Available on iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad

Christmas is The Most Wonderful Time of the Year… for sending idiotic yet strangely festive videos to your friends and family! In a world where nearly every Christmas app is aimed at spreading cheer and good will, Annoying Christmas is uniquely positioned to capitalize on all the smartasses who are just itching to spread stupidity instead which I think is 100% awesome.

Annoying Christmas provides a small set of templates to choose from, then you record a video of yourself saying some really stupid shit while keeping your head relatively still, and then *voila* you’ve got a pretty weird video that you can upload directly to Annoying Christmas’ YouTube channel and share with loved ones whether they want you to or not!

Truth is, you don’t HAVE to be annoying. This app can be used for good as well as evil, so if you want to say nice things and sing Christmas carols while your eyes and mouth are stuck in a Christmas ornament or on a gift box, then by all means have at it. It’s fun! And it’s weird. And it’s potentially hilarious.

This first video below is yours truly. It’s a close approximation of the faces and noises I’d be making if I was doing the nasty with Angelina Jolie.

Available on iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad

Decorate a Christmas tree, turn on the lights, and admire it in all its glory while you listen to a nice piano rendition of Silent Night on an endless loop as snow falls gently from the night sky. There! I just described iTree’4′Christmas from head to toe.

It’s not the sexiest app I’ve ever seen, but the resulting tree is nice and I’m sooooo glad iJeem Factory made it so you can actually turn the tree’s Christmas lights on. Dragging tree decorations from their little boxes at the top of the screen can be hard at times (fat-fingered tree decorators beware), and I wish you could take in the tree, music, and animated snow without the control buttons present, but other than that iTree’4′Christmas is alright in my book. The app’s built-in screenshot button is also a nice touch in case you want to use your tree creation as a background image.

Available on iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad

I just thought of a very festive and potentially hilarious use for Video Squeak: gather your kids or coworkers or drunk friends, and use Video Squeak to make a video of them singing that Christmas song by Alvin and the Chipmunks! They can do it in their normal voices, or they can try to imitate the Chipmunks’ trademark squeakiness, and the ensuing Video Squeak-ed result will have everyone literally LOLing and you’ll be the hero of the party!

Below is a piss-poor effort on my part to show what this app does to voices with the pitch cranked up to about 80-90%. I should have made my friends sit there and tell jokes or something.

The audio in my video above is kind of hard to understand because of I have Video Squeak’s pitch control set so high, and it gets a lot better if you dial down the pitch to about 50%. Video Squeak also allows you to upload your video to YouTube directly from the app.

Overall this app is pretty good and it does what it says it does… it makes your voice squeaky! The pitch control is useful and operating the thing is more or less just like the iPhone’s native camera/video app.

There are just two things that bug me. First, the screen where you input your video’s title and description is very cramped and the Title field is limited. I was going to call my video “Playing with Terry the Dog” but I had to shorten it because that turned out to be too many characters. I’ve seen video titles on YouTube that are way longer than that, so I think a fix is in order.

Also, Video Squeak doesn’t seem to support shooting video in landscape mode (with your device turned on its side). I was holding my iPhone horizontally the entire time I was making the video above, but when it uploaded to YouTube it looked like it was on its side. Luckily YouTube provides an easy way to flip your video so it looks right, but I wasn’t expecting to have to use it!

Those small issues aside, I like Video Squeak and I think it would be especially fun to play with if you have children or other people you can make goofy videos with.

(btw… scroll down for the song and lyrics to the Chipmunks song!)

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From appkruti:

Leave a comment below and you could get this app for FREE… preference will be given to those who *promise* to post an honest review in iTunes! If you are selected to get a free code, we will send it to you via Facebook.

(Chipmunks:)
Christmas, Christmas time is near,
Time for toys and time for cheer.
We’ve been good, but we can’t last,
Hurry Christmas, Hurry fast.
Want a plane that loops the loop,
(Alvin:) Me, I want a Hula-Hoop.
(Chipmunks:)
We can hardly stand the wait,
Please Christmas don’t be late.
(Dave:) Ok Fellas, Get ready.
That was very good, Simon.
(Simon:)Naturally!
(Dave:)Very Good Theodore
(Theodore:) He He He He
(Dave:)Uh Alvin, You were a little flat
So, watch it, Alvin…Alvin?…ALVIN!!!
(Alvin:)OKAY!!
(Chimpunks:)
Want a plane that loops the loop,
(Alvin:)I still want a Hula-Hoop.
(Chimpunks:)
We can hardly stand the wait,
Please Christmas don’t be late.
We can hardly stand the wait,
Please Christmas don’t be late.

