One of the better Yuletide traditions is the venerable holiday Advent Calendar, in which each day of December leading up to Christmas is marked off on a special calendar by opening its corresponding door to find a small gift, toy or chocolate squirreled away inside.
This year, we here at Cult of Mac decided we wanted to give our readers their very own Apple-themed advent calendar, filled with the year’s best apps, gadgets, stories and other curios. So each day in December, we’re going to lovingly peel back the door on the Cult of Mac 2012 Advent Calendar to reveal another delicious morsel, something really special that came out this year that we think every one of you should enjoy.
T.G.I. it’s Day 21, and today’s delicious little morsel? The addictive iOS game 10000000.
10000000 (“Ten Million”) is a game that seemingly has everything going against it. It has a ridiculously undescriptive name that makes it a difficult game to search for on the App Store. Its graphics are Commodore 64 level at best. The gameplay is based off of two of the most tired genres out there: endless runners and match-3. And it was made by a single guy working in his spare time who didn’t bother marketing it at all.
Despite all of these seeming drawbacks, 1000000 is one of the most addictive, endlessly playable games to come out all year… and a game that deserves every bit of success it has garnered this year.
Think of 10000000 like Temple Run, except instead of swiping to dodge or jump, you need to match tiles to fight and destroy monsters that stand in your way. Fail to match gems quick enough and time catches up to you, ending your game.
The 10000000 in the app’s title refers to the number of points you need to get in a single playthrough in order to “beat” the game. 10000000 is also married to an addictive RPG leveling up mechanic, which allows you to “buy” various level-ups to make defeating the enemies that stand in your path easier.
10000000 is a fantastic example of App Store innovation and proof that even small developers without big marketing or development productions can make it. You can get it now through iTunes just for $1.99.
