Zombie Death Quota

 Title: Zombie Death Quota

Developers: Edelica Computer Entertainment

Xbox Live Marketplace Page

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I love FPS, but I don't like zombies. But, I was drawn to Zombie Death Quota because of it being a zombie-slaying game in a boxed world similar to Minecraft. At first, I thought it was just another copy, but I was very wrong. It has NO building mechanism. The only things to do here is shoot zombies to death. But, there's a twist in the fact that you have a quota of dead zombies you have to achieve before passing the missions. Throughout the world you'll find sub-machine guns, sniper rifles and other weapons that work quite well, but you'll also find zombies that'll charge at you as soon as they spot you, or as soon as you shoot them. After the quota of zombie kills and the quota of toxin containers are finished, you're not entirely done, because you have to survive until your evacuation method, a helicopter, arrives. But, it doesn't arrive where you are or even where you spawned, but at one location, to which you must head. I personally loved the game, but it might not be for everyone. It needs improvement, but it’s really good.

Xenominer

Title: Xenominer

Developers: Gristmill Studios

Official Page

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Ever since Minecraft was crafted, so to speak, many people have been trying to improve on the legendary formula. One of the results is Xenominer. Xenominer is an indie game in the X-Box Live Marketplace and it draws many aspects from Minecraft and improves some of them, but also has many that are not very good. Among the good things is the fact that the world is, allegedly, endless. It’s based on a moon, so it’s filled with craters and glowing substances that are, obviously, not Earthen. These glowing substances, alongside A.I. servant bots, make the game quite interesting, but its downfalls may just outweigh it. The HUD covers most of the screen and seems to be a copy of Halo's. The character's life support is at the top, comprised of Health, Battery and Oxygen. At the bottom is the Item List alongside other things that are way too tiny to be understood. Problem is, these two things make the actual field of vision extremely limited which makes it hard to play, because you have to constantly look down to see where you're walking. Another problem in the game is that the field of vision is also dark. You can barely see five blocks ahead of you unless there's a glowing block before you. On a good note, the sky above the landscape is extremely beautiful. Overall, Xenominer is a game with extremely high potential, but it still needs a lot of polishing.

Zombie Driver HD (Xbox Live Arcade)

Title: Zombie Arcade HD

Developer: Exor Studios

Platforms: Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Android (Tegra based devices)

Rating: M for blood and gore, language and violence

Gameplay: Single-Player, Vehicular Combat

Official Page

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Lately, there have been many Zombie-themed games, movies and similar things, and the X-Box Live Arcade isn't an exception. One of the games that I found there was Zombie Driver HD. It is an extremely gory game (not apt for children) that delivers epic zombie-killing in an extremely unique way: Driving. You literally drive a taxi around a zombie-infected city, picking up power-ups such as a machine gun, flame thrower and rocket launcher, and fulfilling missions for the military. From time to time, as prices for carrying out missions and kill countless of zombies, you get new cars and money, the latter being used to improve the speed, toughness and such of the cars. Though having a pretty good basis, this game is not for those who prefer games without bad-words, as it has many, and the camera is viewed from above and from quite far away, making the zombies not-so-visible. The game is good to kill time, but I wouldn't suggest it cheerfully like I would do about other games.

Happy Street (iPhone App)

Title: Happy Street

Developers: Godzilab

Category: Games

Cost: Freemium

Rated: 4+

For more information, and to download this app, go to its iTunes Preview Page.

STEPH SAID

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Happy Street is literally the cutest, most colorful game I’ve had in my iPod. The cheerful, intriguing characters and the simplicity of the game make it entertaining.

In this game you have a street and you have to fill it with houses, shops and decorations. Each house has a different set of personalized animal tenants: from pirates to cowboys to robots. Each house comes with an accompanying set of shops to buy separately: the pirates like to buy in the bazaar, the cowboys in the saloon and the robots in the watchmaker’s. And with a birthday cake you can change the characters’ appearance.

However, Happy Street doesn’t have a full background story that keeps developing throughout the game, but it constantly gives you quests to fulfill, which develop a small standalone story.

It can be played offline! (Having an iPod instead of an iPhone makes this a big deal for me.) Nonetheless, having an internet connection when you play will give you an opportunity to accelerate your progress, and to enjoy certain parts of the game only available online. The former may be achieved by asking your Game Center friends – who also play Happy Streets— to help you by sending you stuff. Need a rope to finish a quest but don’t have the materials? Ask a friend to send you one! The latter involves visiting these friends I mentioned and constructing a Hotel so your friends’ characters may visit your street. Also, to get the daily bonus you need to be connected to the internet. These are not necessary to enjoy the game but will surely help.

