Tag: Bulkypix »

Retro gaming and God complexes: two great tastes that taste great together. And in the case of 148Apps Editor's Choice app The Sandbox, that's exactly what gamers get. Now, though, the fun expands to the magical iPad screen (including full retina display support), providing a universal experience on either iOS device. Reviewer Rob Rich had this to say about the game: "Sometimes a game’s title just fits. It does a perfect job of getting the point across without bombarding the reader with unnecessary words...games like The Sandbox do titles right. It’s pretty much dead-on about what players can expect. Which is to say it’s a sandbox. A glorious, pixilated, element-manipulating sandbox."

This latest update from developer Pixowl and Bulkypix does more than just make The Sandbox universal, it also adds 11 new tree species, 7 new backgrounds, 8 glowing gems and 30 missions to solve. That's enough to keep any budding godling busy.

More additions are on the way, including new ways to bring lifeforms to your creation, so get in The Sandbox, start playing and 'unleash the pixel artist dormant in you.

Mobile gamers already got a taste of BulkyPix and Pohlm Studio’s ghoulish survival game Hasta La Muerte when it arrived on Windows Phone 7 last year. With its recent release on the App Store though, that many more people can now give it a shot. We can’t stop death but what if we could command it?

In Hasta La Muerte players attempt to ferry groups of souls to their eternal resting places. However, the path is not an easy one. Throughout the 30 levels players will have to confront damned and inconsolable souls, an enigmatic scientist and his monstrous creations like the Meca-Angel, and various other hellish obstacles in this unique 2D world. Players aren’t powerless though. Using “Soulpets” they can gain new abilities, rack up points, and formulate new strategies in this “chase-and-be-chased” experience.

Looking out for the dead is a hard task but somebody’s got to do it. Hasta La Muerte is available now for $0.99 on the App Store.

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Brainergy, a new puzzler from BulkyPix, takes a familiar style of game and gives it an environmentalist slant. Developed by Pohlm Studio, the goal is to convert elements into energy sources to clean up and power the world.

The graphics are minimalist and the basic gameplay is simple. Just position things like solar panels over sunshine to convert it to energy. You can harness rain, wind, and more in increasingly complex arrangements as you try to find the best possible solution. The game is set on Earth, and takes players on a journey to 13 cities to battle the greenhouse effect.

Brainergy has six types of energy and 14 converters to help players solve the 50 included puzzles. The game explains how the various conversion processes work and offers other tidbits on point in much the same way that Fruit Ninja teaches fruit facts. In other words the environmental education is not part of the gameplay, but rather offered after the round where you can choose to read it or not.

Still it’s interesting to see a major game publisher putting out a title that focuses on something of greater social and intellectual merit than how to best kill zombies or make matches of three. If you try Brainergy, we’d love to know what you think in the comments.

Spellsword, a new title from Fire Fruit Forge, is set to be released soon. According to a release announcement and screenshots posted on the Touch Arcade Forums, it should be released sometime soon (possibly within the next month).

After watching the gameplay trailer, it looks to be quite the action-packed hack and slash game. The storyline is based on a “spellsword” with the ability to kill many minions at a time and the champion who picks up the sword. The game has a sort of retro look and the music even sounds 8-bit derived.

Apparently, the mission/quest system was somewhat inspired by Jetpack Joyride. There are quests in different areas but the game still contains an “endless gaming” sort of feel. There will be 60 missions at the release of the game.

Fire Fruit Forge is also the developer team behind hit title, Terra Noctis. Check out the gameplay trailer for Spellsword below.

We sat down with publisher BulkyPix today to talk about a slew of upcoming games for iOS, including The Sandbox, Lightopus, Kung Fu Rabbit, Saving Private Sheep 2, and Gnu Revenge.

Pixowl led off the meeting with The Sandbox, previewed on 148Apps here. It's exactly what its name implies: an open-ended game with retro-pixel charm and a TON of things to do, play with, and create with. We're pretty excited about the potential of this little toy/game, and look forward to it's release, hopefully in May of this year.

Lightopus, developed by Appxplore, comes out this coming Thursday, and has a neon-colored look with some surprisingly subtle gameplay mechanics. Players take on the role of a protozoan-like creature who must gather its babies, while avoiding and attacking enemies with those very same babies. The gameplay feels a lot like fl0w or the initial level of Spore, which isn't a bad thing, and has a relaxing electronica score. Stay tuned here for a review soon.

Kung Fu Rabbit features a cute but dangerous rabbit with all the right kung fu moves. Previewed here a week or so ago, the game tasks players to take on the role of the aforementioned rabbit, out to save rabbit babies from the evil shadow man. Kung Fu Rabbit looks adorable, but make no mistake, it's a tough platformer to beat. This combination of tough yet cute could be a winner when it releases March 15.

Saving Private Sheep is getting a sequel, the cleverly named Saving Private Sheep 2. Militant sheep aim their hedgehog at the exposed parts of their nemesis, an evil fox. The mechanics may look familiar; aiming and powering the slingshot full of hedgehog feels a lot like Angry Birds. However, the actual content is more puzzler than physics destruction, as players need to find the best way to pass the hedgehog ordinance from sheep to sheep.

Gnu Revenge is a humorous puzzle game that uses the concept of gravity and acceleration as its main, pardon the pun, thrust. Players shoot a wacky-looking gnu at a dastardly crocodile in a spaceship, saving fellow gnus from some horrendous-yet-unspecified fate, shooting around planetary bodies with various amounts of gravitational pull. Using just the right amount of boost to avoid crashing into planets or flying off into space is tricky yet strangely compelling at the same time. Look for this one to come out at the end of March.

Three other titles, releasing in April and May of this year, include a hidden object game based on the point and click PC game, Runaway, and a darkly mysterious app titled Yesterday, which features a serial killer and the homeless with some beautifully gritty graphics.

We will, of course, be keeping our eye on all these titles as they release. Our thanks to BulkyPix for spending time with us at the conference today.

Being a cute and cuddly critter must really suck. It seems like the more adorable something is, the more likely it'll be harassed by zombies or space aliens or something. In the case of Kung Fu Rabbit it's decidedly the latter. An entire village of fluffy bunny children has been abducted and it's up to the lone remaining Kung Fu master to bring them all home.

Players will jump, slide, wall-jump/slide and beat the tar out of baddies throughout 70 levels. With two different difficulty modes, no less. Carrots can be earned and spent on various accouterments, lending a bit of a personal touch to each individual's rabbit. Some will no doubt also like to know that Kung Fu Rabbit will support Airplay (720p), iCloud and the iCade.

Release details are still a bit lacking in specificity, but Kung Fu Rabbit should be making its way onto the App Store in early March. There's also no official word on a price, but it's going to be universal so at least we know