Jump Into the Past: a Duke 3D revival

"Damn! Those alien bas***ds are gonna pay for shooting up my ride."

Does this opening sentence sound familiar to you? Two days ago, after installing Duke Nukem 3D on my iPhone, I launched the game and was welcome by it.

I used to play with Duke on a PC powered with a Pentium 133 a long, long time ago. When I saw it on the App Store, by chance, I couldn't resist buying it and playing it again.

The port is really good, although still incomplete. The primary three episodes are there (L.A. Meltdown, I didn't even remember the name!) and the feeling is just the same. I noticed some graphical detriment that I wouldn't call minor:
mirror effects, for example, were things that made Duke 3D so cool,
back in the 90's. Playability on the iPhone isn't so good, either, in
my opinion. The user is given two choices: digital and analog controls.

Digital controls, whose screenshot is shown in the next picture,
is the easiest control to get accustomed to. By sliding your finger
onto four buttons you can control Duke's movements just as if you were using a joystick. While playing you still need to use additional buttons (such as jump or use): these buttons are located on the uppermost right corner of
the screen and they're sufficiently small so as you confuse them one another.

The analog controls, at first impression, seem more intuitive because the user is given two separate joysticks:

Nonetheless, I found these controls pretty hard to manage and quickly switched to using the digital ones exclusively.

If you're feeling some kind of longing for such an old game, Duke Nukem 3D can be purchased right now on the App Store at just 0.79 Eur. Much less than an espresso, here in Spain.

The iPhone as a gaming platform: the App. Store business model is the killer factor

I've been reading many articles about iPhone capabilities as a gaming platform: the last one I read, Wall Street Journal's Apple to Sony, Nintendo: Game Over man!, was quite clear.

Curiosity is a powerful driver and in a matter of minutes I found myself digging into the App. Store to choose a game to drive a quick test with. I chose Need For Speed Undercover. The quality of the game seems impressive to me. Rendering, music, responsiveness of the iPhone (it's a game whose user interface uses the built-in accelerometer): despite the size of the display, it seems like I'm running it with a last generation game console. No doubt. At the end of this articles Here are some NFSU screenshots, if you're wondering about its quality.

But the great news for me as an user, as Wall Street Journal pointed out, is not the fact that I'm handling a mobile device which, incidentally, is a great gaming platform too. This is just a technological accomplishment I could expect any other producer to achieve. The news is that I, who never owned a gaming console nor am planning to, bought a game. Let aside the initial investment to buy, for example, an XBox. Console games are traditionally priced at much higher a level than I paid for NFSU, yesterday. Moreover, you have to go and buy it. Even if you downloaded it, you should still need to burn it. Apple's App. Store model is the winner and killer here. Yesterday night I was laying in my bed with my iPhone, wondering whether I would keep on reading a book with Stanza. I thought about the WSJ article, I opened the App. Store, chose a game, clicked on it and... started to play! Right ahead, just after waiting just a couple of minute for the download to complete. I did not moved from there and was charged less than 4 Euros.

Game addicts may well say that the gaming experience is not nearly as equal as it is when using another platform. I have to agree, but that's out of topic. What strikes me most is the iPhone gaming experience as an end user, from the initial purchase. Easy, comfortable, handy, cheap! The App. Store, moreover, is a growing library of applications here at hand: sometimes, what's most difficult is not buying but choosing.

Vintage games: Monkey Island Special Edition on the iPhone

The ScummVM project and the porting on the iPhone were a good omen. But LucasArts' release of Monkey Island Special Edition for the iPhone on July 22, 2009, confirmed the rumors about LucasArts being porting some of its vintage games to the iPhone. Really good news, though, especially for all of the Monkey-fans out there like this 30 years old guy which grew up playing with them.

If right now you're launching the App Store beware the size of the download: 351 MB. If you're not connected to a wireless network then wait for it.  Hurry can cost you very much if you haven't got a flat rate. The size of the application, though, is well justified: a brand new orchestration, spoken dialogs, graphics delivered in two versions (original and Special Edition).

When I first launched Monkey Island on my phone I was really excited. During the application bootstrap I felt that nostalgic impression of remembering  something that you thought it had gone. It's a game, I know, but hey, you're a kid just once. And I was with Monkey Island.

The first impression was pretty good. I didn't remember well the game and the new graphics it bears weren't a shocking surprise to me. They are polished, greatly fit with the application and remember the last Monkey Island PC releases so much. Reading the game instructions I learnt that the gesture to switch to the classic view is a two fingers slide. As soon as it appeared, I clearly remembered. That cross shaped pointer which was a watermark on LucasArts' adventures!

Here are some screenshot of the two look and feels of Monkey Island Special Edition. The first is the map of Melée Island:

 

  

The maps are similar and the new look recalls The Curse of Monkey Island. The first thing you should get used to is the new pointer. At the beginning, the good ol' cross pointer was easier to use. The asymmetric pointer with the rotating arrow isn't that usable to me, at the beginning, especially on this device: my brain focuses a point and the finger goes there.

The second snapshot is a view of the village. On the classic view, there you have the verbs and the objects you collected. On the new view, the object are inside the chest on the right corner, at the bottom of the screen whilst verbs are on the face icon on the other side of the bar. A gesture which is available only with the new graphics is that double tapping an object invokes its default verb. Opening a door has never been so easy!

  

 

I think the game is really worth what it costs: less than 6 Euros. You will need plenty of time to amuse and get to the end.

The last advice: don't shake the phone. That's the gesture to get an hint. Hints in an adventure are no cool.

A trip to Monkey Island with your iPhone

Yes. How many night did you spent in front of a monitor, playing with Guybrush, in Monkey Island? I confess I grew fond of that series of game. Yesterday, with great surprise, I opened the App Store just to see that the number one application in the Top 25 list was LucasArts' The secret of Monkey Island.

I was just (well, still...) a teenager at the beginning of the 90's when I used to play at The secret of Monkey Island at my PC. It was so different a game. I really got caught up. Because of Monkey Island I started playing adventure games. Only adventure games. The Monkey Island series, the Indiana Jones series (although earlier), The dig, Grim Fandango.

I mean, I really, really miss those adventure games. I grew up with the golden man logo of LucasArts. A game, was LucasArts'. Period. I never got used to play a shoot'em all game. Well, maybe just a couple of games from LucasArts' Jedi series. Not even now can I sit and play those games. Not even to just admire their incredible graphics effects and their incredibly realistic 3D engines. I just get bored.

Whilst the story and the magic of Monkey Island always kept me awake so many nights. I'm now buying the game, to feel a little of that magic, almost 20 years later.