Free-to-play Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

Daily iPhone App: Haunted Hollow is frighteningly good

by Mike Schramm (May 3rd, 2013)

I've been crowing about how great Firaxis' Haunted Hollow is since GDC earlier this year, so odds are that you've probably already seen me telling you once (or more) to go pick it up. But in case the message hasn't gotten through yet: Go pick it up. Firaxis' latest game is just an excellent, ...

Firaxis' Haunted Hollow appears on, disappears from the App Store

by Mike Schramm (Apr 23rd, 2013)

There's good news, bad news, and the best news on this one, and I'll give you the good news first. Firaxis' Haunted Hallow appeared on the App Store this morning, which means the game is just about ready for prime time. The free-to-play strategy title was one of my favorite games I got to see ...

Shadow Era gets a new expansion, a new website, and a new app

by Mike Schramm (Apr 18th, 2013)

These days, the only iOS card game I'm playing with any regularity is SolForge -- I wish there was a little more to it, but the mechanics are very well-constructed. Shadow Era, one of the first collectible card games on the App Store, is still kicking around, however, and has gotten bigger than ...

Payback 2 goes free-to-play

by Mike Schramm (Apr 10th, 2013)

Payback 2 arrived on the App Store late last year. It's the sequel to a game called Payback that was sort of a Grand Theft Auto for iOS (before Grand Theft Auto for iOS was actually released). Payback 2 added online multiplayer and a new "custom mode," and as of today, it has gone free-to-play, ...

Daily iPhone App: Beastie Bay is Kairosoft's addictive take on Pokemon

by Mike Schramm (Feb 11th, 2013)

There are a few words in gaming that, whenever I hear or read them, just make the hair on the back of my neck stand up in anticipation. "Blizzard." "Civilization." "Puzzle Quest." And I would say that it's time to add "Kairosoft" to that list, because the Tokyo-based developer's mobile games ...

EA shares more about upcoming Ultima Forever for iOS

by Mike Schramm (Aug 7th, 2012)

Bioware and EA recently announced plans to revive the Ultima brand as a free-to-play online title that will premiere on iOS. In a recent interview, executive producer Jeff Skalski shared more information about the game. First, the game's microtransactions will mostly focus on cosmetic ...

Handcircus set to return to iOS with free game based on Okabu

by Mike Schramm (Mar 29th, 2012)

Simon Oliver's Handcircus studio was one of the biggest winners in the early days of the App Store. His game Rolando was originally published by Ngmoco back before the company went completely bonkers with social and free-to-play casual games. After Rolando 2 sort of sputtered out into the ...

Free-to-play overtakes premium games revenue in the App Store

by Mike Schramm (Jul 7th, 2011)

The latest blog post from Flurry reports that free-to-play revenue has overtaken premium revenue in Apple's App Store. I think this was pretty much a guarantee at some point in the future, though it's happening probably a little sooner than most expected. Free-to-play gaming, where a game ...

TUAW's Daily App: Astronut

by Mike Schramm (Nov 23rd, 2010)

You may have already heard about the Iconfactory's new game Astronut, but just in case you haven't, we'll happily be the ones to tell you. From the makers of Ramp Champ and Twitterrific comes a game that's sort of a mashup between Dizzypad, Captain Ludwig and Doodle Jump. You play a little astronaut ...

Ngmoco releases We Farm in the US, celebrates three million We Rulers with free mojo

by Mike Schramm (Aug 5th, 2010)

Ngmoco's free to play strategy is spooling right along -- not only is its We Farm title now available on the US App Store (it arrived late last week after a short beta in Canada), but the company is also celebrating three million We Rule players by awarding everybody 20 free mojo. New players can ...

Hands-on: League of Legends for the Mac

by Mike Schramm (Jun 4th, 2010)

Defense of the Ancients is one of the most interesting stories in all of gaming -- it was originally a player-created mod for the Warcraft III real-time strategy game, and it completely revamped the RTS game into a RPG/hack-and-slash mashup, where the player controlled a champion character that ...

We Rule content update, server fixes incoming

by Mike Schramm (May 3rd, 2010)

Ngmoco CEO Neil Young posted another update last week about We Rule. That game is probably the biggest hit Ngmoco has come across yet with its freemium model, but unfortunately, the title has been plagued with service outages since the release. Young says that they simply underestimated the amount ...

TUAW Interview: Freeverse CEO Ian Lynch Smith on the Ngmoco purchase

by Mike Schramm (Feb 23rd, 2010)

We were all pretty gobsmacked last night with the news that iPhone gaming developer Ngmoco had purchased longtime Mac game developer Freeverse, so we went hunting for answers. Fortunately, Freeverse CEO and founder Ian Lynch Smith was nice enough to sit down and take our questions this morning, and ...

Ngmoco cancels Rolando 3, says it can't fit into a free-to-play model

by Mike Schramm (Feb 18th, 2010)

Here's some unfortunate news out of Ngmoco: The company tells IGN that while there was a Rolando 3 (the second sequel to the very popular and excellent rolling iPhone platformer) in progress, the game has been essentially canceled, and will never see release in its current form. Why? The second ...