Earlier this week, Firemint announced the release of their new game Firemint Real Racing which is now available for purchase for the iPhone and iPod Touch from the iTunes App Store for only $9.99.  Firemint is a relatively new app developer that burst onto the scene with their first self-branded game, Flight Control.   Below is the information from the press release or you can visit Firemint’s website for more information.

Firemint, a leading developer of games for  iPhone and iPod touch, today announced that its highly-anticipated  racing game Firemint Real Racing™ is now available for purchase on the  Apple App Store. Firemint Real Racing is Firemint’s second  self-published game and follows on from the phenomenal success of  Flight Control, which has gone to the #1 paid app position in 20  countries including the USA, UK and Japan. With over 800,000 downloads  so far, Flight Control is one of the most popular games ever to be  sold on the Apple App Store.

Firemint Real Racing provides gamers with the most thrilling racing experience by featuring a unique in-car view and carefully balanced, intuitive accelerometer support. Players will also enjoy a full suite of social networking features enabled by Firemint’s revolutionary Cloudcell™ technology, which allows users to automatically upload video replays of their best laps to their YouTube account and lap time  records to social media sites like Twitter – all straight from the  game.

Firemint Real Racing features include:

• Boasting via broadcast – upload video replays of your laps to YouTube with the push of a button.
• Unique in-car view – cockpit view with animated driver and dashboard instruments showing actual race data.
• Custom control options – Firemint Real Racing includes several different control methods including combinations of accelerometer or touch-based steering as well as automatic or touch-based acceleration and braking. Players can adjust handling and sensitivity to suit their personal preferences.
• Huge variety of cars and tracks – Players can unlock 36 cars in three classes (hatch, sedan and muscle) and 12 unique tracks designed for racing, each with its own challenges.
• Endless hours of racing thrills – Players can choose from five game modes: local head to head over Wi-Fi, Time Trial, Quick Race, Online League play and a massive single player Career mode.
• Best in class graphics, sound and handling – Firemint Real Racing delivers consistently high frame rates, carefully detailed trackside environments and cars, 3D sound effects, licensed music and cinematic cut scenes. Accurate surface variations including asphalt, grass, gravel and ripple-strips affect vehicle speed, responsiveness and handling.
• Connected racing for extended game play – In addition to YouTube functionality, players can sign up for online leagues and set up customized personal leader boards on a purpose-built community web site.

Yesterday, Spb Software House announced the availability of their award winning Brain Evolution puzzle pack for the iPhone and iPod Touch.  Back in January 2007 Doug reviewed the Windows Mobile version of this game.  Even though the platform has changed, Doug’s review provided many amazing screenshots and explanations of the levels that will help the novice get up-to-speed very quickly.  Now SPB has ported this game to the iPhone and iPod Touch, with many new enhancements.

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More worrying rumors for the new Palm Pre.  It seems that customers have been experiencing rapid battery drains.  As in the Pre is completely ‘powerless’ after sitting idle for 2 to 4 hours.  Now could this be a settings issues?  Sure.  Maybe its something that Palm can fix?  Possibly.  However, poor battery life can be a deal breaker for many people, myself included.  I don’t want to have to worry about charging my phone every 2 hours.  I have meetings at work longer than that, and I would hate to miss a call due to lack of ‘juice’.  Even Sprint is admitting that frequent charging is something that you may need to do. 

 

No – it’s good for a half a day of heavy use. I’ve been charging three times a day (noon, 5PM, overnight) but I’m heavy on the phone – 4 to 6 hours of calls a day on Bluetooth with all the apps open at once.  

We’ll get some tips on maximizing battery life out here next week.

Buzz About Wireless Admin
Sprint Nextel

I guess we will just need to wait and see.  Here’s hoping that this is something that is fixable. 

Via Gear Diary

I put an exclamation mark there to make the whole idea of a chart more exciting. It’s a good, quick comparison for people who are wondering what the differences between the two models are – after all, they look so bloody similar! The chart still doesn’t say anything about how much faster the new iPhone is. Nobody seems to know that, and it’s funky that Apple would reveal the specs of their Macbooks but not their iPhones.

Ah well, all I need now is a chart to show me the cheapest way to upgrade to an iPhone 3GS without jumping into a fresh three-year contract…

[Engadget versus chart here]

At about 1am Eastern time, Zune.net went dark.  I know that sounds scary, but its actually good news.  Microsoft was updating Zune Headquarters to allow for better performance, and they also threw in a few new features.  My favorite new feature is ‘follow the artist’.  This will allow Zuners to tag an artist that they like and receive all sorts of information:  news, tour dates, RSS feed aggregation, latest Twitter and blog posts.    Plus, the RSS feed aggregation will allow Zuners to add links to an artist page.  I love the fact you can get all your info in one place.  It is all about convenience.  The main page of Zune.net will also feature more social aspects with additional music recommendations and listening now module.  Just to clarify all of these updates are just for Zune.net, not the Zune software.  I would really like to see the ‘follow the artist’ integrated into the software.  Plug your Zune in, and the latest news and releases from your favs are right at your fingertips.

Via Zune Thoughts and SolSie.com