Innehållsförteckning för Vol 5 2023 från iPhone User

PHOTOS in Focus 1 This is the name of the Photos album you have open (or in this case, where the pics were taken, as we’re looking at all the photos and not a single album), and the dates between which the photos contained in that album were all taken. 2 Tap here to select photos. You can pick out as many as you like, and dragging your finger will select multiple photos more easily. 3 Tap the three-dots icon for a pop-up that lets you zoom in and out, set the thumbnails, filter pictures, show them on a map and more. 4 These are your pictures. Tap the Select link, then tap photos to select and unselect them. Tap and hold a picture for a pop-up that lets you…

1 Set up your Health Profile. It should appear the first time you open the app, but if not, tap the icon in the top right corner of the Summary screen. Tap Health Details, then Edit and add your information. Do the same for Medical ID too. 2 The main Summary screen, accessed by tapping the Summary icon at the bottom, starts with your Favourites. To configure, tap the Edit link and choose the items you want to use. Note the Existing and All tabs. 3 In the Browse tab, tap Activity and then Activity again for your Activity data, which is taken from your Apple Watch. It shows how you’re getting on filling your rings today, and how your activity level compares over the last week, month and year.…

Finding and viewing TV shows 1 From the main screen, tap the top right icon (silhouette or your photo) for this window, from where you can manage your account (tap your name), manage services to which you’ve subscribed, or add funds or gift cards to your Apple account, to spend on apps and media. 2 Tapping Connected Apps shows the TV and catch-up apps you downloaded from the App Store, and that are linked to your TV app. Tap the switch to unlink an app and stop its content appearing in your TV app. If you don’t have any, download some now. 3 Tap Account in the top left corner to go back to the previous window. Then tap Done, in the top right corner, to get to here. This…

First Steps with FaceTime 1 To start a FaceTime conversation from the Contacts app, first find the contact card of the person you wish to call. If that person’s email or phone number are registered with FaceTime, you can see FaceTime icons for both audio (the telephone receiver) and video (the camera). Tap one to make the call. 2 There are several ways of starting a FaceTime call from the FaceTime app. Tap the New FaceTime button (top right). Add the name of the person you want to call (or their phone number or email address if they’re not in your Contacts), then tap a button for either a video or audio FaceTime call. 3 The FaceTime app also shows a list of recent FaceTime calls, showing whether they were…

The People tab 1 Tap the People icon at the foot of the screen. To start sharing your location with friends or family members, tap Start Sharing Location. Enter the name, Apple ID email, or phone number of the person you want to share with. 2 As is usual, you can tap the + sign to the right and select a person from your Contacts app. Add as many people as you wish, and tap the Send link. Then you can choose whether to share for an hour, the rest of the day or indefinitely. 3 The people you shared your location with can now see you as a blue spot on the map. Pinch and spread to zoom in and out. Tap a name for options. From here, you…

Sign in with Passkeys 1 If you don’t already have an account on the site you’re trying to use, create one in the usual way, with a username and a password. Procedure differs from site to site, so follow the on-screen instructions to register an account. 2 Once again, details vary from site to site, but on the Nestlé site, you can add a Passkey instead of entering and re-entering a passcode. All you have to do is tap the fingerprint icon instead of entering passwords into the password field. 3 The site invites us to set up a Passkey for the site and the account in question. When this is done, the Passkey is saved in your iCloud Keychain, and therefore are available for use on all your compatible…

Searching for Photos 1 Type (or at least, start to type) ‘Photos’ and you can open the Photos app, or see photographs taken from apps, including the Photos app. Tap Show More next to Photos from Apps to see more pictures. 2 You can look for specific subjects within your photos if you wish. Here we’ve searched for ‘beach’. In the search results are pictures taken from the Photos app; tap Search in App and you’ll see the results in Photos. 3 You can be more specific too. By searching for ‘Summer Cats’, for example, we see pictures of cats that were taken during the Summer months. Of course, we could use that search in other apps too, such as Mail and Safari. Accessing Spotlight To access the Spotlight feature…

How to activate and speak to Siri 1 To open Siri, hold down the Side button or the Home button on older iPhones. Siri now appears at the foot of the screen, as you can see here. 2 Begin speaking and the coloured icon reverberates to let you know that Siri can hear you. If it doesn’t, tap it to talk to Siri again. 3 You can also access Siri by saying “Hey Siri” and then speaking your request. Tap the answer shown to open the app that created it. Siri learning The more you use Siri, the more it learns about you, your voice and the sort of words you use. The digital assistant gets used to your accent and also your way of speaking. Over time, Siri has…

HOME in Focus 1 Tap this waveform icon to record a message which is then sent to every intercom device connected to your Home app. 2 The Plus icon opens a pop-up, from which you can add a HomeKit-compatible accessory; or add a scene or group of instructions to your accessories activated with a single tap. 3 Tap here to access a list of your accessories, your Home settings, options to edit the Home view and reorder sections, and access to rooms you’ve set up with HomeKit accessories. 4 These status icons give important information gleaned from your HomeKit-compatible accessories. You can tell at a glance, for example, whether a light is on, what the temperature is or whether a motion sensor is picking up movement. 5 The Home app…

The GorillaPod range of camera and mobile phone tripods is among the most versatile and comprehensive mounts around, and now there’s one for the latest, MagSafe iPhones (that’s the 12-series and later). The lower half of the device is business as usual; a regular GorillaPod tripod which you can bend and mould into almost any shape. Need a shorter leg to compensate for an uneven platform? You’ve got it. Want to mount your phone at a lower height without sacrificing stability? Not a problem. You can even hold the legs together and use it as a (short) selfie stick, or bend them around a tree branch or metal pole to hold your phone in positions that just wouldn’t be possible with a traditional tripod. Click and stick The upper part…

