It looks like Apple aren’t slowing down with their new Apple Arcade launches quite yet. Just 5 days since the last update Apple has released a further 5 titles onto their subscription service. Judging by the short introduction videos on the App Store, they look to have the same high quality of the previous additions and they bring the total up to 80. Image courtesy of the Apple Arcade Twitter account
For those keeping up, it looks like there are some new additions to Apple Arcade that have sprung up overnight, bringing the current total to 75. The new additions are: NIGHTMARE FARM - This looks like an interesting, if not a little strange title. After reading the App Store description it’s a little hard to even see what this ones about, but it’s labelled as a ‘simulation’. You apparently have to visit a farm and give the creatures there food and toys.
Whilst surving bullet storms or going on an adventure across the world can be great fun, you sometimes need to step back a bit in life and time the pace down a bit. Beautiful graphics or a pumping soundtrack usually make for an interesting gaming experience, but in the right situation, something far simpler is called for. It’s this time when quiet, relaxation and simpler time is required that today’s comes into its own.
Enter The Gungeon is one of my favourite games I own on the Switch, so when I heard that there was a sequel, of sorts, heading to Apple Arcade I was all in. The new game, Exit The Gungeon, by developer / producer Devolver Digital, takes what was enjoyable about the original, and creates a new, interesting mobile first experience. Described as a ‘bullet hell dungeon climber’, the game sees you take on the role of one of four different Gungeoneers.
The last game I reviewed, Oceanhorn 2 is, as mentioned within, best experienced on the biggest screen you can, and ideally with a controller. Now that the weekend is over, I wanted to today look at a game that’s less time consuming and one that works well on the iPhone instead. Something fun for some short, weekday break bursts. When I’ve seen anyone on Twitter recommending an Apple Arcade game that is good to use on the iPhone, particularly in portrait mode, I’ve seen todays game recommended more often than not.
It was, and is, my intention to keep these micro reviews true to their name. To keep them short and sweet, and to simply act as a quick guide to whether or not a particular title is worth your time amongst the fairly crowded Apple Arcade line-up. A review for the game I want to look at today, Oceanhorn 2, should really just read: ’This game is fantastic and you’d be mad to not play it’, but I guess I should perhaps expand, just a little …
Merriam Webster defines the world ‘impossible’ as something which is: Incapable of being or of occurring With that in mind, the next game I’ve chosen to look at in my daily Apple Arcade daily reviews, could be written up under the Trades Description Act. Not only was the first game not actually impossible, neither is this reimagining of an App Store classic, Super Impossible Road. While it may not really be impossible, it is a bit bloody hard …
After a manic week of work, family and digging through endless Apple Arcade games I needed a break and a little relaxation and, luckily I didn’t even have to leave the Arcade to find it. The next stop on my whistlstop tour of Apple Arcade is the ’relaxing col(u)or-mixing puzzle’ game, tint., by Bangkok based developer Lykke Studio. tint.1 requires you to solve a multitude of different puzzles through the power of watercolours.
The previous Apple Arcade reviews that I’ve written have been for games that, in my opinion, are best experienced on a larger screen1. In order to bring a little balance to the force I wanted to try a game that’s more at home on the iPhone. To that end, today’s Apple Arcade Daily micro-review is for Bleak Sword from Devolver Digital. The Apple Arcade listing for the game describes it as featuring Dark Fantasy Dioramas which is a perfect description of the graphical style used in the game.
Next up in our journey through the Apple Arcade catalogue is the excellent Agent Intercept by prolific development house PikPok. Agent Intercept sees you take on the role of a James Bond come Austin Powers type secret agent tasked with completing various missions in order to stop the dastardly CLAW organisation. The missions all, conveniently, involve chasing, racing, destroying and otherwise generally bothering a plethora of bad guys in your souped-up secret agent vehicle from the start of the course to the end.
With the (early) launch of Apple Arcade to iOS / iPadOS beta testers, early adopters now have access to an impressive library of some really fun and interesting new games. While, right now at least, the list of available games is somewhat shy of the promised ‘over 100’1, it’s still an ample launch catalogue. Since it was first announced at this years WWDC I’ve been looking forward to trying Apple Arcade, so as soon as I spotted it had launched I jumped all over it.