Kelly has to build a chain of shopping malls because that is the thing to do just like that. I found it really strange that someone gave me control over shopping malls when I can’t even build a store without going through the tutorial. Controlling a farm, a spa or a hotel I can understand but building a chain of malls as a rookie is weird. Anyway the story is not really important to the gameplay.

Create A Mall is all about building and upgrading stores. You have a limited number of storefront slots, and have to make sure that you mix and match in an attractive manner to the customers. New stores can be bought as building plans, and they later show up in the lease menu where you buy your storefronts. To upgrade a store you need to have resources that can be bought in the resource menu. To speed up building you can also hire extra labor. All of this is done under four tabs: lease, labor, resources and plans. Once a tab is chosen you get the available choices below, with arrows to scroll through them. I have had a hard time seeing all the really small numbers, and the entire interface give me a headache. Everything is tiny, and most of it is text based instead of using icons.

Create A Mall looks old, and there is a definite lack of polish. It reminds me of games I used to play five years ago on my small screen Sony Ericsson phone. Having graphics on par with the games Digital Chocolate churned out five years ago isn’t good enough.(Digital Chocolate still uses the same old graphics today) I like that the graphics are bright and colourful though.

The music isn’t good at all, and got me annoyed right away. Some kind of circus meets elevator music mashup that becomes grating to the nerves. Sound effects are ok, although sparse.

The reward in Create A Mall is that you can do some shopping within the game. Dressing up Kelly with some raunchy clothes can be fun for the younger players, but not really for the age group able to play the main game. Global high scores are available to let you compare yourself against the world of mall builders. Trophies can be earned as you achieve certain goals.

Create A Mall is a strange game combining cuteness with an ugly user-unfriendly interface. Building a mall is an underwhelming experience both to the eyes and ears. Me, my wife and my 10-year-old daughter all agree on this one: pass, and save those four bucks for the next time you go shopping instead.

Final Rating

Create A Mall $3.99
Version: 1.0.1
Seller: 99 Games

We had the privilege of sitting down the Kyu Lee, the president of Gamevil USA, to get a feel for the upcoming sequel to the excellent RPG, Zenonia. Let me first say that Gamevil did not change anything drastically as far as the visuals and sound go in Zenonia 2, and I really like this. The original game was the perfect mix of the Link to the Past visual style from the SNES days, and a deep leveling and equipment managing system on par with modern RPG games. There were some complaints that it was a bit too hardcore for newcomers to the genre, and Gamevil has addressed this… kinda.

According to Kyu, there won’t be as much grinding necessary in Zenonia 2. It’s become an American cliche that foreign RPGs tend to focus a lot on grinding out your character to level him up, and Zenonia was no exception. You will be able to choose from 4 different characters this time around, each with their own backstory and branching storyline. This will address the complaint of the lack of replay value to the original game. You will also be able to fully customize the appearance of your character, and different weapons and armor will appear on them as well. While the menu interface has been streamlined, there’s still the wonderful equipment and leveling management you should expect from any RPG, so if you’re not a fan of that, this game probably isn’t for you.

One of the most exciting aspects of Zenonia 2 is the brand new PvP (player vs player) mode, which will feature asynchronous multiplayer against human characters. Essentially, another player’s character will have it’s stats, spells, equipment, and other vital info uploaded to the server. You can then challenge that character, and play them in a live battle. So much like the Aurora Feint, you’re not actually playing the person live, but rather playing a representation of their character live. According to Gamevil, millions of battles have already taken place in Korea, where the game has been out for a couple months. I think this will be a sweet feature to expand the replayability of the game. When I asked how this would effect the leveling of the character, the question was kind of dodged, with Kyu instead stating that he expects most people will beat the game before entering into this mode.

