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Zoo Tycoon Friends lands on Windows Phone and Windows 8

Sharang Sharma

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October 13, 2014

One advantage of being invested in the Microsoft ecosystem is that you get access to tons of exclusive content whose IP is owned by Microsoft. Zoo Tycoon is another such popular game series that we’ve seen evolve over the last decade. Now, Microsoft has released a new game in the series called Zoo Tycoon Friends, exclusively for Windows 8 and Windows Phone users.

Features:

Create your ultimate zoo and release animals to nature reserves to aid conservation efforts!
Free-to-play game syncs automatically between your Windows 8 phone, tablet, and PC!
Bond with more than 40 amazing interactive animals in your zoo!
Bonus one-of-a-kind story and mission design!
More than 100 animal-friendly missions!
Get creative! Decorate your zoo and share it with your friends!
Connect with your friends through Xbox Live and Facebook!
Special bonus for Zoo Tycoon for Xbox One players!
Achievements are reflected in your Xbox Live gamerscore!

Similar to the previous titles, players are tasked with building and maintaining a zoo and attracting visitors at the same time. That’s not all, since teh game introduces a new mode where players are supposed to control human characters and rescue animals around the world that are “in peril from global warming, flooding, drought, and other natural and man-made threats.”

Zoo Tycoon Friends is a universal app and is available for free. Unfortunately, it isn’t supported on devices with just 512MB RAM yet, but that can be changed via an update in the future. Grab the game at the links below.

13 gigs of Snapchat photos released by hackers, third party clients said to be involved in the breach

News

Sharang Sharma

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October 12, 2014

0

In what is one of the biggest breach of personal space ever, hackers have released close to 100,000 pictures from Snapchat accumulated over the years. These are users’ personal pictures that should have been deleted after being seen by the recipients. As these pictures are supposed to get deleted after some time on both sender and receiver’s phone, many of them are of explicit nature, including child porn. This tops the recent scandal where several explicit photos of many celebrities were released on the internet by hacking through Apple’s cloud service.

Third party apps are being blamed behind storing these images, with Snapsave’s name coming up on the top. The app allows to save images sent to users on Snapchat, a clear violation of Snapchat’s policy. Although, the developer of the app, Georgie Casey has outrightly denied storing these pictures. It is believed that a particular site named Snapsaved.com was involved in the leak. The site when active, acted as a web client, allowing users to save Snaps that they received.

Although Snapchat wasn’t involved in the leak and has confirmed that its servers weren’t breached, it will severely impact the brand’s image which is used by millions of users. Recently, the company was valued at $10 billion. The company has come under fire earlier as well, when username and phone numbers of 4.6 million users got leaked online.

For users, who use Snapchat, we advise to strictly use the official app, instead of third party ones. Even if you’re using third party apps, make sure they’e made by reputed developers.

[via]

Is this the official Swing Copters for Windows Phone?

Sachin Sharma

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October 12, 2014

0

After failing to deliver on the promise to bring Flappy Bird to Windows Phone, it seems like developer Nguyen has bought his new title Flappy Bird to the Windows Phone Store. Although the store has been flooded with spam apps that try to pose themselves as Swing Copters, this new title seems to be authentic, since the registered publisher name is .Gears, which is what the developer uses on Android and iOS. What’s more, the description of the game also matches that on Apple App Store and Play Store.

While there is no way to confirm for sure, it seems to us like this is the real deal indeed. It isn’t that hard to port the rather simple game to Windows Phone, so we hope Nguyen did take some time out for Windows Phone users.

Grab Swing Copters on the Windows Phone Store for free here. You can also check our review of the game here.

Daddy Was A Thief, Weather Flow and more are this week’s Red Stripe Deals

Sharang Sharma

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October 12, 2014

0

This week’s Red Stripe Deals on Windows Phone include the recently released title Daddy Was A Thief and more. Here’s the complete list:

Daddy Was A Thief – $0.99

Bank staff is usually friendly and polite. This time something went wrong! Gain as much money as you can! Hurry! Everyone try to catch you, but you are clever, aren’t you? Find combo speed boosts, shortcuts and grab power-ups to survive.

