A Humble’s Numble is a number twister that picks up where other games left off – into the scary domain of mental math. Your goal is to add up numbers by drawing a path, horizontally or vertically, with your finger and the numbers should add up to the sum or ‘numbles’ on top of the screen – not an easy feat.

You can wean yourself first on the free play mode, which isn’t timed, but if you’re confident enough about your number calisthenics, you can go straight to Challenge mode. If you want to show off your nimble number prowess you can compete with your friends on Facebook or on the global leaderboard thanks to Open Feint integration.

The graphics are cheerful shade of blue, with the numbers enclosed in tear-shaped pods. At present there is only one type of skin, and it would be a nice add-on to have different skins for the numbers. I can straightaway tell you, that those tear-shaped pods are equivalent to the tears or sweat I shed racking up numbers in my head. Game controls are intuitive and pretty simple to learn. Since numbers are added up by tracing a path with your finger, it’s expected that the screen and interface would be responsive and it is. As you progress in the game, it gets a bit more complicated with the introduction of negative numbers.

The updates are promising – the introduction of more arithmetic functions (multiplication and division), different themes, multiplayer mode and online game mode. The nice fusion of arithmetic with the sensibilities of a good puzzle game make A Humble’s Numble a pleasant surprise. Even if you hate and fear Math as much as I do, you might be surprised how easy it is for you to love this game. The best part? It’s free. No need to be humble about A Humble’s Numble – it’s a smart little game to brag about.

Learn more about A Humble’s Numble for iPhone and iPod touch in the App Store

Of late, many new and promising TD/RTS games have begun exploring side scrolling action anew. These games get to showcase gorgeous visuals and play put differently from path-based, free form types. Such types have their own limitations and advantages, leaving it to innovative developers to offer something new and a little different.

Battle of Puppets emerges as one of these promising new offerings that foray into a popular and well represented genre. Here, the battle is played out on the theater stage. In Battle of Puppets, you manipulate a veritable showdown of rival puppets fighting to be the biggest Broadway draw in 22 different cities in the US. Basically it’s defend your castle and crush your opponent with your fighting marionettes.

Puppets have their respective strengths and weaknesses – the cheap, basic units are fast and easy to create while the more powerful ones take longer and cost more. On top of defeating marionette foes, you need to destroy set constructions, and of course, the enemy base itself. Likewise, your defensive strategy hinges on protecting your puppets and castle at all costs. The winner is the one who crosses over successfully to the other side of the battlefield and destroys the other’s castle decisively.

There is a level map, and different puppet armies to choose from. In keeping with the theme, these are all named after popular musicals with a unique set of puppets and set design. Ironically, you don’t get to hear the famed operas playing – instead a pseudo-classical soundtrack is substituted for these classics. Most of the information that you need is accessible on the screen. A tap pulls up the unit creation menu, another shows a mini-map identifying the location of your units as well as the enemy’s. You can easily view the battle by swiping the screen from left to right.

A complicating factor is that you can only have a certain number of fighting units on the battlefield at any given time. This means you have to plan and choose your units wisely. Another variable to look out for is the weather, which can pose serious challenges while offering rewards when successful.

There are 3 player profiles as well as game modes to explore: battleground, survival and fast battleground. There are likewise 3 levels of difficulty to choose from, and a training mode to practice gestures for using professions. ‘Professions’ are special power-ups that are activated using gestures, drawing shapes that temporarily stun advancing enemies.

I’m waiting for online scoreboard and social media integration, as this game is bound for that destination. While there’s enough action to keep you busy, I look forward to more levels and puppet armies – even at a higher price tag. A multiplayer option would be fantastic, and this game’s replay value would skyrocket. (See Ver 1.2 udpates!)

What I appreciate most about this castle vs castle game is that it forces one to strategize properly instead of just sending off random units here and there. As you progress in the game, you will appreciate the fine differences among the different puppet armies and their units and you will be forced to plan accordingly.

Beautiful, unique and compelling, Battle of Puppets is a rare original game that turns a familiar genre into a work of art. The uniquely drawn, colorful puppets are done with clarity, vibrancy and flair and the animated cut out set props are unique to each location, making each battle truly a big production.

BTruly deserving to be on the App Store’s New and Noteworthy section, Battle of Puppets gives a dazzling, starmaking performance that makes it one of the best iPhone and iPod Touch games to emerge in 2010.

