Mac|Life - Reviews

Anomaly 2 Review

Joseph Leray — Wed, 22 May 2013 18:50:19 +0000

Like predecessors Anomaly: Warzone Earth and Anomaly Korea, 11 Bit Studios’ Anomaly 2 turns classic tower defense upside down. Instead of fortifying a base with turrets, cannons, and soldiers, Anomaly 2 places you in command of the incoming horde. Armed with a combat suit capable of setting up decoys, detonating EMP pulses, and healing units, you'll be tasked with leading a convoy of tanks, armored mechs, drones, and mobile labs through hostile territory, blasting through metallic alien defenses to clear roads or liberate important objectives.

As the third entry in the series, Anomaly 2 has firm command of the game’s basic conceits: Missions, friendly units, and enemy types are varied and work well together, and the large maps are flexible enough to support multiple play styles. For example, enemy Chargers are vulnerable to missile attacks, and if your squad isn't equipped to handle them, you can call in new units on the fly or avoid the fight altogether by changing the convoy's route.

With new waves of enemies spawning and objectives changing mid-battle, playing Anomaly 2 often feels like putting out multiple fires at once. Quick hands and good timing are often as important as critical thinking and sound tactics, and Anomaly 2 addresses our biggest gripe about its forebears: Lieutenant Simon Lynx has never been easier to control. Getting through Anomaly’s long, arduous missions is satisfying, but suffering a loss – or worse, a game crash – after 20 minutes of chipping away is frustrating, especially since the difficulty ramps up significantly toward the end of the campaign.

Anomaly 2’s story mode is a prelude to its new, intricate multiplayer mode, which pits a convoy (a "Squad") against a player-controlled alien installation (the "Towers"). The defense-oriented aliens play more like traditional tower defense or real-time strategy games, as you must gather resources, create chokepoints, and unlock new towers to succeed. While multiplayer matches can be difficult to find, dedicated players will find a fast-paced affair with the nuances expected from the genre. The campaign mode is great training for Squad players, however the complex Tower mechanics suffer from a lack of tutorials or a single-player component.

The bottom line. Anomaly 2 improves on earlier games in the series and puts enough spin on the tower defense genre to attract new players and veterans alike.

Review Synopsis

Product:

Anomaly 2

Company:

11 Bit Studios

Contact:

http://www.11bitstudios.com

Price:

$14.99

Requirements:

Mac OS X 10.6, 2.8 Ghz processor, 2 GB RAM, 512 MB VRAM

Positives:

On-the-fly tactics keep things fresh and fast-paced throughout. Improved controls. New multiplayer modes push the series forward.

Negatives:

Brutal difficulty spikes and technical issues combine to make some sections frustrating.

Score:

4 Great

Google Hangouts Review

J.R. Bookwalter — Tue, 21 May 2013 18:01:11 +0000

Google+ is a hit-or-miss proposition for many socially connected folks, so the company’s first Hangouts attempt — originally part of the Google+ app — passed by largely unnoticed. Now available as a standalone app, Hangouts appears hell-bent on reinventing the messaging wheel, but winds up leaving too many spokes off to make this a smooth ride.

While the free, universal Hangouts app offers cross-platform support between iOS, Android, Chrome OS, and web browsers, it’s really a baby step toward loftier goals, which will eventually include SMS and Google Voice integration. However, both features are currently MIA. The app offers little for those who’ve remained on the Google+ sidelines, since users will be required to sign up before they can communicate.

For those used to AOL-style instant messaging, Hangouts might feel like touching down on an alien planet. To start a new Hangout, you can select up to 10 Google+ users from the jumbled mess of those in your circles, as well as random folks presumably pulled from your address book. Whether one-on-one or in a group conversation, Hangouts can be used to send photos, message in real time (with optional emoji), or make video calls, where the focus automatically switches to whoever is speaking at a particular moment. This gets pretty amusing when more than one chatty user is on the line at a time.

