Game Review: Rabbids Big Bang

I couldn’t really come up with a catchy headline for this game, mainly due to the fact that the title of it is so cute to begin with, but here’s my short review of this incredibly annoying Xbox Live title for your Windows Phone. Rabbids Big Bang, is a $.99 title from Ubisoft that drove me so insane, I almost regretted downloading it, much less paying for it. A combination of irritating rabbits and seemingly impossible physics just made this a bit frustrating to play. Yet after a week, Rabbids Big Bang still had a home on my Nokia Lumia 925.

Game play on Rabbids Big Bang is simple enough, or at least it seems that way. You touch the direction you want your rabbit to hit the other one and pray. Then you have to figure out how to use jetpacks and other ‘helpful’ items to complete the levels as fast as you can.

Once you’ve master the game, Rabbids Big Bang gets nasty. The levels get harder, or even impossible to master quickly and you start the slow decent to madness trying to pass a level – for hours at a time. If there were a prize for most frustrating Windows Phone game ever, this might just get it. Rabbids Big Bang is challenging, maddening and even fun, although it may result in the need for therapy or heavy drinking later.

Even still, the site of the Mission Complete screen brings us all right back down to earth and an epic feeling of accomplishment. Rabbids Big Bang is available in the Windows Store for $.99 and, if you are slightly OCD, should be the next download you get. Just remember to keep your charger near by because you will need it to keep the game going after you can put it down.

Nokia Play To Leaves The Beta Program

For those of us with DLNA hardware, or almost DLNA hardware in my case, Nokia Play To has been great for sharing our music, movies and photos to enabled devices. In a quick tweet today, Nokia announced that the Nokia Play To App has left the beta program and is in full Store mode. There’s nothing to cover feature wise or announcement wise, but seeing another program graduate from the Nokia Labs program is great.

For those that have a Lumia and are not familiar with it, Nokia Play To allows you to send DLNA signals to wireless speakers, TV’s and more to show your device’s content to external sources. I personally have a Sony SA-NA410 wireless speaker that I love to link to and use instead of the built in speakers. This way I can have my device on my DT-900 charger and still keep the music going – similar to the JBL Power-Up Speaker, but with much better sound.

Nokia Play To is available for Lumia devices in the Store. You can download it for you Nokia device by clicking this Nokia Play To link.

App Review: OneTube Delivers A Top Notch YouTube Experience

When Google put the brakes on the amazing YouTube App that Microsoft designed last year, it was pretty much the job of MetroTube to carry the load. While I liked MetroTube’s interface, it just never really worked for me. I found myself just using the mobile YouTube site instead. Fortunately, every day, there are more and more possibilities coming to Windows Phone daily. OneTube from RicardoPons is the latest video App that I have thrown on my Nokia Lumia 925 and I have to admit, this one might just be my new daily driver for accessing Google’s great video sharing service.

OneTube has an interface that is rather simple, but very functional. The video window is at the top of the screen and you can swipe left or right to see comments, related videos and a few other great features. Upon loading, OneTube opens to a recommended video screen. A quick swipe shows the trending videos. Another shows your account page. A final swipe brings up your subscription page.

Jumping in to the account page is where OneTube really shines. Every category on the page is very self explanatory, but with a heavy feature set, this page is a powerful addition to OneTube. From this single page, you can view your uploads (your channel), your playlists, your likes, favorites and even your downloads.

Overall, OneTube is the best YouTube client experience that I have had on Windows Phone since Google shut down the amazing Microsoft App. This is a good thing for me as I use YouTube and haven’t found an alternative to it yet. I love the ease of uploading videos with Nokia Video Uploader, but watching videos on my Lumia basically was like watching them through a mobile site. Sure, it worked, but something was missing, and that missing something was a great layout, nice feature set and OneTube.

If you are missing your YouTube fix, visit the Store today and snag a copy of OneTube for your device. The 47MB install size is well worth the space for an interface that looks this good. 

Taking A Trip Down Android Lane…

So, there I was, plugging away online trying to get a Lumia for my boss to test drive when all of the sudden, HTC popped up and ruined the only chance I had of converting someone else to the glory of Windows Phone and the Lumia Icon. Instead, HTC not only stepped up with a guarantee of the One M8 being spectacular, but they even decided that I should try an M7 (they were out of M8’s that were compatible with my carrier) and see what all the fuss is about.

