Bendroid, the development team behind the hugely popular Mystique series of games, have announced the release of their latest Andriod game, CarWash 3D.  Car Wash 3D is a similar concept to the flight control style games where instead of guiding a number of aircraft to land safely, you have to try and guide a number of cars through a car wash without them crashing into either one another or the scenery.

Here’s the description from the official market:

CarWash 3D is the world’s most challenging game created just for you. Touch and guide cars directly into the car wash and avoid being hit! Remember, you need to wash every car, otherwise you are OUT OF BUSINESS!!!

Featuring:

- Incredibly simple, but amazingly engaging.

- Beautiful 3D graphics.

- 3 unique locations.

- More than 10 various vehicles.

- Local and Global highscores.

- WARNING: Insanely addictive gameplay.

As well as announcing the game’s release, Bendroid have also announced that, for the first few weeks, there will be a little competition running: the player with the highest score across the three online leaderboards will win a Verizon DROID.

We’ll take CarWash 3D for a spin and will have a review for you next week.

More details can be found here.

It seems like every other day there’s a Chinese manufacturer releasing yet another Android powered tablet PC, and sadly there’s very little to differentiate one from the other.  Today’s offering from the Far East though, is admittedly a pretty nice looking piece of kit and for the most part, it doesn’t have the low end specs that some of it’s counterparts have been lumbered with.  Chinese tech brand Mastone have unveiled the Lifepad I859.  Mastone demo’ed a prototype of the  device, then called the PROWAVE, at MWC 2010 (see the video below – note the PROWAVE in the video was running Android 1.6, but Maston have stated that the I850 will be running 2.1).

It’s a pretty slick looking device with a 1GHz ARM Freescale CPU, 512MB RAM and 2GB of flash memory under the hood.  It has a 7 inch 800 x 600 resistive (urk!) touchscreen, a 3G SIM slot, GPS, WiFI connectivity, a front facing webcam, microphone and mono (as best as we can tell) speaker.  All of which adds up to a pretty respectable entry to the soon to be saturated Android tablet market.

We can expect to see the device appearing over the Summer, but no pricing has been announced as yet.

{Story via Lifepad, video from ARMdevices.net}

The clever folks at Myriad Group (the people behind the impressive Dalvik Turbo) have announced a new tool called J2Android, which converts Java applications to run on Android’s virtual machine, Dalvik.  This is good news for users of Android devices, with a massive back catalogue of existing Java MIDlets already available, this means we’ll have way more apps to feed our phones.  J2Android should be available at the end of the second quarter, or the beginning of the third quarter, of 2010 with it’s price yet to be revealed.

Here’s a video of J2Android in action:-

Below is the official press release from Myriad Group:-

DUEBENDORF ZURICH – March 19, 2010: Myriad Group AG (www.myriadgroup.com), a global leader in mobile technology with software in over 2 billion phones, today launched Myriad J2Android, which allows the seamless conversion of MIDlets into Android applications. Phone manufacturers, operators and mobile application stores can now leverage the tens of thousands of MIDlet applications already on the market, creating new revenue opportunities and providing the Android community with access to a variety of rich content.

Utilizing J2Android, phone manufacturers, operators and mobile application stores can rapidly populate their Android storefronts with premium applications from launch, without the need for porting or middleware. As a result, they can deliver end users access to a library of content and a richer user experience on their Android handsets.

Myriad J2Android delivers automatic conversion of compiled MIDlets into Android applications, providing a trouble-free and cost-effective solution. Further software features include adaptive screen scaling and the ability to apply virtual keypads and softkeys, allowing both users and content owners to benefit from full use of the screen estate. This MIDlet to APK approach requires no source code or middleware allowing for seamless discovery and 1-click accessibility.

“As Android devices appear in greater volumes, the challenge has been how quickly the industry can make apps and content available to cope with user demand.  One obvious source is the catalog of quality titles already available but locked away in Java format,” said Malcolm Dawe, Chief Product Officer of Myriad Group. “Our technology unleashes this content’s potential enabling the industry to bring to market premium Android content from day one.”

This software is the latest addition to the Myriad’s arsenal of Android solutions, offering best-in class solutions from application components to complete device integration. J2Android is fully supported by both the Dalvik engine and Myriad’s Dalvik Turbo virtual machine. The latter was launched at Mobile World Congress last month to a very positive reception, as it delivers increased application execution speeds of up to three times and improved battery life on Android handsets.

As a founding member of the Open Handset Alliance (OHA), Myriad has been playing a key role in Android solutions since its early days. When partnering with Myriad for Android application development or porting, operators, OEMs and application store owners benefit from Myriad’s rich heritage in Java technology development and unique Android platform expertise.

A demonstration of Myriad J2Android is now available to view on the Myriad YouTube channel, along with Myriad Dalvik Turbo and other demo clips http://www.youtube.com/user/myriadgroupmarketing. For more information please visit www.myriadgroup.com.

About Myriad

Myriad Group AG is a global leader in mobile technology and has shipped over 3.2 billion software applications in more than 2 billion mobile phones. Its comprehensive portfolio includes browsers, messaging, Java, social networking, user interfaces and middleware for all types of mobile phones, from ultra-low cost handsets to advanced smartphones.

The company provides both individual components and complete solutions, which enable handset manufacturers and operators to deliver amazing experiences on mobile phones. Myriad also develops USSD-based customer self-care platforms that deliver over 10 billion messages a year to 220 million mobile users across more than 30 mobile operators worldwide.

Myriad was created from the combination of industry leading companies, Esmertec and Purple Labs. It operates worldwide, with offices in Switzerland, France, UK, USA, Mexico, China, South Korea, Taiwan, Japan and Australia. Headquartered in Dübendorf Zürich Switzerland, Myriad is listed on the SIX Swiss Exchange (SIX Symbol: MYRN). For more information, visit www.myriadgroup.com.