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Newly Available On iOS : Star Wars – Heroes Path, Xenowerk, Dr. Panda in Space, Bonza National Geographic and More

Phew…what a week for gamers with E3 and the Steam Summer sale hitting, not to mention quite a few iOS price drops.

But all that gaming goodness couldn’t keep a whole new crop of iOS game releases from launching.

Starting things off is a surprise title which launched at the beginning of the week. Fallout Shelter is a new mobile-only simulation game set in Bethesda’s popular Fallout universe. One room at a time, you must plan and construct their own state-of-the-art underground Vault (courtesy of Vault-Tec). You are trying to protect the Dwellers and keep them happy and alive, while putting them to work to generate food, water and electricity, to keep the vault up and running. You can even send your Dwellers off on recon missions in the Wasteland to explore the surface for useful items and weapons. The game is brimming with character and funny dialog among the Dwellers. If you are a fan of simulation games like Tiny Tower, I think you’ll probably have some fun this one, regardless of whether or not you are familiar with the Fallout game series.

The makers of last year’s excellent word puzzle game Bonza have teamed up with National Geographic to bring us an all-new free-to-play release of their game, called Bonza National Geographic. There are quite a few free puzzle packs included with the download, and there are also some additional packs which can be unlocked though play and IAPs. This new version of the game includes a wide variety of categories for puzzles as well as some jigsaw style puzzles crafted using some of National Geographic’s award-winning photos. If you haven’t checked out the original Bonza, then this free National Geographic one is a great place to start.

It’s been quite some time since we’ve seen a new Call of Mini™ dual-stick shooter game from Triniti Interactive, but this week they return, guns blazing with Call of Mini™ Squad. In a world “abused and attacked by walking dead” do you think you have what it takes to l;et those bullets fly and defend what’s left of humanity?

How about a little kart racing. KKRacing is actually the first of two racing games I’m featuring this week, we’ll get to the other one when we get to the paid titles. While certainly not the best Mario Kart clone out there, KKRacing is a decent FREE kart racer, offering a good deal of vehicle customization as well as five different race modes including Speed Race, Gold Race, Skill Race, Smash Race and Endless Race.

Puzzle game aficionados, Ivanovich Games have teamed with developer Zen Brains to release Match’em/a>. The basic rule is that you must join two or more tiles of same color to remove them. However things can and will get frantic as the board fills up with blocks and each level tweaks or slightly changes the basic rule to have new goals to accomplish, adding some variety, especially during longer play sessions.

Spell Block Academy is a kid-friendly word game for the iPad where the player is cast as a young wizard’s apprentice trying to “enhance his or her magical vocabulary: by spelling words on a game board. You do this by rolling lettered dice around the board until they drop into the correct hole matching the missing letter of a word. You quickly move up from one die to multiple dice which roll simultaneously, so you need to plan your movements better, such that you don’t drop a letter into the wrong hole, or accidentally roll a die off the end of the board. It is a fun little mix of puzzle and word game, coupled with a cute theme that kids should enjoy.

If you are looking for a little platforming fun, WonderCat Adventures is a new runner platformer featuring a robot pod-riding cat. Using a single finger, you tap to make WonderCat’s pod jump, holding down for longer jumps. You must navigate sliding and swinging platforms, hopefully successfully besting each of the game’s 50 levels and 5 bosses battles.

Pixelbite, the creators of Space Marshals and the Reckless Racing series are back with a beautiful looking new top-down, dual-stick shooter called Xenowerk. A scientific experiment has gone horribly wrong and now it’s up to you to strap on a couple of guns and try to stop the mutant infestation. The game features responsive virtual dual sticks and some stellar lighting effects as you explore a dark, decimated underground science lab with just a flashlight for light. Upgrade your weapons and armor and take on increasingly more powerful mutations as you descend deeper and deeper into this dangerous underground petri dish.

Next up is a spooky, horror puzzle/adventure game called House of Grudge. Hitting that horror punch list, the game’s plot contains a quaint quiet village, a young couple with a baby, a tragic event and a “creepy dilapidated mansion”. Players must solve various puzzles to progress through the rooms of the spooky mansion. Do you have what it takes to make it out alive?

On a cheerier note, it’s one small step for pandas and one giant leap for panda kind. Your kids’ favorite panda, Dr. Panda, has just launched into outer space for his latest tile, Dr. Panda in Space. Children get to customize and launch their own rockets, explore the universe with Dr. Panda and even meet some (friendly) aliens and some of Dr. Panda’s other friends. There is no IAP and dozens of activities to keep your children entertained.

We’ve finally made it to that second racing game which I mentioned earlier. Swing Racers features a pretty cool drag to accelerate mechanic. Rather than steering, it makes you feel like you are dragging your cart around the course, but with some nice physics and reactions. These touch controls afford the game a bit more of a tactile feel than your traditional racer as you are zooming around the track, not only trying to win, but also fulfill various goal, which may included destroying other vehicles, collecting all of the stars, etc. Unfortunately the game does not appear to support local or online multiplayer play, but the single-player gameplay is still enjoyable.

Finally that brings us to the latest mobile offering from the folks at Disney, a Star Wars-themed puzzled game called Star Wars – Heroes Path. The game, which plays very similarly to Square Enix’s Hitman GO, recreates the events of Episode IV: A New Hope in a strategy board game like manner. Players must safely navigate characters like C-3PO, Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Princess Leia, Chewbacca, and Obi-Wan Kenobi though tiled levels, avoiding getting caught and killed by Storm Troopers or other enemies. New elements like sliding tiles, R2-D2 clone holograms and more are introduced as you go which add complexity and require new and different strategies. Each level has multiple goals to complete, which may require completely different approaches to complete all three. Just an FYI, four heroes and six chapters are included in the $3.99 purchase price, however it will cost you an additional $3.99 in IAP if you want to unlock both the Obi-Wan Kenobi and Han Solo characters which come with and additional four chapters (which amounts to 24 more levels). Overall, this is a nice little puzzle game, with a great Star Wars theme and I’m hoping there will be more Episodes in future. If you are a Star Wars fan, you’ll want to pick this one up. If you are a Hitman GO fan, you’ll want to pick this one up.