iPad

Jetpack Joyride

| trent

Contrary to what many academics might believe, research students can’t constantly work on their research. There is always a need to try and do something that isn’t the constant writing, thinking or data analysis. Of late, my choice of break has been Halbrick’s Jetpack Joyride.

I normally don’t blog about or review games, but in this case I think it is worth it. Originally the game was 99¢ or $1.99, but the developers of the game made it free. Given how much I play and enjoy the game, the new price of nothing makes me feel a little bit guilty (I did buy an in-app purchase to support Halfbrick on that feeling). The game is s side-scrolling, action, arcade style game with simple controls and simple gameplay. Just try and fly “Barry” (the main character at the centre of the game’s super-involved story) as far as you can collecting coins, tokens and achievements along the way, while trying to avoid comic death by “zappers” and missiles.

Jetpack Joyride - Angry Birds
Jetpack Joyride - Angry Birds crossover?

The game, while straight-forward, can be a massive time sink. The “one more try” factor in this game is huge and the constantly changing missiones (game objectives) give the game excellent replay value. The choice of “Barry” as the character’s name is as Australian as a thong-wielding, flanny-wearing, roo-riding bogan; but I love the choice of name.

Machine Gun Jetpack
Jetpack the steampunk way – The machine gun jectpack

The one thing that I would change about the game is the ability for the game to synchronise across iDevices using GameCentre. With the older version of the app, I kept loosing my achievements projects and had to restart the game each time. There was no way to recover achievements or game progress. I know other games sync to GameCentre and allow you to restore on other devices. I’d like to see Halfbrick to do this; although they just released an update that seems to fix the problem of progress loss.

My recommendation:Your a fool if you don’t try this game that’s available for free (and is developed by an Australian company).

Check out these pads!

| trent

Now it’s my turn to wade into the Apple tablet blogging foray. Generally I was surprised that more than I predicted came true, especially in terms of pricing.

But first, I must comment on the name. Apple didn’t call it the iTablet, iSlate or iBook. Rather, Steve and his friends go and call it iPad. Now Steven, get some women in your workshops and focus groups. Never name your product so that it can easily be made fun of. Besides, it’s one letter off iPod, and an unusual accent could easily make the two sound the same. Please rename it soon Steve.

The device itself features classic Apple styling, it is sexy and eye catching. Two important things wer missing: a landscape oriented dock port, and a webcam. I can live without an extra dock port, but a webcam? What? Let us hope that Wired’s story is correct (see http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/02/apple-ipad-may-ship-with-webcam/). I’d want to use this thing for Skype, and I would be devestated if Skype didn’t work or there was no webcam, or worse both.

The screen resolution is perplexing (4:3 aspect ratio). The PA-Semi designed A4 processor sounds interesting. The apps look sexy. iBooks looks like a new place for me to blow iTunes credit. iWork for iPad looks innovative, but somewhat limited. The keyboard dock looks good, as does the ‘very nice’ Apple-designed case. This could be my netbook, if it can impress me.

The price though was the nicest surprise. I was expecting to pay much more, but it seems $499 is an excellent starting point for the device. It is US dollars, but the Australian Dollar is strong, so the price difference should be very reasonable. Fingers crossed.

Overall, I want to see a little more content and try out the device before I decide difinitively if I like it or not. Here is hoping Apple has one more thing up it’s sleve before shipping date.