ZX Nostalgia. Adventure edition vol.1

Seems like everyone's favourite 8-bit home micro, the ultimate game machine of the 80s, the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, is experiencing a revival on the iPhone and the rest of Apple's iDevices. No, really. The seemingly excellent ZX Nostalgia. Adventure edition vol.1 has just made it to the App Store, is compatible with the iPhone, iPod and iTouch, looks brilliant, and is offering some of the best adventures the Speccy has ever seen. You can get the adventury ZX Nostalgia here.

The app allows you to play some classic Zenobi text adventures (find out more about Zenobi here). It is optimized for both the iPhone and the iPod and runs at 100% full speed on all models., whereas both sound and multi-touch control are supported. It is also possible to play in either portrait or landscape mode. As for the games included, well they are some of the best Zenobi ever published:

- A Stroll In The Bleak Forest (1989)
- An Everyday Tale Of A Seeker Of Gold (1986)
- Behind Closed Doors 1 (1988)
- Behind Closed Doors 2 (1988)
- Behind Closed Doors 3 (1989)
- Bulbo and The Lizard-KIng (1987)
- Bulbo Pics (1987)
- From Out Of A Dark Night Sky (1988)
- Fuddo and Slam (1987)
- Fuddo Pics (1987)
- Just One Of Those days (1988)
- Retarded Creatures and Caverns (1989)
- The Balrog and The Cat (1988)
- The Goblin Gazzzette (1988)
- The Goblin Gazzette 2 (1989)
- The Secret Of Little Hodcome (1986)

A CPC for your Caanoo

The 8-bit Amstrad CPC, both in its 464 and 6128 variants, was a fantastic home computer, that was wildly popular in Europe and sported an amazing catalog of gaming software. Then again you know that; if not please do read this lovely Amstrad retrospective and come back. Happily those proud owners of the Caanoo handheld can now play through said catalog on the go via the rather excellent and absolutely freeware Cap32 (a.k.a. Caprice32) emulator.  

Cap32 emulates every classic CPC model you'd care mention (464, 664, 6128) and even sports some rather impressive features to enhance your retro gaming experience. Think cheats, save states, memory monitors and more. What's more you can discover and download hundreds of games for free via CPC Game Reviews.

Elite brings Spectrum gaming to the iPhone

Elite, the ancient and still going publisher that has already given us dozens of classic ZX Spectrum games, is going back to its roots by releasing a most promising ZX Spectrum emulator for the iPhone. Apparently and according to touchArcade the emulator will be packed with games and will hopefully get further (possibly through DLC) game compilations. The upcoming ZX Spectrum: Elite Collection (Vol.1) has already been approved by Apple and further volumes are being prepared.

Impressively, Elite has packed its offering with more features than any 8-bit lover would hope to ask for: officially licensed ZX Spectrum games, game-specific play controls, extensive playing instructions, the option of portrait or landscape play, and authentic Speccy sound.

Highly portable SNES emulator

Having already tried PocketSNES, the lovely freeware SNES emulator for the WiZ, I can attest to its brilliance. Everything I tried on the thing work perfectly, though apparently it still had some bugs and minor incompatibilities. Enter PocketSNES version 7.0.1; the latest version of the emulator that fixes more bugs and adds more features. Enjoy. 

Mobile Interactive Stories

Textfyre is a truly unique company and the sole developer and publisher of quality interactive fiction (a.k.a. text-adventures) for Windows and Mac computers. Happily, they seem to have decided to go mobile and getting their games to run on iPhone, iPad, Android, Windows Phone 7, Kindle, Blackberry, and Palm. To help them make the rather indie delights of intellectual gaming on the go a reality, you should visit their Kickstarter page. Here's what you will be supporting:

Textfyre will be publishing interactive stories to all mobile devices. Stories will be developed internally at Textfyre, but also licensed from any author or company that wishies to publish their content on our platform.

The platform will allow free and paid content while offering a central repository. The reader can interact on a Kindle, then open up the same story on their iPhone and start where they left off. They can move to their Mac or PC and do the same. Stories will come in all genre's and lengths, leaving those details to the story designers. Textfyre's stories generally offer 10 to 20 hours of interactive time and include hints and introductory assistance.

We plan to have our engine and user interfaces implemented by the end of 2010 with your help. This will include native Mac OS X, iPhone, iPad, Android, Windows Phone 7, Kindle, Blackberry, and Palm Pre devices (barring unforseen technical or other factors).

And here's an online demo of The Shadown in the Cathedral to help you understand what kind of games we're talking about.

Undercroft (iPhone) gone free!

If you are looking for a brilliant RPG to enjoy on your iPhone, Undercroft is a brilliant choice, what with its sword & sorcery setting, oldschool gameplay, big world, tons of baddies and lovely graphics. Oh, and it's now free to play. Get it here.

Back to the Newton

Emulation can be a funny thing. It can even enable you to enjoy Apple's pretty ancient Newton pad can now be enjoyed on the iPhone. Find out more here.

AGS on the iPhone

According to the excellent AGS Blog Ben304's quirky, indie, and freeware (at least on the PC) AGS adventure "!" has been succesfuly ported to Apple's iPhone. This of course could only mean that more adventure gaming fun should be coming to Apple portables everywhere, which in turn means the masses will finally accept the glory of point-and-click gaming. Or not. That's beside the point though. Just watch the video and give the PC version of Ben's ! a try.

Ken's Labyrinth for free

Some of the earlier and more historic games that helped the FPS become the behemoth genre it currently is, remain both interesting and extremely fun to play, as anyone who has recently enjoyed a game of Ken's Labyrinth will tell you. Even more so, when played in a shiny new handheld console for free. You can grab the Wiz / Caanoo version of the game here.

Atari's Greatest Hits: Volume 1 (DS)

I just can't help but be intrigued by retro compilations. Silly, I know, but that's me I'm afraid, and I really feel you should know about the forthcoming Atari’s Greatest Hits: Volume 1 for the Nintendo DS. It will, after all, be very soon released in the US (let's hope for an equally swift European release) and will include 50 or more classic Atari 2600 and arcade games. What's more, the thing will impressively feature single card multi-player for 20 of the included titles, among which Space Duel and Pong are bound to make me smile.

Additionally (also, allegedly), Atari’s Greatest Hits: Volume 1 will sport a sleek and colorful interface, that will let us access the games themselves, their original manuals, an Atari memorabilia showcase, and even an Atari Trivia game.

The complete Atari’s Greatest Hits: Volume 1 game line-up is as follows:

Arcades:

Asteroids, Battlezone, Centipede, Gravitar, Lunar Lander, Missile Command, Pong, Space Duel, Tempest.

Atari 2600:

3D Tic-Tac-Toe, Adventure, Air-Sea Battle, Asteroids, Atari Video Cube, Basketball, Battlezone, Bowling, Centipede, Championship Soccer, Dodge ’Em, Flag Capture, Football, Fun with Numbers, Gravitar, Hangman, Haunted House, Home Run, Human Cannonball, Math Gran Prix, Miniature Golf, Missile Command, Outlaw, Realsports Baseball, Realsports Boxing, Realsports Football, Realsports Tennis, Realsports Volleyball, Sky Diver, Slot Maching, Slot Racers, Sprintmasters, Starship, Stella Track, Submarine Commander, Surround, Swordquest Earthworld, Swordquest Fireworld, Swordquest Waterworld,Tempest and Video Checkers.

Impressive, eh? Let's just hope the emulation is proper. Oh, and here's the thing's trailer: