Raccoon Rising [99¢] from Romper Games is a delightful game about a sleepy raccoon trying to survive when his forest is invaded by an army of robots and their deforestation machinery. After watching the trailer (below), you might expect an endless-vertical jumping game, as it resembles NinJump [Free/HD]. But, it's actually more like a vertical platform game, because you're not constantly jumping and can find places to stop and plan your approach upwards, through the obstacles. Also, it's level based, so you're not always restarting from the very beginning. The little raccoon's simple story is told through comic-strip cut-scenes as he journeys through four worlds, including a temple, Tanuki forest, a ship called the 'Salty Sprocket' and finally, a city. Each world features different graphics, music, enemies and obstacles, but the goal is always to progress upwards until you reach a gate, which shuts behind you. Each time you reach a Read More

It's a good time to be a word game fan. Every few weeks a new genre standout arrives, ready to tide you over until the next big hit. Now App Store superstar Zach Gage (Unify [$1.99/Free], Bit Pilot [99¢], Halcyon [$1.99]) has thrown his hat into the word game ring with SpellTower [$1.99] . Those of us who fit in the Venn diagram intersection of iPad owners and word game fans benefit -- SpellTower is elegant, clever and fun. Not that it's entirely unique. We've all played any number of games that make use of SpellTower's main mechanic. Presented with a grid of letters, you spot a word and trace a path through its letters to select it. You can trace in any direction, loop diagonally back on your path, and make words of any length past two. And if that were all there was to it, this would be a Read More