that are spinning in circles.  This can start to get really frustrating, especially when it seems to only affect your team while your opponent’s players all rush straight to the end-zone.  Oftentimes you feel more like you’re watching a little league game where half the players stand around eating grass and chatting than any sort of real football.  I understand that the hectic movement is a central part of the classic table-top game, but it begs the question that if your core game mechanic is immensely frustrating then what is it doing in a game.

You'll see this pretty often

The way to counter your team’s erratic movements is by passing the ball to any player that seems to be heading in the right direction.  Thankfully Super Shock Football features a terrific passing mechanic that is really where the game’s fun comes from.  The longer the pass you try to make, the smaller the target you have to hit.  Add in the fact that you need to compensate for the receiver’s movement and you have something that’s both very quick to master and feels super satisfying when you can pull off a really long throw and have a player catch it in the end-zone.  I found myself forgiving most of the flaws brought on by the vibrating table mechanic since not having to control the players means that you can focus entirely on perfecting every throw.

True to its predecessor’s origins, Super Shock Football has a distinctly 50’s exaggerated cartoon graphics style.  The character models look great and have a surprising amount of detail when the camera zooms in, and the stadium itself looks terrific.  You can use the tilt controls to adjust the camera angle and multi-touch to zoom in, which I often ended up using just to have a nicer view while players ran.  The menus themselves all look pretty good with the same authentic retro style of the rest of the game.  Normally I would criticize a game for not having any music while you play but here I found that the lack of noise during game time really helped with the whole classic football vibe.  While you play you’ll only hear the occasional sound of the ball being caught or the ref’s whistle blowing, the audience cheer as you near the end-zone and a chorus of marching band music when you score. It’s small touches like these that really make the game’s atmosphere more immersive.

Wee! Camera angles!

There are three different difficulties to play on as well as a local multiplayer mode included.  After only a few games I felt comfortable playing on the hardest difficulty since so much of the game relies on luck.  Also included is support for OpenFeint’s superb social network and achievements system that is becoming more and more standard among some of the app store’s best games.  Overall, Super Shock Football is a pretty fun game.  The randomness of the movement can be pretty frustrating sometimes, but once you begin to look past it and master the passing controls you’ll have a blast with this game.

Score

MustTap Score: Silver Tap

Looks great and gives out some quality stuff!

Bottom Line
The randomness of the movement can be pretty frustrating sometimes, but once you begin to look past it and master the passing controls you'll have a blast with this game.

Screenshots

Mission: Deep Sea is a game for iPhone & iPod touch, where you control a sea turtle to complete various missions, swimming in beautifully shaded 3d underwater world, using multi-touch technology.

The version 1.1 includes:

- Free play is possible, time limited play no longer causes mission failures
- New easy control option – Control by tilt
- Menu selection sound level has been corrected

We may be getting a promo code for it, so definitely be on the look out for a review from us in the coming weeks.

Jules Verne’s Return to Mystery Island is a point-and-click adventure game developed by Microids and published by Chillingo.

The Game

Return to Facepalm Island

You wake up face down on the beach, sand in your nostrils and the taste of sea water in your mouth. Wait a minute, this isn’t Gilligan’s Island. Of course not, you’re smack dab in the middle of Jules Verne’s Return to Mystery Island for the iPhone/iPod Touch, and you are taking control of Mina, a sailor who finds herself stranded on an island somewhere, and she is hungry. Really. You start the game off by scrounging up materials you find on the beach so you can regain the strength to move some logs that are blocking your path into another area. To do so, you have to gather up the materials to make a fire, some food, and a strong stomach because all you can really find are some assorted seafood and a dead porcupine.

I know, I’ve made the game sound utterly thrilling, but there is a certain level of depth evident in Return to Mystery Island. You will find so many items that it just becomes an encumbrance to be holding them all, but many of them do combine with one another or interact with the environment in some way. For example, in the beginning of the game, you find a metal plaque. Must have been some useless award that was given out, because clearly you don’t care what it was used for, as you combine it with a rock and sharpen it into a knife. You can then take this knife and cut down a vine near the logs blocking your path for some thin rope, or on the grass to get some wheat grain, or on those monkeys throwing rocks at you for a free meal. Okay, I was just joking on the last one, please don’t send PETA after me.

Oh great, I’ve got crabs.

