'Quiz' Category Articles
Asynchronous Trivia Game 'Quizboard' Now Available for Free
Wednesday, June 13th, 2012I'm not always a fan of comparing games as "something meets something", but in the case of the just released Quizboard [Free] from Planeto I can't really think of a better descriptor than it's like Words With Friends meets Trivial Pursuit. Asynchronous multiplayer games seem to be the best fit for most mobile gaming titles, and Quizboard takes this to the trivia genre with a few interesting twists.
There are 10 different game board layouts in the premium version, and as you pick from a selection of questions from various categories you lay them out on the board trying to be first to hit an end goal point with the highest score. The real strategy lies with special gameplay elements like multiplier squares, the ability to stack same category questions to build the point payout, streak bonuses for answering questions right in a row, and more. Part of the fun in Quizboard is utilizing these little nuances in the gameplay to really rack up a high score.
I've been playing Quizboard for the past couple of weeks after a friend turned me onto it, and even though I'm not a huge trivia buff I've really been having a great time. The questions aren't overly hard and they hit a lot of categories that interest me. It's free to download Quizboard and play to your heart's content, but there will be ads in the game and access to only one board. From within the game it's $2.99 to unlock the premium version which gets rid of ads and gives you access to the rest of the game boards.
If you like playing live trivia against people but don't always have the time, Quizboard should be able to fit right into your schedule. And hey, it's free to try out so there's no reason not to give it a go even if you're not typically big on trivia titles.
Posted in Free, Games, iPhone games, iPod touch games, Quiz, Release | 6 Comments >>
'You Don't Know Jack' Heading To iPad and iPhone
Friday, April 8th, 2011If Jeopardy [$4.99 / HD] and Trivial Pursuit [$.99] got together after a drunken night spent staring at YouTube football-in-the-crotch videos, popular culture rags, and irreverent comedy routines, the fruits of that night of passion and drunken perusing of media would be You Don't Know Jack, one of the most irreverent and entertaining quiz show games ever. And for the first time, it's poised to grace iOS devices -- though, the question of "when" still remains.
Date and actual hands-on time with it aside, YDKJ iOS has the appearance of being a faithful port of the latest rash of games. In the press release announcing this momentous occasion, the PR firm notes that these particular versions will launch with 20 full episodes (10 questions each) and all those interesting bits and pieces of side content, like the "DisOrDat," the "Jack Attack," and even "Who's the Dummy?" Neat!
Posted in iPad Games, iPhone games, iPod touch games, News, Quiz | 14 Comments >>
Quiz Game 'Go Native!' Goes Free
Wednesday, September 29th, 2010Last week we took a look on a clever multiplayer quiz game called Go Native! [Free]. Instead of needing to guess the correct answer like most trivia games, Go Native! asks you to choose the most popular answer amongst all of the other players playing the game. We explained how this all works in our review:
In Go Native! you play the role of a native trying to, well, fit in with the natives. Fitting in involves answering an onslaught of questions, but instead of needing to answer questions correctly, you're trying to guess the answer that the majority of other players picked.
This involves a silly thought process that forces you to decide whether the players you're playing with are going to answer questions seriously or just pick whatever the silliest response is to the question asked. You can play with up to 30 players at once, and questions range from multiple choice, simple yes/no, or even filling in the blank where you're able to type whatever answer you'd like.
In our review we thought the game could be a lot of fun, but like a lot of online games, required a large active player base to really ever see its full potential. Realizing they needed to seed their online community with a load of players, the developers dropped the price of Go Native! to free. If our review at all piqued your interest, but you were reluctant to take the plunge on a paid online game with very few players, now is your chance to give it a spin for free. With any luck, a lot of other people will too because I'd really like to play a full 30 person game of Go Native!
Posted in Free, iPhone games, iPod touch games, Quiz, Sales | 5 Comments >>
'Go Native!' Review - A Cool Online Game In Need of Players
Friday, September 24th, 2010In the wake of how much fun I've been having with MovieCat!, I've been on the hunt for other trivia games to add to my arenal. It was at this point that I stumbled across Go Native! [99C/], which offers an oddly amusing untraditional take on trivia. In Go Native! you play the role of a native trying to, well, fit in with the natives. Fitting in involves answering an onslaught of questions, but instead of needing to answer questions correctly, you're trying to guess the answer that the majority of other players picked.
