Friday, 29 April 2011

Unpleasant Horse iPhone App Review – Ban This Sick Filth!

In a week where it has been revealed that Apple are tracking our every move and Sony have let bands of criminals gain access to our private information, one could be forgiven for thinking it couldn’t get any worse.  Well, bad things come in threes and to close out this trinity of horror, Unpleasant Horse has been released for the iPhone.
It’s the debut game from 4th and Battery, an offshoot of PopCap Games who’ve previously been responsible for wholesome family fare such as Peggle and Bejeweled 2.  They even managed to sidestep controversy with the worryingly titled Plants vs. Zombies by making the undead lovable instead of evil.  4th and Battery are supposedly their ‘experimental’ division and if Unpleasant Horse is any indication of what’s to come, experimental is just another word for sick.
Raucous guitar music plays over the title screen, suggesting that despite the friendly pink background and cute birds, this may not be one for your children.  Apple, who previously refused the game entry into the App Store, agree too and have slapped a 9+ rating on the game – a move we applaud but feel it’s still too lenient.
The idea of the game is for your tattooed black horse to jump from cloud to cloud in pursuit of pretty (yes, that is how you spell it 4th and Battery!) white ponies.  When you catch up with one you must leap on its back and drag it down the screen: where horror awaits.  The ground is covered in buzz-saws waiting to grind the white ponies up, while you jump to the safety of a nearby cloud, ready to do the same thing again.
Instead of cutting away at the last moment, Unpleasant Horse revels in its violence.  Blood, bones and if you pause it and examine the screen carefully, intestines too, are sprayed into the air; all accompanied by a realistic saw sound.  I felt physically ill the first time I saw this, and have spent some time replaying the game to make sure the effect continued.
If slaughtering ponies wasn’t enough, you can grab feathers from passing birds to help you jump a little higher.  Oh, and by ‘grab’ we mean mercilessly kill too.  All while Strauss’s Blue Danube plays over the top in some childish attempt to juxtapose beauty with ugliness.
That’s really all there is to this simple high score game, where the only reason to return is to try and reach the top of the leaderboard.  The 2D graphics are actually very good, and there’s plenty of attention to detail too.  Saying that, I was very glad when the game crashed occasionally – perhaps the work of a rogue 4th and Battery coder’s conscience?
Why 4th and Battery have bothered making the game universal for use on the iPhone and iPad I just don’t know, however, the biggest insult is that no-one will be put off playing Unpleasant Horse thanks to a ridiculous price tag; as it’s a free download.  Quite how they can give away this type of throwaway, pick-up-and-play monstrosity and still sleep at night is beyond me.
If you’re in the market for a twisted platform/high score game made by people who obviously sniggered like schoolboys while developing it, then give Unpleasant Horse a try get yourself to a doctor.
Overall: Sick Filth.
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Samsung files additional iPhone US suit against Apple

Samsung has filed a new lawsuit against Apple in the US, joining a variety of other legal actions filed in other countries, in reaction to Apple’s original suit claiming Samsung has “slavishly” copied its iPhone and iPad designs.
According to a report by Bloomberg, Samsung’s latest case, filed in a federal court in San Jose, California, involves ten patent infringement claims.
The complaint says the patent issues “relate to fundamental innovations that increase mobile device reliability, efficiency, and quality, and improve user interface in mobile handsets and other products.”The report notes that specific patent claims include “ways that a phone allows calls and Internet surfing at the same time; improvements in how text messages and attachments are sent; reductions in interference among mobile devices; and increases in the capacity of mobile networks.”
Samsung’s filing seeks an injection against Apple and cash compensation, saying “Apple continues to violate Samsung’s patent rights by using these patented technologies without a license.”
Samsung is the world’s second largest holder of patents after IBM. It is flexing its patent muscle against Apple in response to legal complaints that alleged infringement of seven Apple patents related to behavior (including tough gestures) and three related to product design.
Apple’s original complaint, filed April 18, stated, “Rather than innovate and develop its own technology and a unique Samsung style for its smart phone products and computer tablets, Samsung chose to copy Apple’s technology, user interface and innovative style in these infringing products.”
Samsung threatened legal retaliation the next day, noting that “Apple is one of our key buyers of semiconductors and display panels. However, we have no choice but to respond strongly at this time.”
Apple was Samsung’s second largest client in 2010, generating 4 percent or $5.68 billion of its revenues. The group developing Samsung’s offending “Galaxy” mobile products is not the same group that builds the components Apple uses or fabricates Apple’s A4 and A5 mobile processors, but the two companies have been unable to reach a settlement on the copying issues, resorting to the courts instead.
Apple is similarly involved in bilateral lawsuits with Nokia, a war initiated by the Finnish phone maker in October 2009. Apple has alleged that Nokia has attempted to obtain greater licensing fees from it than other companies for technologies that are ostensibly offered by Nokia under “fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory” terms, and has subsequently countersued over claims that Nokia is also violating Apple’s intellectual property.
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Apple rumored to have cut CDMA iPhone 4 orders by half as sales slow

Sales of Apple’s CDMA-based iPhone, which made its debut on Verizon earlier this year, have reportedly eased considerably following initial pent-up demand, prompting the company to halve its production of the device for the remainder of 2010.
According to a report by DigiTimes, iPhone 4 assembler Pegatron this week reported a net losses of NT$559 million (US$19.38 million) for the first quarter of 2011 with per-share earnings of negative NT$0.25 and gross margin of only 1.8%, all historical lows. The results are said to have surprised market watchers, who were initially bullish on the manufacturer’s performance in 2011 after it landed orders to produce the CDMA iPhone 4 for Apple. Looking forward, those market watchers are said to be “turning conservative about CDMA iPhone 4 shipments in the future as volumes may not be as strong as expected.”
Specifically, the report claims that Pegatron originally expected to ship 10 million CDMA iPhone 4s to Apple in 2011, but “sources from upstream component makers pointed out that Apple’s orders already saw a significant reduction and the volume is estimated to drop to only five million units.”
For its part, Apple is believed to have already assembled and shipped more than 3 million CDMA iPhone 4s during the first calendar quarter of 2011, 2.2 million of which were activated by Verizon and another million or so that went to fill the channel or were purchased and exported unactivated.
Assuming DigiTime’s latest report is accurate, it would suggest Apple only plans to sell roughly 1 million units per quarter for the next two quarters before it introduces a universal iPhone 5 around the fourth quarter of 2011 that will be capable of running on both CDMA and GSM networks.
Though much excitement in the consumer space proceeded this January’s launch of the CDMA iPhone on Verizon’s network, demand for the device is believed to have quickly trailed off due to a number of factors, including initial reviews that placed the speed of the carrier’s 3G network well behind that of rival AT&T’s.
Verizon iPhone
Consumers are also believed to have seen less of a value proposition in the initial Verizon device, which arrived with a design and feature set nearly identical to the existing iPhone 4 for GSM networks, which history would suggest is nearing the final stretch of its life-cycle.
Add to that weeks of rumors of an all new, universal iPhone 5 heading to manufacturing this September, and it may be safe to presume that the best days for sales of CDMA-capable iPhones are yet to come.
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