Of course, I pretty well laughed as my Nokia Lumia 925 is all the phone I could possibly want, and probably will ever need, but it made me think… What am I missing by being on the dwarf-child operating system. So I decided to take HTC up on their challenge, which I will start on Friday, or maybe a bit later if it takes me longer to get everything set up. Here’s what I am going to be looking for in the new Android that made me run for the hills to start with.

Have they gotten better with the Apps?

What drove me nuts about Android to start with was the incredible amount of force closes, spinning screens and just unresponsive behaviors that my Android devices had. Even my Toshiba Thrive tablet locked up more than it worked right.

What Apps am I missing out on?

Yes, this is one that is still a sore spot with me. My local credit union (BECU) won’t make a Windows Phone App until more people are using Windows Phone. They haven’t figured out what everyone else already knows though – they won’t start using Windows Phones until the Apps are there. I’m looking forward to using my Banking App, SwagBucks TV and Hootsuite. Those three Apps might just be enough to sway me back to Android.

Can the camera keep up?

Call it an ultrapixel, megapixel or a gigapixel, I really don’t care. What I want to know is that can this HTC One take a good image that I can share. I’ll be honest, I LOVE my Nokia Lumia PureView camera. It is the reason I left the HTC Titan to start with and moving to the 810 was rough for me – even though the camera was very good on it as well. Having the 925 in your pocket to capture images is just a pleasure. I can only imagine how much better the crop and zoom factors make it on the 1520, 1020 and the Icon. Can 4 ultrapixels deliver what the PureView does?

How’s the overall experience with Microsoft products?

I’m spoiled, ok? I have Office on my phone that syncs with my OneDrive and everything is on all my PC’s. It’s perfect. That said, what does Microsoft do to me? They make OneDrive for Android that does exactly what my Windows Phone does – just without the Office part. I honestly don’t use Office that much on my phone anymore now that I have my Dell Venue Pro 8 Tablet, but will I miss it?

Is social networking a better experience with the One?

After performing the WP Dev Preview update, I am completely missing out on what made Windows Phone special, the integration of social media. It’s still there on the surface, but they made it just like everything else in now it relies on Apps to get the heavy lifting done. One of my favorite parts of my HTC Evo 4G (my last real Android phone) was that it used HTC Sense to lay in to Facebook and Twitter. It was much like Windows Phone was in the 7.x days. Post photos, update statuses and view posts just by clicking an icon. It was nice. If HTC has the One set up anywhere close to that, it might be a tough fight to come back to the bummer that is WP social sharing now

I really can’t wait to take the “new Android” for a serious spin. I’m not sure they will be able to win me over, but isn’t the job of anyone in the industry that cares about tech to make sure that we are using the latest and greatest stuff and know what we are talking about when we say Blank is better than Blank?

I hope that the next few weeks brings me a serious threat to leave Windows Phone. I’m not expecting that by any means, but let’s just see what happens. As I said, I’ll try and get going on this soon, maybe even this weekend. My question is, can I leave my Lumia home and use Android as my daily driver?

Windows Phone 8.1 Preview–The Ugly

After about 2 weeks now on the Windows Phone 8.1 Developer Preview, I am pretty much frustrated with a few of the improvements in the system. Well, I won’t call them improvements, rather, horrible changes to functionality that Microsoft has laid into the new OS version. Let me just get rolling on them and you can beat me up via email and comments later if you want.

First up, WHAT DID YOU DO TO THE ME TILE? Yes, I am yelling about this one! At first, it was a bad, but now it’s an ugly. As a matter of fact, most of this post is going to be centered on the debacle that is now known as the Me Tile. If, and this is a big IF, the features aren’t restored to this tile when the OS is officially released, it will be a devastating blow to the overall functionality of the social networking aspects of Windows Phone.

The old Me Tile (right) had the option to update your photo by tapping on it. You also had the option to post an update to MSN, Facebook and Twitter all at the same time. The old tile also linked to Facebook messenger and MSN Chat, so you could message your contacts via Wi-Fi when your signal was down. You could also check in at a location on Facebook as well. The new Me Tile (left) strips so many of these options away from the tile, that it is practically useless.