We successfully initiated several one-on-one video calls, graduating to a four-person Hangout with a mix of a third-gen iPad, two iPhones, and an Android-based Verizon Droid DNA thrown in for good measure. Hangouts completely crashed on us at one point, but relaunching the app and tapping the still-in-progress session got us back in the action without missing a beat. Call us old school, but we miss the traditional IM trappings: There’s no way to see only a list of who’s online, for example, nor can users go offline and leave a status message in their wake. We also weren’t impressed with the picture quality of video calls — it was passable at best, even with a fast Wi-Fi connection.

The bottom line. Hangouts is a nice first step toward unification, but we’re waiting for the promised Google Voice integration before this has the potential to replace our go-to messaging apps.

Review Synopsis

Product:

Hangouts 1.0.1

Company:

Google

Contact:

http://www.google.com

Price:

Free

Requirements:

iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad running iOS 6.1 or later

Positives:

Good companion app for heavy Google+ users. Cross-platform chat between iOS, Android, and web. Native iPad support.

Negatives:

No way to view all online users at once. Requires Google+ account. Video call picture quality passable at best. No SMS or Google Voice integration (yet).

Score:

2.5 Okay

Fast & Furious 6: The Game Review

Nicole Tanner — Tue, 21 May 2013 17:12:07 +0000

The Fast & Furious movie franchise has gathered a cult-like following of fans who enjoy the intense action and tricked-out vehicles, with the sixth entry expected to dominate the box office once more this weekend. Fast & Furious 6: The Game is true to the elements that made the film series such a smash, with beautiful graphics and plenty of extras relating to the films – though the actual racing in this free-to-play affair can get a bit dull and repetitive after a while.

You start the game as an up-and-coming driver who has caught the attention of the major players from the film. They recruit you to perform a number of jobs, which run parallel to the story in the movie. Fast & Furious 6: The Game isn’t traditionally what you might expect for a racing game. Rather than steering the car and controlling acceleration and braking, Fast & Furious 6 is all about simply tapping the screen at the right time. Luckily, the game does a better job at this style of control than others in the genre, like CSR Racing.

There are two types of races in the game: Drag and drift. Drag races require you to launch at the beginning of the race, and then tap multiple times to shift. Drift events, meanwhile, include all of the elements of drag races, but add in a drift mode where you must tap and hold to complete the wild whip around a turn. Your timeliness in executing these commands can earn you some in-game cash, even if you don’t win the race.

And speaking of cash, you will need a lot of it to progress in the game. Buying new cars and upgrading them is a vital component, and even if your timing is perfect, you will almost certainly lose if you’re up against a more powerful opponent. Upgrades can be purchased with the free in-game money or with a separate premium currency. Sadly, premium currency is really the only option if you want to progress through the game with any amount of speed. Earning the cash on your own simply takes a very long time.

The bottom line. While stunning to look at, Fast & Furious 6: The Game loses its luster after a short time.

Review Synopsis

Product:

Fast & Furious 6: The Game 1.0.2

Company:

Kabam Inc.

Contact:

http://www.kabam.com

Price:

Free

Requirements:

iPad, iPod touch, or iPhone running iOS 4.3 or later

Positives:

Eye-popping graphics. Includes movie extras, like trailers and clips from previous films.

Negatives:

Simple gameplay gets boring quickly. Takes a very long time to progress unless you spend ample cash.

Score:

2.5 Okay

MacBook Air Shortages May Hint at New Release for WWDC

Leif Johnson — Fri, 17 May 2013 21:57:07 +0000

If you've found yourself wanting a MacBook Air over the last couple of days, you might be better off waiting, according to AppleInsider. In fact, you may even have a hard time finding it. All across the country. from Amazon.com to B&H and MacCollection, resellers and retailers are reporting that the lightweight laptop's completely or nearly out of stock, and the increasing shortage is being trumpeted as proof that Apple will release a new model at WWDC on June 10-June 14.

