POV: SMS-BOX Christmas Time!
Swain Valasek | Dec 16, 2009 Lifestyle, POV
User rating: 
(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
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Flysoft’s rating: 9.0
IAR’s rating: 7.0
Russian developer Flysoft arrives in the Nick of time (see what I did there?) with a nifty little holiday messaging app called SMS-BOX Christmas Time! Does it send visions of sugar plums dancing through your head or give you a case of the humbugs? Flysoft is pretty confident it’s the former so let’s see what they have to say first then I’ll try to confirm or deny with plenty of opinions along the way.
Tags: $0.99, christmas cards, holiday, mms, sms, Swain Valasek
POV: mPassport Paris
Michael (Admin) | Dec 16, 2009 POV, Travel
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mPassport Paris is on sale for free – normally $2.99
HTH Worldwide’s rating: 9.0
IAR’s rating: 9.0
I’ve done some traveling in my day, and when you don’t speak the local language it can be pretty hard to get what you need! Luckily I’ve only needed food, bars, and bathrooms for the most part so the language barrier wasn’t really a huge concern, but I imagine I’d be singing a different tune if I needed to be inspected by a doctor or locate some drugs of the legal variety.
mPassport Paris is designed for exactly that situation… whether you need a dentist, a shrink, a pharmacy, or pretty much any other medical service, this app will find it for you if you’re in The City of Light or, as most Americans know it, The City of Hot Lovin’.
Tags: $2.99, translator
POV: Cell War
Swain Valasek | Nov 13, 2009 Games, POV
User rating: (1 votes, average: 4.00 out of 5)
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TipCat Mobile’s rating: 8.0
IAR’s rating: 8.0
TipCat Mobile (a CWC company) has certainly made a splash with their first action game for the iPhone called Cell War. It’s an arcade shooter, a horizontal shmup to be exact (and we’re all about exact here at IAR). There’s no shortage of these babies in the app store so does it carve out a niche or simply step to the back of the line? TipCat tells us it’s the former and I tend to agree…read on for their capsule review followed by the comments of yours truly in the name of all that’s honest and fair.
Tags: $2.99, shmup, side scroller, Swain Valasek
POV: PixTalk
Michael (Admin) | Nov 12, 2009 POV, Travel
User rating: 
(3 votes, average: 3.67 out of 5)
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Space Lama’s rating: 8.0
IAR’s rating: 6.5
If you’ve ever been in a place where you can’t understand a word the locals are saying, then you probably know the pain of trying to pantomime whatever it is that you’re after… a memory card for your camera, a safety pin for that broken bra strap, a doctor to take a look at your massive head wound… and that’s what PixTalk is all about. It basically a collection of photos that are grouped and categorized for quick reference while you’re on the road, just in case the person you’re trying to “talk” to isn’t getting your drift.
Tags: $1.99
POV: iChowdown (Mr. Dumb EP3)
Swain Valasek | Oct 24, 2009 Games, POV
User rating: (3 votes, average: 4.33 out of 5)
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Zenux Lab’s rating: 8.0
IAR’s rating: 6.0
iChowdown from Zenux Lab is the third effort in the Mr. Dumb Series, all games of which feature the same hand-drawn art style, characters, and purposely low-brow humor. Worth noting that EP1 was reviewed by me here and EP2 is somewhat stillborn, likely in ‘Apple approval process limbo’. EP1 turned out to be a rather charming game so let’s see what the developer has to say about EP3 and I’ll provide the IAR point of view afterwards to see how iChowdown stacks up.
Tags: $1.99, casual, Swain Valasek
POV: MonsterABC
Michael (Admin) | Sep 14, 2009 Education, POV
User rating: (4 votes, average: 3.25 out of 5)
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MediaBrand’s rating: 8.0
IAR’s rating: 7.0
Women tend to run away screaming when I approach and that makes it hard for me to reproduce, so in order to test drive MonsterABC I recruited the help of Ella, a sassy little four-year-old whose parents I’ve known since my first day of college back in the stone ages.
MediaBrand‘s app is a colorful learning tool that provides alphabet practice for toddlers by providing a word and an illustration for each letter as well as each word’s spoken pronunciation, plus there’s a fill-in-the-blank section where the child picks the missing letter in words like “kite” and “umbrella”. The spoken parts sound like they’re voiced by a child (good move!) and the artwork is top-notch, so I think it’s fair to say that MonsterABC has a lot going for it. It’s simple, it’s glossy, and it was able to hold Ella’s attention for waaaay longer than I was predicting.
There is, however, one major part of MonsterABC that Ella’s parents weren’t at all crazy about…
Tags: $.99, good for kids
POV: Bomb Shot Recipes
Swain Valasek | Sep 2, 2009 Entertainment, POV
User rating: (1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
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Zenux Lab’s rating: 9.0
IAR’s rating: 5.0
Bomb Shot Recipes from Zenux Lab is a fun little app to help you get smashed drinking bomb shots with your friends (or alone if that’s how you roll). If you’ve been out of the loop on this term, a bomb shot is very simple in concept. You take a shot glass full of hard liquor and drop it into a glass filled partway with something neutral like cola, fruit juice or an energy drink (called the ‘wash’). Some bomb shots are meant to be imbibed ‘clean’ wherein the shot glass contents are left intact when dropped into the glass while others are ‘dirty’ where the shot glass contents get partially mixed with the wash or even poured directly into it. As you can imagine, people have gotten insanely creative about bomb shots over the years. Bomb Shot Recipes aims to corral this favored pastime right onto your iPhone so let’s see what the developer has to say followed by the opinions of yours truly.
Tags: $1.99, bomb shots, drink recipes, shots, Swain Valasek
POV: Mr. Dumb – Go Down
Swain Valasek | Aug 30, 2009 Games, POV
User rating: (5 votes, average: 3.80 out of 5)
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Zenux Lab’s rating: 9.0
IAR’s rating: 7.0
Mr. Dumb – Go Down from Zenux Lab is actually Epsiode 1 of an ongoing series of games featuring the same characters (currently Ep. 2 called ‘Mr. Dumb – Toilet’ is in development with a preview posted here). The developer is keying on the blatant silliness, apparent homage to Beavis & Butthead and pickup and play simplicity of these games to win over some fans. The gameplay in Go Down is reminiscent of Papijump or Doodlejump but in the opposite direction so you’re trying to go down as far as you can. Let’s first have a look at what the developer has to say then I’ll provide an IAR angle for comparison.
Tags: $0.99, casual, Swain Valasek
POV: Volunteer-O-Matic
Michael (Admin) | Aug 20, 2009 POV, Productivity
User rating: (3 votes, average: 3.67 out of 5)
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Generic Software’s rating: 8.0
IAR’s rating: 6.5
In the words of Generic Software, Volunteer-O-Matic “takes the hassle out of everyday decisions by providing a convenient way to randomly pick a name, chore, or any other entry from user-created lists.”
There are already way too many “who’s paying” apps so Generic Software is taking that idea a step further by letting the user decide whether the question is who’s paying or who’s gonna clean the cat’s litter box or whatever the big conundrum of the day might be.
It’s a really simple concept that I could see being useful in Brady Bunch households and office break rooms, and so far this app is off to a pretty good start. There are some things missing from the app that Generic Software acknowledges and is already working on, but there are also a couple of other features that I think could extend this app’s usefulness even further.
Tags: $.99
