Garters and Ghouls is a game with an identity crisis. Does it want to be an RPG or an action shooter? Who knows! Who cares… I get to kill bad guys!

Touch Pets: Dogs and Eliminate from ngmoco Approved

ngmoco:)’s hotly anticipated titles, Touch Pets: Dogs and Eliminate, have finally made their way past Apple’s approval process. For those who don’t know, Touch Pets is a pet sim that focuses on raising and training “the ultimate puppy” and also includes a wide array of social features. Eliminate, meanwhile, is a multiplayer online first person shooter. Both games will be free (yes, you read that right!) but will feature In-App Purchases. Note that IAP’s won’t be necessary to play the game; you’ll just need them to unlock extras. With Eliminate, for example, you get to play a certain number of games per day before your “energy” runs out; you can play without energy but you won’t be able to earn any in-game credits.

While both apps are approved, don’t get too excited: ngmoco is doing a Canada-only release first, to make sure that “all Eliminate systems are online and all puppies are house broken before unleashing upon the world,” according to their tweet. It’s an interesting strategy that will have non-Canadian fans grumbling, but given that ngmoco is releasing two extremely hyped games with heavy online components at once, it makes sense. Once the games make their USA debut, we’ll post our reviews; for now, you can check out our preview coverage from earlier this month.

Update: Eliminate is now out worldwide. Make sure you grab it! It generally takes a few hours for new apps to show up in the App Store, so don’t worry if you can’t see it yet.

Canadians can get Touch Pets here, though the rest of the world is still waiting.

A well polished top down shooter that is a perfect homage to the classic Capcom shooter 1942. Kids these days have it so easy getting unlimited gameplay from these classic gametypes for a mere dollar.

Smooth controls, fantastic visuals, and great gameplay work in perfect harmony to make Meteor Blitz the best top-down space shooter available.

Alive 4-ever is quite possibly the best game of its kind in the app store. If top-down, two joystick shoot-em-ups are your thing, pick this one up right now.

Inkvaders is so so pretty… I just want to stare at it all day. Eventually though, the repetition will wear on me and I’ll never look at it again. Such is life.

Duke is here to kick ass and chew bubblegum, but lucky for us, he’s all out of bubblegum. Minus some control issues, Duke’s first trip to the iPhone is all kick ass.

Minigore doesn’t do a lot, but what it does do is executed perfectly-don’t get mauled by the black furbies. Actually, don’t just avoid a beatdown, shoot the crap out of them. Furbies were annoying anyways…

The game should be called “Turn tank… TURN!” Because that’s what you’ll be screaming the entire time you’re playing this game. Or maybe “Turn Turn Tank: Alamo Defense” because while there’s honor in playing this humble shooter, you’re not coming out alive.

This is not the DOOM you remember. Though it’s a bit short, DOOM Resurrection is an incredibly engaging and fun “on-rails” shooter that contains some of the best graphics seen yet on the iPhone.

A terrorist attack is about to occur, you play the role of a biotic super soldier who is the only one able to stop it. Can you manage to stop the attack in time?

Galactic Gunner is actually a tap-to-shoot game worth playing. Although it’s short, cinematic action makes it an incredible journey.

This is far from the quality shooter experience that I received from Isotope, but any app selling for $0.99 is worth a try if you like the genre.

Prepare your .308s, shotguns, and flamethrowers; the dead have risen!

Isotope probably has more content than any other shooter and is one of the most addicting iPhone games that I’ve ever played.

Caster has great potential as a magical 3D shooter. Its innovative control scheme excels in all fields…except when it comes to aiming, which is a major flaw that ultimately cripples the experience. Future updates could make this a surefire hit, but as it stands, Caster frustrated me with its brevity and difficulty of targeting enemies.

Galaxy On Fire is a perfectly playable game, but suffers from general blandness. Everything in the game, except the good commerce system, seems like it had been done before, making this game unfortunately seem like a trip into extreme mediocrity.

The graphics are bad, the frame rates are bad, the gameplay is bad, the sound gets annoying because the graphics and the gameplay are so bad, and the story is hokey. All this, for only $5.99!

Cosmic Nitro, from the makers of Galcon, is a fairly standard foray into the missile defense genre. Many of the game elements are as expected, but the sheer intensity of this game separates it from some of its competition. If the game was twice as long/hard, Cosmic Nitro would be a must have $0.99 game.

Galaga REMIX is a typical Galaga remake, with not much new content to justify its price tag. It includes both the classic gameplay as well as a “remixed” version, and both benefit from three control schemes. It’s far from a must-buy, but at least it has that nostalgic value.

Wolfenstein 3D for the iPhone is a near perfect re-creation of the classic game that popularized the FPS genre. Surprisingly the game holds up quite well after all these years and looks quite solid on the iPhone platform. What’s even more surprising is the gameplay, which proves that the iPhone can be a solid FPS platform.

Radio Flare is a musical side-scrolling shooter with a soundtrack that dynamically morphs as you play, responding to your actions. While I love the audio and believe that its spot as an IGF finalist in Audio Achievement is definitely deserved, the core gameplay ultimately failed to hook me.

HotField is an entertaining game, but this port could use some more time in the oven.

Heavy Mach’s a fun action game, although it has room to improve.

Time Crisis Strike is a mediocre port of an arcade gaming classic. It does possess decent graphics and relatively good controls, but the lack of a story, bonus weapons, and those big arcade guns make the game become quite stale.

An accelerometer based space game that takes the shooting out of shooter and still delivers solid, difficult, and amazingly fun arcade action. An example for how to get the controls just right in a game.

Fun retro shooter, a cross between Defender, Robotron: 2064 and Asteroids. Good graphics, innovative and great controls make this a fun game and a great bargain at $0.99.

Astraware Platypus Sneak Peek

Astraware/Handmark today published a video showing some of the gameplay of their new iPhone game, Platypus. It looks to be a pretty good side-scrolling shooter — something the iPhone has had very few of. (good side-scrolling shooters that is, there are plenty of crappy ones)

No word on the release date yet but would expect it soon. Hit the read more link for the video.

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