Puzzlejuice

Would you believe me if I said the hiatus was due to playing too many video games? Well, it's not that true, but we'll just say that it is.

Today I wanted to write about an game called Puzzlejuice for the iPhone/iPad. Puzzlejuice was created by the roommate of my very favorite internet person, Sean "Day[9]" Plott. (See his link on the sidebar.) I bought it on his recommendation and it does not disappoint. It's a game at professes to "punch your brain in the face." If you like match-3 games and/or Tetris and/or word games like Boggle or Text Twist, this is the ultimate game for you.

Gameplay works as follows: Tetris-like pieces made up of various colors drop from the top of the screen. When you match three of the colored blocks together or when you make a line of blocks, they turn into letters. Then, using your finger, you spell out words with the letters, which then clears the blocks.  Simple, right!?

It does sound a bit complicated at first, but after the first 30 seconds or so it all comes together. You can also earn powerups and such as you accomplish objectives, making for an innovative and fun experience. The game itself is very encouraging, calling you things like "awesome" and "bro." It had a few bugs at release but has since been patched and runs smoothly. It's $1.99 on the app store and totally worth it! 

I give Puzzlejuice four Brosefs out of five, for unique and engaging gameplay and a surprising sense of humor.

Humble Bundle Acquisitions: Machinarium

Last time in Humble Bundle Acquisitions, We talked about VVVVVV. Today we'll be discussing Machinarium.

Machinarium is a sweet, point and click, puzzle game about a little robot who apparently gets bullied a lot. Your job is to help him put himself back together, cross bridges, break out of the jails, and save his friend. It's a lot like the Monkey Island series but with a lot less pirates and much better art.

Speaking of the art, this game is gorgeous. The entire game is hand-drawn in pen and ink. And the soundtrack is spectacular. One of the songs is on my top 25 most played on my iPod. There's so many charming and well-done things about this game, you should stop reading and just play the demo here. Then you should pick it up for PC, Mac, or even on your iPad! The computer version is $10 and comes with the soundtrack, which is worth it for the soundtrack alone. It's $4.99 on iTunes.

Here are two of my favorites from the soundtrack. Enjoy!

iOS Nastolgia

Apparently, in an effort to make money off all the kids (and adults) getting new Apple mobile devices, people have finally gotten on the bandwagon of re-releasing classic games onto iOS. I've been crossing my fingers for Final Fantasy 6 for about two years now, but still no luck there. However, we've been graced with some awesome stuff lately. Including:

• Final Fantasy Tactics
• Chrono Trigger
• Sonic CD
• Mega Man X
• GTA 3

I wanted to put two or three exclamation points after each one of those, but that just wouldn't do. I'm so excited about all of those. I've resisted buying all of them, but I did fall prey to the overpriced FFT as well as Chrono Trigger and Sonic. I've always had a thing for Sonic the Hedgehog and I never played CD, so that had to happen. I played through GTA 3 when it came out and I'm not in high school anymore, so I think I'm a bit past killing cops for fun.  I didn't get Mega Man X because I distinctly remember having to press a direction button, jump, dash, and shoot all at once. That was pretty tricky on the SNES controller; it's got to be impossible on an iPod screen. 

I still can't consistently hit a specific target,
but I'm having a great time doing it!

Which brings me to a point about iOS ports. As exciting as these games are, they were tuned for whatever control scheme they were initially released on, and don't always lend themselves well to iPods. Final Fantasy Tactics is particularly hard to manage sometimes. In fact, it's made me want to play it less and less. Chrono Trigger has been really hard to get used to as well, I'm still running into walls on accident and can almost never attack a specific enemy consistently. Anyway, if anyone at Square reads this, they should think about implementing an alternative form on control. That'd be awesome.