This involves a silly thought process that forces you to decide whether the players you're playing with are going to answer questions seriously or just pick whatever the silliest response is to the question asked. You can play with up to 30 players at once, and questions range from multiple choice, simple yes/no, or even filling in the blank where you're able to type whatever answer you'd like.
The goal of answering questions correctly is to advance from island to island, collect coconuts, and eventually meet up with the legendary Princess Mango. Different islands have different risks associated to them such as islands with quicksand and questions that need to be answered quickly. There's also an island where instead of answering the most popular answer, you need to choose the least popular as well as islands that cause you to lose all your coconuts with a wrong answer among others.
It's a cool premise for a game, and I like the idea of playing in a pool of 30 players online racing to the finish in a crazy popularity-based trivia contest. Unfortunately, there's no one to play with yet. I've only ever seen a few players online, and when I originally thought the game I was in was filling up with active players, I was incredibly disappointed to just see the player list filled with generic bot names.
The developers of Go Native! seem to have fallen in to a similar situation that quite a few games dependent on online players have found themselves in. In order for the game to be fun, there needs to be a large number of people playing online, but without a large number of players playing online, the game isn't captivating enough to play against bots waiting for other people to show up.
If Go Native! takes off and you can actually participate in 30 player games without issue, I could see it being a really great time. Unfortunately, with so few active players, all that Go Native! seems to have is a whole heap of unrealized potential.
Posted in $0.99, Games, iPhone games, iPod touch games, Quiz, Reviews | 7 Comments >>
Exclusive Sneak Peeks: Gilded Skull Games 'Imp or Oaf?' and 'Galactic Keep: Dice Battles'
Friday, July 10th, 2009Rob Lemon of Gilded Skull Games dropped us a note about two titles they have in the works for the iPhone. The first is Imp or Oaf?, a quirky guessing game where a portion of an image is shown, and players can either decide if they're looking at an imp or an oaf. Tapping the image zooms out a bit, and scoring is based on how far you needed to zoom out on each image for the round.
While Imp or Oaf? may be too simple to interest core gamers, the art style is closer to what you would expect in a children's book and raises the bar on what we've seen in the past with games aimed at kids. Imp or Oaf? is tentatively going to be released in August or September, and will begin beta testing soon.
As a table top RPG fanatic currently playing City State of the Invincible Overlord (An ancient AD&D module.) I'm far more excited about Gilded Skull Games' second game in the works, Galactic Keep: Dice Battles. Utilizing gameplay elements from classic pen and paper roleplaying games, Galactic Keep takes a clever spin on RPG adventure games and tells the story as if you were sitting around a game table tossing out twenty sided dice and listening to the dungeonmaster explain the environments while they drive the plot forward.
Similar to D20 table top RPG's, players will roll dice to create characters, move, and battle. As Gilded Skull Games explains, one of the key elements to the game will be the story:
We want to create a variety of story 'missions' in the first offering that allow quite a bit of replay. To this end, the first five missions that will ship with the game will have branching story paths that lead to at least 5 different endings per mission, various different unlockable playable characters, different items to equip and special attacks to collect.
Every mission will be different, some will be dungeon crawls with lots of creatures to kill and loot to collect. Others will be more socially oriented, as players explore large maps and communicate with NPC's. One of the things I'm mosted excited about is the planned inclusion of Bluetooth multiplayer to battle other player's characters. With my circle of friends, quite a few being avid Dungeons & Dragons players, something tells me I'll get a lot of use out of this.
Also in the works are plans for addon packs to be sold via DLC following the game's release. Galactic Keep is slated for submission to the App Store early next year, but the developer has promised to keep us posted on its progress.
For more information about either of these games, check out the ongoing discussion thread in our forums.
Posted in Adventure, Board, Exclusives, iPhone games, iPod touch games, Quiz, Retro, Role-Playing, Upcoming Games | 16 Comments >>
'MindRacer Duel' - Where's My Calculator?
Friday, June 26th, 2009As a child of the 80's, it was a big deal when my school was one of the few in my area that had a complete computer lab in the library with an Apple II for each student in the class. The catch? All the "games" available all had to do with math or typing. Spielhaus's MindRacer Duel [App Store] provides quite a bit of personal nostalgia, as you're forced to solve math problems on one of three difficulty settings to make your car travel down the race track.