PAC-MAN CE DX – $3.49

PAC-MAN Championship Edition DX, which is a best-seller on Xbox LIVE Arcade, now appears on the scene on Windows Phone.

MoBu – Financial management – $0.99

Revolutionize your personal finances management and finally put money aside. When other applications only offer you to enter and track your expenses and income, MoBu lets you in addition define expenditure and savings budgets, and fully analyze your financial wealth.

Weather Flow- $0.99

The weather experience tailored for Windows Phone 8 with amazing live tiles and awesome lock screen support.

Facetune – $0.99

Facetune is a fun and powerful portrait & selfie photo editor!

Professional photographers and graphic designers constantly photoshop models to perfection, and now so can you! Without the expensive price tag or complicated tools, Facetune gives you the ability to retouch and add artistic flair to selfies and portraits with ease, from the convenience of your phone.

Puzzle games for kids – $2.49

This app delivers 5 amazing games that helps young kids learn about various subjects!

1) WORLD MUSIC – Arrange music instruments and learn their names and sounds
2) JUNGLE SAFARI – Learn animal names and their sounds
3) THINGS THAT GO !- Learn a variety of vehicles and the sound they make
4) WORLD OF SPORTS- Learn about sports from around the globe
5) SHAPE PUZZLES – Learn to recognize and associate common shapes

Temple Run 2 adds NFL runners in the latest update

Games
News

Sharang Sharma

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October 11, 2014

0

It seems like every wants to pay a tribute to NFL these days. After Angry Birds, Temple Run 2 has become the latest game to feature NFL content alongside the ongoing NFL 2014-15 season. Released by Imangi Studios last year, Temple Run 2 is the direct sequel to endless runner Temple Run.

Changelog:

Let’s play some football!!!
Take the idol and escape the temple as your favorite Pro Football Player!
Football players available for a limited time only. Pick up the first down while you can!
Show your support by downloading your favorite player and helping him win his weekly head to head matchup!
Many new players coming this season, so check our Facebook and Twitter page for all the updates!
Want to escape the Evil Demon Monkey as YOUR favorite player? Let us know who you want to see!

The two new players have been inspired from quarterbacks Russell Wilson of the Seattle Seahawks and Colin Kaepernick of the San Francisco 49ers. Both of them can be unlocked within the app for 99 cents each. We’re sure players can expect more of such updates in the coming days, adding even more players.

The update is available for Android and iOS. Similar to the missing Angry Birds NFL update on Windows Phone, this one is missing from the platform as well.

Temple Run 2 – Android

Temple Run 2 – iOS

Gameloft’s Cars: Fast as Lightning lands on major platforms

Games
News

Sachin Sharma

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October 11, 2014

0

Gameloft has released a new game called Cars: Fast as Lightning based on Pixar’s animated movie series Cars. The game is available on Android, iOS, Windows and Windows Phone and is aimed at the young ones.

Features:

• Drive into a true Cars experience, capturing the fun personality of the characters that kids and fans have come to love, including Mater, Francesco, and more!
• Play high-quality animated cutscenes with amazing voice acting, including Owen Wilson as the voice of Lightning McQueen!
• From the legendary Lightning McQueen to the exuberant Francesco Bernoulli, race as 20 Cars characters that you can upgrade and customize with quirky paint jobs! Race as the Radiator Springs Car, Tuner Car, Spy Car, or an International Racer!

HIGH-OCTANE, CUSTOMIZABLE ARCADE RACING!
• Are you up to speed? Feel the heat building beneath your hood in acceleration-charged racing games with easy-to-learn controls, fast nitro boosts and other high speed surprises!
• A completely customizable racing game! From Rocky Loops to Roller Coasters, build a 3D track to perform fun stunts!
• Hit the nitro and GO! Play against friends and drive your best to beat their track times in a weekly tournament free-for-all!

The visuals are sharp and the voice overs in the cutscenes seem to have been done well. Although the gameplay is rather simple for a racing game. You’re supposed to press the pedals on straights and leave it on bends. That’s it. The cars seem to steer well on their own, so it’s unlikely to hold adult audience’s attention. Although, kids could find the adorable characters, funny dialogues and the gameplay in general amusing.

