Life is app to you

MANILA, Philippines - I have recently gotten into the habit of playing games on my iPod iTouch. 

Let’s see, the reason I have the iPod iTouch is because, with the voice recording app and a proper headset with mic, the device can now be used as a digital recorder (at last).  Also, occasionally, and that is very occasionally, I listen to the 25 songs I have saved on it.  Of course, that it is Wi-Fi ready is great, especially when I am in a hot spot and I need to check on an e-mail really quick.

And then there are the apps, and yes, the games.

Gaming is a mood thing for me.  I have played with all sorts of gaming devices from the PSP to Nintendo DS to the DS lite to the Wii to the XBox — you get the picture.

There is always some interesting game to learn and more so to play.

On the PSP I enjoy Tekken. I like being able to take on one of the fighters and beat the guts out of the other fighters in the dojo.  I really get a kick out of this game. Not too much thinking, just a lot of quick movements to get the opponent down.  On the Nintendo, I really like the Super Mario games — who doesn’t?— hopping, jumping, running and just being able to do the impossible to get the points.

Wii is among my favorites because it is so interactive. I love Super Wario, doing the weirdest things and having the best laughs while doing them.  Holding the console like it was a broom and keeping it steady for a few seconds, fun! I took a break from gaming when my migraines started getting the better of me.  Blame it on age, flashing lights and jerky movements.

But it is hard to keep an occasional gamer down. Enter the iPod iTouch.  The addiction started slowly; one word game at a time. There was Muddled, Imangi and Wordwhirl.  But, the Wi-Fi connection and the continuous search for new apps kept me glued.

Today, I am a proud owner of over 30 apps, which I downloaded from iTunes and the Philippine App store. Some of them free apps, others paid.

How do I pick what I get?  I read the reviews and I take a close look at the screen images of the game.

Game Time

I have lumped my games into categories: Bad mood, relaxing, thinking and skills development.

My bad mood games are the violent ones. There is Zombieville which begins with a “play if you dare” warning.  The purpose of this game is to clear as many levels as you can by shooting all the zombies that cross your path. And, even if the main player has the gun, he can easily get his head chopped off with several zombies attacking at one time.

There is Creepers, which, just like zombieville, requires one to kill all the creeps that are attacking a child sleeping on a bed. The more creeps killed, the higher the points.

The relaxing games for me start with Fishing. I just love how I need to literally flick the iPod forward just like I was really fishing. It takes a few seconds and sometimes even a minute to watch for the movement of the bob in the water. When it moves I have to reel in the fish, not too fast because I could snap the wire and not too slowly either that the fish could get free.

The koi pond is also very relaxing as the sound of water moving in a pond is all one hears as the koi swim freely. 

One of the games that take more than just one playing to get used to is Sway. This game requires that I hold the iPod with two hands and I keep my thumbs on the screen so that Lizzie (the green toad) swaying does not fall off and die. The purpose of the game is to collect as many stars as I sway Lizzie to the end of the course.

Cooking Mama and Chocolate shop are games that require a little more skill — in the cooking department that is. I am more into Cooking Mama because it is fun to cook on the iPod iTouch. I can fry (with complete sound effects of frying), flip burgers, chop with a knife, slice the meat, make dumplings and even bake cupcakes all in the span of a few minutes and without really getting my hands dirty.

It Ain’t Real

Reality and life are what we make of them, right?  So, for me there are days, especially when I am just hanging at home, that my reality is virtual.

When my eyes tire of all the lights and the migraine starts to creep in, I shift to reading — another way to make this world a little more worth living in.

And how.