App Of The Week

Neil StraussThe Loop

Okay, I’ve played Plants vs Zombies to death, which got me addicted to tower defense games. George Rockwell recommended Fieldrunners, which became an obsession for a while and, after solving, Towermadness became the next preferred leisure time-waster. However, I then hit an app wall. Couldn’t find anything worth playing more than a few times.

But then one of the great Nintendo DS games was turned into an even better iPad app: Scribblenauts Remix. There are five or so worlds, each with ten levels. In each, the goal is to literally write and create any object you can imagine in order to help people meet various goals.

But the genius of the game, and what separates good from great, is that the team that created this left very few stones unturned: They were wonderfully and obsessively thorough. Eighty percent of what you can imagine can be created here: If you type in “Plato,” the Greek philosopher will appear. If you type in “Zombie,” a zombie will appear, bite Plato, and turn him into a zombie. The other great thing about this is watching the interaction of the objects you create, which has also been well thought-out by the creators.

Better played than explained, here’s an example of the non-gameplay element of Scribblenauts. The gameplay is even better, though mostly I enjoy it for the simple clever-ness:

If you get the App, at some point type NEOGAF into the game, and interact with the item that then appears. Genius.