The news is well in line with the predictions earlier this year by KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, which we reported on back in January. Kuo has a knack for accurately predicting Apple's releases, and as MacRumors reports, in April he announced her suspicious than the MacBooks and MacBook Airs built with Intel's latest Haswell processors would be the product highlights of WWDC. MacRumors went on to report that Kuo doesn't believe we'll see retinas displays with the release, citing "cost, thickness, and production concerns."

There's plenty of reason to believe that there's truth to the rumor; after all, reports of dwindling stock by third party resellers have been used to predict the release of upcoming new Apple products many times in the past. Still, it appears some resellers are doing their best to keep some of the virtual shelves (that, or consumers are returning them). In the time between AppleInsider's announcement of the shortages to the writing of this article, the number of available 1.7Ghz 128GB 11.6-inch MacBook Airs on Amazon went up from 10 to 13.

Follow this article's author, Leif Johnson, on Twitter.

Turnado Review

David Biedny — Fri, 17 May 2013 14:00:44 +0000

There are many iOS music creation apps, but very few that are designed primarily as real-time multi-FX units. Turnado instantly takes the throne as the king of iPad audio processors. It’s a powerhouse of 24 different audio effects – all highly programmable and sonically luscious – resulting in a monster effects unit suitable for both studio and live performance that sports excellent audio quality and some truly insane sound mangling potential. This app won’t make noise by itself, but when coupled with the internal microphone, external audio hardware, and AudioCopy or especially the Audiobus app, Turnado becomes a truly awesome sonic processor.

Turnado's core is formed by 24 effects modules, which can be placed onto your virtual rack with up to eight used simultaneously – and all of them sound quite excellent. With a ridiculously deep level of programmability, it's enough to daunt casual users, but positively delight those with a technical bent. There is something here for just about every type of ear, with an emphasis on crazy delays, reverbs, stutter and time slicing effects, and filters – including a nifty combed envelope filter (think of the guitar riff in Green Day's “Boulevard of Broken Dreams”). Add in pitch shifters, a phase shifter, and a flanger, and the list is truly comprehensive. The software provides four X-Y pad controllers, each one managing two effects simultaneously for instant live performance mayhem.

And then there’s the rather terrifying, appropriately named “Dictator” mode, which gives you one master fader control to move all eight effects knobs at once, something akin to a master button that fires all weapons simultaneously. Suffice it to say, it’s insanely chaotic, and might just blow out your speakers – or eardrums. Or both! While it’s fun to open iTunes songs and run them through Turnado, it’s when you plug this into the effects slot of Audiobus that the real magic starts to happen. And then there’s the extensive MIDI support – you can have each and every control and knob in Turnado respond to just about any type of MIDI input, further opening the creative floodgates.

The bottom line. It'd take pages and pages to describe the depth and sweetness of Turnado, though at $20, it may seem expensive. However, at less than a dollar per effect, it’s an absolute bargain for musical maniacs.

Review Synopsis

Product:

Turnado 1.0.1

Company:

Sugar Bytes

Contact:

http://www.sugar-bytes.de

Price:

$19.99

Requirements:

iPad running iOS 5.0 or later

Positives:

Comprehensive selection of audio effects. Extensive programmability. Live controls. High quality sound.

Negatives:

Not cheap for an iPad app.

Score:

5 Awesome

Karateka Classic Review

Mikel Reparaz — Fri, 17 May 2013 01:42:11 +0000

If you were a gamer with an Apple II in the mid-'80s, there are a few names likely to stir nostalgic echoes somewhere deep in your heart; names like Choplifter, Hard Hat Mack, Ultima, and (most relevant to this review) Karateka. The first-ever game by Prince of Persia creator Jordan Mechner, Karateka finally reappeared as a rhythm-based remake in late 2012, but now Mechner's giving old-school Karateka fans what they really want: the unvarnished original, adapted for iOS and fitted with tweaks designed to tug at our sense of nostalgia (while also making the game less frustrating).

One of the first games to use cutscenes and motion-captured animation, Karateka was a marvel in 1984, although it's relatively simplistic today. As a nameless karate master, your task is to save the princess Mariko from the clutches of the evil warlord Akuma. This you'll accomplish by running through his fortress and beating down his henchmen in lengthy, one-on-one fights. You can punch and kick in three directions (up, down, and straight ahead) using comfortable, clearly marked onscreen buttons, and your enemies grow progressively tougher the further you go. Standard stuff, really.