Playing on Easy is, as you would expect- quite easy. Expert mode provides math problems filled with parenthesis and negative numbers, which require a little more brain power to quickly figure out on the fly. MindRacer Duel can be played both single player and two player, and at the current price of free, there's not much reason to not pick this one up if you're looking to brush up your math skills, or have kids that need to learn their multiplication tables.
App Store Link: MindRacer Duel, Free
Posted in Free, Games, iPhone games, iPod touch games, Quiz, Racing | 9 Comments >>
Sony TV Releases 'Jeopardy!' to App Store
Saturday, April 4th, 2009Fans of everyone's favorite game show will be pleased to hear that Sony Pictures Television has just released Jeopardy! [App Store] for the iPhone and iPod touch.
This...is...JEOPARDY! Put your knowledge to the test in this exciting new game created for the iPhone and iPod touch! Pick a category and dollar amount and answer clues written by Jeopardy writers. Buzz in quickly and answer correctly to watch your earnings rise, then hum along with the classic Final Jeopardy theme music while you respond to the final clue. Play America's favorite quiz show today!
Features listed by Sony:
- Use the touchscreen to write your name on the podium, just like a real contestant on Jeopardy!
- Play in Landscape mode so that you see the contestants and the categories on the same screen
- Includes real sounds from the game, including the classic Final Jeopardy Music!
- Listen the famous voiceover "This...is...Jeopardy!" from the famous Johnny Gilbert when the game starts
- Create your own custom contestant
- Packed with over 1500 clues, enjoy hours of entertainment!
Each round of the game is played across three different categories (as opposed to the TV show's six) with answers at five different dollar amounts for each. In normal play (where there are three levels of difficulty), when you pick an answer a timer begins ticking down and you have the option to respond or pass--but choose quickly, as at any moment another contestant may buzz in. For each answer you choose to respond to, three question choices are presented. The multiple choice approach makes for a rather simpler game than the TV show, but is not a surprising move for a computer edition of the game.
Jeopardy! also features a single-player mode which is the same game, but lacking other contestants.
The graphics are nothing to write home about, but then that's not the focus of the game, and the authentic audio does add nicely to the experience. (And who hasn't wanted to write their name on that glowing blue screen?) In all, fans of the 25 year old quiz show will likely find Jeopardy! for the iPhone to deliver an enjoyable mobile take on the game.
App Store Link: Jeopardy!, $4.99
Posted in $4.99, iPhone games, iPod touch games, Quiz | 24 Comments >>
'The Price is Right' - The iPhone Game
Sunday, November 16th, 2008FremantleMedia released an iPhone version of the long running daytime gameshow The Price is Right [App Store, $4.99]
The 84.5MB iPhone game offers 16 of the pricing games from the gameshow in which contestants guess at the actual price of various items. Features include:
- Single Player Mode: Play to avoid strikes and to rack up the biggest winnings.
- Party Mode: Compete against up to 4 players to accumulate the highest value of prizes.
- Includes 16 popular pricing games, plus Contestant's Row, Big Wheel & Showcase Showdown.
- Theme music, announcer audio and game sounds create a true-to-show experience.
- Rack up achievements in your personal trophy room.
First impressions of the game show a well implemented game that is reasonably faithful to the game show. The game itself is somewhat condensed to allow for individual play (even if you don't win the Contestant's Row). The products are shown both with video clips and images with detailed descriptions. The announcer's voiceover follows you throughout the game.
Based on early play, it's hard to tell how many video clips there are, though it certainly contributes to the sizable 84.5MB size. Overall, a safe bet for those who are fans of the show.
App Store Link: The Price is Right, $4.99
Posted in $4.99, iPhone games, iPod touch games, Quiz | 36 Comments >>
Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader? The iPhone Game.
Friday, August 29th, 2008Fans of the gameshow may be interested to see that Capcom has released an iPhone version of Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader [$9.99, App Store]. For those not familiar with the game show, Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader is a game show in the U.S. in which adult contestants are asked grade-school level questions opposite a 5th grader.
The iPhone version takes on the same format, asking a series of up to eleven questions per round ranging from subjects like U.S. history, math, and social studies. Work your way up to the top question, or admit that you are not smarter than a 5th grader.
According to Capcom's mobile site, the mobile game contains over 800 questions, which presumably also applies to the iPhone version.
Posted in $9.99, iPhone games, iPod touch games, News, Quiz | 6 Comments >>