Char Entertainment and Epic Games’ Infinity Blade — a game we called “an elegiac app store masterpiece” and one of the best games on the App Store — is getting another beefy, free update on Thursday, and aside from more content, it brings one huge new feature to the game: multiplater deathmatch. Swoon.
Chair and Epic Games’ Infinity Blade ($5.99) may disappoint those who looked for a direct iOS analogue to the Unreal 3 Engine’s console offerings (where first-person combat by beefcakey “Tom of Finland” style space marines often spills over into rocket-turret-mounted monster truck driving sequences) but gamers who would so miss the point are a rare breed easily descried by the government-mandated “DERP” tattoos branded into their foreheads. For the rest of us, Infinity Blade is a perfect crystallization of the iPhone’s capabilities as a cutting-edge gaming device, a paradigm shift in the way AAA developers approach multitouch interfaces, and… lest we forget… the most visually impressive and polished game on the App Store.
With the App Store’s prohibition on third-party interpreters having recently been reversed, the iOS future is again rosy for Epic Games, one of the biggest names in next-gen engine licensing whose Unreal Engine powers some of the most visually impressive games on PCs and consoles, including the Gears of Wars series, Bioshock, Batman: Arkham Asylum and Borderlands, among others.
Following the impressive release of their proof-of-concept demo app, Epic Citadel, Epic vice president Mark Rein has announced that the software development kit for its Unreal 3 Engine will soon add iOS support to the many other features available to its licensees.
This is great news for gamers: Epic Citadel was a stunning demonstration of the graphical power of iOS which was downloaded over a million times in one week… and it wasn’t even, strictly speaking, a game. Native iOS support in the Unreal Engine makes it all the more likely that developers will bring your favorite franchises to your iPhone in the future.
Now let’s hope Epic themselves follow Epic Citadel up with that Unreal Tournament iPhone port they were playing with back in December.