Still, Karateka holds up surprisingly well. Its characters are still fluidly animated, pummeling enemies is still fun (and features the same satisfying crunch/pop sounds when fists and feet connect), and getting through Akuma's castle and its occasional traps is still a challenge. There are a few flaws that weren't apparent 29 years ago -- since all attacks do roughly the same amount of damage, for example, there's almost no practical reason to ever use any of them except for the front kick, which has the longest reach -- but these are minor.

Karateka Classic also features a few cool additions not in the original; while death in 1984 meant having to start the game over, you can now simply rewind to your last victory by swiping left across the screen. Additionally, nostalgic fans can alter the game's appearance to better fit their memories, with the option to see the game in monochromatic green or amber, or even with horizontal scanlines that mimic an old CRT display. Obviously, this won't hold the same appeal for someone new to the game, but the chance to try an important-but-obscure piece of gaming history for $0.99 is nothing to sneeze at.

The bottom line. Karateka Classic is a superb port of an excellent (if ancient) fighting game, and is a great way to rekindle old memories or to simply see what all the fuss is about.

Review Synopsis

Product:

Karateka Classic 1.0

Company:

Karateka LLC

Contact:

http://karateka.com

Price:

$0.99

Requirements:

iPhone, iPod touch or iPad running iOS 4.3 or later (optimized for iPhone 5)

Positives:

A faithful, extremely playable revival of the 1984 original. Onscreen buttons are comfortable and unobtrusive. New rewind feature effectively eliminates any frustration from a late-in-game death.

Negatives:

Rewind also ensures that the game can be finished in 15-30 minutes. No way to get rid of black border and expand to full screen. Fighting system feels simplistic by modern standards.

Score:

4.5 Excellent

Frozen Synapse Review

Nathan Meunier — Thu, 16 May 2013 15:34:43 +0000

A slick cyberpunk vibe with a futuristic neon glow sets the stage nicely for Frozen Synapse's brain-twisting tactical combat encounters. When it first launched on Mac and PC, this cool indie strategy game garnered high praise for its unique asynchronous take on turn-based combat and play-by-email style multiplayer matches. This iPad port gloriously packs all of the clever strategizing and insane resolutions of the original – and even lets you play against desktop users – without losing anything in the jump to the portable format.

Frozen Synapse sports a strong story-driven campaign to supplement its multiplayer focus, but regardless of mode, the maps are randomly generated, which adds exciting unpredictability and variety to the squad-based battles. Each round tasks you with queuing up sequences of commands for each neon soldier in your unit. Like many turn-based strategy games, the idea is to outmaneuver, outsmart, and outgun your A.I. or human opponents. However, the fact that both you and your foes spring into action simultaneously after planning each turn's moves throws a wild and crazy wrinkle into the mix.

During the planning phase of each round, you focus on moving your troops, tweaking their aim and stance, and using cover, all while trying to anticipate your enemies' movements. Meanwhile, your opponents are doing the same, and once both sides are ready and locked in, the resolution phase engages and all hell breaks loose as the bullets fly. A cool fast-forward feature lets you "test" your plans before committing, but the way things actually play out can be very different depending on what plans your opponents unleash. This unpredictability keeps you guessing and adjusting plans on the fly, which makes the matches intense and exciting.

Different unit types add sniper rifles, shotguns, machine guns, rockets, and grenades into the fray, and each has its unique advantages. There's a lot to wrap your head around at first, but video tutorials do a good job of explain the ins and outs of the initially complex control system. Once you get a feel for how everything works, Frozen Synapse opens up the throttle on some of the best tactical strategizing you'll find on iPad.

The bottom line. This great indie port flops turn-based strategy on its head with delightful asynchronous chaos and intense multiplayer matches.

Review Synopsis

Product:

Frozen Synapse 1.0

Company:

Mode 7

Contact:

http://www.frozensynapse.com

Price:

$6.99

Requirements:

iPad running iOS 4.2 or later

Positives:

Thrilling asynchronous battles. Tons of strategic depth. Great multiplayer experience.

Negatives:

Minimalistic neon art direction is a bit garish.

Score:

4.5 Excellent

Disney's Story Review

Michael Simon — Wed, 15 May 2013 21:43:15 +0000

If you have kids, you have photos. And if you have an iPhone, you have lots and lots of them in your pocket at any given time. There are plenty of apps that'll help you personalize your favorite pictures by adding captions, colors, and effects, but they all require a hefty dose of effort – especially if you've let a lot of birthday and vacation shots pile up.

Disney's Story understands that most parents probably have a couple hundred photos and videos sitting in their Camera Roll, but don't know where to start with organizing them. With an emphasis on speed and simplicity, the app will help you effortlessly create personalized stories out of your favorite moments without having to pore over dozens of unrelated pictures.

When you launch Story, you'll see the same pictures that are in your library, but instead of a giant chronological list, the app automatically splits them into events. By utilizing the hidden metadata embedded in each picture, Story skillfully organizes your photos and video, even knowing that pictures taken at different places on the same day are probably unrelated. Tapping on a "moment" expands it, and here's where Story really shines.

We expected to see lots of flashy Disney branding, but Story makes sure your photos are the star of the show. You won't be overloaded with options, but there are more than enough to make your story sing. Themes are fairly subdued, with muted colors and tasteful textures, and while the interface is nothing to write home about (and we don't know what's going on with the icon), navigating the menus couldn't be easier. Rearranging photos and adding text is such a breeze, your storyboard will be complete with barely any effort.

Finished stories are stored on Disney's servers as mini-scrapbooks that can be shared with your friends, but we'd definitely like to see some actual outputting options in future updates. Since stories need to be uploaded before sharing, it can take some time; besides, we're not sure how comfortable we are giving Disney that much access to our lives.

The bottom line. Use Disney's Story and your photos will live happily ever after.

Review Synopsis

Product:

Story 1.0.1

Company:

Disney

Contact:

http://www.disney.com

Price:

Free

Requirements:

iPhone or iPod touch running iOS 5.1 or later

Positives:

Great method for organizing photos. Effortless creation of stories. Good customization.

Negatives:

Bland interface. No outputting. Slow uploading.

Score:

4 Great

Sid Meier's Ace Patrol Review

Mikel Reparaz — Wed, 15 May 2013 18:04:47 +0000

Firaxis, the developer behind Civilization, has been busy on Apple platforms lately. The past few weeks brought us the excellent Mac port of XCOM: Enemy Unknown (via Feral Interactive) and the kid-friendly iOS strategy game Haunted Hollow, and now the company's rolled out Sid Meier's Ace Patrol, a free-to-play, turn-based tactics game set in the skies above World War I.

Managing a squadron of four pilots, it's your job to direct them (usually two at a time) through missions that might involve bombing enemy supply lines, escorting bombers, or shooting down spy balloons — and which will always, always involve dogfights with two or more enemy pilots. While Ace Patrol presents an idealized version of the Great War — women pilot biplanes into combat, everyone sports a cheeful smile all the time, and no pilot ever dies — it takes a fairly realistic approach toward flight, at least insofar as its turn-based setup allows. Your input is limited to tapping on movement markers, but things like altitude, g-forces and the model of plane you're controlling affect which maneuvers are available in each turn, as well as how accurate and damaging your attacks are. And as your pilots gain experience (by shooting down other pilots), they can unlock new moves, like barrel rolls, tighter turns and loops that let them outmaneuver their opponents.

If a drawn-out campaign isn’t your thing, there’s also a two-player mode that enables quick dogfights, although as of this writing it only works by swapping the same iPad between players. There’s a network option, but it apparently won’t be functional until a future update.

However you decide to tackle it, Ace Patrol is light, fun, and surprisingly involving, although its "free" price tag is misleading; paying nothing only gets you the first six missions of the British campaign. Paying a buck unlocks 18 more, while another $4 gets you the French, German, and American campaigns — all of which are more or less identical apart from the uniforms and planes. Ace pilots are also sold separately for a dollar each (or $5 for all eight), and if your pilots are in the hospital or imprisoned behind enemy lines, you can also pay $0.99 to spring them all rather than waiting for them to recover. Strangely, none of this is annoying — the campaigns are reasonably priced for what you get, and the game actually limits you to three paid recoveries per campaign — but it can get expensive.

The bottom line. Sid Meier’s Ace Patrol is a deceptively deep, highly polished and surprisingly addictive look at the strategy behind old-school dogfights.

Review Synopsis

Product:

Sid Meier's Ace Patrol 1.1

Company:

2K Games

Contact:

www.2kgames.com

Price:

Free

Requirements:

iPad, iPod touch, or iPhone running iOS 5.1 or later.

Positives:

Seemingly simple, easy-to-grasp gameplay hides a layer of complexity and rewards careful decision-making. Offers a lot of enjoyable content (if you're willing to pay for it). Building up pilots and unlocking new planes keeps things interesting.

Negatives:

No way to "earn" paid content. Few noticeable differences between the campaigns. Online multiplayer not enabled in this version.

Score:

4 Great

Go Home Dinosaurs Review

Andrew Hayward — Wed, 15 May 2013 16:20:31 +0000

In the tradition of Plants vs. Zombies, Go Home Dinosaurs delivers streamlined tower defense action on iPad under a delightfully absurd premise. As a projectile-tossing gopher, you'll collect coconuts to fill each stage with an array of offensive turrets and structures to ward off colorful dinosaurs attempting to disrupt your precious BBQ. And the game even adds in a puzzle element, as the defenses arrive on Tetris-like pieces that must slot into the purposely cramped grid layouts. While not always the most electrifying mash-up, Go Home Dinosaurs still charms as it (lightly) challenges.

The 60 stages are split evenly between three worlds, and as you progress through the different stage layouts, you'll unlock several new tower types. Starting with the likes of a simple turret and a freeze ray that simultaneously slows and injures beasts, you'll soon be using a laser gun, a magnet that pulls meteors from orbit, and a turntablist (DJ GO4) whose beats slowly wither away creatures that cross his speakers' path. Go Home Dinosaurs' whimsical tone is jokey and cartoonish, but there's still strategy needed to keep the dinosaurs from reaching the sizzling steaks at the end of each path. Picking the right combination of tower cards to match the stage layout is essential, and requires both pre-planning and the occasional trial-and-error do-over. You'll also need to smartly position your gopher (when not snagging coconut currency) to get the most out of his automated attacks.

Still, Go Home Dinosaurs is a much simpler affair than the usual tower defense offering. The tight stage layouts limit your options in many cases, and without tower upgrades, simply clearing levels is typically a straightforward task; perfectly completing each challenge is much tougher, however. With each backdrop supporting 20 stages, the action can get a bit sleepy and repetitive, as well – we would have loved to see a bit more visual variety to punch up the quest. While it comes at the expense of some depth and flexibility in strategy, accessibility remains a key perk in Go Home Dinosaurs, and paired with the vibrant aesthetic, it makes the game a perfect entry point for kids and genre newcomers.

The bottom line. Breezy and pleasantly presented, Go Home Dinosaurs may not be a hardcore tower defense option, but it's still an enjoyable tweak on the genre.

Review Synopsis

Product:

Go Home Dinosaurs 1.1

Company:

Fire Hose Games

Contact:

http://www.firehosegames.com/

Price:

$4.99

Requirements:

iPad running iOS 6.0 or later

Positives:

Unique take on tower defense that mashes in puzzle elements. Extremely accessible and good for newcomers and kids. Colorful and amusing presentation.

Negatives:

Streamlined approach won't deliver much challenge for hardened genre fans. Despite varied layouts, relying on the same three backdrops turns tiring.

Score:

3.5 Good