First, you only get single network update posting. New Apps like Multishare are trying to bridge the gap, but so far, I have not had much success with them. They seem to authenticate to Twitter just fine, but only one of my shared Facebook status updates has appeared.

Next, you can no longer set chat status in the new Me Tile, meaning you need to go to third party Apps for chatting. I know that this was part of the “Facebook Messenger” App move, but seriously, why do I want a tile that just shows the updates that my live tiles for Facebook and Twitter already told me about anyways?

Moving on from there, and continuing down the communications thread, by de-linking messaging from the Me Tile, it now no longer appears in the messaging tile as well. Messaging is now just SMS and MMS messages. There’s no more Facebook Chat included in there, nor is there MSN chat either. While I don’t blame the Me Tile for this, it seems like Microsoft gutted the social networking features completely from the core of the OS and that is why it doesn’t work throughout the system – as well as the Me Tile.

Finally, and probably the second biggest issue with this update in my opinion, is that you can no longer update your MSN and Facebook profile image from the Me Tile. As a matter of fact, I still haven’t found out how I can do it without going to the mobile site. I haven’t found an option to do it in the Facebook App. The Me Tile no longer has support for updating it. The only way I was able to do it was via the mobile web site for Facebook. This goes along way to showing how much was built in to Windows Phone 8 as far as Facebook went. With the 8.1 Preview, it’s all gone.

Hopefully, as I said, Microsoft will install some of this back in when the OS is released by the carriers and hardware partners. If not, I’m not sure adding a third row of tiles and a notification area was worth losing all my social networking abilities. If Microsoft was going for game changing on this one, they did change their game. I’m just not sure it was for the better in this case.

The Dell Venue 8 Pro: Add To Your Windows Phone Experience

I was recently lucky enough to pick up an item that not only enhanced my Windows Phone experience that my Nokia Lumia 925 delivers to me, but I got this item at an amazing price. The Dell Venue 8 Pro is a remarkable little machine and whether you are in the market for a tablet or a laptop, you might want to read on to find out more about this powerful little monster.

I have to admit that my journey began with a search for an e-reader. I was looking at Kindles and Nooks, since I already had a nice portable Windows powered Netbook, I didn’t need much more than a slightly larger screen than my Lumia provided for reading. Since I was pretty well committed to the Kindle due to all the free titles that I had earned from Amazon, I decided that I was going to rule out the Nook and wait for a Kindle sale.

It was at this point I saw the Dell Venue 8 Pro in the same price range as the Kindle tablet series devices. Then I read on a bit more and found that it was as small as the Kindle and ran a full version of Windows, not the dreaded RT that the Surface that I previously test drove had on it. I figured why on earth would I not give something this size a shot as a reader for that $229 price tag? There were also refurbished units down as low as $169.00 which I highly recommend if you are budget conscious.

Now that you know the journey that led me to getting my Dell Venue 8 Pro, let me tell you a bit more about it, show you how it works and what I use it for. The Dell Venue 8 Pro runs Windows 8.1, and a full version of it, not the cut RT like most lower cost Windows tablets run. The Venue 8 Pro is equipped with an 8” display, MicroSD slot, MicroUSB port and a volume rocker.

The internals of the device aren’t anything that will make your head spin, but the quad-core processor, 2GB of RAM and 32GB or 64GB of storage are enough to keep pace with the basics that you would want to run on the Venue 8 Pro. You might wonder why I emphasize the Pro on the Dell Venue 8 Pro so heavily. It’s because the Dell Venue 8 is an Android tablet and the Pro is the Windows version. It’s a pretty important feature to note.

I snagged the 64GB version for myself thinking that I would need the additional storage, but after getting everything I needed installed and inserting a 32GB SanDisk Ultra MicroSD card, I found that the 32 would have given me enough storage room. I’ll still take the extra 32GB for the small amount that it cost to upgrade it, but the second Dell Venue 8 Pro in our house is only the 32GB model. Yes, it was so impressive the wife had to have one as well. Now that you have an idea of what the Dell Venue 8 Pro is, how do I use it to make my Windows Phone Experience better?