A couple final notes here. All the buttons in the GUI can be arranged however you like, which will be nice when arranging spells for convenience. This also will come in handy for those who want to play this game on the iPad when it launches. There are 3 difficulties in the game, and each one will feature unique item pickups. It definitely shows the Gamevil is putting a lot of work into reasons to play Zenonia 2 more than once, and I for one will be waiting for it’s release. The game looked, sounded, and played just as well as the first, and we already got a sample of the tongue-in-cheek humor of the original. Gamevil has not announced a release date yet, but I would expect to see this title out in the next month or two.

Check out the character intro video below for a tiny bit of gameplay - complete with cheesy voice over!

Binary Mill is a relatively new group of developers that has focused on CG animation in the past to “pay the bills.”   They have brought this talent into play with their stunning 1942-styled arcade shooter, Assault Squadron. As I’ve said before, I’ve always had a soft spot in my heart for top-down space shooting games. I used to pump quarter after quarter into the 1942 arcade cabinet at the local pizza joint when I was a kid. There’s just something about massive waves of enemies, ridiculous power ups and and super bombs, and huge bosses.

In Assault Squadron, you get all of the above + cinema quality CG cutscenes to pull the story together. Oh, and I should mention that the action switches between both top-down and side scrolling views to mix things up. It’s truly a wild ride, as this game has all the crazy weapons, bosses, and levels that I’ve been waiting to see on the iPhone since the beginning! There have been other top-down shooters, such as Siberian Strike, that worked well, and were certainly fun. However, no other game I have seen for the iPhone has captured the crazy arcade madness like Assault Squadron has.

Gameplay is pretty straight forward. You can control your ship from anywhere on the screen, and you automatically fire. You lift you finger from the screen for a second or two to start firing your secondary weapon (needs to charge up), and double tap for the big bombs. You collect different colored orbs to power up your weapons or give you point multipliers. If you can beat the boss/level without dying, you will have a massive point multiplier at the end of the level, which will boost your score quite nicely. Under normal mode, you have 10 continues to use, but under the highest difficulty you get none. Yikes!

As I mentioned before, the game will follow a storyline that’s accented with fantastic CG cutscenes. You will be able to choose from two ships at first, but can unlock two more as you play through the game. Each ship will have completely unique primary/secondary weapons and smart bombs. I was hoping to see multiplayer support, but at the moment that’s not available. Despite this, with 4 different ships to play through, 3 different difficulties, and global high scores, it sounds like Assault Squadron has plenty to offer.

I’ve been playing a preview build of this game for a couple days now, and I’m having a blast. Looking forward to the final release.

I was quite pleased at the wide variety of favorite characters. Out of all entrants, 11 of the characters were chosen for favorites. Check out the original post for the entries.

Chun-Li was unsurprisingly the overall winner, with Ryu bringing up a close second place. Where’s the love for Ken and his flaming shoryukens?! Oh well.

Definitely no love for Zangief though. Poor Zangief! Austin gave a proper reason for liking him though:

Because Street fighter loves the gay community so
much, that not only are most of male characters overtly
homosexual, the have a big hairy one, so he can be the “bear”,
and “hug” all the other twinks… i know to much about
homosexual subculture.

Thanks, Austin. I think.

I was originally going to choose my favorite based on description, but there were too many, so I went ahead and chose a first/second place winner at random:

1st Place ($10 SF4 card and iPhone case!)

SloMo: Chun-Li! I used to kick some serious butt with her back in the 80-90’s when Street Fighter 2 came out. I used to sick a lot of quarters in at the circle-K against my friends. No wonder we never had money!

2nd Place ($10 SF4 card)

rkb37: Chun-Li, because she helped me dominate all my opponents with her sweet moves.

I would like Chun-Li to dominate ME with her sweet moves! Thanks for playing everyone. There will be a new contest tomorrow for two different games, and a review up for Street Fighter IV soon! (I’ll give you a quick preview… it’s REALLY REALLY GOOD.)

iEscaper!2 –Escape from Castle of the Doom- plays exactly as the first game in the series. You have to find clues, and objects to solve puzzles blocking your path. Puzzles are varied ranging form shaking your iPhone/iPod Touch to solving a lights out tile puzzle. Most of the time is spent trying to find that elusive object or clue needed to progress. Finding the puzzles is usually the easy part, but getting to solve them can at times take time. All objects found end up in your inventory, and stays as long as they are still useful. Objects within the inventory can be combined, examined and equipped. It is important to always have the correct object equipped when searching the Castle of the Doom as you might find something you haven’t understood the clue for.