Cars: Fast as Lightning is free to download and can be completed without spending a dime on IAPs. Although, if you’re passing your device to your young ones, we suggest you tinker your Store settings lest you want to end up with a credit card bill that’s very long.

Cars: Fast as Lightning – Android

Cars: Fast as Lightning – iOS

Cars: Fast as Lightning – Windows Phone (link not live)

Cars: Fast as Lightning – Windows

Mojang working on Minecraft for Windows Phone

Sharang Sharma

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October 11, 2014

0

Mojang isn’t wasting anytime after getting acquired by Microsoft and the team behind Minecraft has already started working on the Windows Phone port of the game. Minecraft is already available on Android and iOS.

However, according to Tommaso Checchi, a developer at Mojang, the team had begun porting Minecraft to Windows Phone even before the deal with Microsoft was completed. Although, the work hasn’t gone far and is still in its early stages. It still needs optimizations and tweaks and could take a while before it gets launched on the platform. The good news though, is that Minecraft will be tweaked to work with even low end devices, meaning a majority of WP users will get to play the game when it lands on the platform.

Earlier, Minecraft founder Markus Persson had been openly critical about Microsoft’s Windows 8, believing it would end the open platformness of PC. As for Windows Phone, the team never felt it had sufficient numbers to justify a port. Well, that was all before Microsoft acquired Minecraft and its IP for $2.5 billion.

[Source]

Google Play Store gets another push towards Material Design in the latest update

Android
News

Sharang Sharma

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October 10, 2014

0

Google’s intent to get Material Design on everything Android look another leap today with the most recent update to Google Play Store. The update takes Play Store on Android to version 5.0.31 and besides adding new Material Design elements, brings a new flatter icon.

The changes are apparent everywhere with bold colors, new animations, shadows and coloring. Sections that have been updated include the “What’s new” section, search result pages and the page where your apps are listed. Although app listings themselves haven’t been changed much, since they were already brought to speed in the last update.

Another important change is that the whole Play Store feels faster than before. How much of that is real performance improvement and how much comes from new animations isn’t known exactly, but as long as it works, we’re not complaining.

The update is slowly rolling out to devices across the world and if you haven’t received it already, it should be sitting inside your phone soon enough.

[via]

Xbox Video’s latest update on Windows Phone fixes SRT subtitle issue

Sachin Sharma

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October 10, 2014

0

Xbox Video hasn’t been among the list of warmly received apps by the public, but Microsoft has taken upon itself to make the app better. The latest update to the app takes it to version 2.6.346.0 and fixes an issue where SRT files stored on SD card were failing to show up. Oh, by the way, SRT support was added to the app in the last update.

Changelog:

Fixed an issue preventing SRT files in the root of an SD card from being discovered
Polish fixes and general improvements

Grab Xbox Video for your device from the Windows Phone Store here.

Angry Birds Seasons gets new levels to celebrate NFL 2014-2015 season

Games
News

Sharang Sharma

-

October 10, 2014

0

Angry Birds Seasons has been given a hefty update by Rovio, featuring new NFL levels. The deal was struck between Rovio, NFL and Spalding and the update showcases enough of both of them in the new levels.

Angry Birds Seasons get 15 new ‘ballin’ levels’ and a $4.95 pass pays tribute to 30 NFL teams by adding a level for each of them. This isn’t the first time Rovio has struck such a deal with some popular franchise for its Angry Birds series, but as long as it keeps the now 5 year old series fresh, we don’t mind. The update is available on Android and iOS and is yet to make its way on to the Windows Phone Store.

Changelog:

15 ALL NEW NBA THEMED LEVELS! Hit the court with the Angry Birds – it’s time to go pig or go home!
30 TEAM LEVELS! Buy the NBA Pass and unlock one level for every NBA team!
NEW POWER-UP: SHOCKWAVE! Harness Bomb’s Shockwave power and do massive damage!
LEVEL FAILED – OR IS IT? Out of birds? No problem! Use the Shockwave for one last chance at completing a tricky level!

Excited? Check out the trailer below.

Angry Birds: Season – Play Store

Angry Birds: Season – iOS