What I liked the most about it (besides the availability of offline playing), is how easy you can obtain Flooz, the premium currency. Generally, freemium games give you a gem or two once you reach the next level, and that’s it. In Happy Street you will win Flooz when you reach the next level, you will get at least one in the daily bonus, you can get up to three Flooz a day by visiting your friends, you will get one almost every time you finish a quest and you can get some more in certain mini-games. One day I made 17 Flooz! So to buy the premium houses and shops you don’t need to invest money, only time. Nevertheless, this game is so beautiful, unique, original and easy to play that I will spend a few bucks in it, just for the sake of supporting the developers.

Warm Bodies (Movie)

Title: Warm Bodies

Year: 2013

Director: Jonathan Levine

Rating by MPAA: PG-13 for zombie violence and some language

Synopsis: After R (a highly unusual zombie) saves Julie from an attack, the two form a relationship that sets in motion a sequence of events that might transform the entire lifeless world.

Official Page and IMDb Page

Official Trailer

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When I hear Zombies, I think halloween. When I hear drama, I just roll my eyes. When I heard the two together, I was intrigued. I went to see Warm Bodies and, honestly, it was really good. It had a great cast and was a very uniquely made story, with magnificent make up and visual effects. Many funny parts dot the movie and the obvious cheesy moments too, but it had suspense and action and even a bit of gore. After all, you can't have zombies without gore. This love story based on a post-apocalyptic world of zombies makes for a great movie to watch for both guys and girls because of its excellent mixture of action, romance, drama and comedy.  In fact, it's a movie even my mum enjoyed, and she's not into comedy nor zombies. Here's hoping that other loves stories follow this movie's example going forward.

STEPH SAID

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When I first heard about Warm Bodies, about what it’s about, I decided to not watch it. I didn’t even watch the trailer. I don’t like zombies or horror movies, and after Twilight, I’m skeptic about love stories involving a fantastical creature. However, I was very surprised with, and intrigued by, the amount of guys that told me they wanted to watch it. I mean, if a guy wants to watch a love story there may be a catch somewhere. I decided to watch the trailer. Two days later I was in the theater watching the movie.

It is everything you’d expect from the trailers, and more. It has the perfect combination of drama, comedy, gore and love. The dramatic parts made me shed a few tears and the comedic parts had me laughing out loud. What was more amazing was how subtly the movie changed from one to the other. Usually, movies are funny at first then, get all dramatic. Warm Bodies kept moving back and forth. This is why, I think, it attracted such a large and varied audience: it wasn’t a comedy with a happily ever after nor a drama with a few jokes, it was a perfect mixture of both genres.

The story’s general development is foreseeable; nevertheless, it is entertaining to watch. On top of it being entertaining, some unexpected plot twists will keep you at the edge of your seat.

Nicholas Hoult excelled in his performance. He managed to look dead and still be funny and portray emotions. His character made the movie likable and, surprisingly, very relatable. Trying to seem “normal”, to fit in and to not freak out the girl/boy of your dreams is, I think, every teenager’s goal.

The Simpsons: Tapped Out

Title: The Simpsons: Tapped Out

Developers: Electronic Arts

Category: Freemium, Games

Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iOS 4.3 or later. This app is optimized for iPhone 5.

Rating: Rated 12+ for the following: Infrequent/Mild Horror/Fear Themes, Infrequent/Mild Simulated Gambling, Infrequent/Mild Cartoon or Fantasy Violence, Infrequent/Mild Profanity or Crude Humor, Infrequent/Mild Alcohol, Tobacco, or Drug Use or References

For more information and to download the app go to its iTunes Preview Page.

STEPH SAID

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Review:

This has become my favorite game app. If you like The Simpsons, you will this app too. The game starts with Homer playing with his MyPad at work. He was so focused on the game that he didn’t notice a red alert and, consequently, did nothing about it. There was a nuclear explosion and everything was wiped out Springfield: every house, every shop, every tree. Your task is to rebuild Springfield.

What is great about this game is that it looks like the series. Every house and store looks exactly as it does in the cartoon. Also, as you keep leveling up and adding houses and stores, more characters arrive at your Springfield. You can hear the characters talk and you can give them specific tasks that go in hand with their personalities and hobbies. For example, you can make Lisa study, babysit Flander’s kids or play the Sax; while Apu can either work endless shifts in the Kwik-E-Mart, feed the octuplets or pray to Ganesh.

Something that I love about the characters is their constant breaking of the fourth wall. They talk about the game they’re in and about the player. I find it hilarious.

Even though the app is free, you can pay real money to buy in-game currency: Donuts. The Donuts are used to buy special things or places or to speed up a process. They are useful but expensive. The good news is you don’t need Donuts to play the game. You will earn some donuts when you level up or when or complete certain tasks, but I don’t think there will be a lot of Donuts to earn.

