If you're not familiar with Venan Entertainment's Space Miner [$2.99], let me get you up to speed. In a nutshell, the game is incredible. So incredible in fact that it was our 2010 iPhone Game of the Year. It's an awesome modern spin on the Asteroids formula with light RPG elements, a lovable game world, and upgrades out the wazoo for your ship. Additional difficulty modes (including a super-difficult perma-death mode) add a silly amount of replay value, making Space Miner one of the few iOS titles I've ever replayed from start to finish multiple times across multiple difficulties. In other words, you need to check it out. This weekend Venan released the game design document for the game, and while it doesn't really reveal anything new or exciting that we already didn't know, it's really cool to take a look at what was the foundation for one of our favorite Read More

So the lines for Verizon iPhones haven't been anything like AT&T lines, but that's OK. We figure anyone hardcore enough to wait this long for an iPhone on Verizon probably got in on the crazy 3:00 AM preorder or simply decided to order online since it seems like winter isn't loosening its icy grasp yet on most of the United States. I can't blame people for not wanting to line up in the cold. I did 8 hours of sub-zero temperatures to wait in line for a Wii, and never plan on doing that again. If you've been following TouchArcade for a while now, this guide likely won't be of much use to you. For the sake of accessibility, I'm going to assume you've mostly ignored the world of iOS gaming, as you had no reason to follow it previously using whatever Verizon phone you had before. If this describes you, Read More

...our review we called it "one of the best games [we've] played since the App Store went live over a year and a half ago." Looking back on the game re... Read More

Way back at E3 in June of this year, developer Venan announced Space Miner Blast [Free], an arcade-focused spinoff of their full-fledged RPG-style shooter Space Miner: Space Ore Bust [$1.99/Lite]. The introduction of the iPhone 4 and iOS 4 threw a wrench in the development of Space Miner Blast, and the game that had once been "coming soon" was delayed for the next several months. Just over a week ago Venan released a trailer for Space Miner Blast to celebrate that the game was finally submitted, and indeed just a couple of hours ago the game went live in the App Store. Space Miner Blast is free to download and play, but comes with ads in the menu and title screens and 10 second countdown timers that must be endured before beginning the game and in between levels. In addition to the default ship, there are three additional ships available through Read More

Back in June we caught up with Venan Entertainment at E3. At the time, they showed an ad-supported free version of [$4.99 / Lite] called that took the core shooter gameplay of the original and applied it to a fast-paced arcade style mini-game. Back at E3 they were reluctant to get specific on the release date of Space Miner Blast, but assured me it would be available "soon". Recently Venan posted a bit of an explanation on their blog, and like quite a few projects that were in the works at the time by other developers, both iOS 4 and the iPhone 4 threw Venan a curve ball. Aside from apologies, a few interesting tidbits come out of the blog post. First off, Venan has developed a system to download high resolution assets from within their games while still staying under the 20mb ceiling of over the air downloads. With any Read More

...doggy! I got 7,317,543 points in #SpaceMiner! Ain't that just peachy? Try it for free! http://bit.ly/bNbuu0... Read More

...diggity! I got 11,120,378 points on Hard in #SpaceMiner! That's mighty swell! Try it for free! http://bit.ly/bNbuu0... Read More

...doggy! I got 8,830,962 points in #SpaceMiner! Ain't that just peachy? Try it for free! http://bit.ly/bNbuu0... Read More

Venan Entertainment, creators of Space Miner: Space Ore Bust [$1.99 / Free] and Ninjatown: Trees of Doom! [99¢], were at E3 this year crammed in the corner of the mobile section. The two new titles they had to show off were Ninjatown for the iPad, and a brand new freemium arcade game based on Space Miner called Space Miner Blast. Space Miner Blast will be supported by unobtrusive in-game advertising, with optional DLC which will add features to the game and disable advertisements entirely. Most of the original Space Miner has been stripped out in favor of a quick survival game with a very basic upgrade system. All you do is see how big of a multiplier you can keep going by blasting as much ore as you possibly can (while defending against enemies of course). Here is a few minutes of gameplay: Ninjatown: Trees of Doom! for the iPad retains Read More

Venan Entertainment, most famously known around these parts for Space Miner [99¢ / Free] gave us a look at their upcoming game, Ninjatown: Trees of Doom this week. Loosely based on the Nintendo DS game , Trees of Doom is a high-scoring jumping game like Doodle Jump [99¢] set in the Shawnimals universe, Ninjatown: Trees of Doom has players jumping between two trees, avoiding obstacles and picking up power-ups while seeing how high they can go. One thing that stuck out in my time with Ninjatown was how well the game scales up as you climb higher and higher. It starts very easy with only a few enemies to avoid and some branches to fling off of, and as you get further, the volcano in the background erupts, new enemies emerge, and day turns to night. You can see how this all plays out in the new trailer: Your ninja is Read More

Venan Entertainment's Space Miner [$4.99 / Free] seems to be universally loved by nearly everyone who touches it. We couldn't get enough of the game in our review, and it is one of the few iPhone games video games I've ever played where I enjoyed playing through it so much the first time that immediately after I beat the game the first time I started a second play through on the next higher difficulty. From our review: Space Miner places you in the role of the nephew of good ole' Uncle Jebediah Gritstone, proprietor of the galactic Gritstone Mining Station. Uncle Jeb has hired you on to help with the ore mining and it's with much excitement that you make your way to his mining station in your veritable space jalopy. Once on board, things get complicated (it's a long story, enjoy it in-game) and Uncle Jeb is desperately counting on Read More

...@VenanEnt Space Miner Lite is now available on the App Store! http://tinyurl.com/ydhhqhg #iPhone... Read More