Finish gaming company Rovio is hoping to replicate the success of the Angry Birds series with a new game called the Amazing Alex.

A Billion Angry Birds

Gaming companies know that you are only good as you last title (pretty much the general rule of thumb in business, no?). Even the most storied developers can make one ‘wrong’ move and have fans turn on them like a Roman mob. And although Rovio’s Angry Birds has been downloaded over a billion times, the Finish company is not putting all their Easter eggs in one basket.

Meet the Amazing Alex

Gamasutra reported last week that Rovio has acquired the rights to Casey’s Contraptions from developers Mystery Coconut and Snappy Touch. The first game based on this acquisition will be Amazing Alex. Even with just a cursory glance, you can see the similarities between Casey and Alex.

Rovio’s VP of Franchise Development, Ville Heijari, stated that the company had acquired all rights for the brand. “Working with Noel [Llopis, Snappy Touch founder] and Miguel [A. Friginal, Mystery Coconut founder] has been fantastic, and this is a game that we all fell in love with from the first play,” said Heijari. However, it is not clear if the two developers behind Casey’s Contraption will be staying on to work with Rovio on the new title.

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Most weather apps give you the straight facts, your basic meat and potatoes. Now, there is nothing wrong with a staple of weather facts, but there are two new apps that bring something a little different to the radar screen: Dark Sky and SF Climates.

Dark Sky

Dark Sky is another successful Kickstarter project. The project received nearly $40,000 from over 1,000 backers. What sets this app apart from other weather apps is its focus on short-term weather predictions. We often want to know what the weather will be like during the day, but often what affects us the most are short-term weather patterns (i.e., if you will step outside, will you be poured on 15 minutes later?).

The Dark Sky app is fully interactive, so you can scroll through a storm to see how it began or how it is progressing. In this way, you can explore many hours of storm data and you can also see what a storm or a weather pattern might look like up to an hour in time.

Because most weather apps only update every five or ten minutes, you end up with jittery satellite images, which makes it difficult to access in which direction a storm is moving. What the Dark Sky app does so ingeniously is use the same algorithm that predicts the weather for those 5-10 minute intervals and uses it to predict the weather in between. The result is a beautifully fluid animation that is unlike anything you have seen.

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A couple weeks ago we wrote about the teaser trailer for Smappsoft’s new mobile game, Wave Rave. Wave Rave for the iOS was released today, and it is every bit as tantalizing as we predicted it would be.

The game was inspired by the work of mathematician and physicist Joseph Fourier (of Good Will Hunting fame).  Wave Rave presents players with a series of increasingly complex waveform puzzles. As the clock ticks, players must match target waveforms by reconstructing them from their component waves before time runs out. We will spare you the details with respect to modulation, but basically you have to match the pretty undulating shapes.

As you move on in the game, the puzzles increase in complexity. There is also a Game Center leader board integration that adds a social aspect to Wave Rave and makes it easy to compete with friends. It basically acts like the high scores on old arcade games.

We recommend you check out the in-app tutorial before you begin. The game is not as easy as it appears. Fueled by some wicked dance beats, it may be harder to keep your feet still than to actually complete the puzzles.

This is definitely an app we can say is worth every penny. The Wave Rave app can be picked up for $1.99 at the App Store.

The Make Your Own Puzzles app for the iOS challenges you in a game of wits — against yourself. Inconceivable!

Make Your Own Puzzles App for the iOS

So you have become disenchanted with the Sunday New York Times Crossword Puzzles. They are a bore. You feel your wits would be unmatched by the Sicilian, Vizzini, of The Princess Bride. The Make Your Own Puzzles app will then give you the opportunity to challenge yourself and others with a crossword puzzle of your own construct.

The first thing you need to do is select a puzzle title, author name (that would be you), as well as a few other parameters. You can do a simple word search puzzle or more of a NY Times-type of crossword. Then provide a word list and some helpful (or not-so-helpful hints), and the Make Your Own Puzzles app takes care of pretty much everything else.

Puzzles can be saved as PDF, PNG, or JPEG files so that they can easily be shared with friends. The PDF files can also be saved in the iBooks and Kindle apps. Each puzzle comes with a blank puzzle, a puzzle with hints, and an answer key, so there will be no debate as to the veracity of the answers. It is important to note that the puzzles are not playable on your device. They are meant to be printed out. You can do this directly from the device using the AirPrint set up. You can email it to yourself and print it from a desktop, or you can print it from the iTunes File Sharing option.

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The Magic Plan app brings such ease and intuitiveness to home design that it will make you feel like you could quite easily design the new wing of the Guggenheim.

A Magic Plan App

We spend a lot of time writing about fun apps and games and useful productivity applications, but some of the most innovative apps on the market are the ones being used by professionals and amateurs alike to do more quotidian things like redesigning your living room. The Magic Plan app by Sensopia uses augmented reality to create floor plans that look like they were done by a professional draftsman.

All you have to do is download the app, and with iPhone or the iPad’s camera, you start laying in virtual pylons in every corner of the room. From each pylon, you stretch out a grid line to the next pylon until you have mapped out the entire room. Then with the single touch of a button, the Magic Plan app magically converts the augmented reality grid you have created into a two-dimensional floor plan. You can save your floor plans in PDF, JPG, and DXF format, or you can publish an interactive floor plan directly on the Web.

