iGame Radio

Ambrosia Software, publisher of cool utility, productivity, and game programs for the Mac and iPhone, has announced a holiday sale. The Ambrosia Holiday Bundle provides savings of up to 70% off on their games & utilities. The sale runs right up until Christmas Eve, December 24th 2009.

There are two different bundles that you can choose from, at three different prices for each bundle.

The “work” bundle starts at $59 and includes:

• WireTap Studio
• Soundboard
• Dragster

The “play” bundle starts at a mere $19 and includes:

• SketchFighter
• Apeiron X
• Bubble Trouble X

Both bundles are priced at a 50% discount, and feature larger sizes with more products for 60% and 70% discounts (for example, you can pick up a bundle that includes both Aquaria and EV Nova for just $39!). Definitely some big-time deals there, so check them out.

I’ve been playing Ambrosia’s Aquaria for the Mac for the past few days. The visuals are stunning, the game world is extensive, there is no end to the number of baddies out there, and the game continues to drop new and interesting ones on you at every turn.

Not fond of the slog, though. The game has save points, and when you hit them, all the bad guys you killed show up again. I mean, when I kill the bad dude, I want him to remain dead, dammit! Also, I think they were going for kind of a 3D effect using 2D for the maps, but it ends up being a bit confusing.

I’ll give a lot more in the complete review next week.

Actually, I flew in from Macworld Expo 2009 a couple of hours ago. I just finished getting back from eating. Macworld was awesome, tiring, worrying, stressful, and full of surprises. Despite the fact that there wasn’t even a poor excuse for a game pavilion this year (game companies were scattered all over the place), and that several of the stalwarts that we associate with Mac games (Aspyr Media, MacSoft), weren’t there, there were still a significant number of gaming companies, both software and hardware, attending.

I chatted with CCP (EVE Online), Transgaming, Codeweavers, Freeverse, Feral Interactive, Software MacKiev, Ambrosia Software, and VMware. I also talked to some on the hardware side, including NEC about their giant curved screen (a new iteration is due out soon), and i2i Stream about the application of their technology to gamers.

All in all, I have a ton of interviews that you’ll be hearing over the next week or two, and Corey and I are set to do a recording tomorrow with a full overview of what Macworld was like…I’ll get it posted by tomorrow evening.

BTW, Feral Interactive, what was with the Feral t-shirts with the BioShock logo on the backs? They were all wearing them. I asked one of them why, and he said, “Well, we’re all just big fans of BioShock, we just wanted to wear our BioShock t-shirts today.” Yeah, and you’re publishing Black & White 2, but I didn’t see you wearing t-shirts with that logo on the back. Hmmm. A ton of food for thought there.

Ambrosia Software announced today that they’ve updated EV Nova, their space-based strategy shooter, to include a Universal Binary so now everyone can blast away in space. The update also includes some bug fixes and compatibility with MacBook and MacBook Air systems with an Intel GMA X3100 video card.

EV Nova is the third game in the Escape Velocity series, thrusting you into a sprawling universe dominated by a myriad of warring factions, each sharing a common bond, but so philosophically different as to make conflict inevitable. Wait, wouldn’t that really describe just about any large group of sentient beings, though?

Common Bond: We all breath air.
Philosophical difference that makes conflict inevitable: we each believe that the other should be dinner.

Ummmmmm…..

Ambrosia Software has released Aquaria for the Mac. This game has been in development for, like, ages. Well, since May of 2007. That’s when Ambrosia first announced the game for the Mac. This game was the 2007 IGF Seumas McNally Award winner and was released for the PC in December of that year. But Ambrosia had adopted the philosophy that “it’s not done until it’s done.” I just wish “done” was much earlier!

The last time I looked at the game, which was at Macworld of this year I believe (I don’t remember them having it at NME 2008), it looked awesome. Let me know what you think. I’m downloading my copy now.