Filed under: Gaming, iPhone, iPod touch
Pocket Magic for the iPhone
It seems to be a bull market in magic applications for the iPhone. Earlier this week I reviewed Magic Show, which performs a pretty neat trick you can play on your friends and office mates.
Now, new in the app store we have Pocket Magic, [App Store link] which presents a 'mind reading' effect you can
spring on the unsuspecting.
The trick presents a colorful screen and asks you to select one of the many numbers that appear, and indicate what color it is. After some nice animation, you are asked to find your number again among the many on screen, and again indicate what color the number is again. At that point, the app can usually guess what number you selected. It also successfully predicts a magic color that appeared at the beginning of the trick. For many, this will be baffling, for others, not so much.
For assistance in learning the trick, there is an apprentice mode, which walks you through the simple steps to pulling the trick off, although most of the heavy lifting is done by the application.
One suggestion for the developers is that when choosing the numbers the ball selected should animate or glow so you are sure you made the right choice.
It's interesting how the iPhone seems to be a good platform for magic tricks, and many effects are coming out. It may be a good fit because there is something whimsical about the iPhone itself, coupled with the fact that one of the iPhone's strengths is that is really an entertainment device, as well as a cell phone, web browser and email mini computer.
I wouldn't be surprised to see increasingly sophisticated tricks appearing on the App Store shelves in the near future.
Now, new in the app store we have Pocket Magic, [App Store link] which presents a 'mind reading' effect you can
spring on the unsuspecting. The trick presents a colorful screen and asks you to select one of the many numbers that appear, and indicate what color it is. After some nice animation, you are asked to find your number again among the many on screen, and again indicate what color the number is again. At that point, the app can usually guess what number you selected. It also successfully predicts a magic color that appeared at the beginning of the trick. For many, this will be baffling, for others, not so much.
For assistance in learning the trick, there is an apprentice mode, which walks you through the simple steps to pulling the trick off, although most of the heavy lifting is done by the application.
One suggestion for the developers is that when choosing the numbers the ball selected should animate or glow so you are sure you made the right choice.
It's interesting how the iPhone seems to be a good platform for magic tricks, and many effects are coming out. It may be a good fit because there is something whimsical about the iPhone itself, coupled with the fact that one of the iPhone's strengths is that is really an entertainment device, as well as a cell phone, web browser and email mini computer.
I wouldn't be surprised to see increasingly sophisticated tricks appearing on the App Store shelves in the near future.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Anderson said 3:29PM on 12-12-2008
Is there really any trick here? All the program would have to do is just store the number and color of the ball you selected the first time. The subsequent steps of trying to narrow down the color and number to guess is just pointless for a computer that already knows what you selected the first time.
ex. Pick any card, show me the card, was the suit a [whatever was shown]?, was the number [whatever was shown initially]?, Ta Da!
Reply
BosonQuark said 9:54PM on 12-12-2008
Actually I just bought this today, and it is more sophisticated than just remembering the number you pick. You never tell the app what your number is. So the trick is the app determines what number you chose without you ever telling the app what your number is. Yes for some of us it is still easy to figure out what the app does, but for everyone I performed the trick on at work today they couldn't figure it out so it was worth the 2.99 to me.
AwayBBL said 5:41PM on 12-12-2008
The only magic is the disappearing $2.99.
There's a better trick called MindReader on myHIP... And it's free!
Reply
alansky said 11:24PM on 12-12-2008
MindReader definitely performs a pretty neat trick. I have no idea how it's done.