Code Retard

(Credit:
CNET)

Old-school gamers will remember an age when there were no continues, no checkpoints, and no respawns. If you died during a level, that was it–you went back to the beginning of the level to do it all again. The craziest thing about it? You liked it even though it drove you crazy.

These days, a gaming purist might say games have gotten too easy and gamers have gotten too soft. When dying in a game doesn’t mean anything, how can you truly enjoy the game? I’m not sure it matters, but I can see both sides. Maybe after checking out this collection–if you don’t throw your
iPhone through your computer screen from frustration–you can tell me what you think in the comments.

This week’s collection of iOS apps is all about games that are both frustrating and addictive. The first is a favorite of mine from 2011 that is sure to induce rage seizures (not really, but you know what I mean). The second gives you some easy levels to start with but quickly gets extremely hard. The third is all about collecting weapon crates (or at least attempting to) for high scores.

It may look peaceful, but it took me about 10 restarts to get this point–not even close to the finish.

(Credit:
Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)

League of Evil (99 cents) has been around for a while and is like an iOS remake of the popular console and desktop game Super Meat Boy. For those who haven’t played Super Meat Boy, it’s a platform game that has become well-known (dare we say, “legendary”) for being extremely difficult. League of Evil is probably not quite as hard as the game it emulates, but you’ll find the same rage-inducing effect when you’ve restarted some of the later levels for the 20th time.

Like other platform games, League of Evil gives you directional controls for movement on the lower left part of the screen and buttons for jump and attack on the lower right. Your goals are to complete a level in the shortest amount of time possible, find and retrieve a hidden briefcase, and take out the scientist at the end of the level. The first several levels are not too bad, but once you get into the second tier of levels (54 levels total across three tiers), your old-school arcade skills will definitely be put to the test.

League of Evil is not for those who are new to platform games; even the most skilled gamers will be challenged by this title. But if you like the challenge of getting your run through a level exactly right and are willing to try the same level again and again for that feeling of finally succeeding, we highly recommend this game. Check out League of Evil Lite to see if you like it, but you won’t get the really hard levels without paying.

If you wait too long the enemies start to swarm and you’ll have to shoot your way out.

(Credit:
Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)

Bit-1 (99 cents) is a platformer that may not frustrate you as quickly as the others in this collection, but you’ll definitely feel the heat as the levels get harder. True to its name, Bit-1 features old-school 8-bit graphics, making your little robot charmingly cute. Left and right directional controls are on the left side of the screen, with jump and fire buttons on the right.

Bit-1 starts you out easy with a big open level that’s a snap to complete as you collect coins and shoot at evil robots before finding the exit. But as the game progresses, you’ll need to fight off more enemies and make extremely precise jumps to find your way to the exit. The enemies get harder as well, requiring several bullets to take out larger opponents that block your path. Fortunately, you’ll also find new weapons that make it easier to clear your path, but Bit-1 has a way of swarming you with bad guys regardless of your firepower.

With 25 levels, Game Center support for global high scores, and hard-core bosses to beat, Bit-1 is a great time-waster for those with a high threshold for frustration. Anyone who wants to revisit the glory days of arcade gaming should check out this title. If you want to try before you buy, download Bit-1 Lite for free.

The crate may be close by, but if I even brush against an enemy, I’ll have to start over.

(Credit:
Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)

Super Crate Box (99 cents) is a maddeningly addictive arcade platformer with a concept that’s very simple, but manages to keep you coming back for more. Using left and right directional buttons on the left and buttons for jumping and firing on the right, your only mission is to stay alive and collect weapon crates. When you collect one, another appears randomly on the map and you receive a random weapon for fighting off the endless rampage of deadly monsters.

Super Crate Box is one of those games that is highly rage-inducing. Even the slightest touch by one of the enemies ends your game and often the weapons can hurt you as much as they help you. For example, a grenade launcher has an excellent blast radius, but you have to account for the amount of time it takes for a grenade to explode once it leaves the gun (giving enemies time to get you). The disc gun is deadly on your foes, but once shot, the disc bounces off the wall and returns to where you’re standing (we’re certain you will come to hate the disc gun). If you can manage to stay alive long enough to grab just 10 cases in one game (no easy task), you’ll unlock a new map forcing you to rethink your entire strategy.

The game starts you out on Normal mode, and if you can grab 40 crates before dying (almost impossible!) you’ll unlock the official SFMT mode. At the time of this writing, I can’t find out what SFMT stands for, but I do know you’ll need to grab 20 crates in this faster mode in order to open Ambush mode. Suffice it to say, the game is already hard and just gets harder with each mode.

Somehow, even when I died countless times in Super Crate Box, something kept me trying just “one more time” to beat my record. If you don’t throw your iPhone across the room first in frustration, we think this will be your experience with this fun time-waster as well.

