Developer/Publisher: ciretose
Price: $0.99
Verdict: Buy It
Pros: Quick to pick up and play, difficult to master. Lights-Out with a twist. An interesting puzzler that thankfully strays from the standard match 3 template.
Cons: No variation to the gameplay. Additional modes would have been nice.

In an app store flooded with match three puzzle games, it’s nice to see something different. Squares! is an interesting strategy puzzle game that tasks you with changing each of the boxes in a five by five grid from their starting color. Each of the squares has an arrow on it pointing to another square, and touching that square will change the spot that the arrow is pointing to another color. The boxes progress from green to yellow and finally to red, with a red square meaning game over.

You gain bonus points at the end of the level based on the number of yellow squares on the board at the end. Finish the level with fewer then four yellows and easy bonus points will be yours to have. I found the game quite addictive while I tried to play a perfect game by turning all of the squares green. Such a game would have netted me a fat 1250 point bonus. The developer posted a video of one such game online, but for me it was not to be.

To help with the quest for bonus points you start each game with five “shakes”. Simply shake the iPhone to use one and all of the arrows on all of the colorless squares will change directions. Be sure to use your shakes sparingly though as you can’t win any more as the game progresses, something that would have been nice. Your precious “Shakes” can also be used to perform an undo should you make a bonehead move. While this is a nice feature to have while hunting a perfect game, I found the penalty a bit too stiff for me.

While I would have liked to see some additional gameplay modes in the game to break up the monotony, Squares! delivered on it’s strategy puzzler promise. Games like this aren’t for everyone, but Squares! has become a great time killer for when I have a few spare minutes during the day. If you are looking for something unlike other puzzlers on the App Store Squares! is a decent choice, but it’s hard to recommend to everyone due to it’s lack of features or modes.

Released: April 11th 2009
Developer/Publisher: Publisher X
Verdict: Buy It ($1.99)
Pros: Easy to pick up, plenty of levels
Cons: Will suck away your time

The strength in depth of iPhone developers is what is making the platform such an attractive prospect, both for gamers and those who make them.

Magnificent Gadgets and Gizmos is the latest release from Publisher X (HydroTilt, BeerPong and the Zen Pinball series). A physics-based puzzle game that will keep you on your toes throughout.

Each level features a simple concept on first look, use a range of components which incorporate a “Goalon” (a pink orb) and get it from one side of the level to the next. Sound simple? You’d be surprised.

Featuring 44 levels of physics related puzzling, Magnificent Gadgets and Gizmos has kept me on my toes for the last week or so. The levels are split up between three difficulty levels, Easy, Medium and Hard, with the first concentrating on making sure the player can grasp all of the basics required to tackle the later (and much harder) levels.

Creation of the gadgets is very easy. Using GoWheels (green goes right-left, red going the opposite way) and a series of connectors – pipes, ropes and girders – simply tap where you want the components to go, make sure they’re connected correctly and then hit the play button. There are extras available on the way, but I won’t spoil any surprises for you here.

A particular aspect of the game that I liked was the ability to try out a range of gadgets on a level without being penalized for it. It’s as though you’re encouraged to use any knowledge of physics you have and build on that, while at the same time keeping some friendly competition open by giving you the chance to “show off” your gadgets to your friends, as well as save your creations for use later on.

If you do ever get super stuck at the levels, there is salvation – two types of hints are available on each level. The first gives you a slight nudge in the right direction, useful for when you’ve done a run through with a gadget and gotten pretty close to getting to the goal. The second gives you a slightly larger helping hand, creating a gadget that *almost* gets through the goal, meaning you still have to do some work to get there.

In later levels you’re presented with objects within the environment that you can interact with. These include explosive cannons, rumbling conveyor belts and even a few fans – amongst others.

Magnificent Gadgets and Gizmos is definitely a game you can just pick up and play, with the ability to skip ahead a few levels if one is particularly making things difficult for you. Whether you can put it down, is another thing. Definitely a game to buy if you enjoy puzzle games, and at $1.99, it’s something of a steal.

Released January 30 2009
Developer: Namco Bandai
Publisher: Namco Bandai
Verdict: Buy It

The App store is buried under acres of shovelware, gasping for a breath of fresh air, lest it be entombed in the same soil as the Nintendo Wii.  If the iPhone platform is ever to be a viable contender with other dedicated handhelds like the DS or PSP, it needs to cultivate top-tier titles that are more than just the current throw-away experiences; the App store needs a standout hardcore game. Time Crisis Strike just isn’t it.

Don’t get me wrong; it really, really wants to be. It’s got nostalgia going for it along with a solid arcade pedigree. This is enough to warrant a purchase from older, more hardcore gamers, even at $5.99. And for that audience, I can actively recommend giving Time Crisis Strike a try. The problem is that it’s far too difficult for anyone else.

Casual gaming be damned.

I applaud Namco for not taking the easy route and cashing in on some useless match-three puzzle game that everybody seems to be regurgitating these days. Time Crisis Strike looks and sounds better than a vast majority of iPhone games out there, and also requires more skill and strategy than most. Unfortunately, those ingredients alone don’t necessarily produce fun.

Time Crisis Strike is brutally challenging. It is one of the few games on the platform that demands your attention and is not something that can be played while standing in line, for example. For those who remember the arcade and console entries into the Time Crisis series, Strike will be instantly familiar. The game is a first-person shooter in which the player must duck behind cover to reload and escape incoming gun fire. You have thirty seconds to clear an area of enemies, and then are shuffled off to the next encounter. Shooting is accomplished by tapping the screen, and taking cover can be mapped to a forward or backwards tilt of the phone.

Here’s the problem: everything you do in Time Crisis Strike precludes you from seeing it. You can tell yourself that tilting the phone away to take cover makes sense since you shouldn’t be able to see enemies while hiding, but it won’t make it any less frustrating. Then there are the bad guys that jump in from off-screen and immediately shoot you, and ones that hop around a screen you can’t see because you’re fingers are all over it. The straw that breaks the camels back is the fact that ducking often takes longer than it does for the bullet to perforate your body. Putting the game on the easiest difficulty setting gives you one more “continue” but no respite from the onslaught.

Time Crisis Strike is for the hardest of hardcore, which is commendable in some respect, but makes it difficult to recommend to most people. It’s for the sort of person that still imports Dreamcast games and loves Japanese top-down shooters.

The arcade mode sports three levels, but I couldn’t reach the end. There is also a separate mode with several standalone missions, and I would love to tell you what those are like, but I haven’t been able to get past the first one. I have been playing games for more than fifteen years. The average iPhone user doesn’t stand a chance.