Architects, contractors, draftsmen, and designers can now just walk onto a site, and in a matter of minutes, they can set up a floor plan with the kind of precision programs like AutoCad deliver. The great thing about the app is that you do not need to have drafting or drawing skills. You don’t even need to pull out a measuring tape or move a single piece of furniture.

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If you want to get a glimpse into the world of a Hollywood visual effects artist, then download the VFX Studio app for the iOS. This simple tool makes it easy to add some cool effects to your pictures.

VFX Studio App

Visual effects, like all other post-production work, involves the process of adding multiple layers to raw footage until you have a finished film. And if you ask most filmmakers, they will tell you that process they enjoy the most is post-production. This is because it is here that you begin to see a film take shape.

With the VFX Studio app, you can take part in some of your own post-production work. The VFX Studio app is similar to another very popular iOS app called Action Movie FX, which allows you to add visual effects to video images.

The really great thing about both these apps is that with some very simple tools you can create visually compelling images. And then a visual effects artist is born.

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If you have not yet discovered the Hubble app for the iOS, then you have yet to uncover a hidden treasure at the App Store. Although there are some very cool constellation and astronomy apps out there, the Hubble app offers something that is scientifically unique and, well, incredibly fun.

What is Hubble?

The Hubble telescope was carried into orbit by the Space Shuttle in 1990. It was named after Edwin Hubble, an American astronomer who changed the way we ‘saw’ the universe. Over the last 20 years, Hubble has made some profound discoveries and has altered our perception of our own galaxy and the universe beyond.

With its “deep field,” Hubble has captured galaxies whose light has been travelling for billions of years. It has not only found new planets, but it also managed to do what was once thought impossible with our existing telescopes: capture an image of a planet in a distant galaxy. In fact, when Hubble was launched, we didn’t even know if there were planets outside our own solar system. Indeed, we have come a long way.

The Hubble App

The Hubble app, called HubbleSite, includes much of what you would expect: spectacular Hubble images that have been optimized for the iPhone and the new iPad’s Retina Display. The application includes histories of the telescope itself and the numerous discoveries it has made. There are also some cool images of the telescope that detail its various components.

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The Cortex Camera app by Whimsical Productions is the latest in the growing number of camera applications. And although you may be experiencing some app fatigue by now, we think this one is worth checking out.

Cortex Camera App for the iOS

Nothing produces better images than the human eye, except maybe Hubble. Now, cameras may very well do things that the human eye cannot do (for example, selective depth of field, art filtering, etc). But what they cannot do, as of yet, is produce the kind of clarity that are own optical mechanism can reproduce ─ that is, of course, if it comes equipped with 20/20 vision.

The Cortex Camera app is the first camera application we have seen that has found a novel way to approximate what the human eye does so effectively. It does so by combing 100 frames of video into one noise-free still photograph. The inspiration for the Cortex Camera app comes from our own visual cortex, which has over 140 million neurons in each sphere of the brain that continuously process visual information and turn all that data into images.

The Cortex Camera app will greatly reduce noise, especially in challenging light conditions. It can also be used on the iPad, where it will help increase the pixilation from 5 megapixels to 8 megapixels. Some of the other features include tap-to-focus and pinch-to-zoom (without further loss of detail). Another great feature is that you can optionally save your photos to PNG format for maximum quality.

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Dabble app for the iOS launched worldwide yesterday at DEMO 2012. Dabble is the product of fledgling social-media company Daemonic Labs, though considering the pedigree behind the operation, the company could hardly be considered a ‘green’ startup.

Dabble App for the iOS

So you are asking, “Yet another photo application? Another social-media app?” Well, yes, but this one is a little different. Dabble app for the iPhone is a photo and social-media application, but that would be the broad category to help slot it somewhere. The app, however, has a lot more than just a picture-taking and socializing component.

The idea behind the Dabble app is that anywhere you are in the world, there are gems all around you — the perfect romantic restaurant, the best place to shop for shoes, a nice spot to have a picnic. So think of Dabble as a Lonely Planet Guide but with pictures.

Basically, the idea is that you snap these “social postcards” of yourself or loved one wherever you are. You don’t even need to be in the shot. These postcards then get left behind, so to speak, so that friends and family (or other Dabble app subscribers) can retrieve them and learn from your experiences, maybe even just to see the spot from a different light.

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Okay, so no one actually makes calls anymore. That’s a real bummer. If you are a little old school like me and feel bogged down in the quagmire of texting, then the Jawbone Thoughts app is for you. The Jawbone Thoughts app is a messaging service that allows you to send voice messages instead of texts. Jawbone is also the maker of the Jambox we recently reviewed.

Jawbone Thoughts App for the Textually-Challenged

I have to admit: I hate texting. There, I said it. I know this is not cool for a twenty-something-ish techie writer, but that’s just the way it is. Now, that doesn’t mean I will be using pen and paper to send out my messages to friends anytime soon, but call me old-fashioned; I still like to hear a voice.

The Jawbone Thoughts app lets you do both: send and receive messages as well as hear the voice of your favorite people. We wrote about a similar service called Six3, but that infinitely cool application involved video messaging. The Jawbone Thoughts app pares things down even more.

The app is very easy to use. Once you have downloaded and installed the application, you can start recording and sending out messages. Your iPhone contacts are listed in alphabetical order and all have a red dot next to their name. If you click on the red dot, you can instantly record your message. Once you have finished recording, you can choose to where you would like to send it: an email address, a landline, or a home phone. It should be noted that messages to landlines incur a charge of $0.15.

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