Available on iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad

I’m gonna level with y’all… I’m only reviewing this app because the screenshots looked funny! And they didn’t disappoint.

Light Her Fire is a Do-and-Don’t guide for would-be lotharios everywhere! The “Do” suggestions seem valid but they kind of have the stench of a guy who’s so whipped he’d fry his own nuggets in hot oil if the Mrs. demanded it. And the “Don’t” suggestions… comedy gold!

As a guy with ZERO game, I can testify that help is desperately needed in certain sectors of the male universe! Some men are so incredibly bad with chicks that advice in any form, even when it comes from a piece of hardware, is comforting and maybe even helpful.

So is Light My Fire going to get you laid tonight? Uhh… no. Most of the “Do” suggestions, while very sweet and heartwarming, are for guys who are looking to keep a woman, not get one. But like I said, the value in Light My Fire isn’t in the Do suggestions… it’s in the Don’t suggestions! They’re not side-splitting funny (sorry, I exaggerated with the “comedy gold”), but they’re goofy enough that laughing over them with the lady might actually bring you closer.

This app not only gives suggestions but it also provides the ability to make your own notes that detail all the romantic things you plan to do with your love, and it also has an event reminder to alert you when it’s time to roll your naked body in honey and rose petals and go streaking through her office. Unnecessary, but it shows effort on AMSVT’s part.

Bottom line: this app has good intentions for those who idolize their women and some funny ideas on how to piss girls off for everyone else.

Available on iPhone & iPod Touch

“Magic 8 Ball” apps are as old as… well, they’re as old as the App Store. Ask an inane question, shake or tap, and get a prophetic answer that the cosmos prays you won’t take seriously.

So if it’s that dumb and that simple, why bother giving MagikUniverse a try? Geez, I dunno… I guess I’m just a sucker for bright shiny objects.

First of all, counting down from 10 to 1 is entirely optional! I did this several times while asking questions like “will I grow two feet, gain 100 lbs., and get a $20 million NFL contract” and the answer wasn’t yes or no! It was more like “maybe”. Well duh, obviously MagikUniverse is wrong because I fully intend to become the NFL’s oldest rookie ever, but this app does seem to have a tendency to give wishy-washy answers.

Even worse, the animation that transitions you from this answer to the next is excruciatingly slow. With a real, live Magic 8 Ball in your hands you grow to accept the physics of a multisided thingy floating in water, but this is software and, dammit, the answers need to come faster. A lot faster.

Quinn Michaels is very graciously offering his app for free to those willing to pledge an App Store review (scroll down below) so I feel kind of bad about ragging on his app like this, but there’s so much room for improvement here it’s almost comical. I’ve always despised harsh critics who offer nothing in the way of suggestions so here goes:

Dear Quinn! Please consider the following improvements to MagikUniverse…

1. Speed up the transitions between answers
2. Offer both “normal” answers and “smartass” answers and let users toggle between the two
3. Give the option of predetermining a positive or negative answer
4. Let users enter their own possible answers

You might hate some, or all, of my suggestions but for an app this simple that’s all I can come up with!

And for the readers… as of right now I’d rather ask my idiotic questions to Uncle Boris. But is this app worth paying a buck? The only answer I can give is below:

From Quinn Michaels:
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Leave a comment below and you could get this app for FREE… preference will be given to those who *promise* to post an honest review in iTunes! If you are selected to get a free code, we will send it to you via Facebook.
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Available on iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad

For some strange reason – probably because I’m a geek and a safety nut – I really wanted to try this app. And I wanted to like it. In retrospect, I’m not entirely sure what I expected an app full of safety signs to do. I’m not sure I am any farther ahead with that question now that I’ve actually tried it.

There are some benefits to this app. First of all, and most importantly, it’s free. Secondly, a couple of the signs in the “other” category presented some mild amusement, such as the ‘Warning: Falling Penguins’ one.

Overall though, I’m not entirely sure what this app is intended to do. It may be useful for studying for a driving test, or a WHMIS or HAZMAT test, but I think the developer would find a better audience by categorizing the app as Education, instead of Entertainment.

Available on iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad

I remember playing with an app like this a long time ago… it offered a few free answers provided by human reps and then you had to pay to ask their “experts” anything else. Thankfully ChaCha isn’t that app! But it is basically the same service: ask a question, get an answer from a real person.

ChaCha does require registration after your “trial period” expires (not sure if it’s based on time or number of questions asked), but it’s free to register and it’s free to get answers to all the stupid questions you can come up with.

