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So you’re a casual chess fan and you’re looking for a great mobile distraction while on the road, waiting for a car repair or snuggled in bed before sleep. Developer, 99 Games has release two chess games for the iPod Touch and iPhone through the iTunes store: Chess Pro and Chess Lite.

Both the Pro and the Lite versions are based on the same basic game play style, while the Pro is the full blown version Chess Lite offers a lighter gaming atmosphere for a lighter amount of money. You can purchase Chess Lite for USD $.99 cents while the Pro version will run you USD $3.99. Quite honestly, the $3.99 version is worth while if you want to put any real effort into playing chess because it has more styles of play, better graphics and, most importantly, the ability to chose difficulty levels. The Lite version is designed for casual play, we’re not sure what the difficulty setting is for this release.

The Lite release has minimal graphics, very flat and 2D while the Pro version has a rich 3D look and feel to the game environment. For all intensive purposes, we’ll talk more to Chess Lite Pro as this has the most bang for the buck and all the features at your finger tips.

Chess Pro Graphics

You’ll find three variable difficulty settings: easy, medium and hard. New chess players will want to jump right into ‘easy’ mode and start learning the ropes. You’ve never played chess? That’s completely fine because the game will help you along by showing you the moves that are valid for the specific game piece in question. There is also a hint button you can click if you’re really lost as to what a good next move may be. Word of warning, we’ve used the hint button through an entire game and lost badly so, take the hint as just that… a hint.

Hardcore chess players will probably not want to see all the legal moves a specific piece can be made, this can be disabled in the options menu. By turning off legal moves, you’ll naturally increase the difficulty level of game play because you’ll be on your own for where you can placing the piece. Naturally, you can push up the difficulty level as you become more familiar with the game and find a better challenge. You’ll know the game is working its magic as even the iPod Touch gets warm after playing a bit of Chess Pro.

This game is all about playing on-the-go so you’ll find you can save your progress at any time with up to five save slots and resume when you’re ready to play again. While playing through a move, you’ll notice a timer up near the top right counting up your play time, this will give you a good idea of how long it is taking you to defeat the opponent. How fast can you defeat the CPU?

There is a local two player mode which allows you to hand over the mobile device to a friend to play their move. After your turn is over, the board will animate and “flip” so the next player can make their move. This is great if you’ve got a competitive itch with a friend or spouse and don’t want to pull out a real game board. We’d rather not have the board flip, though, since it’s very easy to play the device on the table with a player at both sides, the flip would be great if was an optional setting.

Chess Lite Graphics

The touch style of play works well with chess as we’re all used to playing chess by moving game board pieces. For our big finger friends, this may prove to be a slight challenge as the game board is pretty small. If you’ve got the finger dexterity to type on the iPhone/iPod keyboard you’ll have no problem with Chess Pro or Chess Lite, but their seems to be no way to zoom in if you’re big finger challenged. There is an undo button for those that mis-slide or otherwise mess up their move (don’t use it to cheat!)

There are two variants to the standard game of chess: Suicide and Losers. In the suicide variant, you’re goal is to be the player with no pieces left on the board or have no legal moves left. This sounds easy for those that are not good at Chess but it’s harder to lose than you think. You’re forced to capture your opponents piece if the chances arrives, so you can’t just sit idle and lose because they’re going to try to lock you into capturing them. Losers variant is similar to suicide but the player who loses their king will automatically lose the match, much like standard chess.

You’ll find the Pro version also arrives with three game skins or “themes” to play. You can use the hardwood chess pieces, the silver metallic pieces or the 2D pieces you’re stuck using with the Lite version of the game.

Hardcore chess hobbiests or competitive players may find this game lacking in certain areas we’re sure, but for the rest of us “normal people,” this proves just the distraction we need on the go. It plays well, looks polished, contains variants for those that get bored of standard play and costs less than $5.00. It’s hard to argue with that!

Ashtons: Family Resort is a time management game that is a bit different from other time management games. Players control two people’s time instead of just one. Players control a husband and wife that are starting their own tourist business and in the process upgrading their own house. Controlling two peoples time, is more challenging because there are more things going on at one time.

Like most time management games, you have to send the characters off to help the customers. In this case, the customers are vacationers. The vacationers want to do all types of different activities and that is where the characters come into play. The activities change based on the area the vacationers are in. In the beginning of the game, the activities are fishing, bike riding and such. The next area is a winter area and the activities are building snowmen, ice skating and such.

The activities are the main item to attend to, but there are other things that pop up. The ice cream machines will break, the ice skating ring needs retouching and the player has to fix these items. The other challenge are animals that become annoying. In the camping area, players have to deal with raccoons knocking over the trash and bunnies eating the flowers. Each area has their own bothersome animals that need to be swatted away.

When each level ends, there is a matching game that the player has to perform. The matching game adds additions to the house. The matching game is similar to a match three game, but you can match three or more and have them disappear. The players has to match a certain amount of items to pass the stage.

The graphics in Ashtons: Family Resort are clear and well done. Each vacation area is in a different weather climate and each area’s graphics are very fitting. Players can easily tell what the families need or want to do.

Ashtons: Family Resort is an extremely fun and a bit different time managment game. The added matching game after each level gives the game a different feel. Players can still upgrade all thier items in the game like any time management game. The different areas also add to the different feel the game offers. If you are a time management fan, you definitely need to check out Ashtons: Family Resort.

Handmark has announced the release of Hellfire for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Hellfire is a helicopter game and, as you might expect, takes advantage of the accelerometer in the iPhone/iPod Touch for game play control.

“Our GTS World Racing game made superb use of the unique accelerometer feature in iPhone and iPod touch and customers loved it,” said Cassidy Lackey, vice president of Handmark Studios. “Hellfire also offers a fantastic gaming experience that takes advantage of many of the innovative features these revolutionary devices have to offer and is positioned to be another big winner with mobile gamers.”

Players can choose from two different helicopters and the point is to rescue the prisoners of war from behind enemy lines. The accelerometer allows players to tilt the iPhone/iPod Touch to the left or right to fly in that direction and tilt the device to speed up or slow down. Players have sixteen missions to work their way through.

Hellfire sounds like a fun game if you are into shoot ‘em up flying games. The concept of the game sounds intriguing. If this is a game you would like to play, head over to the Apple App Store and pick it up. It will cost you $4.99.

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Color Cross is a picture crossword puzzle game for the PC. Color Cross takes the concept of the picture crossword puzzle games and adds a few layers to it. There are multiple colors that need to be solved and once a puzzle is solved it opens a piece to a bigger puzzle. Solving puzzles will open different themes too. There is no shortage of puzzles to solve in Color Cross.  

Picture crossword puzzles are a genre of games where players have to figure out which squares to color. Players are presented with a grid of squares with numbers at the top of the columns and the sides of the rows. Each row and column will have one or more numbers by it. The numbers represent how many squares are colored in that row or column. For instance, if there is a column with 3 1 1 on top of it that means that there are three colored squares, one colored square and another colored square in that column. The columns are typically longer than 5 squares across, so it becomes a puzzle to determine which squares need to be colored.

The rows have numbers on them as well and between the column numbers, the row numbers and the fact that each section needs a space after it, players can figure out where the colored blocks are. Each set of colored blocks need to be followed by a space. Players can’t put a block of three and then another colored space right after that.

Color Cross takes the rules of the picture crossword puzzles and adds another layer. Players have to solve multiple colors in Color Cross all on the same grid. Players will start filling in one color and when that color is finished the color and numbers will switch to another color and that color will need to be solved. Some puzzles have three or more colors to them. The last color becomes the easiest to match because there are not many available spots by that point in the game.

Players can choose from different themed puzzles. Each theme has different pictures to solve. There is a candy theme that most of the picture puzzles are associated with candy and when a row or column is complete little candies come bouncing out. Each solved puzzles brings players closer to opening new themes. Solving puzzles will open more puzzles as well.

The graphics in Color Cross are simple, but fitting. The point of this type of puzzle game is to make pictures out of colored squares so the graphics don’t have to be too intense. The themes for the different puzzles are cute and I like the added candy coming out.

Color Cross was an extremely fun and addicting game. I like the added piece of uncovering a bigger picture as you solve the puzzles. The fact that I was uncovering a picture made me want to keep playing to see what the picture was. If you are someone that likes puzzle games, you should check out Color Cross.

PlayFirst has announced the third title in their Chocolatier franchise, Chocolatier: Decadence by Design, is available for download. Chocolatier: Decadence by Design is an economic simulation game. Players have to balance finding ingredients around the world and mastering great chocolate recipes to sell for lots of money.

If you follow PlayFirst closely, you may be wondering how this release of Chocolatier could possibly be the third in the series. The game before this game, The Great Chocolate Chase, was a spin off on the series. The Great Chocolate Chase was an assembly management game, a different type of game than the other games in the Chocolatier franchise.

Chocolatier: Decadence by Design has players trying to locate the best ingredients from around the world. Players get to use their imagination and create their own chocolate recipes. The fancier the recipe, the more money you make. The only thing limiting your success is your imagination. On top of chocolate making, players can participate in mini-games and quests to make and sell gourmet coffee.

Chocolatier: Decadence by Design sounds like a game that has great aspects for all types of gamers. Not to mention the graphics and themes in the Chocolatier franchise games are always great and yummy looking. If this sounds like a game you would like to play, head over to playfirst.com and pick it up.

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