• Mobile Office - I have Office 2013 installed on my Venue 8 Pro – this allows me to edit the documents that I have on my Lumia 925 on a larger screen and with my travel Bluetooth keyboard. Sure, I can edit and post to blogs from my Lumia, but how much easier is it to edit that Excel spreadsheet on an 8” display with keyboard?

• Photo Editing – I actually started a Lumiaography blog site last month. It’s all dedicated to photos taken with my Lumia and edited only in OneDrive for Windows 8. There’s no Photoshop magic, just the native OneDrive editor in the Windows 8 App. When I am out and about, I can stop at the nearest coffee shop, and let my OneDrive sync to the Venue 8 Pro. I can then edit a few shots and post them via Live Writer 2012 and be on the road again in minutes.

• Gaming – I’m not a gamer per se, but you guys know how much I review on here, so I get a good taste of what is out there. I’ve tried the graphics intensive games like Asphalt 8 that run without any issue and some of the easier ones like Xbox World Series of Poker which runs smoothly as well. I haven’t thrown any of the major PC titles at it yet, but I would expect that it would lag on anything with heavy 3D rendering. I’ve heard a rumor, and read online in a few place, that you can even hook an Xbox controller to it and play games that way.

• e-Reader – This was the primary reason I was looking for a mid-range tablet device. My Toshiba Thrive was just too big and my Lumia was just a bit too small. I originally thought about replacing my 925 with a Lumia 1320 for $325, but I decided that it wouldn’t be a great move for overall since the camera was weaker and it’s just plain big for a phone. That said, the Venue 8 Pro is a spectacular reader. Using the Kindle App, I am able to store all my books online and only download a few at a time to conserve space. The screen is bright and easy to read and the adjustable fonts are fully customizable.

Overall, there really isn’t a gap that the Venue 8 Pro can’t fill. It is a fully functional laptop, a tablet and an e-reader all in one. Is it the fastest on the market, no. Is it the best on the market, no. Is it as glamorous as the Surface Pro 2, no. What it is, is an extremely affordable, ultra-mobile, Windows 8.1 powered tablet that will work for many functions that most people are forced to drag a 6 pound laptop around to complete. With a Venue 8 Pro and a Bluetooth keyboard, you will be more productive and get more from your Windows Phone, just like me.

If you have any questions about the Venue 8 Pro, feel free to leave them in the comments below or send an email to smartphonedeals@gmail.com. The Venue 8 Pro is available at Amazon.com from $169.00.

Game Review: Yatzy Wagers You’ll Roll For Coins

Classic board games are always a great way to pass the time and there are always plenty of options for which ones you want to play on your Windows Phone. Yatzy is one of those classics that offers Windows Phone users a new twist on the ever popular game. Not only did Seavus AB add wagering to the game, but there is a major switch-up in what you need to roll to score well.

Looking at the game itself, it’s a rather simple setup. Dice on the right, score card on the left. Tap the shaker icon located below the dice to roll them. Tap the dice you want to save and tap the shaker again to roll your next batch. You get three turns to get the best score you can. After those are up, tap the highlighted boxes in the scoring column to use select where you want to use the points. If you aren’t happy and want to sacrifice a scoring area, simply tap a 0 and it is done.

Of course the game has a baby level where you can bet as little as 100 credits and only win 20 additional credits, but the real fun starts when you wager 1000 on a 2 to 1 bet. I lost more times that I won with Yatzy, but that won’t stop me from continuing to play this one. Game play was very smooth and the 39MB install size isn’t all that large considering how powerful this game gets. Soon, I will get into the online mode and try playing against some people and see how that works. For now, I was pretty happy with just playing the game alone and losing to myself.

   

It’s worth nothing before I call this game perfect that resume mode was far from great with it. I exited the App to check tweets 3 times and had issues with all three re-entries. The first time, the game kicked me out and I lost my 100 credits. The next time, it came back to this screen and hung. The final time, the game completely rebooted. My advice, don’t leave the game unless you want to take a chance on losing your credits you just bet.

Overall, check out Yatzy, especially right now that the paid version is still free. I don’t know how long this will run, but make sure you grab it while the grabbing is good. You may love it, you may get bored with it, but you can never have too many classic games to pass the time. Grab Yatzy today and let me know what you think!

Store Link: http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/yatzy/6b41e872-41da-4d69-bd67-827e2e03e2a7