New Games
The Lego Movie Video Game ($5) — Almost one year after the release of The Lego Movie comes the, aptly, if not originally titled, companion game. Generally following the storyline of the movie, the iOS game puts players into the world of Emmet as he finds himself unwittingly pulled into a quest to save the world and stop the evil tyrant Lord Business. Featuring a mix of more than 90 characters from the film, including Batman, Superman, the Green Ninja, Gandalf, Benny, and more, the game takes players through 45 exciting levels featuring all of the Lego worlds shown in the original movie, from Flatbush Gulch to Cloud Cuckoo Land and beyond. Players must collect and use Lego instruction pages to learn to build in a new way and harness the power of the Master Builders to create extraordinary Lego structures and vehicles. The game also features scenes from the film and employs the same Lego toy set animation style developed for the original movie.
Rocket Cars (free) — From Illusion Labs, the creators of Touchgrind Skate 2, Mr. Crab, and the Labyrinth series of games, comes this new car racing game. As the name implies, players strap in and rocket their way through a variety of landcapes, including offroad desert tracks, picturesque wooded areas, and a challenging copper world. Rocket Cars features over 60 levels and competing AI cars with increasing difficulty as well as unique single-touch controls and a variety of upgrades and power-ups that can be gained by performing tricks to knock out opponents and reach the goal first.
SpongeBob: Sponge on the Run ($4) — Just in time for the upcoming SpongeBob movie, Nickoledeon’s new endless runner puts players in the role of SpongeBob SquarePants and Plankton, on a quest to find the lost Krabby Patty formula. On their journey, players travel through Bikini Bottom, Apocalyptic Bikini Bottom, and a real world beach while flying past obstacles with Plankton’s jetpack, floating through coral forests in a bubble, or racing along in the Patty Wagon. Users can customize SpongeBob with unique costumes, collect various power-ups, and even become Super SpongeBob to knock everything out of their path. The game also features exclusive custom voice-overs and animation.
Updates
1Password 5.2 (free) — The venerable iOS password manager gets another small but feature-packed update, adding a new Login Creator, One-Time Password support, and a number of UI enhancements and sync improvements. The Login Creator streamlines the workflow for creating new logins, with hundreds of popular sites and services included, while users of the “Pro” version can now add One-Time Passwords for services like Google Accounts, Dropbox, and Evernote, basically obviating the need for the standalone Google Authenticator app. Pro users also gain the ability to remove attachments from the item editor, and add many new custom field types. Master Password changes now sync properly between Macs and iOS devices, and the app adds a number of other interface, stability, and performance improvements.
Clumsy Ninja 1.12.1 (free) — Everybody’s favorite little iOS Ninja gets his dancing shoes on for Valentine’s Day in this latest content update. A new “dance pack” provides exclusive music and moves, allowing you to simply drop a boombox and see your ninja disco, breakdance, and even do the robot. A new dance suit is also included so you can show off Clumsy’s new moves with style.
Hotspot Shield 3.0.1 (free) — If you find yourself regularly using open Wi-Fi access points, or struggling to access streaming media content from your home country when traveling abroad, you’ll definitely appreciate what Hotspot Shield has to offer — namely the ability to protect your connection against eavesdropping while also providing points of presence in other locations. This latest update offers even more flexibility for iOS users by taking advantage of new developer options in iOS 8 that allow users to easily toggle protection on or off and change Virtual Locations right within the app. Using the app is also much simpler now, with only a single iOS provisioning profile required, rather than having to re-install profiles for each configuration change. Users can setup Hotspot Shield to only activate when browsing specific sites, or alternatively exclude certain sites from Hotspot Shield’s protection. Users can also alter the country setting on the fly to access content in the United States, United Kingdom, and Japan, helping to allow access to sites and services that may be censored in some countries, such as Google in China or Skype in the Middle East. You’ll need an “Elite” subscription to access some of the more advanced features such as virtual locations, but if you’re simply looking to secure your browsing while hanging out at Starbucks, the free version will do fine.
Snapchat 9.0.1 (free) — In the past year or so, Snapchat has been gradually moving beyond its roots as a merely ephemeral picture and video messaging application, adding new communication features such as “Stories” to try and build communities and groups around the Snapchat experiences. With version 9 the service takes an even sharper left turn with its new “Discover” feature. A departure from its traditional person-to-person approach, Discover is intended to provide a collection of curated content from publishers like ESPN, Yahoo News, National Geographic, Cosmopolitan, and more. Discover will provide daily stories, compiled into editions that are refreshed every 24 hours, with “full screen videos and photos, awesome long form layouts, and gorgeous advertising.” Essentially, Snapchat wants to turn its ephemeral messaging app into an ephemeral content delivery app, positioning itself as a place to go for quick bites on what’s happening in the world.