One of my real gripes about Return to Mystery Island is the inventory. Sure, you have multiple pages of inventory space available to you, but if you need to combine items on separate pages together, you’re going to have to place it into your hand slot, scroll over to the desired page, and drop it onto the item. Fortunately, they have a combo bar above the items themselves, making it so you only have to fumble with the pages once!

Graphics

Return to Mystery Island has wonderful graphics that are beautifully rendered on the iPhone. On my iPhone 3GS, looking around in this wonderful scenery was smooth as butter and I could not complain. The environments are very lush, colourful, and the animations are all very smooth. The graphics are the strongest aspect of Return to Mystery Island and they definitely do not disappoint. There are also some drawn portions of the game, such as story cut-scenes or when you combine two items successfully, which are great additions.

Sound

Sideshow Bob would be proud.

The musical sound track of Return to Mystery Island is wonderful – a subtly oriental feeling about it that fits the environment perfectly. If I were to complain about anything at all, it is that it loops quite a bit, and after a long session of trying to wrack your brain on what to do next, it can get annoying. The sound effects are great, delivering a very crisp and distinct sound.

Conclusion

Jules Verne’s Return to Mystery Island is a wonderful point-and-click adventure game that has wonderful graphics, great sound, and deep and challenging gameplay that will keep you playing for hours. Fans of the genre and fans of Jules Verne novels should definitely check it out.

Score

MustTap Score: Silver Tap

Looks great and gives out some quality stuff!

Bottom Line
Jules Verne’s Return to Mystery Island is a very faithful and well done adaptation of the game onto the iPhone and iPod Touch, very nifty little point-and-click adventure game that sports beautiful graphics and music. A thinker, a challenge, and if you’re into these games or a fan of the series, you should consider buying it.

Screenshots

Minigore is a run-and-gun action game developed by Mountain Sheep and published by Chillingo.

The Game

The pads.

Minigore is a run and gun game. You play as John Gore, and all you do is run, gun, and pickup the occasional power up. On the bottom left of the screen is the movement touch pad, and on the bottom right is the shoot touch pad. The problem that I ran into is that you cannot see most of the bottom of the screen. This equates into getting killed many times by unseen enemies. So, you run around, dodging and shooting little monsters. Then you start shooting bigger monsters that split up into the little monsters. This is the gameplay of Minigore. You kill stuff that splits up into small stuff that you kill that splits up into smaller stuff. If you get hit, you lose your clothes for a different set of clothes, like Maximo, and gain a short speed boost. Any damage after that will kill you.

Flowers!

While you are blowing away the creatures, you can find little flower things left behind. When you pick three up, you transform into a flaming bull. In this form, you run around and destroy everything you touch. Be aware that this is timed occurrence, so make sure you are out of harm’s way when it ends. The other power up is the shotgun, which has limited ammo but spreads to hit multiple enemies at once. If you shoot at a power up box, it will explode, firing bullets in a 360 degree radius around the box. To be honest, the weapon power-ups suck, is it too much to ask to have more than two weapons in a game? The sole point of the game is to get a high score; no story, no other levels, nothing. Just get a high score and try to get up on the leaderboards.

Graphics

Bulls on parade.

Minigore does look good. The little, block headed John Gore looks great, and the environment, while not too diverse, also looks good. The monsters on the other hand could use work. They are not too detailed and are quite simple.

Sound

Minigore does offer good sound effects. John makes a few quirky comments, the gun sounds great, and the monsters make little “poof” sounds when then die. The music does get old fast, but most people that play it for a long time will probably listen to their own music.

Additional Comments

Minigore gets old fast. If you are not one of those people who will die in an attempt to be number one on the leaderboards, you will probably only briefly play Minigore. A mystery for myself is the loading screen: it shows other characters, which are nowhere to be seen. Hopefully with future updates the game will be vastly improved.

Conclusion

Minigore will not last more than one sitting for some people when they realize that they saw everything in the first few minutes. It had the potential to be a very good shooter, but it fell flat on its face. If you like getting high scores, this will be your cup of tea. If not, there are better and worse places to spend your game time at, but Minigore is worth at least checking out.

Score

MustTap Score: Silver Tap

Looks great and gives out some quality stuff!

