Single Player mode held my interest for about five minutes. We tried two-player. We didn’t finish the game. Maybe my partner and I are both type-A personality gamers who get into games with a fury, but we found ourselves pulling the phone from each other’s hands time after time. Additionally, the “Pause” and “Menu” buttons are in the corners next one player’s goal. Even more so than having the phone ripped from my hands, having the game suddenly pause and staring at each other took us out of the moment.  The second time it happened we both went “meh?” and gave up.

Bottom Line: Air Hockey is not my kind of game. If it is yours, give SteamPunk Hockey a try since it attempts to deliver a new experience.

SteamPunk Hockey (Free)

Credits drive both your level advancement and your ability to buy better armor and weapons. Credits are also used to upgrade them. Each time you kill an opponent, they drop credits and health power up that can be picked up by anyone. Taunting (shaking your iPhone or Touch) over a dead body adds to the credit score at the end.

Energy drives your ability to stay in the game. Each round takes a third of your energy bar. Four power cells replenish a third of your bar. You can wait to recharge naturally on a two hour cycle, or you can spend 4-12 power cells to replenish your energy bar. While energy is zero, you can play but not earn credits. You an also increase your ranking, not level, which is used by the matchmaking system to usually get a roughly equal four-way death match. I tried to lower my ranking by getting killed as much as possible and not killing anyone. No luck. Rank only advanced or stayed equal on zero energy. There may be other ways to manipulate the ranking system, but this is one they covered. A quick check of GamePro does not list any cheats. I find that gratifying. Nothing tanks a FPS than easy cheats that destroy fair-play.

This app plays best over WiFi, and I have had good-luck over 3G. YMMV on 3G. Some report not fairing as well as WiFi. I claim they are whiners.

Touch Arcade has a great info-post on what you need to know to get started quickly in Eliminate Pro and not was your precious credits going down dead-end paths.

Eliminate Pro Wiki provides a great buying guide comparing relative merits of the weapons and armor.

Eliminate Pro (Free)

Rather than point out feature-by-feature how PhotoTrader improves on the concept,what does it do? Swap photos with strangers and include text with the photo. While there it starts with a random element, you can friend people as you get to know them. Friends can then exchange pictures directly. It provides a time-line of who sent you things as well as the ability to review what they sent. You can block someone from sending you more stuff. The FAQ says this is non-reversible. That is fine for the class of individuals we’ll discuss momentarily. There is also a mature setting for those who wish to send, umm, ‘mature’ pix to each other. The good news is no more random crotch shots you were not expecting…unless you have the mature tag, in which case, I can’t imagine PhotoTrader will have any fewer unannounced rooster shots or any less hairy leg shots. And that brings up the one feature I wish they would implement…autoblock those hairy legs. Nobody wants to see that even if you put your your xbox controller on your lap, Mr. HairyLeg Owner. Ah well, no app is perfect.

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