Centipede Ultra ($.99)

Who doesn't love those old fashioned arcade games that we used to play so much? Sitting in the bar with some friends playing the classic game of Centipede used to be one of America's favorite past times in the 80's and now you can play this great game on your iDevice! How awesome is that?!

This app brings Atari's finest to the palm of your hand with new updated graphics and sound. (Boy, does it sound great with headphones!) This game brings you new power ups to destroy those nasty critters but still has that old fashioned feel of the trackball and fire button.

This game has three game difficulties. The easy level (which is what I play on) fires automatically. Medium and hard is where you have to click a button in the top left/right of the screen to fire. Other than that the game feels about the same though. To play you just slide your finger back and forth to aim (and fire). If you have never played the game before, it is quite simple to get used to. When you gain more points you will get another life. (Every 15,000 to be exact) All together you can get ten lives.

The PowerUps

I love this feature. These were not in the original (based on what my Dad remembers) but its awesome all the same. If you fire at a PowerUp you will get a special power. These include:

*Rapid Fire- Super fast shooting!
*Multi Shot- 3 cannons firing parallel
*Reflect Shot- 2 cannons firing diagonally (Great for spiders)


There are also PowerUps that affect the environment:

*Time Slow- Slows down all enemies (Also happens when hitting an inchworm)
*DDT (Bomb)- Completely nukes all insects
*Burst- Kills all enemies near the Burst PowerUp
*Swarm: Makes 4 enemies COME OUT OF NO WHERE!!

I must say... This is a fantastic app. Me and my Dad play it all the time. There are a few things I would love to see in an update though.

A universal highscore list- The game comes with a device highscore list (for when you play against a friend on that device), but there isn't an online leaderboard for this game
OVER 1,000,000!!- The score counting stops when you hit 999,999!! Yes...we've done it.
Old Centipede option?- Some prefer the classic look of the game. Maybe you could put in an option?

My Dad just said (as he's sitting here playing it) "This game definitely held up over three decades" So take it from him. He's been playing it since the beginning.

http://www.atari.com/