Man of Steel
$2.99/$4.99/$5.08
Warner Bros. has paid the big bucks to make sure this mobile fighting game has the looks of their blockbuster film. Henry Cavill’s features are there along with his sculpted physique and an opening comic book sequence to deliver Jor-El’s premonition of greatness, the speech that played a key role in the movie’s early marketing. This makes for a great first impression, but the game behind it is rather empty.
As Superman your task is to brawl your way through a succession of matches acting as General Zod’s invasion. Standing toe to toe with the first Super Soldier, you trade blows by swiping the screen until Superman lands one powerful enough to send his foe flying into an oil truck or police cruiser. The destruction is fun, but it merely leads to the next super soldier and so on and so on.
Although you can work in heat vision, grappling moves, and flying attacks, the game still feels awfully repetitive. There’s no plans to foil, no friends to rescue, and everyone is mute. They stand and fight until someone loses their head. Think Super Rock’Em Sock’Em Soldiers. Boiling a hero who is capable of so much down to just a man of brawling muscle seems like such a wasted opportunity for such a major release as this.
Despicable Me: Minion Rush
Free
Just when I thought I’d never want to see another Temple Run-inspired Endless Runner again, here comes Minion Rush with a wildly creative take that makes the idea seem completely new. During their off hours Gru’s minions like to hold a competition to see who can run through the weapons factory to collect the most bananas. This means ducking, dodging, and leaping past missiles, lasers, buzzsaws, and farting machines.
You can do “despicable” things to other minions along the way and collect power-ups including banana vacuums, freeze rays, and a concoction to enlarge you into a rampage-sized monster. There are plenty of secret areas to discover (I like the purple disco ball room), costumes to unlock, and mini-games featuring Vector, Meena, and fluffy unicorns. It’s one of the best games this year, highly recommended.
Walking With Dinosaurs: Inside Their World
$4.99
Based on the Emmy award-winning TV series that brought dinosaurs to life through computer effects, this encyclopedia offers animated 3D models that can be spun with a finger and studied from all angles. Stephen Fry narrates each of the entries as well as special tours through the different time periods, major discoveries, and the men and women who uncovered them.
There are sixty species of dinosaur included, covering land, sea, and air, and their digital models are exquisite to explore, often with different poses and models of their eggs or prey. The variety of different calls, from growls to honks to squeaks gives them all a nice touch of personality.
Although the entries themselves are just a page of text, the way the content has been carefully curated to represent most aspects of dinosaur research today, it’s an introductory overview that offers a better education that it may first seem. This is more than just a companion app to a popular television series, it’s a rewarding reference book too.
