The Week That Was: 22/05/10 – 28/05/10

Proudly sponsored by Chillingo Ltd – A weekly round-up on the latest and greatest apps to have hit the App Store. Hit the jump for more!

Pirate’s Treasure is out now on the App Store ”“ $1.99

We have a brand new sponsor, @Chillingo! Look out for this segment to be continued for months to come. Thanks guys!

The week I have been waiting for arrived, bringing the a whole 720mb of Splinter Cell Conviction to my iPhone. This is by far the biggest game I have had to download, only beaten by the GPS app TomTom. With Gameloft getting games this big, it is a real step towards console standard games. Sadly once you spend the first 10 hours of this week finishing Splinter Cell and waiting for Prince of Persia to come out this week, we received some other excellent games to play. Out of no where came another huge game by Activision, the Nintendo DS hit game Phoenix Wright and the game that started it all, Prince of Persia Retro. There is a lot to get through this week so I had to pick the best of the best, check out my thoughts below.  

Splinter Cell Conviction – $9.99

One of my all time favourite games is Splinter Cell on the Xbox. Gameloft have taken on the hard task of bringing a decent version of Splinter Cell Conviction to the App Store. Most of their games range between 250-350mb yet they have doubled the size of Splinter Cell to make their biggest game ever. This game is beyond impressive, featuring 11 huge levels and all the special stealth skills Sam Fisher has in the console games. I haven’t seen really good reports about this game, but seeing how it is on the iPhone I am absolutely amazing at how good this game is.

You play through this game as Sam Fisher and his friend for 2 levels as you try to rescue your daughter Sarah. You must sneak around in the dark taking out enemies with an array of weapons and skills. This game has a few problems such as the guards being extremely dumb and will stay so unless they aren’t killed in one shot. This aside, the game makes you think about what you need to do and not just fire away like crazy. Sam Fisher is the modern day Assassin’s Creed and makes for a damn good iPhone game. This game is worth the higher price of $9.99 that Gameloft don’t often go for.

Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart 2 – $9.99

The biggest game on day 1 of the App Store was Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart. The game was impressive and one of the must have titles, but slowly as the quality of games rose poor old Crash was looking like it was lacking quite a bit. Out of no where we have received a sequel to the popular game, fixing many of the issues from the original game. Many of the fixes are a huge advancement in graphics and lots of new game modes. While the game gets a bit laggy when lots of drivers are on the screen and one oversteer can make or break your race this game is once again top of the pack.

After Mario Kart, Crash Bandicoot is probably the most well known kart game. All the characters we know and love are back as you race through 12 new tracks and multiple game modes. The biggest addition is multiplayer where you can race your friends over WiFi. This game follows the classic action packed race with powerups and apples galore. This sequel brings back everything I love from the Crash Bandicoot series yet was missing from the original game. This game is perfect for the entire family, with easy to use controls and fun gameplay. This game has the Activision perfection we come to expect.

AVP Gold Beach Volleyball – $3.99

While I am playing every sport from Table Tennis to Cricket on my iPhone I have never found a decent volleyball game. It seems if anyone was going to make a decent game it would be the official Volleyball association. The game seems to have it all with decent graphics and well thought out touch controls, but the finishing touches are lacking on this game. The controls are hard to get used to, but once mastered the game is far too easy to win. Also at times the camera angle doesn’t allow you to see which player needs to hit the ball, if the control buttons work at all.

There are no tournaments in AVP Beach Volleyball, something which I would have considered a must for this game. Instead there are two game modes, normal and time attack. This game is fun for the first few games but with no achievements or new people to unlock it leaves you wanting more. AVP just haven’t delivered enough content to make this game worthy to buy. If you are extremely desperate for a volleyball game then this is as good as it gets. I do suggest waiting for either an update or another volleyball game as this disappointed me.

Other Notable Releases this week Include:

Phoenix Wright by Capcom

Prince of Persia Retro by Ubisoft

MTV Star Factory by Real Networks

Cubed Rally Racer by Jared Bailey

Stay tuned next week for the 32nd installment of ‘The Week That Was’. If you have any suggestions to improve the segment please either email me at damon@razorianfly.com or submit a comment below. Thanks! 😀