Apple’s new textbooks are in the iBookstore.

(Credit:
Josh Lowensohn/CNET)

Apple’s new digital textbook initiative is Steve Jobs’ brainchild, McGraw-Hill CEO Terry McGraw says.

“Sitting and listening to all of this, I wish Steve Jobs was here,” McGraw told All Things Digital in an interview referring to Apple’s iBooks 2 announcement yesterday. “I was with him in June this past year, and we were talking about some of the benchmarks, and some of the things that we were trying to do together…This was his vision, this was his idea, and it all had to do with the
iPad.”

Apple yesterday unveiled its plans for playing a more integral role in education. Chief among the announcements was iBooks 2, a digital-textbook initiative that will let publishers create interactive titles. Apple showed how the textbooks, which will run on the iPad, can increase student interest through video, 3D images, and other multimedia content. The textbooks–for high school, at least–will cost $14.99 or less.

Apple’s push into the education market didn’t surprise many industry observers. In Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs, the author wrote that the company’s co-founder had “set his sights on textbooks,” since he believed the $8-billion-a-year business was “ripe for destruction.”

Jobs’ “idea was to hire great textbook writers to create digital versions, and make them a feature of the iPad,” Isaacson wrote. “In addition, he held meetings with the major publishers such as Pearson Education, about partnering with Apple.”

iBooks 2, and even Apple’s revamped iTunes U, which provides an education portal for students and instructors, could be a coup for the company. Prior to yesterday’s announcement, none of the major textbook publishers had fully embraced digital versions. Now that they have, Apple might be able to corner that lucrative market.

But now that Apple has entered the digital textbook race, might other companies, like Google, follow suit? When All Things Digital’s Peter Kafka asked McGraw if his company will bring digital textbooks to other platforms, the executive sidestepped the question, deciding instead to stick with Jobs, saying that he and Apple did more “in terms of creating this personalized learning platform than anyone.”

“When you ask someone to save the world, you really want to give them a world worth saving.” That’s what R.A. Salvatore (we call him ‘Bob’), the narrative consultant for Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, has to say about the game world he helped create. Salvatore is a NY Times best-selling author and though I gave up on his Drizzt books long ago, the guy knows how to world-build.

We don’t see Salvatore in this video, however. This video focuses on the Big Huge Games’ art team working on Reckoning and how they brought the world that Salvatore created to life. We see a lot of concept art and how it is translated into the game world. There are a lot of monsters and settings to explore. It particularly focused on the trolls and bogan, which looks like a good ol’ ogre to me. It’s interesting that they took pains to bring the trolls’ heads down to a human level so you don’t feel like you’re just swatting at their legs in combat. That shows some deeper thinking, which is a good thing.

It’s unclear, however, if that will translate into success for Amalur. So far, it looks like pretty standard fantasy. EA has put a demo out, but I’ve yet to play it.

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning is out on February 7th.

Below you can find links to download Absinthe, a tool released by the Chronic Dev-Team to jailbreak the iPhone 4S and iPad 2.

Absinthe 0.1.2 (Mac): absinthe-mac-0.1.2-1.zip

<!–<!–<!–

We were waiting for more information on several Vita titles. Among them was Assasin’s Creed, Call of Duty and of course Mortal Kombat. At least one of them is now revealed and explained.

Being confirmed just 2 days ago, Sony today posted detailed interview on the subject. The interview confirms the cover above. Moreover it confirms that the game is port of 2011?s MK and therefore will include everything from PS3 version adding more exclusive content like Kratos. We were once again reassured the game will run at 60 fps and look graphically similar to Vita’s big brother. The game will use the touch screen and the accelerometer but unlike Ultimate Capcom vs Marvel 3 a simple touch won’t execute an instant hit. Instead it would be used only for fatalities and X-ray attacks. However, there are some unfortunate news too.  No cross-play will be available. Last but not least, the game will include both adhock and infrastructure multiplayer.

Mortal Kombat, as is the official name of the game,will land on our consoles sometime in the spring.

Source : Playstation blog

Similar Posts:

• Many Vita games priced
• GameStop Document Reveales PSV Games Dates and Prices ?
• Memory Cards or Not?
• Lord of Apocalypse : No Cross Play

Posted in PS Vita News

Thanks to C4E for releasing LT3.0 for Slim Liteon Drives.
We have updated the whole range of Lizard software tools to work with this new Relese. We recommend follow the next guidelines to get your update working without issues:

a) Update your Lizard to Gecko 1.28. If you have doubts check the Tutorial
b) Open Lizard Toolbox, Press “Get Device Details” to read Lizard Serial
c) Go to Settings Tab then press button “Get Lizard Updates”, this will first update your Lizard Toolbox Version to 1.51.
d) After the first update succed, repeat steps “b” and “c” to download an update the new Fileset (LTPLUS 3.00 b)
d) If you use the Standalone feature on Lizard you need also download the new SD File Pack LT 3.00b and extract on your Micro SD Card, you can grab it from the blog.

