I know there's a thread dedicated to iPhone games but this is so absolutely fantastic it deserves its own first play thread.
It's a fully ONLINE first person shooter on the iPhone, based around a heavily modified Quake 3 engine. It can be played over WiFi or 3G. It works on ngmoco's Plus+ online infrastructure which is essentially, an 'Xbox Live' for iPhone. A lot of games are starting to support it now, including it's own online leaderboards, friends list, and achievements for each game.
It's deathmatch only, first to 10 kills, 4 players. Some games can be over ridiculously quick but it's a good thing the matchmaking is lightning fast. Or you can choose to create a friends party complete with online chat, and if your friend isn't online when you invite them, it will send them a push notification for them to accept wherever they are and jump straight in your game.
There's an auto-fire option. So all you need to worry about is the movement and aiming. It takes a little while to get used to but when you do it's very quick and very, very good fun. If you don't want to auto fire, then you can just tap on the right hand side of the screen to fire a single shot, or double tap and hold to aim and fire at the same time. It works very well and is proof that first person shooters can work incredibly well on the iPhone.
It's FREE. Well, almost... Let me explain.
The game works on an 'Energy' system. You start off at level 1 with a basic armor and basic weapons, and when you download the game you are fully energized with a few spare power cells to refill yourself with. Whenever you enter an online matchmaking game with energy, you will earn money for every kill and for all bonus drops. When an enemy's dead, you can stand over their body and shake your device to taunt them. The longer you taunt them, the more money you'll get, but you can only taunt them for a certain period of time, and it leaves you as essentially a sitting duck.
If you join a game in progress, then the game deducts no energy. If all your opponents leave the game and forfeit the win to you, then you lose no energy. That's brilliant. But if you play a game from start to finish, regardless of if you win or lose, you get a chunk of energy knocked off. A third, to be exact.
One full bar of energy lasts only 3 games, and to recharge 1 game's worth of energy is 4 power cells. You start with 20...
Here, you have two options. You can use in-app purchases to buy a power pack (20 cells for 59p, 280 cells for £5.99 and some ridiculous amount like 900+ for £17.99) or you can wait 4 hours of real time for your energy to recharge.
When your energy is empty, YOU CAN STILL PLAY and your skill rating is still affected. You just don't level up or earn money to upgrade or buy equipment.
Some argue that it makes a huge difference, but as a level 21 myself having been kicked by a level 9, I definitely think it's more down to skill than money.
So you decide.
Regardless, if you own an iPod Touch or iPhone and love FPS games, you owe it to get this. It's absolutely superb and fantastic fun to play. And if you do, add Vally to your Plus+ friends list.
I also forgot to mention that it scales in graphical quality depending on your device. I'm running on an iPhone 3G so I get the lowest possible graphics quality, whereas iPod Touch 2nd/3rd Gen and iPhone 3GS users get much, MUCH better graphical quality.
It's a fully ONLINE first person shooter on the iPhone, based around a heavily modified Quake 3 engine. It can be played over WiFi or 3G. It works on ngmoco's Plus+ online infrastructure which is essentially, an 'Xbox Live' for iPhone. A lot of games are starting to support it now, including it's own online leaderboards, friends list, and achievements for each game.
It's deathmatch only, first to 10 kills, 4 players. Some games can be over ridiculously quick but it's a good thing the matchmaking is lightning fast. Or you can choose to create a friends party complete with online chat, and if your friend isn't online when you invite them, it will send them a push notification for them to accept wherever they are and jump straight in your game.
There's an auto-fire option. So all you need to worry about is the movement and aiming. It takes a little while to get used to but when you do it's very quick and very, very good fun. If you don't want to auto fire, then you can just tap on the right hand side of the screen to fire a single shot, or double tap and hold to aim and fire at the same time. It works very well and is proof that first person shooters can work incredibly well on the iPhone.
It's FREE. Well, almost... Let me explain.
The game works on an 'Energy' system. You start off at level 1 with a basic armor and basic weapons, and when you download the game you are fully energized with a few spare power cells to refill yourself with. Whenever you enter an online matchmaking game with energy, you will earn money for every kill and for all bonus drops. When an enemy's dead, you can stand over their body and shake your device to taunt them. The longer you taunt them, the more money you'll get, but you can only taunt them for a certain period of time, and it leaves you as essentially a sitting duck.
If you join a game in progress, then the game deducts no energy. If all your opponents leave the game and forfeit the win to you, then you lose no energy. That's brilliant. But if you play a game from start to finish, regardless of if you win or lose, you get a chunk of energy knocked off. A third, to be exact.
One full bar of energy lasts only 3 games, and to recharge 1 game's worth of energy is 4 power cells. You start with 20...
Here, you have two options. You can use in-app purchases to buy a power pack (20 cells for 59p, 280 cells for £5.99 and some ridiculous amount like 900+ for £17.99) or you can wait 4 hours of real time for your energy to recharge.
When your energy is empty, YOU CAN STILL PLAY and your skill rating is still affected. You just don't level up or earn money to upgrade or buy equipment.
Some argue that it makes a huge difference, but as a level 21 myself having been kicked by a level 9, I definitely think it's more down to skill than money.
So you decide.Regardless, if you own an iPod Touch or iPhone and love FPS games, you owe it to get this. It's absolutely superb and fantastic fun to play. And if you do, add Vally to your Plus+ friends list.
I also forgot to mention that it scales in graphical quality depending on your device. I'm running on an iPhone 3G so I get the lowest possible graphics quality, whereas iPod Touch 2nd/3rd Gen and iPhone 3GS users get much, MUCH better graphical quality.
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