An interesting selection of mobile games has been released and/or announced over the last couple of days, so here's a quick run-through. This is all rather low-key considering Microsoft's announcement, but, well, life goes on. After all, will the new Xbox have a pub fighting simulation? No, but you can now play one on your phone...
Pub Fight Yes, Iomo's funny and pretty daft pub sim is now available for download from all the usual sources. You play as Terry the landlord fighting off four generations of lager louts, including gangsters, hippies and break dancers. It's not a beat 'em up really, more a rhythm action game based around casual alcohol-fuelled violence. There's a different setting for each decade - the seventies is set in a pub toilet and each bout starts with you at the urinal. Your character zips up, turns round and starts kicking disco dancers. That, to the best of my knowledge, never happened in Street Fighter.
Golf Club 3G Just released by Elkware this is, as the title cunningly suggests, a 3D golf sim. The visuals look quite nice, and there are weather effects and customisable characters.
Midnight Pool Another new release, this is a very polished, very playable 2D pool sim from Gameloft. The single player mode has a kind of Hustler feel - it's all based in a smokey pool hall, and you have to gamble cash on each match. You also get extra money for pulling off special shots, which is quite a good idea. The press release they sent me proudly boasts 'with Lynyd Skynyrd's Sweet Home Alabama, Midnight Pool is the first mobile game featuring licensed music!'. This is both funny and sad: funny because it reminds me of the eighties when you got things like 'featuring digitised speach!' and '100% machine code' emblazoned on game covers. It's sad because mobile gaming is obviously desperate to ape the console games market, treating any form of licensing as a guaranteed cash cow.
Splinter Cell Chaos Theory It's out everywhere now and you really have to try it. This 2D take on the stealth adventure genre is a lesson in brutally simple yet highly effective game design. Possibly the most accomplished mobile game conversion I've ever seen. The press release comes with some impressive stats:
"On the day of its release, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Chaos Theory was made available to Gameloft's 130 operating partners, as well as 150 affiliates. Seven hundred different versions were developed in Gameloft's internal studios to accommodate 180 mobile phone models and 5 languages. The game is available today in 65 countries worldwide".
Totally Spies Gameloft has acquired the rights to produce a mobile game based around this French cartoon series. If you've somehow missed it, here's what it's about:
"Totally Spies is an animated series that enjoys worldwide success.Sam, Alex and Clover, three young college students from Beverly Hills, find themselves thrust into the thrilling world of international espionage. Thanks to their respective talents, the three heroines must meet a formidable challenge: balance school with the fast paced lives of secret agents!"
