The week was filled with announcements from Verizon and Google. It’s easy to get caught up looking at the tech specs of new Nexus 7s and Droids, but really the thing that will make the device worthwhile for you will be the apps. Plenty of great apps made their way to market over the course of the week, though you may have missed them. No worries, though. We’ve collected the best apps and updates of the week for you to download.
Piano Genius (iOS, free)
Piano Genius manages to make learning the piano fun. This may sound entirely foreign to those that learned from an old lady who would smack your hand with a ruler every time you missed a note, but it is entirely possible. Piano Genius applies a bit of game logic to incentivize playing well, but the real reward is an understanding of one of the most important instruments around. You’ll learn your way up and down the keyboard and will be tapping out over 400 tunes in no time with the help of Piano Genius.
Tinder (Android, free)
Tinder first came available for iPhone and aimed to make romantic matches happen based on location. Of course, the more people who have access to Tinder, the better your odds become. That makes Android the perfect place for the hot-or-not app. When you start using Tinder, the app will make you aware of someone near by who may be looking to meet up. Tinder allows you to anonymously like or pass on the person from the app. If you like them and they like you, Tinder moves into phase two of turning you into a couple by introducing you and starting an in-app chat.
YouTube Upload (Windows Phone, free)
Windows Phone owners don’t make up a huge share of the mobile market, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t around interesting things that should be shared. We believe that no matter your OS of choice, you should have the ability to upload cat videos to YouTube. Nokia agrees. It launched its YouTube Upload app this week. All you have to do is select a video that you’ve captured on your phone and send it off via this app. Before your know it, it’ll be up on YouTube for anonymous people to leave nasty comments on for no reason.
Sky Gamblers (iOS, $5.00)
There’s nothing like the excitement of the wild blue yonder. It’s open sky meant for you to explore. Except getting a pilot’s license is a tedious process. It’s probably cheaper to just download Sky Gamblers instead. This app puts you in the cockpit and behind the controls of a fighter plane. You’ll take to the skies, which are painted with impressive detail, and can fly alongside other pilots who are also playing all over the world. A wide range of single player missions and multiplayer game modes will have you in the air for hours.
Pac Man Dash (iOS, free)
We’d never deny the well-earned classic status of Pac-Man. It’s a character and a franchise that everyone knows well. (Who knew a barely defined yellow circle could be so popular?) But, for Pac-Man to make its way onto mobile devices, it needed a bit of a makeover. That is exactly what it gets in Pac-Man Dash. Gone is the overhead view as you eat pixels and run from ghosts. Now Pac-Man has taken to the 2D side scroller to get his kicks. Navigate through 70 missions, try out vehicles, and avoid ghosts along the way.
Gentlemen! (Android, $5.00)
It’s not too often that a mobile game features multiplayer that actually requires your partner to be next to you. Gentlemen! uses Android devices as the board to its modern multiplayer board game. You and your friend will duel on one screen, fighting with weapons that range from Knives to bombs to homing pigeons. The fight goes fast and will require a unique combination of skill, thoughtfulness, planning, and a good bit of luck.
Imo messenger beta (Android, free)
There are tons of instant messenger options out there for mobile devices at the moment, but Imo has to be one of the more popular ones thanks to its ability to compact chats of all kinds into one single app. The beta version of the messenger service got an update this week that adds a whole new way for users to talk: video chat. If you’d rather see your partners than read texts or just hear from them, the video feature is worth a shot. Plus you can still access your IMs as well if your video chat ends up boring you.
Twitterrific (iOS, $3.00)
If you like getting your tweets from an app other than Twitter’s official one, Twitterific is a pretty great choice of an alternative. With its most recent update, it looks to make an even better impression on users. A new visual appearance will greet users upon opening the app, one that appears to be designed with the upcoming iOS 7 in mind. Feature wise, users will enjoy an in-app browser that can play multimedia content, maximized photo sizes, and as will every update, tons of bug fixes that make the overall experience a more enjoyable one.
Plex (iOS, $5.00)
If you get immersed in the Apple universe, you probably use Plex to manage your media. Plex is a popular media server that allows users to manage their videos, podcasts, and other stuff across all of their devices. An update to the iOS app for the service brings changes to the app in the way of bug fixes. Most importantly, Plex no longer suffers from a bug that caused the app to crash upon signing in. Other improvements include multi-part playback, browser stability, a “clear cached data” option, and much more.
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