Capcom will release Resident Evil 6 later this year for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 on November 20, it said on Thursday.

The latest game in the venerable action-horror franchise will feature Chris Redfield and Leon Kennedy, two of the most popular heroes of past Resident Evil games, as playable characters. They will both be joined by new characters, possibly to be controlled by the computer or a second player much like in Resident Evil 5.

A report by IGN also indicates that Resident Evil 6 will take place in a variety of real-world locations, including China.

The same report hints that the game will aim for a happy medium between horror and action. This, more than anything else, gets me excited for the game: Past Resident Evil games always offered an excellent mix of survival horror atmosphere and heart-pumping action. I felt this blend was missing from Resident Evil 5, which was heavily focused on action. If Capcom can get the formula right once again, then Resident Evil 6 will be worth getting excited for.

All the CyanogenMod-supported LG Optimus devices. From left to right: 3D, Hub, Sol, One, 2X, Black, and Pro. (Found on Google Plus.)

(Credit:
Ricardo Cerqueira)

As CyanogenMod skates past 1 million active users, making it by far the most popular custom flavor of
Android around, one of its main developers has asked the Android community if there’s interest in creating an app store for Android modders and their fans.

Koushik Datta suggested a marketplace designed for apps, ROMs, and emulators that Google refuses to host and carriers refuse to allow. Not surprisingly, the answer he got was resoundingly positive.

Dutta, also known as Koush, said in a Google Plus post earlier this month that the time was coming for an app store that specialized in rooted Androids. He’s laid out a couple of goals for the project, including that it would be open to all custom ROMs, and not just the CyanogenMod ROM that he spearheads. He proposed that it host apps that have been removed or blocked from Google’s Market, including one-click root apps, connection tethering apps, emulators, Visual Voicemail apps, and even other custom ROMs.

Another suggestion he made was to take a page from Apple’s now-industry defining playbook and have a portion of sales go to the support of CyanogenMod.

The post was well-received, including more than 1,700 +1′s, 656 shares, and 500 comments. Feedback ranged from one person’s simple, “Epic Sauce,” while others raised concerns about the proposal’s legality, how carriers would react, and whether the focus would be the business of selling apps or creating a good user experience.

Several security concerns were raised, too, such as preventing malware from being disguised as legit apps, app vetting, and implementing a payment method securely. (I couldn’t link directly to those comments because Google Plus doesn’t allow comments to be anchored or permalinked, but they are under the original post.)

Dutta also revealed that before he suggested the modder’s marketplace, he had approached Amazon about including their Android market in CyanogenMod, but wrote that he was “brushed off” for now.

It seems like every week we get a report on how poorly the PS Vita is doing in Japan. The story is consistent enough that I’ve considered not even reporting on it for the time being, since we’re basically making the same post once a week when the sales numbers roll in. But despite the device’s sales troubles, Sony believes there’s still strong demand for portable gaming devices.

Speaking to Edge, SCEI President Andy House noted that while the PS Vita doesn’t have its own strong numbers yet, the company feels comfortable using the success of the 3DS as evidence of a robust “gaming-primary” device market. It may seem strange to see Sony using Nintendo as a benchmark, but with sales like the Vita’s, the company is essentially grasping at straws.

Of course, this is Sony we’re talking about, so House couldn’t resist taking a shot at the 3DS as a casual device:

“What I think we’ve done is point to a market that really has started out with potentially casual games on other devices but now wants a deeper, or better, or more premier gaming experience.”

It’s amazing to me that Sony still manages to dismiss Nintendo devices, despite the fact that those devices continually outperform Sony’s products. Regardless, House is right about one thing – there’s still definitely a market for handheld games.

Handheld Nintendo games, anyway. Awww snap!

But seriously, what do you think of Sony using Nintendo’s success as an indication of the Vita’s future?

[Destructoid]

Apple’s new textbooks are in the iBookstore.

(Credit:
Josh Lowensohn/CNET)

Apple didn’t surprise anyone at its New York City event today, but the company did make it clear that it wants to be a key player in the education industry.

The company kicked off its event at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum today discussing the troubles American students are having competing against those living in other countries. And Apple, vying to be the hero, said it has some solutions to improve educational quality for students.

The first solution is iBooks 2 for iPad. The offering allows textbook makers to sell their titles to
iPad owners for $14.99 or less. In a demonstration, Apple showed how interactivity stands at the center of its textbook push, allowing students to view videos and even 3D images from within a title. In addition, the textbooks support note-taking, flash cards, and highlighting.

Apple says iBooks 2 is designed is to solve the major issues hurting today’s textbooks–a lack of durability, portability, searchability, interactivity, and outdated content.