Bottom Line
High score or bust! Minigore is about achieving the high score. For those who want to improve their skill and get a ridiculously high score, Minigore will be a great experience. On the other hand, people that want different settings and a story will be disappointed. That being said, it is worth trying.

Screenshots

Knights Onrush is a defend your castle type game developed by MoreGames Entertainment and published by Chillingo.

The Game

Knights Onrush is one of the most polished games with the defend your castle theme, where hordes of enemies rush to attack your castle, break down the doors, and probably smack you around a little. You, as the defender of the castle, are tasked with the job of fighting these guys off and making sure that your door survives to take a beating another day. There are a variety of methods at your disposal to get rid of the baddies, but most of your killing will involve grabbing one of them by tapping and holding onto the screen, and making a flicking motion upward as to keep your hands clean and blame gravity for their death. Another, more funny method is to once again, lift them off the ground and just smash them right down, which is more effective for the stronger enemies because they do have more health and will survive a fall.

To help in the senseless massacre of your enemies, you will also be able to upgrade your door and purchase weapons which you can mount in your fortress of doom. You can purchase a boulder, which is a massive rock that you just drop on enemies to turn them into pancakes, columns, which can repeatedly slam into the ground and kill everything it hits, fireballs, which explode upon contact with the ground, crossbows, which spears everything it hits, and cannons, which causes a massive explosion. Together, the upgrades and weapons will get you out of binds and jams, simply because of their sheer stopping or killing power.

Knights Onrush has three different modes: Campaign, Endless Siege, and Madness. Campaign essentially walks you through and lets you familiarize yourself with the different weapons at your disposal and the huge variety of enemies that you will encounter. Trust us when we say it, there is quite the variety of enemies that will come banging at your door. Endless Siege is essentially short levels where you survive as long as possible, against an unlimited number of enemies. Madness steps it up a notch and throws a relentless wave of enemies at you every day, but gives you a bit of a life saver with a stronger door than you would have started out with otherwise.

Killing an enemy in Knights Onrush will give you gold, which allows you to purchase all these wonderful upgrades and weapons. In addition, there are sacrifices, which you can gain from well… sacrificing enemy units. You purchase the sacrificial pit or the dragon altar, and just drag and drop an enemy there and let it do its job. Sacrifices allow you to purchase the higher end weapons, which you will definitely want for when the situations get REALLY sticky.

Graphics

The art behind Knights Onrush is top notch, very detailed and has a great cartoony style that is perfect for the game. The sprites are smoothly animated and even die very smoothly. Sometimes I do run into some weird graphical glitches such as enemies being stuck in mid air, or stuck in my castle, but all you really have to do is tap and drag them around and they should be good to go. Check out the screenshots to get a better idea of the art.

Sound

Knights Onrush has a typical medieval fanfare soundtrack, which is fitting for the game. Sound effects are quite crisp and clear, and as a whole, the sound of Knights Onrush is more than adequate for the game.

Additional Comments

If there were one major complaint I could make about Knights Onrush, it is that because of the way the armies rush onto the screen with multiple layers, it really makes it hard to be precise with your grabs. For example, when knights and explosive barrel throwers and catapults rush the screen at the same time, I generally want to grab the catapults and throw them at the barrel throwers which will cause a massive chain reaction killing everything around it. Now the problem rears its ugly head when the knights are in the front layers and the catapults and explosive barrel throwers are in the back layers, and I will end up grabbing a knight and throwing it into the ground and have my door pummeled by boulders and explosive barrels. Just a little annoyance that is trivial.

Conclusion

Knights Onrush is one of those games that will keep you playing regardless of the fact that it is the same thing every round, it is addictive and the multitude of methods of killing will just keep you coming back for more and trying to attain higher scores for the leaderboards. Definitely one of those games you have to own.

Score

MustTap Score: Silver Tap

Looks great and gives out some quality stuff!

Bottom Line
If you are a fan of defend your castle type games, Knights Onrush is definitely the most polished and robust of them all, with several different game types and an online leaderboard to keep things competitive. Definitely have to buy it!

Screenshots

Defender Chronicles is a game from Gimka and Menara Games, published by Chillingo. It was one of those titles I had picked up on a whim based on a random suggestion (and a weekend sale!) that I just fell in love with. I apologize in advance for any sort of gushing that I do during this review.