Learn more about the Battle of puppets for iPhone and iPod touch in the App Store

Most hidden object games are visual treasures unto themselves – however, for far too long, they have stayed within the familiar bounds of the genre. Most, if not nearly all focus on simply picking out objects in a room from a list of items to be found. Usually the room itself is littered by completely unrelated and odd objects to add to the confusion. Some offer twists such as a mini-game component or inventory elements familiar to RPG games. However, at the end of the day, the basic formula is unchanged – you tap ad infinitum and you have move from one puzzle to the next without anything new being done, really. For far too long, an otherwise interesting genre is rather static.

It comes as a pleasant surprise and a breath of fresh air that Alawar’s latest release, The Treasures of Mystery Island, offers something new and a little different for hidden object games.

The core of this game is the adventure experienced through the eyes of Alex, a pilot whose cargo plane crashes and finds himself in an unfamiliar and unknown place where he is rescued by one of the natives. For his survival and escape from Mystery Island, he has to find objects for the natives, return these objects to their proper locations and put together items that will aid him in his survival and escape from the island.

The hidden object mechanics holds the game together, but done with a greater degree of difficulty and with an interesting twist. Instead of cobbling together a list of objects and moving from one room to the next without a discernible purpose, Mystery Island makes object hunting and collection a new and challenging experience.

Scattered all over the room and cleverly concealed among other objects are pieces and shards of the objects you’re tasked to look for. Looking for a sliver of glass here, a piece of feather there to put together a jar or a feather mask is an incredibly challenging, often frustrating but rewarding experience. Fortunately there’s no time limit, and you also have unlimited but rechargeable hints to aid you when you need it the most. Once you’ve found all the objects in a particular room, it doesn’t stop there. In all the rooms of a particular level are other objects that need to be returned to their proper places in order to unlock mini-games that when you play successfully, will yield items you can use for your own escape. Thus you move from room to room, keeping an eye out not only for items that you need to assemble to form a single piece, but also to check if your inventory has items that you can return to their proper places. Now and then there are items you need to restore to their locations to perform actions that will allow you to put back another item. Some items, when returned to their proper places, yield vital clues to your whereabouts and means to escape.

After accomplishing the mini-games, you also get to win trophies for various achievements. An added objective is collecting items for various characters in order to collect their business cards.

Although most hidden object games are, by definition, a sight to behold, The Treasures of Mystery Island adds a bit of a twist with animated backgrounds. The in-game sounds and effects blend nicely and evoke the rhythm and exoticism of the locale. More importantly, it’s the gameplay that stands out, giving object hunting a sense of purpose and depth to the experience. In a sense, this game is a real adventure that offers exciting twists and turns to the storyline through its complex gameplay.

A more in-depth tutorial or enhancing the help section will assist in navigating the complexities of this game. It took me a while and some research online before I was able to fully grasp and appreciate the overall mechanics.

With more than 20 episodes and more than a dozen mini-games, The Treasures of Mystery Island offers hours of purposeful and absorbing gameplay. It might be a bit complex for newbies to the hidden object genre, but it’s certainly one game that fans and newcomers alike should have.

The Treasures of Mystery Island is a genuinely thrilling adventure that offers a refreshing twist on the hidden object genre. It sets the standard for other hidden object games to follow.

Learn more about The Treasures of Mystery Island for iPhone and iPod touch in the App Store

Slug wars is all about winning, right in the lane of fire. Armed with indomitable army snails and slugs, the basic objective of this game is to wipe out the enemy coming from the other lane. Played out on the garden battlefield divided into 3 lanes, at your disposal are 8 different kinds of soldiers, with different strengths, speeds and ranges of attack.

Slug Wars follows the basic tenets of the tower defense/real time strategy genre – there are fast and easy units to create and mobilize, medium-range types that do a little more damage and the super weapons that do maximum damage. The occasional flower blooming on the field is the currency of unit deployment and survival. Since the game plays out on three lanes only, your focus will be on managing your queue of soldiers, making sure they are equal or superior to, the enemy’s.

The control scheme is fairly simple. You use the slider to select which unit you want to deploy and tapping on the lane of your choice to send units. At the same time, you can view what the opponent is likewise sending out to meet you since the other side of the field is a mirror image of your own. From here, you can anticipate which units to use and when.

There are three basic modes: Campaign, Skirmish and Slug it Out. Skirmish is all out war with the AI player while Slug It Out allows two human players to fight it out. The tricky part in Slug Wars is managing the queues. This game has a strong offensive component – one of its plus points and you need to gain ground as you not only push back the enemy, you have to dominate the lane in order to capture his side. There are only three chances to survive the onslaught, and after a while it gets harder to keep track of all the activities happening in each lane.

Graphics and sounds play a pivotal role and making Slug Wars stand out not among only similar games, but even as against the seminal Plants vs Zombies which arrived recently. The slugs are cute, funny and feisty creatures – armed with salt shakers, lobbing pellets and attacking with gusto. Voice acting makes a huge difference here, as the distinct and funny battle cry of each slug makes the game a friendly and hilarious assault on the senses – “Yamler?” will find its way into your head for the rest of the day after playing the game. I enjoy the sound effects very much, but some in-game music or the option to play my own music would also be a good option to have.

While Slug Wars is a rip roaring experience the first few times you play it, it still needs some depth and variety in order to effectively compete against an ever growing TD/RTS genre. Even with different levels of difficulty, it’s not that difficult to play in part owing to the lack of variety in the gameplay. It needs to up the ante in terms of challenge – for example, it deviates from most TD/RTS games in the sense that there’s no recharging time for each unit: a simple, yet effective stumbling block in the deployment of units. More lanes in the higher levels would also be a good addition. The slider controls need some minor tweaking so it’s easier to monitor unit deployment – highlighting the unit deployed to confirm that the slug has been sent out to the queue will minimize confusion and make queue management a lot easier.

There’s no option yet to upgrade units and weapons, as well as power ups, more obstacles and additional twists to the gameplay. The developers have promised to incorporate user feedback and I am looking forward to a massive update. In this update, I hope to see Open Feint and social media integration, as well as achievements to be unlocked.

Overall, Slug Wars has a huge potential to become a breakout TD/RTS game with some enhancements and updates. As it is, it’s definitely a game worth having and the continuous updates worth waiting for.

Learn more about Slug Wars for iPhone and iPod touch in the App Store

Tune Runner is the latest title from acclaimed indie wonder Appy Entertainment, known for Facefighter and Zombie Pizza, both unique and visually stunning games. Tune Runner is a music game that breaks out of the mold of rhythm games and also presents itself as a unique experiment on the still nascent in-app purchase business model.

Gesture-based, the objective is to draw different shapes corresponding to the ones that appear on the screen to keep the Groov-EE, the dancing robot, dancing. Using tracks from one’s own music library categorized by artist and title, unique levels are generated for each track played. The player can also opt to try out recommended tracks from the Hot Tunes section or the featured indie group Angels and Airwaves.

The game starts out leisurely and ends in frantic fingerplay. A series of correctly drawn 15 shapes unlocks a bonus round which speeds everything up and continues until the chain is broken or until the song ends. The absence of modes of difficulty will encourage one to stick to short songs for easy play and longer ones for a real challenge.

One play is equivalent to one battery to recharge Groov-EE, and Tune Runner only provides 10 batteries. Still, one can fully enjoy the game and continue playing by clicking on ads or playing a mini-game to recharge the batteries. Meanwhile, battery packs for longer plays are sold as in-app purchases: 40 for $0.99, 99 for $1.99 and the ad-free full version Fusion Pack is $2.99. With the options available, it’s easy enough to just buy a few batteries and hold out on the full version if one doesn’t intend to play it often, or take the plunge depending on one’s perceived value of what the game is really worth.

There is something endearing about Groov-EE the dancing robot and the randomly generated themes that seem to reflect the beat or rhythm of the chosen track.

Tune Runner’s plus points also include using one’s one music library as in-game content, online leaderboard and social media integration via Open Feint, and fairly challenging gameplay. The dancing robot is fun to watch, and the sound effects nicely blend in with the track that’s playing. Personally, I found my interest renewed in my neglected music collection after playing Tune Runner. The game serves as a nice and easy quick fix on a commute – I can listen to my own music and have fun with it at the same time.

I like that one can enjoy Tune Runner free although at some inconvenience. However, there are a number of cons as well. While I do not really mind playing the ad-supported versions, some of the ads are a bit jarring and may turn off some players. The in-app purchases, especially the full version, need to offer something more enticing to the players other than just longer or unlimited gameplay. A clearer and fuller explanation about the battery and recharging system will greatly clear up the confusion and encourage more players to upgrade.

The graphics and gesture controls are not as polished as Appy’s previous titles, and the gameplay might feel repetitive after a while. Its replay value can be enhanced by lending more variety to the experience – more shapes, power-ups, different game modes, and more mini-games.

