The weekend is halfway over and — if the weather in your area is anything as dismal as it is in mine — thoughts naturally turn to amusing ourselves with the latest apps.
But which ones to sample? Whether you’re looking for a clever translation app, one of the best games of the year so far, or a nifty tool for blasting music from any Bluetooth speaker in your house, we’ve got something for you.
Check out our picks below.
Microsoft Translator
Machine translation may not yet be perfect, but it’s getting better all the time — and more useful, too.
This week, Microsoft rolled out an important update for its Microsoft Translator app for iOS, adding the ability to translate text in images. Simply tap the camera icon on the app’s home screen and you’ll be able to point your iPhone toward whatever sign, menu or book you want to translate — at which point the correct translation will be overplayed on the image.
Languages include Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and Turkish.
While it’s not yet perfect, and Google has experimented with similar tools, this is certainly worth a download — even if you just use it to dazzle less tech-savvy friends over coffee.
Available for: iPhone/iPad
Cost: Free
Get it from: App Store
Tennis Champs Returns
Aside from happy memories of Mario Tennis on my Game Boy, and Virtua Tennis on the ill-fated (but much-loved) Dreamcast, I’ve never been much of a tennis videogame player. It was reading the superb write-up of the retro-styled Tennis Champs Returns on TouchArcade which got me to give it a go, however — and, boy, have I struggled to tear myself away from it since then.
There’s a great career mode, superb controls, a genuine ability to develop your skills as you play, and most importantly plenty of ultra-competitive moments. This could well turn out to be one of 2016’s best iOS games.
Game, set and match, indeed!
Available for: iPhone/iPad
Cost: Free
Get it from: App Store
Stellar Wanderer
A 3D space battle game, in which (in tried and true tradition) you meet gigantic space stations, rugged traders, and hordes of space pirates, Stellar Wanderer is a great game for anyone who enjoys titles like Galaxy on Fire and Eve Online.
You can check out our full review here, but take our word for it that this is an intense and fun game with some great battles — and even a decent storyline thrown in for good measure. You’re sure to get your five bucks worth.
Available for: iPhone/iPad
Cost: $4.99
Get it from: App Store
Airfoil 5
Photo: Rogue Amoeba
Rogue Amoeba’s AirFoil 5 lets you send audio from your Mac to any Bluetooth speaker within range, or even to multiple speaker groups at once.
It’s a great update to an already must=have app, although audio quality degrades after 10 minutes if you’re on the free version. To get rid of that limitation, you’ll have to shell out $29 for a license — or $15 if you’re upgrading from a previous version. Hey, it’s worth it!
Available for: Mac
Cost: Free trial (with $15-$29 for full version)
Get it from: Rogue Amoeba
