This Week’s App Store Updates – 4th June 2010
June 4, 2010 | Andy Boxall
Browsing the App Store this weekend? Here are thirteen new or updated apps for the iPhone and iPad worth taking a closer look at if you are:
Buzz Aldrin Portal to Science and Space Exploration.
If you’re even the slightest bit interested in science and space, then this app is well worth investigating. Buzz has gathered many experts in various fields including space tourism, deep space and the exploration of Mars and the Moon to provide informative content, plus extras including live streaming NASA TV $1.99/£1.19.
Designed for both the iPhone and the iPad, this beautifully realised wooden ruler app has a marker for keeping your spot as you measure. $0.99/£0.59.
Best used with an iPhone 3GS, this text capture app will recognize and convert anything from business cards to entire magazine pages. With captured numbers, URLs or email addresses, a simple tap will call or open an email or Safari page. $1.99/£1.19.
Help little Polly escape from her dream world, where there are all sorts of scary things waiting to frighten her, and get back to her bedroom. A platform game with puzzles, Polly Bad Dream looks pretty surreal and as her abilities are limited, we expect it to be quite a challenge too. $0.99/£0.59.
The iPhone version has been around for a while, but now we have an iPad-specific version of the bread-based shooter. There is a Time Trial and a Long Run version of the game, with the first being limited to 2 minutes play and the second based around your ‘Jelly Power’ energy levels. $0.99/£0.59.
A game based on the song of the same name, by Katrina and the Waves. The gameplay looks simple enough as you flick clouds away and collected energy from the sun to help the Earth grow stronger. It also has the world premiere of the song sung by the Soweto Gospel Choir. $0.99/£0.59.
Another iPhone app conversion, this time one which will really make use of the larger screen! Make really striking images by changing them to black and white, but then keeping certain sections in color. A video tutorial will get you started and there is also an undo and a save feature. $1.99/£1.19.
Kill all the horrible germs that have escaped from a laboratory! There are 30 levels to this puzzle game, whose simple control system involves dragging germs until the collide with others or fall from the screen. $1.99/£1.19.
Updated to fix some crash issues, this iPad only office application lets you view, create and edit Microsoft Word and Excel files, plus either retrieve or save them on various cloud services including Google Docs, DropBox or MobileMe iDisk. $7.99/£4.99.
Gather all your favorite comics into this one application, which is designed for both the iPad and iPhone. Stripr saves the comics as offline material for browsing later and has a zoom feature to ensure you can read what’s going on! Free.
It’s a Twitter client with Hello Kitty backgrounds and the chance to put any one of 40 different Hello Kitty images inside your tweets. These can be viewed on a Tappit client, or as a link in a regular Twitter client. $3.99/£2.39.
This app from credit card company MasterCard allows you to send money to friends and family and receive payments too. It’s free to receive, but you’ll get charged to send, plus the system can be used for business purposes too. US-Only, Free.
A 3D puzzle game designed to show just what the iPhone 3GS can really do, graphics wise. The game is a physics-based puzzler where you guide a package though a maze, which has a total of 20 levels and if the reviews on iTunes are anything to go by, a considerable challenge! Currently on sale. $0.99/£0.59.
MasterCard's MoneySend is a joke. Their PR said that it's an iPad application as well, but isn't.