Tag: Lord of the rings - middle-earth defense »

It's not often that we have four major new games released on the same day, but that's exactly what happened yesterday morning. Thanks to a confluence of events and the alignment of the planets, RAGE, Lord of the Rings Middle Earth Defense, Splaterhouse and Mushihimesama Bug Panic are all available right now for iOS devices. Forget holiday shopping for others, time to buy yourself some gifts!

RAGE is the latest offering from John Carmack and id Software, the folks behind the incredibly popular Doom franchise. The game finds players in a post-apocalyptic game show where they must survive waves of mutants and scrounge up enough money to win their freedom. This should be a nice appetizer for the console version of the game, which is slated to be released in September of next year. By the time that edition arrives you should be well-versed in all the different ways to slay mutants.

Just in case you were wondering, no, the Lord of the Rings franchise will never go away. This latest entry takes on the tower defense genre with an iPad game centered on protecting Middle Earth from Sauron. Players can positions and upgrade heroes to fight the hordes as well as call on allies to thin the enemy ranks. If you've been missing Aragorn and company then here's your chance to jump right back into Tolkien's fantasy realm.

How far would you go to save the woman you loved? Would you put on a cursed mask and enter a mansion full of demons who hunger for your flesh and only exist to cause you pain and suffering? Or would you instead just remember that there are plenty of fish in the sea and she was kind of a nag anyway? If you chose the former then welcome to Splatterhouse, where senseless violence has never been so fulfilling. If you chose the latter then congratulations, you are a sane and reasonable human being.

First off, if you can pronounce the game's name correctly, you win a dollar. Once you've struggled with typing the title into the App Store search (good luck AutoCorrect) you can gain access to a great new update on a classic arcade game. One warning though, you have to have the absolute latest model iPhone, iPod or iPad to play this game, otherwise it simply won't work on your device. Thankfully a warning is posted prominently on the app description so hopefully there will be minimal cases of people downloading the game and then not being able to play it.

In addition to Magic Life and Gun Bros. launching soon, there are a few other games we got to take a look at recently. All of them coming later this year from Glu.

Toyshop Adventures - launching late September, price: free

This is a cute puzzle / platformer based in a toy shop. The owner of the shop has literally lost his marbles in the store and you, a animated toy, are tasked with finding them. While mainly a platformer, there are some puzzle elements to get you through the levels and find every marble. While not as deep and with no announced customization options, the game does have some elements that remind me of Little Big Planet. The camera angles / 2.5D graphics and the overall fun, toy-like qualities remind me of LBP.

Toyshop Adventures will be released in September with the first 10 levels included free. There will be additional episodes, each with multiple levels available for in app purchase. Further episodes will be released over time.

Family Guy: Time Warped - launching mid-November, price unknown

This Family Guy game is based on the episode where Stewie builds a time machine and gets stuck jumping through time when that time machine breaks. The games is developed for and by fans of the show, so expect lots of inside jokes. You'll be able to play the game as Stewie or Brian in this 2D action platformer. That's about all we know so far. Expect more as the game release gets closer.

Lord of the Rings - Middle-Earth Defense - launching early December, price unknown

This movie tie-in game is as interesting as it was unexpected. Middle-Earth Defense will be a tower defense (TD) game based in the Lord of the Rings world. The game uses the actors' faces from the movie to represent the characters from this Tolkien classic series. It's a modifiable path type TD game, wherein the enemies have a set path which you can modify slightly by placing barriers to redirect them. You only have a limited amount of resources, however, so you can only change the course so much.

Different characters will obviously have different capabilities. Some characters are stationary while others will travel within their circle of influence to attack. To add a bit of an RPG element, you can upgrade characters in multiple areas -- unlike normal TD where you can only do an overall character upgrade.

Expect this one to ship in early December for an unknown price.