Racketboy

With the recent release of the updated iPod lines and new iTunes software, Apple also announce a collection of casual/classic games that are made specifically for the full-size iPods.

The games are each reasonablly prices and do feature an interesting alternative to casual gaming on the go, but I questioned how easy they would be to play on an iPod.

Fortunately, iLounge was kind enough to try out each of the games and give us a short-n-sweet review of each…

Pac-Man: D+
“Apple’s 2.5″ 320×240-pixel screen lets you see apparently pixel-perfect renditions of the game’s [features]. There are even enough pixels left over on the right side of the screen to fill with old-fashioned Pac-Man cabinet artwork and a picture of a joystick. Unfortunately, there’s a reason for that joystick: it’s there to let you know the direction Pac-Man’s just been pointed in. Rather than allow the iPod’s four cardinal face buttons to control Pac-Man definitively, Namco’s control scheme here forces you to tap or sweep your finger across the Click Wheel’s surface to signal direction changes, a decision that will remind fans of the simple, efficient, classic Pac-Man controls of how the arcade machines used to play when the joystick was broken. Even when you’ve tapped in the right direction, Pac-Man will sometimes veer unexpectedly in a different direction, such as off into a tunnel or a ghost. The precision motions needed for fakes and turns become harder with the iPod’s control scheme, and the lack of other control options doesn’t help matters, either. ”
Full Review & Screens

Tetris: B-
“The only bad news here is, like Pac-Man, in the controls. Rather than trying to emulate a joystick or joypad with two buttons – the default way to play Tetris since its inception – EA lets you move left and right by sweeping your finger in a rotary fashion on the Click Wheel, and rotates blocks with clicks on the Click Wheel’s left and right sides. Down drops the block instantly to the bottom, while the Center action button moves the block downwards at a pace faster than gravity but slower than the down button. In a phrase, this control scheme is sub-optimal – rotating with buttons and moving left and right with a rotary controller really doesn’t make sense – and begs for user-selectable control schemes. For no good reason, this default control scheme takes time to get used to, and still doesn’t really feel right once you’ve spent time with it, though we found it more tolerable overall than with Pac-Man.”
Full Review and Screens

Vortex: B+
“Borrowing ideas from Taito’s earlier Breakout clone Arkanoid, Apple has added additional, optional bonus items that can be found by breaking open certain bricks, including icons that make the bat bigger, smaller, or three at once, adhesive rather than instantly repellant, slower, faster, and in a very Arkanoid twist, gun-laden… Though the iPod’s Click Wheel is ill-suited to controlling many types of games, its handling of Vortex’s various control features is without significant flaws…Similarly, to the company’s credit, this is one of the prettiest iterations of Breakout to date. ”
Full Review and Screens

Zuma: B-
“It’s known by many names – Atari calls it Ballistic, Mitchell calls it Puzzloop, and Nintendo calls it Magnetica – but PopCap Games and developer Astraware call it Zuma ($5), a game that reiterates the same color-matching theme we saw in the iPod game Cubis 2, only this time in 2-D, and with bubbles and spirals rather than a grid full of cubes. If you like to point at things and match colors, Zuma might interest you – it’s a good if simple game – but if you’re like us, you’ll quickly tire of the repetitive matching action after only a short period of time.”
Full Review and Screens

Others:
Complete List of Games and Reviews