When I was in college, I used to love playing darts.  In fact, most weekends (and some weeknights) you could have found me at our local watering hole (the now defunct Attractions), and usually by the end of the evening my friends and I had found our way to the dart boards. 

Since that time, my darts playing has dwindled significantly.  After my wife and I got married, I had a dart board in our partially finished basement.  Once we started having kids, though, my time and space began wearing out.  I still have all of my darts and dart boards, but with no sufficient space to hang them, they just sit in the basement gathering dust. 

What I really need is a way to play darts, without worrying about the amount of space involved…or tossing sharp pointy objects around my young children.  Fortunately, there is a fantastic new freebie in the iTunes App Store – the aptly named, Darts.

There are a lot of different games you can play with darts, but the two most common are Cricket and X01.  In the iPhone version of the game, you can choose to play either of these games, or just practice tossing darts at the board. 

Cricket: In this game, your scoring zones are only in the 15-20 and bullseye spaces.  The idea is to close the scoring zones by hitting each one three times.  Once you have closed the scoring zone, you can continue hitting it to score points until your opponent has also closed it.  The winner will close all of the scoring zones, while also scoring the most points on the closed zones.

X01: In this game, each player starts with an equal number of points (301, 501, 601, 701, or 1001).  Players alternate turns throwing darts at the board, and deducting earned points from their totals.  The first one to end a turn with exactly 0 points wins the game.

Although these are the primary games most people play, there are plenty of others, including Baseball and Killers, both of which appear to be coming soon in future (still free) updates.  Can’t wait to see that, and maybe even more to come…

Back in those good old college days, we played both of these games pretty regularly,  and I was really impressed by how well they were approximated in the iPod Touch.  The graphics are pretty simple.  Just a dart board hanging on a wall.  Beneath the board, just like any good bar, there is a small chalk board which is used for scoring.

To play, just move the aiming circle to the point on the board you hope to hit.  Then, flick your finger against the screen.  Depending upon how long, fast, and straight you flick, your dart may hit exactly where you aim, or it may fly errantly wild.  What I liked about this game was that, like the real game of darts, the designers managed to work muscle memory and simple trial and error into tossing the darts.  Just like the real game, it is not easy to throw the darts true to your aim.  With a lot of practice, however, you will soon find yourself nailing even the most difficult shots.

I was also very impressed by the Dartbot artificial intelligence, against whom you will play.  According to the developers, over 5 million actual dart throws have been simulated here in order to create an incredibly realistic artificial intelligence. 

Still, I did think it would have been nice to be able to play against my friends.  So, I was thrilled to find that the future plans for this game include multiplayer action, both pass and play mode on one device, or using multiple devices connected on a Wifi network.   The only other request I have would be for the game to keep statistics for you so you could track your improvement.

No game will ever completely replace the experience of playing darts in a bar.  But boy did this one come close.  Frankly, the interface, graphics, and gameplay in this one make it about as close as you can get to a game of darts without putting holes in your wall.m  Check out more info at www.dartsapp.com.  then, download it from the iTunes store.  Better hurry though, before the developers of this one wise up and start charging for it.

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