The presentation is still really good with hi resolution graphics. The music is ambient Asian themes, and sadly you can’t play your own music at all. This was something I wanted for the first game as well. The only option found is to set the volume of the game.

The locations are larger, and less focused on rooms than the previous iEscaper! Instead it feels like you get a castle to explore once you are out of the basement. I preferred level design focusing on one room at a time as it made the original much more intense and focused. The more doors you unlock in iEscaper!2 the more running around you have to do to find clues and objects. Sure the game takes longer to complete, but that is not because of having more puzzles or rooms but rather because you travel for more time.

One small but nagging problem is the translation from Japanese to English found within the game. There are a lot of spelling errors both within the game, and within the user interface. Even the title is strange, and should probably read “the castle of doom” instead of “Castle of the Doom”. Hopefully this can be updated quite easily by the developer.

I really enjoy these room escape games set in a partly historically correct Feudal Japan. Compared to the original I must say that the sequel is a bit less interesting. This is due to the larger environments, and the fact that  I don’t feel threatened at any time. I can take my time doing puzzles without thinking about escaping. That is because I am an intruder out to steal the “crystal of dragon”, and there are no enemies swarming to kill me. It is me versus a castle, and that isn’t that menacing. If you enjoyed the first game definitely pick up the sequel. If you are new to room escape games get iEscaper! –Escape from the Ninja’s Lair- first.

Final Rating

iEscaper!2 -Escape from Castle of the Doom- $2.99
Version: 1.0.0
Seller: CELLNAVI

Coming next from Gameloft: Resident Evil? No…well, technically no.

Zombie Infection is almost a replica of Resident Evil with it’s slow moving stop and shoot, male and female characters, over the shoulder zombie killing game. But I think that’s what makes this game good. With 10 levels, including a zoo filled with zombiefied animals, and an array of weapons, Zombie Infection is sure to please.

The game offers some other impressive features as well. For example, shooting a zombie in the leg will blow off its leg, causing it to drop to the ground and crawl towards you. There are also ways of killing zombies without a gun, including the ability to rip off arms in close combat and curb stomp crawling enemies. You will definitely be satisfied no matter how you dispose of those pesky zombies.

One of the biggest things hitting games today is arena mode in which players survive hordes of enemies. Zombie Infection offers such a mode but we were not able to play it. Unfortunately there was no mention of multiplayer at the meeting but I am hoping that they will incorporate it into their arena mode at some point. Gameloft plans to release the game late March. No price was estimated price was given.

That’s essentially the idea I got during the hands on with Gameloft’s new Fishing King title. There are certainly a fair share of fishing titles out there, and some of them are quite popular. Gameloft intends to capture the attention of reel fishing enthusiasts out there (get it? lol) by focusing on the technical aspect of the sport. This means a focus on the right lure for the kind of fish you’re hunting, as well as other aspects if the process.

As you can see by the screenshots, the graphics are quite impressive, and add to a nice serene feeling while on your boat. Even though this is supposed to be a more “simulation” type of game, I didn’t have any troubles picking it up and catching a fish or two. You start by casting off, and when you get a bite, you must tilt the phone left or right with the fish movement while reeling it in. A final tug up to bring it out of the water when it’s close enough, and you have yourself a trophy! To be honest, this actually felt a bit easy, but I’m assuming the difficulty will depend on what fish you are going for.

There are 30 species of fish in the game, 15 fishing spots, and 5 different locations, including Argentina, Brazil, and Lake Erie. You can fish for fun, or enter tournaments to gain credits to buy better equipment/lures. The build we played felt solid overall, and looked great. Gameloft is expecting a release towards the end of March.

The superhero game has never faired too well in video games. Sure there are some standouts throughout the years, mainly with Batman. But give the hero super powers, such as flight, and for some reason things take a turn for the worse. It’s strange really, I mean on paper it should work, but a look back at Superman 64 is evidence to the contrary.

Step up Chillingo then, with their latest title the Hero - created by Traplight Games - a side scrolling action game that puts you in the boots of a super hero and take flight to rid the world of evil.

You are presented each level with a large scrolling metropolis which you can explore at will. Each one getting larger and more detailed as you progress. Your mission is to rid the level of all wrongdoers. How do you do this? Fly into them of course. What makes this game a winner is in it’s simple game mechanic… playing like Mini Squadron but with people instead of planes, using a virtual stick (or accelerometer if you choose to) you simply point The Hero in the direction you want to go. As enemies appear, a small arrow pops up showing the direction of the threat, as well as flashing to indicate the importance, for example falling babies or timed bombs. Flying into the threat will destroy it, or in the babies case, save it. Most require a simple nudge, but larger enemies require more power. Luckily you have a button which will boost your speed in any direction, and turn you into a super powered battering ram. Power ups also become available, such as ‘freeze’ which lets you encase all enemies in the vicinity in ice, making it easier to pick them off one by one.

Being invincible of course means you can’t actually die, but with great power comes…. a great big head! Yes our hero thrives off his celebrity, as he’s only doing this for the fame. Dotted around the levels are civilians. High-fiving them as they lean out of windows will give you more fame, and in turn more power. Lose your fame though, either by not giving your public love, or by failing to destroy enemies in a timely fashion, and your power will deplete. Lose all your fame, and our Hero will simply stop dead in his tracks and turn his back on the world letting mayhem consume the city.

The Hero is presented in a great cartoon style. He wouldn’t look our of place in Pixar’s The Incredibles, with his big head, square jaw, broad shoulders… but tiny legs. When idle he strikes a pose and bobs up and down in the air, until you move the joystick and he hits flight pose. The enemies come in all shapes and sizes, from simple bombs, to parachuting babies, killer wasps, alien bugs, striped bank robbers, ninjas and large tanks. At times the levels can seem overwhelmed with enemies but, due to the cartoon graphics, the game never stutters and continues to scroll smoothly (60 frames per second on a 3GS). A nice touch is that you can fly our Hero high up into the sky, and to the edge of space, he peacefully bobs about and takes in the views… while no doubt contemplating his place in the universe.

The Hero is tremendous arcade style fun. It doesn’t necessarily bring anything new to the table, but it somehow feels fresh none-the-less. It offers a generous amount of levels, replay value with the ever popular survival mode, a multitude of enemies in all shapes and sizes to keep things interesting and achievements and online leader boards to taunt your friends with. For only $1.99 it certainly packs a punch.

The game plays from the standard third-person perspective, with the ability to easily take cover in certain locations, and perform the “tag and execute” manuever on targeted enemies. You can also easily take down enemies up close with a variety of moves, including the “meat shield” by taking someone captive. There is also the “last known position” feature, which throws down a chalk outline of the last area an enemy saw you in. You can use this and a stealth meter to stay in the shadows and avoid being seen.

With each new iPhone game from Gameloft, we see an improvement in both the game engine performance and controls, and SCC is no exception. The controls feel very smooth, and seem to have been tweaked from Nova, which controlled quite well. Interestingly, there is no button to crouch or sneak, so the game is more reliant on staying behind cover and executing enemies by targeting or walking up from behind.

Many of the familiar gameplay mechanics are present, including infrared vision, camera sticky nades, and shooting out lights to darken an area. It definitely feels like a Splinter Cell game, and it’s cool to see the new and old gameplay mechanics working together. There are 10 levels to beat, which will take aroudn 5-6 hours. There aren’t currently plans for multiplayer or other online features, but Gameloft is confident that the single player experience will deliver.

Gameloft hasn’t announced a release date yet, but based on the polish of the build we saw, I would expect to see this title close to the launch of the console game.