Apps we’d love to see on Android
Following a discussion conducted in a bar over the weekend (the best kind of discussion as far as we’re concerned), we thought we’d put together a list of the applications and games we’d most like to see being released on the Android platform. We’d love to hear your suggestions too. Who knows, maybe some enterprising and dynamic developer is reading this and will roll up his or her sleeves and start coding one of your suggestions.
Simple, yet hugely addictive survival game. You must run and jump across rooftops, dodging death for as long as you possibly can. The monochrome graphics look good and the audio is superb. This is available both as an iPhone app and as a Flash game, so even if it’s never actually ported to Android, those of us who are lucky enough tp receive mobile Flash support will at least be able to play the online version.
There’s not a day that goes by that we here at This Android Life don’t read at least one Engadget article. The folks over at the good ship Engadget recently released an iPhone app that delivers their news feeds direct to the device. It also allows you access to the image galleries, video feeds and podcasts without leaving the app. Twitter, Facebook and email integration is also included should you wish to share an article with others.
Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars
This superb addition to the Grand Theft Auto series was originally released for the Nintendo DS and PSP, but it was recently ported to iPhone, so there’s no reason why it won’t work on higher end Android devices. Widely regarded as one of the best games available for handheld devices, we’d love to see it making an appearance in the Android Market.
In Chinatown Wars you play Huang Lee, the son of a recently murdered Triad boss who has recently arrived in Liberty City to meet with family. You end up involved in all sorts of illegal activities, ultimately leading to an opportunity to avenge your father’s death.
Bloom is a collaboration between the father of ambient music, Brian Eno, and software designer cum musician, Peter Chilvers. Described by Eno as “an endless music machine, a music box for the 21st century”, Bloom is part artwork part musical instrument. You tap a section of the mellow pastel-coloured screen and a note plays, with bassier notes found at the bottom of the screen and the treble at the top. When you’ve finished tapping, the notes you’ve selected are played back to you in a loop. If you don’t tap the screen at all, Bloom can generate it’s own tune randomly and play it back to you. The results are surprisingly musical and anyone who has played around with Bloom for 10 minutes or so will tell you it’s a hugely relaxing app.
Fantastic Contraption is a Flash physics puzzle game where the objective is to move a number of red objects from their starting position to an end zone. You place a number of building objects such as free-spinning or powered wheels and spokes in a designated building area. With these simple objects you can build surprisingly complex and powerful machines to drive, push, roll or even slingshot the red objects to their goal. If you’re new to Fantastic Contraption, play it a few times, then do a search for some of the video walkthroughs: some of the Fantastic Contraption community created solutions are simply brilliant.
Yes, we know Android will be getting the mobile version of Firefox eventually, but it’s not finished yet, so it’s still high up on our wishlist. Android is screaming out for a really good browser. The stock browser is ok; it does it’s job with a minimum of fuss but it is a little limited. Dolphin was a good, solid alternative when it was first released, but then it’s developers decided to jam it up with adware, which understandably put a lot of users off.
World of Goo
World of Goo is a puzzle game created by indie developers 2DBoy which became a massive commercial and critical success after it’s release. It’s similar in theme to Lemmings, in that your ultimate goal is to get a set number of goo balls to an exit pipe. To do this, you build towers, bridges and other structures out of some of the goo balls. There are several different types of goo ball, each with their own attributes and properties.
It’s a very enjoyable game which looks great. 2DBoy announced that an iPhone version is under development now, so hopefully they won’t ignore Android and we’ll see a version for it too.
Again, we know this is coming (for some Android users anyway), but Flash opens up so many other app possibilities, that it just can’t come quick enough. With Flash support, Android devices will not be limited to apps coded specifically for Android, rather they will be able to connect to Flash served apps and games hosted on the internet. Maybe Steve Jobs’ prediction that Flash has no place in the html5 driven future of the internet, but right now, it’s a powerful and liberating tool.
[...] our wishlist of apps we’d love to see on Android is a game called Canabalt by Adam “Atomic” [...]
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