The game gives you the option of signing into Origin. I strongly recommend this for many reasons. First, your progress will be saved online and can be accesses through any iOS device. If your iPod dies (like it happened to mine), you can rest assured that you game is safe and you’ll be able to play it again from where you left of. Also, when you sign up for Origin you receive two donuts, and you’ll receive five donuts when you first invite a friend. Which leads me to the third reason, you can add “friends” and visit their Springfields and earn money and experience while you’re at it. I wrote “friends” because sometimes you don’t even have to know the person. If you read the app’s reviews on iTunes you’ll see many players giving their username and asking to add them. And you can, and may, add them. That way you both will have another friend to visit. So, if you don’t know anyone that plays this game, or even if you do, you can these people.

You can also add me if you wish: smpm22.

iPhone Apps - Color Splash (Free)

iPhone Apps - Color Splash

Knowing that you can add color splash for free in Photobucket (you can read the tutorial on Online Tech Tips), I decided to find the best free app to Color Splash my pictures directly from my iPod. This is something fairly easy to do that can be done for free in a computer, so, I was not going to pay to be able to do it on my iPod. Thus, I downloaded the most popular free apps. Most of them offer Color Splash for free but there are premium versions of these apps that have more effects and features. I used the picture in my About Me page and colored the same thing (my watch) with all the apps, to be able to see the difference. 

In general, some apps wouldn’t even let me use my pictures (Colors Pro HD); with the free version you could only use a default picture. With others I could upload my own photos, but their controls leave much to be desired. For example, in Color Effects and Dash of Color you can't control the brush size; with TouchOfColor Free you can't actually do anything properly; in ColorUp Lite, when you zoom, the app becomes unresponsive; with ColorBlast! Lite you can only undo unce (otherwise is a nice app); with iQuickSplash - Splash Colors! you have to select the region you want with color and then the app edits it, if you don't like it, you have to go back and edit the region you have selected; and in Paint FX Free you can do the opposite: paint the picture gray and leave untouched the part of the photo you want to have color, but once something is gray, you can't easily bring it back to its original color.

In the end the best app turned out to be Illusion Hand Free. Unfortunately, this app uses OpenGL ES 2.0 and is not supported by every iPod or iPhone. That’s why I will also review the second best app: Photo Splash.

Illusion Hand Free

iTunes Preview Page

Requirements (written by The Developers): "Illusion Hand Free uses OpenGL ES 2.0 technology which is only supported on iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4. Unfortunately iPhone 3G and other earlier models are NOT supported. It's the hardware limitation. Sorry for the inconvenience!"

Rating: 

Review:

I fell so in love with this app, I’m thinking about buying the premium version! I still haven’t because I don’t know if I’ll use it often. If I do I’ll post a review.

Illusion Hand Free does what it is supposed to and more. It has some options and controls I wasn’t expecting but found myself missing while I was trying the other apps.

The first app that I tried had a button to move the photo. With Illusion Hand Free you need to use two fingers to move the picture around. At first I didn’t like this because I would use one finger to move the picture and ended up coloring it. It took me some time to adjust, but after I did I saw the brilliance behind it. If you have a button to move the photo you have to click the menu, click the button, move the picture, click the menu again, unselect the button and then you can keep coloring. With Illusion Hand Free you are coloring, use two fingers to move the picture and keep coloring.

Illusion Hand Free also has a brush picker. This allows to choose the size and saturation of the brush and it gives you the opportunity to choose between sharp or blurred edges.

But, what makes this app different is that it has a “CSI lamp (to see what you paint in red light)” and the ability to “Take a snapshot as a draft (to be modified later)”. The lamp is useful when what you’re coloring that has something light, dark or of the same color, right next to it. When the lamp is on what you have in color will turn red and you’ll be able to see if you have painted outside of the borders. This feature was a nice surprised and turned out to be super useful. In the photo I was editing my watch has a shiny surface that reflected my skin color. At first I wasn’t sure where my arm ended and the watch began. This feature helped me a lot.

The snapshot feature is great because you can save what you have done up until that point and finish later.

All of these features are divided between a top and a bottom menu. This menus can be hidden by touching the picture one time.

This app also give you the opportunity to choose the resolution in which you want the photo to be saved and to share your creations from within the app with Facebook, Twitter and Flickr. I haven’t tried this last feature because I don’t like sharing my passwords anywhere.

Photo Splash

iTunes Preview Page

Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Requires iOS 4.3 or later. This app is optimized for iPhone 5.

Rating: 

Review:

This is a really good app; it has the basics features to do what it says. You can choose the brush size, undo and share to Instagram and Facebook or through email. In this app two fingers are needed to move the picture.

Something that this app has, that Illusion Hand Free doesn’t, is the ability to edit pictures from you Facebook albums.

However, this app lacks the "CSI Lamp" and "Snapshot" features and has advertisements. It has an ad banner bellow the top menu. Also, the menus and the ad banner cannot be hidden.

This is a good app, it does what it’s supposed too. But it doesn’t excel at it.