Readers’ App Reviews – November 2015

Happy Thanksgiving! As a way of saying thanks to our amazing readers, each month we like to highlight some of the apps you’ve recently released.

This month is packed with some great apps and games from the community.

I have given all your submissions a try and picked a few I’d like to share. While I make time to install and try out every app you submit, I never have time to write about them all so don’t miss out on the Honorable Mentions below as well. The apps I’ve picked to write about are merely a sample of what the community has been building.

This month we have:

• An app for those addicted to Instagram
• Games that will make you think
• An app for musicians
• And of course, much more!

Keep reading for a taste of your community’s hard work this month!

Gorilla Rush

Gorillas are after your bananas. I know what you’re thinking: “not again!” But this time, you can stop them.

You’ll help a ninja protect her bananas using, of course, a ninja blow dart gun. The gorillas are trying to escape, the only thing in their way is you and your ninja darts!

You only have a few darts. As long as you don’t miss you can recover the darts from the gorillas. Don’t worry about the gorillas, these tranquilizers will only keep them down for a while. But long enough to save your bananas!

• Author: Geykel Moreno @geykel
• Most useful tutorial: How to Make a Game Like Candy Crush with Swift Tutorial: Part 1
• App Store Link: Check it out!

SideGram – Follow Less People

SideGram is a companion app for Instagram for those of us a little too addicted to following our favorites.

Once you start to follow a few too many people, your Instagram feed can become too cluttered. Often times you may follow hundreds of friends as well as hundreds of celebrity accounts. Wouldn’t it be great to split those two groups into two feeds? SideGram is perfect for you!

SideGram will allow you to login with your Instagram account. It will allow you to move some of those accounts your following to SideGram. You won’t be following them in Instagram anymore, but SideGram will keep up with their latest posts and you can check back anytime for a look at the other side.

• Author: Jeremy Sharvit @SideGram
• Most useful tutorial: iOS 7 by Tutorials
• App Store Link: Check it out!

ML cam

ML Cam will allow you to see your favorite effects in realtime on the live feed from your camera.

Its often hard to take a normal photo then get it looking just right after the fact. ML Cam can help. ML Cam will let you see a variety of common effects as well as custom tuning live, before you snap the photo.

Once you’ve got your effects just right, you can snap the photo and it will save exactly what you saw through the view finder. Its very cool and powerful to see some much control at your fingertips.

• Author: Shitian Ni @nishitian
• Most useful tutorial: Image Processing in iOS Part 2: Core Graphics, Core Image, and GPUImage
• App Store Link: Check it out!

Bally – Shadow From The Past

Bally must traverse a new world to save his son from shadows of his past.

You’ll have to fight your way through levels fighting all manner of enemies. You’ll take down crabs and caterpillars on the ground and vultures from the air. Collect gems along the way.

You can uncover secret areas to explore as well as hidden secrets as the story unfolds. There are many you’ll pass willing to help you. Talk with them to learn where you might explore next.

• Author: Abhijit Kayande @Bally_flo
• Most useful tutorial: iOS Games by Tutorials
• App Store Link: Check it out!

Futoshiki puzzle

If you’re a sudoku addict then Futoshiki is going to make your day!

Futoshiki is another popular Japanese numeric puzzle game you’ve never heard of. Similar to Sudoku you start with a 5×5 puzzle grid and place numbers 1-5 in each tile. Ensuring that each row and column has no repeating numbers.

What makes Futoshiki different than Sudoku is a number of signs placed between tiles that dictate some of which numbers may appear there. These greater than or less than signs restrict you from placing larger or smaller numbers in certain tiles.

• Author: Tomas Rychnovsky @SBC_Games
• Most useful tutorial: What’s New in Unity 5
• App Store Link: Check it out!

Towers of Hanoi

Towers of Hanoi is a classic game of math and logic. This game brings it to life on your iPhone.

In Towers of Hanoi there are three rods. You’ll have a stack of discs of increasing size on a single rod. The goal is to move the stack to the last rod. The rules are you can only move one disc at a time and discs may only be stacked largest to smallest. You’ll need to master the shuffling of discs to move each disc slowly from one rod to the next.

Towers of Hanoi has beautiful graphics to accompany a classic game. And its even playable on your Apple Watch! You can play Towers of Hanoi anywhere right on your wrist.

• Author: Daniel Tavares @vibrazy
• Most useful tutorial: iOS Games by Tutorials
• App Store Link: Check it out!

Beetle Boom!

Beetle Boom is a unique game thats quite a lot of fun.

Beetles are trying to eat all the grass, but not on your watch! As the beetles move to the top of the grass, you can bend the grass with your finger and catapult the beetles into the air! They’ll never know what hit em.

You’ve got to last as long as you can before the beetles overwhelm you can eat the grass.

• Author: Hubert Rosicka @hubsibert
• Most useful tutorial: Beginning OpenGL ES and GLKit video tutorial series
• App Store Link: Check it out!