ChaCha’s answers aren’t always “right on”… for example, I asked how to make the kind of green hot sauce that is served in Mexican taquerias and the reply was something vague about green chili peppers. The answer I was looking for would have mentioned tomatillos, but it was just a test and it’s possible I wasn’t being specific enough.

My other test questions, however, have been answered with pretty good accuracy, even my “why do men have nipples” query, and the time required to get an answer is usually within minutes.

ChaCha’s answers do seem to have a little automation behind them but for the most part they’re provided by real humans, so if your question is understandable then you can expect a reasonable answer. If you don’t feel like asking a question, ChaCha provides three ways to find answers to stuff others have asked: Recent, Near Me, and Category.

Personally I’d rather just Google stuff on my own, but it can be kind of fun to mess around with questions and who knows, maybe they’ll actually come up with answers you couldn’t find on your own.

Available on iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad

Chances are you already know how you’re going to honor paganism this Halloween weekend, but if you don’t then Spooksfinder might be able to help! The idea here is to give you a birdseye view of all the Halloween festivities going down in your area, and if you’re hosting something yourself then you can add it to the map.

Spooksfinder seems good at finding community events so it (probably) won’t direct you to any sorority costume parties but who knows what you’ll find out there.

The app allows you to search by city name or zip code, and it also provides details like address, phone number, and website when possible. If you try to visit a website through Spooksfinder, though, be prepared to manually correct the URL! As of now you have to remove an extra “http//” from the front of the URL.

Overall this app isn’t bad, but the results feel a bit limited. Still, if you’re not sure how to entertain the family on Halloween, it might be worth a gamble.

This one, however, asks you to do next to nothing except choose your photo(s). Photofunia is a collection of over 150 photo templates that will drop your pics into everything from billboards to art galleries to magazines. It also uses facial recognition to automatically turn you into people such as a zombie, a bodybuilder, and a Carnival dancer, among others.

The facial recognition thing doesn’t always work out the way you want it to… it doesn’t like sunglasses, and if there are multiple people in the photo it seems to choose one randomly… but this app does most things right provided the entire face is visible and well lit. It would seem natural to include some Facebook and Twitter sharing in this kind of app, but I usually prefer to do those things directly through those sites anyway.

Even if you don’t have an iPhone or iPad you can still screw with pics at photofunia.com which has been around for a few years now. The app is free and can be pretty fun to goof around with so give it a try!

BuddyTV has features that I’ll probably never use… Netflix integration and the ability to use the app as a remote control as well… but that’s just because I don’t have a Netflix subscription and my DVR is 6,500 miles away. Even without these features there’s still plenty o’ stuff that will make my TV time more fun and less aggravating. There’s a Watch List for keeping tabs on my favorite shows, a Favorite Channel list that means I no longer have to sift through channels I don’t get or just don’t give a crap about, and Genre filters that only display certain types of shows. BuddyTV also suggests shows that are on right now (or very soon) and it even offers to add Watch List items to your calendar so you never miss out on anything.

My only request for BuddyTV’s developers is to let me turn off the display of premium channels like HBO, Showtime, etc. cuz I’m too cheap to pay for them. I know I know… just use the Favorite Channels list, right? But sometimes I want to scroll through all the garbage, and turning off the pay channels would be sweet. Otherwise I love this app and will probably fire it up every single time I park my butt on the couch.

Probably one of the most unique apps I’ve came across in a while, Descent is a freefall calculator able to offer “the most accurate possible representation of the time it would take to freefall to the earth’s surface and the speed you would be traveling upon impact”. Sweet.

Well, here are the codes! Make sure you PLAY NICE and leave a comment saying which code you took.

If you manage to snag a code, I’m sure the developer would appreciate an honest App Store review!

1. PM9F7XAEPF4T
2. PMRM47NTETE
3. XHTJ4WX7K4H
4. YAXXEF7MXRLP
5. PL77APHXE77F

iTunes Link – Descent

I’m rather fond of cheesy little ‘shout a catchphrase’ apps, and there is no better way to end a Tuesday than to give out a bunch of free codes for the amusing Holy Robinator! by Little Bird Applictions.

Holy Robinator! comes with 60 wildly amusing “Holy” statements, all of them soundbites of classic Batman and Robin episodes. Ranging from “Holy contributing to the delinquency of minors!” (a personal favorite) to “Holy rats in a trap!” to “Holy schizophrenia!”, this app is chock full of giggle-out-loud sound bytes. Enjoy your Tuesday :D (Holy chocolate eclair!)

iTunes Link – Holy Robinator!