The Game

Defender Chronicles puts a completely different spin on tower defense games: you build guilds instead of towers, you are viewing from the side instead of a top-down view, and you have a hero who can gain experience and levels and be outfitted with gear. Guilds are essentially buildings that recruit units who stand outside and beat the crap out of anything that walks in front of it, which makes me wonder if these are actually just bars.

Guilds come in four distinct flavours, Warrior guilds, Archery guilds, Mage guilds, and Thieves guilds. Warriors are your run-of-the-mill action heroes, they are suited up in full plate armour and they carry a big stick, a big, sharp stick. Archers are weaker in attack compared to Warriors, but they attack three times as fast, so they are much better suited for attacking faster but weaker creatures, as well as flying creatures which neither Warriors, Thieves, or your hero can attack. Mages have a stronger ranged attack in comparison to Archers but at a reduced rate, but they also prioritize their attacks for the stronger enemies, which is perfect when paired up with Archers, who will attack the weaker enemies. Last but not least, Thieves are essentially mini-Warriors (Literally, they’re Hobbits.) who will block and slow down enemies, and net you an extra gold for every kill they make. In addition, they will poison whoever they slash, but they will not attack anything that they deem strong, wusses. In addition, Warriors can be upgraded to Beserkers and Archers can be upgraded to Rangers, both are much stronger versions of their predecessors.

You’re going to need all four of these guild types in Defender Chronicles, because the enemies are vast in number, both variety and volume. You will be attacked by legions of orcs and gnolls, and little creatures whom I have never even seen before, and it is your job to stop them all. Should you fail, your last line of defense is you, your valiant hero standing at the gates of the city, who can level up and have his stats increased, and have a weapon and armour fitted onto him. Of course, if the creature is quite a bit stronger than usual creatures, like a boss, your hero will get flattened like a bug, so try to make sure nothing reaches him but outliers and stragglers.

There are six levels which all have different environments, enemy variants, and different strategies. In addition, there is a shop to buy items, a library to buy research, and an elf hut to also buy research. The game itself is still being updated with new maps, buildings, items, and upgrades while the storyline progresses, so you really do get a good bang for your buck.

Graphics

The graphics themselves may not seem all that impressive initially, but once you take a closer look, you can really see all of the detail behind the sprites, levels, and other art. You can see the little serrations in the sword of the orcs, the straps of leather across their armour, the lighting of the environments, and the detail in all of the art in the game. Graphics don’t normally impress me, but Defender Chronicles has a really well polished look that gives the game a complete feeling and really adds to the fantasy aspects of the game.

Sound

Defender Chronicles has a fantastic soundtrack that gives the game that sort of “epic” feeling that you really need when dealing with hordes of evil minions. The sound effects are distinct, they are clear, and they actually sound like what they are supposed to sound like. A great addition to the game was the ability to play the songs you have in your iPod, but you can only select songs, and you have no real control over what plays. Unfortunately, the game doesn’t allow for you to have your iPod playing in the background either.

Defender Chronicles was also the first game I have ever played on the iPhone with full voice acting for the stories. The gentleman who acts as your advisor will speak to you before every battle, and all of your units will shout out battle cries. It’s a very nice touch, that you can thankfully turn off should you ever get annoyed of it. The ability to turn it off is a fantastic option because the voice acting was actually kind of cringe-inducing at times, which may be one of the few drawbacks of this game.

Additional Comments

The game has plenty of extras to speak of. The Custom Game feature adds to the replayability of the game, where you can play four extra modes: Freestyle (Random), Extended, Classic, Classic Extended. Each of the four modes is unique in its own way and will give you another reason to play through the levels again. In addition, you can go ahead and send an e-mail full of smack talk to a friend or colleague challenging them to an artifact hunt in the game. Personally, I’ve gone ahead and challenged everyone I know without an iPhone or iPod Touch, because I know I’d win that match.

Conclusion

Defender Chronicles is a game that is huge in scope and depth, which gives tower defense a unique twist that will keep your eyes glued to that tiny screen for hours upon hours. You’d better buy this game, or you’re going to miss out.

Score

MustTap Score: Golden Tap

The best of the best; everything about this is perfect.

Bottom Line
A frighteningly addictive game that will have you missing meals and skipping appointments to play, a creative twist on tower defense that is a definite must have for any iPhone.

Screenshots