iPhone Games Bulletin

$9.99 price point for iPhone Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars

Rockstar Games launched Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars on the App Store today, and mighty fine it looks too.

The game looks visually somewhere between the DS and PSP versions, and it requires the latest firmware to play (which could encourage the remaining iPod touch laggards to upgrade).

But most interesting is the price: $9.99 in the US and £5.99 in the UK. If any game was going to break the 10-dollar price ceiling on the App Store, it was this. However, Rockstar has elected to stick with its fellow console firms on $9.99.

iPhone Game of the Day: Minigore

A confession: I haven’t played iDracula yet. So I was keen to jump on Minigore as soon as it came out, with similar buzz around Chillingo’s latest 99-cent game.

Instant reaction: it’s very fun, with a distinct visual style, and bags of ‘just-one-more-go’ appeal.

You wheel around the screen controlling your hero with one virtual analog stick, and firing in a 360-degree arc with another.

It feels like a 1.0 release, though – it will hopefully benefit from some different game modes and maps, and perhaps more sophisticated use of the OpenFeint social platform in future updates – for example, achievements.

App Store Link: Minigore

This was originally published in the iPhone Games Bulletin, a daily news/analysis email for the iPhone games industry. For signup details, click here.