Need a new game to entertain you over the holidays? The sequel to the popular Cut the Rope series just launched today with all new levels and characters and its exclusive to the App Store.
As with the original app, Cut the Rope 2 follows the main character Om Nom through an animated world through a puzzles to solve in pursuit of candy.
Rabbit: Launching today in closed beta, Rabbit is a new video chat and content sharing app– initially available exclusively for Mac– that has been getting a lot of attention. The app lets you chat with an unlimited number of people, create and customize chats, as well as watch movies, listen to music, and share content in chats in real-time. If you are a pre-teen who hasn’t heard of Google Hangouts, you might want to check this out.
Rabbit is kind of like a virtual living room. It runs in the background on your computer just like Skype, so you can always find your friends online and invite them to watch a movie or listen to music at any time. You can share this content directly from your computer, or you can use the Rabbit “SharePad” of integrated content sites to instantly launch TV shows, videos and music you want to watch and listen to with your friends.
Foursquare version 5.4.3:Foursquare gets an update today that brings improvements to check-in notification settings including an “Always” option to get notifications for all check-ins, as well as new “Nearby” and “Off” settings to apply to specific users.
✓ Choose “ALWAYS” for close friends and family you always want to keep up with. You’ll get notifications for all their check-ins, no matter where they are in the world.
✓ Choose “NEARBY” for friends you’d like to hear about from time to time. We’ll only notify you when they’re close by.
✓ Choose “OFF” for those acquaintances you don’t really want updates from. And that bike messenger friend who checks in at every spot on his route.
TomTom version 1.13: TomTom updated the majority of its iOS navigation apps today. On top of the most up to date map data, users can also now backup and restore settings and stored destinations from iCloud. With today’s update TomTom is also providing a free 30 day trial to its HD traffic subscription. In addition, the app now includes compatibility for iPad mini.
9to5Mac once again scoured the App Store for the most notable apps that launched, updated, or announced news recently and gathered them in our usual list below.
Today’s crop includes updates for popular iOS games like Cut the Rope and Angry Birds Star Wars, as well as enhancements to social apps like Highlight and Klip. There also a few noteworthy new apps and price drops. Check out the full roundup below, but keep checking back as we continually update throughout the day.
Updates
1. Skype | Free
Skype just updated in a huge way yesterday, but it pushed out version 4.2.1 today to fix some critical bugs.
2. Highlight| Free
The app that locates nearby friends is now at version 1.3.1 today. The update includes performance improvements, bug fixes, and “reduced resource consumption.”
3. Angry Birds Star Wars| 99 cents
Rovio just launched version 1.1.0 with a bunch of shiny new features, including: 20 levels on the ice world of Hoth, an “attractive” power for Pink bird as Princess Leia, two bonus levels, and more.
4. Angry Birds Star Wars HD| $2.99
Rovio didn’t leave the HD version of its app by the wayside today; it is now at version 1.1.0 with the same new features as listed above.
5. Pageonce| Free
The popular app that tracks bills just went to version 5.71. The full changelog includes:
Celebrate our 4th year on iOS – get Bill Pay for free!
Schedule Payments: Plan ahead and set up your bill payment in advance
Bad Piggies version 1.1.0: Rovio has updated its new Bad Piggies title with 15 new levels today, as well as a new free sandbox level. The update also includes its biggest sandbox level yet, called “Field of Dreams”, as an in-app purchase.
The Bad piggies finally did it — they finally got the eggs! But can they hold on to them with the Angry Birds in hot pursuit? Even under the cover of darkness, they’ll need all of their best machines to stay ahead!
-Fly through 15 tricky new levels with the birds on your tail!
-Take cover in a brand new moonlit theme!
-Unleash your creativity on a free new sandbox level!
-Introducing the Field of Dreams: Our biggest sandbox level yet, now available for purchase!
Kindle version 3.4: A nice update to the Kindle iOS app comes following Apple releasing new features for iBooks. The app now supports Japanese with vertical text & Manga, an option to read books in the publisher suggested font, and a new “Caecilia” font choice. Also included is X-Ray for Textbooks:
X-Ray for Textbooks gives you instant access to all the most important terms and concepts in a book, with glossary definitions, links to relevant textbook pages, and related content from Wikipedia and YouTube (available on many of the most popular print replica textbooks)
One of the big new features in OS X Mountain Lion is the Game Center. This Game Center is cross platform between OS X and iOS. Unfortunately, only a few compatible titles have made their way into Mac App Store for today’s launch. However, some of them are very notable. Some of our favorites include Real Racing 2, Sky Gamblers, and Cut the Rope.
Other than the launch of the new Instagram clone “Facebook Camera” app, the biggest update today goes to the popular Tweetbot Twitter client for iPhone that is now at version 2.4. Included in the massive update is a new search view, as well as access to Trends, Top Tweets, and People that are now together in a single browse section. Nearby tweets were added with an option to change the location, and a ton of improvements to search, including location-based keywords and the ability to change trends’ location from within search view. And, that is only some of the features and fixes included Tweetbot 2.4.
Below is a complete list of features included in the update, with other notable apps and updates to hit the App Store today including the Infinity Blade II: Vault of Tears content pack.
With the announcement of the 2012 Worldwide Developer Conference today, Apple also opened its Apple Design Awards nomination page for iOS and Mac developers. Apple announced last year that the annual awards would now only apply to Mac and iOS apps residing in the App Store, which appears to be the case this year as well.
Through the website set up for WWDC, developers can sign up and nominate apps for inclusion in the awards. To be considered, the app must be on the App Store or Mac App Store by May 1. Note: Apps that are not nominated can still win an Apple Design Award if they catch Apple’s eye.
Winners will get an Apple Design Award trophy and usually some Apple gear or prizes that have not been announced. Apple broke down the criteria for apps considered for the awards:
Developer ZeptoLab UK Limited released a Mac App Store version of its physics puzzler Cut the Rope originally released by publisher Chillingo on iOS in October 2010. According toChillingo, the iOS game reached over 1 million downloads in just nine days and the franchise has now hit over 100 million downloads. The Mac App Store version is the first full desktop release of the game and it was optimized for landscape orientation with “crisp images on monitors up to 2560×1440 resolution.”
ZeptoLab also redesigned some of the game’s original levels for a smooth experience with mice and trackpads. Scoreloop is supported currently when it comes to online leaderboards, but the press release said there would be support for Game Center on OS X when it launches. The game is available on the Mac App Store now as a 133MB download and features 250 levels and 10 level boxes for $4.99 (requires Mac OS X 10.5 or higher). The full press release is after the break (via Reuters):
National Geographic Magazine version 2.1:
