SPB released a new WVGA Windows Mobile game called SPB Quads. Quads is a puzzle game where the goal is to make squares from a field of little squares with different colors and shapes. The object of the game is the same as the mini game that is called quadratic that you can find in the SPB Brain evolution 2.0 release. This game compared to the mini game from brain games has a big happy feeling about it, instead of the more boring looking mini game. The game does this with a vibrant color and shape theme, quality sound and music. The animation used throughout the game are fast and the input to the screen feels direct- as in no lag at all. In the options menu you can choose to have sound and or music and you can get the volume swell.

The game has two modes called ‘Ever Quad’ and ‘Time Quad’. In the ever quad mode you can basically keep on playing until you battery dies. In the timed mode you have to gain a certain amount of points before the timer runs out, as you gain more points the timer gains more time. Both games look equally good on the WVGA 800×480 screens we tested it on. When you get enough points before the timer runs out you are granted a new level, and the game increases the difficulty.

The game features different kind of bonuses and some hints when you are stuck. SPB Quads is not a hard game, but it can become hard as your skill increases and you wish to challenge yourself to a higher score every time. The game can be played whenever you want to, and the ability to set the volume to zero without changing your phone profile assist in this. When you exit the game it actually remembers the state of the game and you can continue whenever you want to or tap the option menu and start a new one.

SPB Quads is a fun little game and for $9,99 it’s worth the cost (if you enjoy it). Feel free to try it out like always SPB Softwarehouse has released a 15 day trial of the game on their website. You can ask yourself if you really care so much about the graphics, and would settle for the more simple version of the game in SPB Brain Evolution 2.0 which is $10 more to buy. I would however recommend the game to be played on the newer WVGA Smartphones (HTC ones of course!), they have bigger screens and make the game more fun to play with your finger instead of cramping with your stylus.

Brain training - Progress Page

Recently (15 September) SPB released their new iteration of SPB Brain Evolution, they are now up to version 2.0. As we haven’t done a review of Brain Evolution yet, this will be a complete review of the game. As you might have guessed from the title of the game, this is a brain game which means that you have to complete all kinds of exercises and puzzles and like many other of these games your ‘brain age’ is measured and is used as a motivator to improve your scores. Let’s begin to say that this game works very well for Windows Mobile WVGA devices.

The game was tested on a Touch HD, Touch Diamond 2 and a Touch Pro 2 from Sprint. The game worked flawless on all these devices but the actually in-depth game test was performed on a Touch Pro 2 which is the current favorite at the moment.

Brain Marking
The games features two modes. The first is ‘Brain marking’ which basically is what you get as you first start the game or make a new profile. You will be tested in five different games to get a quick status of your brain. The following games are some examples of what you will face in this mode:

One of the better games in Brain Evolution, quadronica

Quadronica
Quadronica Shows you a screen with a lot of cubes on it. In these cubes you can make rectangles of the different color blocks, the bigger the blocks the more points you receive for this exercise. In the case of this game the screenshot will clearly show what you have to do.

Memory Trainer
The memory trainer shows you different objects on the screen. You then have a bit of time to remember as much as you can. When the time is up you are asked a certain question. Questions include – How many blue items were on the screen, how many items were rotating to the right – how many awesome WVGA games will HTC Smartphone review in the future? Ok we will be honest that last question is sadly not in the game.

Math
You get what you expect from the math game. There is a certain number of questions you have to answer, these answers slide down on the screen and you have to calculate them and give the correct answer as fast and correct as you can. The better the time and the better the results make the number of points you will receive.

After these tests you receive a brain index that will be used throughout the game. What is new in version 2.0 of Brain Evolution is that you can upload your results to either Twitter or the SPB website so you can compete against your friends or anyone on the web.

Brain Training
The brain training mode has twelve mini games that you can play each day and improve your brain index with. There are some great looking statics pages that look vibrant and are informative on your WVGA device. As you get better and better results in the brain training mode you unlock more games which will definitely motivate you to keep on going and improve yourself. Another fun feature is that you receive a little fact after every day of training you perform. Of course we will not spoil these for you, play the game and you will see even a little addition like this can really complete a game.

New in version 2.0
For people already familiar with this game, here is a small overview of what is actually new in version 2.0 of the game.
- Geometry (exercise)
- Full game statistics and user recommendations
- Online high scores and twitter support

One of the new features in Brain Evolution!

SPB Brain Evolution is a game that you and really your entire family can enjoy. You don’t have to sit down and play for hours and hours. It is a little similar to for instance the Nintendo Wii, often you can just sit down (or stand) and play for 30 minutes and there is nothing keeping you from turning it off. This makes the game really suitable for casual gamers, you can come back every day – but you don’t have to.

The graphics and audio of the game look equally impressive on the WVGA phones we tested this on. This really is one of those gems in the world of Windows Mobile (HTC Compatible) WVGA phones that you enjoy playing and looks great.  The screen is responsive (can be different on any device of course) and the audio is very suitable and not distracting too much, it blends in great with the game which is how it should be.
Check out this post for some more HTC Windows Mobile WVGA compatible games. We hope you have enjoyed this review, for suggestions or anything else feel free to leave a comment.

Looking for more WVGA Games? Check out the following posts:
>> Free WVGA Games you can download now
>> New HTC Compatible WVGA Windows Mobile game – SPB Quads
>> Top 5 Touch HD Games

The third android smartphone of HTC is the HTC Hero, the chin happy design has been out for some months in Europe, and finally the HTC Hero has come out on Sprint. The HTC Hero has gone over some cosmetic surgery for Sprint and lost it’s chin, making it a bit more classic smartphone design. As is the nature of opinions in this case they are divided as well, some prefer the chin and some prefer the smooth design. All in all the phone – chin or no chin looks great, and the build quality is sturdy and feels good in the hand. The Hero is packed with great features and because of the Sense UI allows for a lot of customization in the widget rich interface.

Compared to earlier HTC Android device releases the HTC Hero feels a lot better, the quality of the device itself and the software running it are much more polished then for instance the G1 and the T-Mobile myTouch 3G. The device measures 4.5 by 2.2 by 0.5 inches. Size itself is comparable to the myTouch 3G and quite abit smaller then the G1. Without the HTC chin the device fits great in a normal sized pocket or phone holder. The coating of the device feels great, it’s a little bit soft but not too soft, making the grip on the phone feel good.

Ofcourse a smartphone does a million things, but let’s not forget about the HTC Hero call quality, like most of the HTC devices this is great and seems crisp, though the speaker phone could be better, there is some cracking in the voice and when I called a co-worker with the Hero lying on my desk while typing on my keyboard the found these background noises really loud and distracting. All in all not a really big problem area of this smartphone.

The screen of the HTC Hero seems as vibrant and bright like the iPhone and the iPhone 3G which have the same HVGA (480×320) screen resolution. Browsing the web, updating twitter or facebook all looks great. The browser works great, but is a lot slower then for instance safari on the iPhone and slower then Opera Mobile (both 9.5 and 9.7 score a lot faster). However it’s not annoyingly slow. HTC has made the software so you can use multi touch on the device so pinching to zoom works in the browser. One of the selling points of the HTC Hero is the fact that it supports flash in the browser, but while trying to get this to work on youtube seemed like a big chore, some movies played, some did not. One thing was always the case, it is really slow and takes the fun away from the browsing experience. It seems flash is just not ready yet for usage on smartphones. Perhaps apple isn’t that foolish to not include it in the iPhone.

The phone has some standard themes which basically puts some widget on your screen, from there you can further customize the device, this feature saves quite some time and works well. One thing that also saves a lot of time is that the HTC Hero fetches all your contacts from all your e-mail and social network accounts like facebook and google mail. You will probably still get some duplicate contacts and some that need your time to manually edit, but at least the feature works, and we haven’t seen it on that many phones as of yet.

One of the other big plus points while comparing this device to other android smartphones is the exchange supports, it actually syncs e-mail, contacts and calendar items, something we have not seen before. The camera on the phone is what you would expect from HTC, sadly no flash, no optical zooming and not so great shutter time. If there is enough light the Hero makes great photo’s but as soon as there is a shortage of light like at night or in a not so well lit garage you will get grainy dark pictures that take ages to shoot.

All we would rate the phone a decent 8 out of 10, some things need more work, especially the web browsing and the camera. But the phone offers a great experience and is a joy to use. I’d say apple has to watch it’s back, when android device like this hopefully get some better hardware and faster cpu’s to backup the rich features and flash web browsing.

Free Windows Mobile applications, often quality can be hard to find. But today we compiled a list of five real gems. What they have to offer? Quality, usability and good looks, all in a free package for everyone on the Windows Mobile platform.

Opera Mobile
Let’s start with what is clearly the best browser available on Windows Mobile. Opera Mobile, weather it be version 9.5 that has been available for some time now, or the newest beta of 9.7 Opera Mobile will make browsing on your Touch screen device a breeze. The bookmark system, the speed and the looks and usability make it by far the best experience we ever had while browsing the net. If you have been using Opera Mobile 9.5 for some time now (it is included in many HTC ROMs) you should give 9.7 a try. Not everyone knows this but you can run the two versions side by side, so feel free to try out this beta, and if you don’t like it just uninstall it. Find it here.

Google Maps Mobile
Need we say anything about this application for your Windows phone? Google Maps works great on any Windows Mobile, Blackberry, Android, Nokia device. Google has put quite the effort in this little application to make the experience great. The only thing I would really like to see for this app is that you can predownload some maps from Google themselves, so you can view the maps a bit faster when on a slow connection. Thanks for this great app Google! You can download it here .

Facebook
Microsoft released their own Facebook for Windows Phones application recently, I guess they finally noticed how important social networks are becoming to the mobile phone community. What can I say? The application does work, but seems a bit sluggish compared with the iPhone or Android version. Let’s hope this application will improve with time and bring a good experience to the Windows Mobile 6.5 phones that are hitting the market this October. Download it here.

Stay tuned to see more posts regarding some great freeware Windows Mobile applications getting a short review. There are many more hidden gems that few people know about and are often just as good if not better then a lot of the payed counterparts.

Looking for some quality games for Windows Mobile? Check out this post.

Small bits and pieces of information have been dripping in on the HTC Leo that soon will be released by HTC as their new flagship Windows Mobile 6.5 device. So what makes the HTC Leo so special? So many Windows Mobile devices have been released and were announced recently. Here are the strong points of the upcoming device HTC leo:

Specs
CPU: Snapdragon MSM 8250 1GHz
Display: 4,3″ 480*800 capacitive touch-screen
Memory: 512 ROM and 320 RAM
Camera: 8 mega pixel with auto focus
Radio/GSM: Wi-Fi, A-GPS Blue tooth 2.1 + EDR, support GSM/EDGE, HSDPA
Audio: 3,5mm Jack
Expansion slot: Micro SD Slot
G-Sensor, motion sensor and light sensor.

4.3 inch Capacitive Touchscreen
Let’s start by explaining the difference between a capacitive and resistive touchscreen. Up until now all Windows Mobile devices have used resistive touchscreens, these screens work with pressure points that cover the lower layer of the touchscreen surface. When you press down on one of these pressure points the device knows where you placed your finger/stylus and will react accordingly.

Capacitive touchscreens use a glass insulator layer that has been coated with a transparent conductor. The human body (your finger) is the conductor when touching the surface. This technique requires a very light touch to control your device. The big plus point of this technology is that it supports multi touch (thing of the famous Apple pinch to zoom in). Many people are getting enthusiastic about this technology coming to Windows Mobile. The HTC Leo will be running Windows Mobile 6.5 and we have never seen a Windows Mobile device with a capacitive touchscreen so we have to wait and see what it brings to Windows Mobile. I believe HTC is counting on the sheer size of the touch screen to makeup for any menus or settings Windows Mobile still has that are harder to control with your fingers.

Snapdragon CPU
The past 2 years HTC has made countless Windows Mobile phones with the same Qualcomm 528MHz CPU. In comparison to the newest hardware this CPU really has sub par speed. Comparing it to the CPU in the iPhone or the Palm Pre is like comparing a Lamborghini to a Volkswagen beetle. Yes, the difference is that big.

Windows Mobile 6.5
The HTC Leo will be amongst the first Windows Mobile 6.5 devices. Recently I made a post about Windows Mobile 6.5 and HTC devices so i encourage you to read that if you want to be informed of what Windows Mobile 6.5 will bring to the world of Smartphones.

And really, the rest of the specs speak for themselves. 8mp camera, all kinds of sensors, 3.5 jack for your convenience and plenty of memory available through SD cards. The only point that is kind of worrying is the camera, the camera of the Touch HD/Diamond/Touch Pro series have been sub-par in comparison to Nokia/Samsung and some other brands. Let’s hope HTC fixed this, and impresses us soon.