iPod and iPhone apps/games

[KingPK]

With Christmas just passed, I'm sure that many of us have got (or in my case, will have by the end of the week) a shiny new IPod Touch or IPhone. In anticipation, I checked the app store on ITunes to see what is good, but the way they lay the whole thing out kind of sucks and I really don't want to dive too deep into it until I actually get the thing.

So that brings me to you, the people of TRTSM, to point me towards some good apps to start off with. I prefer free ones, but I'll pay the $1 or $2 if it is worth it. Mainly I am looking for:

- A good news app
- An app for sports scores, though it seems like the ESPN one is the way to go
- A Netflix app
- Any kind of time-wasting game or app that I can play during my lunch break or if I'm on the road. Mostly puzzle-type games. I'd kill for a great trivia game.

 

[Smues]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

The Chad Ochocinco app is free through the end of 2009!

 

[muzzington]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

My brother downloaded the demo for the latest NBA game and I was actually impressed with it.

 

[KingPK]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

The free bowling game is actually pretty fun.

Btw, I'm posting this from my Touch which arrived today. Rock.

 

[Smues]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

The USAtoday free news app seems to be pretty good. There's also a CNN one that's like .99 or 1.99.

As for sports I have the ESPN and the FoxSports ones and both are fine. And free.

 

[KingPK]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

What's a good gaming and tech news app? I have Engadget, but is there one that is strictly video game news?

 

[Adam]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

So question.

Why can't I just assign one of my mp3 tracks on my iphone as a ringtone?

 

[Smues]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

Because Apple wants you to purchase a ringtone because god forbid you use music you've already purchased. There's a work around though. Follow the instructions found here:
http://www.ehow.com/how_2160460_custom-iphone-ringtones-free.html

and it's pretty straight forward. Though I would note that it says they have to be no longer than 40 seconds, I've found that you need to make them 20 seconds or less or the phone won't recognize them as ringtones. It's a pain to have to do it instead of just using the original file, but at least there is a way to do it for free, and this way you're just selecting the portion of the song you want. And thus I was able to make the chorus of
YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.
a ringtone.

 

[Adam]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

Nice choice there Smues.

I once again have 'Voices' as my ringtone. Yes i'm sad, but I just love that damn intro.

 

[Smues]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

What's a good gaming and tech news app? I have Engadget, but is there one that is strictly video game news?

Gamefly has an app that seems to be pretty decent for videogame news, and it also let's you manage your que if you're a Gamefly customer. I've also got Video Games News from NEWSoDROME and I think it may be the better videogame news app but I haven't used either extensively yet.

And also to answer your question about a netflix app I'm using PhoneFlicks. It could be better, but it works. You can access your rental and instant ques and edit them, so I guess that's really all you need.

 

[KingPK]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

I got one called Pocket Flicks. I just liked the look of it.

 

[KingPK]

Best apps and games for the IPod Touch/IPhone

I downloaded GTA Chinatown Wars. The controls are a bit of a bitch, but it actually is a pretty good port of the DS/PSP game at a third of the price ($10)

 

[vivisectvi]

So I finally upgraded to an iPod touch (64g) after my 80g "classic" crapper out on me recently. I'm actually posting from it right now, which is cool because I had no idea that ipod's had wifi these days.

Anyway - any recommended apps or games? Of course, I've already downloaded Street Fighter IV and Mega Man 2 but I was just wondering if there were any more obscure ones I should know about.

 

[vivisectvi]

Oops! Thanks for merging this.

 

[Smues]

So at the moment jailbreaking an iphone is both legal, and insanely easy. Direct your iphone or ipod touch (or Ipad I think) to www.jailbreakme.com and it'll do it for you.

I did it yesterday and of course the first thing I did was get the DBZ over 9,000 theme. A nerd am I. Also got an app that tricks the phone into thinking its on wi-fi instead 3g (useful for apps that are wi-fi only or have 3g limitations), an app to download youtube videos, and the coolest so far an snes emulator that can use a wiimote to control it. Now if only I can figure out how to set the buttons better.

 

[vivisectvi]

Is there a downside to Jailbreaking? Just want to be sure before I proceed..

 

[Smues]

It voids the warranty.

 

[vivisectvi]

Is that pretty much it? I got mine off of craigslist so I don't think I even have a warranty. Can you still use iTunes and all that or does apple shut you out?

 

[Tino Standard]

I thought there was some sort of legal ruling a couple weeks ago that makes it legal to jailbreak your iPhone. Only catch is it still voids your warranty.

 

[Slayer]

I have no interest in pirate apps, but I jailbroke (jailbreaked?) mine last night to get that extra degree of customization that Apple doesn't afford to its users. One big thing was the inability to upload custom SMS tones, which had been a sticking point for me when I first got my phone earlier this year and had hoped would be remedied with iOS4, but of course was not. Once I figured out OpenSSH, remedying the issue was pretty easy

I'm working on some other things right now, may update about those down the line

 

[KingPK]

If you want to jailbreak, don't download the new 4.0.2 update because it apparently is just to prevent jailbreaking.

 

[Smues]

Pretty much yeah. It also fixes some .pdf exploit, but if you're jailbroken there's a fix you can download to take care of that anyway.

 

[Haws Bah Gawd]

I downloaded a neat free game the other day. It was a tap-to-fire Metal Gear Solid game. The reticule could move a little faster, but for free, it's pretty fun, and has nice graphics.

 

[Haws Bah Gawd]

Anyone know how to get the Ipod Touch to stop shuffling everything, or is there a way? If I want to listen to an album, the IT just plays the songs in any order it wants.

 

[Smues]

I'm going off of the phone here, but it should be the same. When you have the screen aligned vertically there should be some icons under the top bar with the length of the song (if thats not showing just tap the middle of the screen once to make it pop up). The one on the right with two arrows crossing over each other is shuffle.

 

[Haws Bah Gawd]

That fixed it. Thanks Smues.

 

[KingPK]

The Netflix app is out. It only deals with Instant (you can't organize your disc queue) and the picture quality and speed is shockingly great.

 

[fazzle]

I've watched about 4 episodes of The IT Crowd on my iphone, it's had to stop and buffer twice, but other than that it's great.

 

[Adam]

What's the deal with Game Centre? A lot of my apps have a use for it, but I don't appear to be able to find it on my original iPhone running Software 4.2.1.

Closer inspection seems to think it's been taken out of the latest update, if that's true, will they be putting it back ON for future updates?

 

[KingPK]

If anyone is looking for a good app to organize your video game collection, try Game Vault; it uses Giant Bomb's database and gives you suggestions of similar games to the ones you already own. It's free (for now) and works great.