Pastry Panic - The sweetest arcade fun

Back in December when I interviewed Underground Pixel's visible head Kevin Drew we were promised more games for 2012. I learned from him all the hard work that goes into producing a game and assembling a team when you go for this radical retro style. After the Christmas-themed Holiday Havoc I was expecting more shots of arcade-inspired games with all their chunky pixels: once you get a taste you only want more! The indie studio is back with more chiptunes, more gameplay modes and some characters that will be very familiar to the iOS gamer.

Pastry Panic is an arcade high-score game where you help your little friend the green monster to clear all the bolts, nuts and springs that accidentally fall on the conveyor belts of a pastry factory. Our hungry hero — possibly Yoshi's cousin — will also take good care of the sweets and doughnuts as they come out of the oven. The master baker doesn't mind it as long as the metal scraps are removed from the line as quickly as possible.

The same premise comes with two modes that help to extend the game's replayability although they follow essentially the same rules. In Mad Dash you move around three conveyor belts trying to collect everything while in Tongue Tied you remain static in the centre trying to grab everything with your chamaleon-like tongue. Pastries eaten count towards your high-score, with a series of combinations to boost your numbers.

Some special pastries act as power ups and mess a bit the game as it ramps up in speed. Every now and then you get the chance to collect letters to form the word 'sweet', which may be a wink to the classic Tony Hawk 2 collecting the word 'skate'. Is this just me?

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Tractor Trails - Addictive family friendly farming

You can't help getting exited when you see a new game by Origin8. The London-based studio is behind some of the platform's most impressive games since the early days of the App Store. Remember the Sentinel series, Space Station: Frontier and MonsterKill? They have good reputation among sci-fi nerds for a reason. It's only when you hear that you its latest release is a farming game when you begin to worry and wonder if this casual leap has been too risky. Don't worry, this type of farming has nothing to do with the time grinding games you see on Facebook.

Tractor Trails is a classic puzzler where you plant trees on a field trying to obtain the maximum yield. You ride your trusty tractor Red and leave behind an impressive kind of tree that grows instantly — unfortunately blocking your way and forcing you to move only forward. This is a new take on the typical gameplay were you have to cover a maze without crossing your own path.

This premise allows for a very strategic gaming experience where you'll find yourself planning ahead, experimenting and replaying levels lured by the high score. There's a bit of memorisation involved and some swiping skill as your movements need to be extra-tight in medium and advanced levels to obtain all the rewards. 

Each game finishes the moment you're stuck and plant a fast-growing tree under the tractor (with an amusing animation), complete every bit of soil available or crash your machine. Tractor Trails isn't particularly punitive and will allow you to progress to the next stage even without every star, obtained for driving over a mole, planting a set number of trees and for doing so in the required time limit.

The game comes with corn collectibles that are the soft currency of the game. These are available in every level can be spent on tractor upgrades. As you imagine, you can also buy some more corn with real money. Without being too exaggerated, I felt the game was balanced until halfway through, where getting a third star to complete the level might require investing in vehicle upgrades.

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Essential countdown app London Bus Checker gets better

The majority of the time I write about apps it's just for the pleasure of playing with them and be able to advise others. Only in a few cases I keep using the app and it becomes a basic part of the way I work and my daily routine. Then there's the duty of a blogger of updating those old entries, just like I did with Instacast a couple of days ago.

Commuting in London is a forced activity that many have to cope with but for me, it's the perfect opportunity to put apps to my advantage. Bus Checker has become an excellent ally for my bus journeys, giving the information of the live departure boards the way I need. In my original review I commented about the interface with a mock bus stop sign, the pseudo departure boards with the dot matrix display and the surprisingly well done customisation of the map. 

"I found very convenient that [the map] shows the letter of the bus stop, specially in those very close to each other. It can get slightly confusing to zoom in and tap on the right one, as you'll normally have another bus on the other side of the road doing the route on the other direction."

After some months of polishing, I'm really happy to see the new version 2.0.5 addressing some of my initial criticism. In the build I previously tested, I found quite confusing to have a blinking dot suggesting the app is continuously updating. For me it looks like the blinking dot in the corner of the display of the Brita jar — pretty much it only counts seconds.

After some clarification from the developer about the meaning of it, the new version has implemented an actual countdown text that explains what's really going on. The dot is still there but at least you know it might have something to do with the "Refresh in 25s" text below.

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There's something different about Instacast 2.0

A change in graphic direction and a new pricing structure is all you need to revolt the troops

Hit the updates icon on the App Store and if you are using Instacast on your iPhone you'll see the the version 2.0. Yes, the podcast app that everyone has been talking about this week for the good or the wrong reasons. I want to get stress my position before I even start describing what's new: I don't have any problem with developers asking for money to support a product. I think it's perfectly understandable that the work that goes into preventing things going obsolete has to be paid. 

The new Instacast update brings some new graphical elements, functionality and new ways interacting with your podcasts. If you're new to this app category, Instacast champions a better way to download, utilise and enjoy podcasts without having to launch iTunes or the local Music app. There are other alternatives with their vision of what this type of app should be — think of the one-man-dream Podbay — but Instacast seems to have a strong following in this iOS niche. 

Perhaps it's this combination of very vocal users what has given it some buzz recently, but I honestly think it has more to do with breaking the habits of it's seasoned supporters. Instead of introducing new features and tweaks slowly, developer Vemedio decided to go for a shockingly huge release. This is an important time for Instacast, an app that's growing up with growing pains.

Going through the release notes it's probably better than launching the app you use daily and see that things have changed while you were away. The one you notice immediately is the inclusion of a launch screen with the Instacast logo (the name on a fat serif). Just like Apple says, adding a splash screen with a background different than the app's main view will make it feel slow. And it does. The inclusion of this logo on the top bar is also questionable as it only adds a bit of branding. 

Back to the feature list, the interface has been revamped to include new hierarchical tabs to filter information and a bottom bar that summarises what's happening instead of changing the way information is presented. We can refer to it as the old Reeder sliding menubar. This is now gone. The 2.0 main view feels a bit heavier but with the continuous testing I've given the app this week on my daily commute I've grown used to it. 

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