Flawed but charming and engaging enough to earn a place in one’s iDevice, Tune Runner is an enjoyable casual game with a lot of potential for further growth. Tune Runner is a bold endeavor on various levels, and I appreciate the fact that a creative and dynamic indie team is taking these risks.

Learn more about Tune Runner for iPhone and iPod touch in the App Store

In human terms, Pik is a regular Joe, an ordinary miner doing ordinary menial tasks as part of his work when his planet, a remote mining colony called Dustbucket-5, is rocked by a series of unexplained mass explosions after bombs fall from the unknown dirigibles up in the sky. This regular Joe of an alien somehow survives the mass destruction and embarks on an important mission to discover the truth, making Pik an unlikely hero in the original iPhone/iPod Touch adventure Pik’s Revenge.

At the core of this RPG is a mystery-adventure played out in quests – one type is closed and complete after doing several tasks, while the other is directly related to Pik’s ‘Revenge’ mission. Pik’s needs are simple – earn enough gold through odd jobs and quests, constantly replenish its health and fend off monsters using weapons that can be picked up on the ground or purchased.

Pik’s Revenge takes place in the future, in another galaxy not unlike our own. Pik moves around, in side-scroller fashion, from point A to point B, picking up various objects (gold, ore, plants, and the like) and entering different buildings and establishments. Pik is essentially free to roam and explore each region, perform quests and do odd jobs for money, health or more points to level up.

In every zone is a smattering of shops, hotels and diners. There’s also a requisite dumpsite, a transport hub and other special areas uncovered through quests.

Establishments open and close at various times, with work accessible only within a particular window of opportunity for the day. In some regions, a work permit is required in order to apply for jobs, as well as transport tickets to travel.

Weapons can only be used once, thus the constant appearance of alien foes means constantly foraging for or buying extra to always be prepared. Constantly decreasing health levels is also a perpetual challenge – if you don’t take the easy way out and buy food or medical packs.

The game starts off slow, and takes some time to really build up on its more intriguing mystery elements. If you are as impatient as I am when starting a new game, I suggest that you take some time to enjoy the film clips and comic book storytelling to acquaint yourself fully with Pik’s quest for revenge.

The side-scrolling and simple quests can feel repetitive at first largely because when you start playing it, you just enter buildings randomly and do quests without quite seeing the big picture yet. Once you move up and you take on more enemies with a variety of weapons, then you’ll appreciate the transition from Pik’s ho-hum-town to that anticipation of bigger, meaner things to come.

I find the side-scrolling controls a bit awkward to work with, despite the customizable location of the arrows and how these can be hidden through the options menu. A single tap will automatically get Pik to move, and it’s only interrupted when he stops to pick up something or fend off aliens. The limited controls often dampen the exploratory feel of the game, not to mention making power-ups like speed enhancing sneakers not as useful as they could be. Perhaps an alternative control scheme which allows Pik a little more movement – jump around, for example – would add some depth and perspective to the game making it feel a little less linear and more dynamic.

I love the gritty sci-fi noir aesthetics of this game – a heady mix of cartoony creatures, and hand-illustrated scenes set in an odd, dystopian future. The geeky humor might not be apparent to some, but the store signs, for one, pay homage to sci-fi film classics such as The Blade Runner and Soylent Green, while puns are scattered all over the place.The soundtrack is just as odd yet mixes well with the game, giving it a strange and dreamlike feel.

The game offers local and global scoreboard and social media integration via Facebook connect. It would be great if Twitter were available in the succeeding versions – I can imagine posting mini-updates to let friends know where I am in the game and what quest I accomplished. With three levels of difficulty available – the game offers replay value in beating the scores and completing more quests. Mini-clips that are part of the game can also be accessed as separate clips in the options section.

While the rest of the game feels surprisingly conventional in terms of control and gameplay, the advantage is that for the complexity and depth of storyline, the game is actually pick up and play. You can dive right in and start exploring. It’s casual enough to play for a few minutes to an hour or more (I’m siding with the latter). The succeeding episodes prove to be very exciting as things get more and more complicated as Pik is closer to unraveling the truth.

Pik proves to be quite an endearing hero – with minimal gestures, and his biosuit mask registering emotions. Wordless as our hero is, Pik’s Revenge is a darkly gorgeous, original RPG adventure game that is a testament to the vast potential of indie titles.

Learn more about Pik’s Revenge for iPhone and iPod touch in the App Store