This handy, mains-powered device is more than just an iPad stand. Sure, it can hold your iPad Pro (2018 or later, either size), or iPad Air (2020), in Landscape or portrait mode, so you can watch media, draw with your Apple Pencil or type comfortably by connecting a keyboard and mouse. But it’s also a wireless charger for your iPhone and/or AirPods. Just place them on the pad at the foot of the stand. You can also buy an optional Apple Watch charger that fits on the side of the device. The stand connects to your iPad’s USB-C socket, and you can plug in peripherals using the ports at the back. There’s three USB 3 ports, a HDMI port and an Ethernet port. There’s an SD Card reader and headphone…

A wireless extender is designed to compliment your wireless router by extending the reach of your Wi-Fi network. Set it up in a location that’s within the range of your current network, and it provides an access point of its own, which in turn transfers data to and from your router. The FRITZ!Repeater 6000 wireless repeater is an update of AVM’s popular FRITZ!Repeater 3000 model, and it makes several advances on the older product. Most importantly, the FRITZ!Repeater 6000 is Wi- Fi 6 compatible. This new Wi-Fi standard is designed for the modern network, where far more connected devices are present than was the case just a few years ago. These days, as well as computers, mobile devices and smart TVs, you’re likely to have Internet radios, connected smart devices…

This is the perfect editor for anyone wanting to put together videos quickly and easily. It takes literally just a few minutes to get the hang of using it, and you’ll be putting together your own videos in next to no time. Ease of use is everything in an app like this, and Splice manages to be flexible enough to create good, professional-looking videos while keeping everything so simple you can’t go wrong. You can add videos and static pictures as well as title pages. Choose from a variety of fades to move from one to the next. You can add music tracks from iTunes, record a voiceover or use the sound from the videos themselves. Adding and removing sections is easily accomplished with a couple of button presses. Click…

iMazing is a device management tool for all iOS and iPadOS devices. Open iMazing on your Mac and connect an iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Apple TV or even a classic iPod, and you can explore and organise its contents with a far greater degree of control than macOS natively allows. Various price points are available, depending on how many mobile devices you wish to use with it. The app can back up your device to your computer, without deleting previous backups. These backups are encrypted, and unlike regular backups, they can be stored on any connected hard drive or NAS drive – it doesn’t have to be your boot drive. Backups can be scheduled and carried out automatically, and you can review and restore their contents just like you can…

I blooming love Double Dragon. Back in the late Eighties, at the local arcade – a dingy, dishevelled dive, complete with sticky carpet and drenched in eye-watering neon – my mate Daz and I would force-feed ten pence pieces into the Double Dragon arcade machine and settle in for an afternoon of cooperative digital violence. It was superb. Imagine how happy I was to get my hands on the complete trilogy on the iPad. Sadly, Daz and I have parted ways in the years since 1987, but these days I have a couple of children who can help me take on the bosses and finally rescue poor old Marian from the clutches of the Black Warriors gang. Often, when it comes to arcade conversions for mobile devices, the end result…

It’s hard to believe Grand Theft Auto III is well over 20 years old. It’s also hard to imagine how the games industry would look without this iconic brand that transcends video gaming. Even non-gamers are familiar with the title, although often for the wrong reasons. Controversy! Violence! Adult content! Yet GTA didn’t become an institution because of its controversial storylines. It invented the ‘sand box’ genre which has changed the face of gaming in subsequent years, with the growth and development of the franchise to the levels one would once question possible with the masterful GTA 5 and the devastating badness of the much anticipated and much savaged Grand Theft Auto Collection. Despite the fantastic ports of Vice City and San Andreas, there was enormous trepidation and excitement about…

BADLAND is a beautifully designed side-scrolling action adventure puzzleplatformer that takes place in an atmospheric forest packed full of deadly traps you must navigate through to reach the end of each level. The game is controlled by using one finger to guide the peculiar furry character through the treacherous BADLAND, much like the highly addictive 2D Helicopter PC game if you recall, or the side-scrolling sections in classic Mario. However, this is a great deal more in-depth and obviously visually superior. The screen automatically scrolls from left to right. You simply tap your device's screen in order to cause the furball to rise higher, thus avoiding the many traps and obstacles in your path. Releasing your finger causes him to drop back down. There are many power-ups available in each…

MAPS in Focus 1 Tap the folded map icon for a pop-up window, where you can switch between four map types; Explore, Driving, Public Transport and Satellite view. 2 Tap this arrow icon to focus the map on your current location. Tap it again and the map rotates as you move, so the direction your travelling is always ‘up’. A third tap returns it to its default function. 3 The blue dot shows your current location on the map and the direction you’re facing. The smaller the blue circle around it, the more accurate the location is. 4 Use the search bar found here to look for a location or nearby feature; we looked for Fast Food. Tap the Search field without typing anything for a list of recent searches…

How to store credit and debit card information 1 To use Apple Pay, you need at least an iPhone 6, 6 Plus or SE; or an Apple Watch connected to a compatible iOS device. Apple Watches are compatible with the iPhone 5 or later, including the iPhone SE and require at least iOS 8. You can make Apple Pay payments online with an iPad Pro, Air 2, Mini 3 or later. 2 Credit or debit cards are added to Apple Pay through the Wallet app. To add a new card, use your iPhone’s rear camera to take a photograph of the card in question. Just keep it in the frame as advised on screen, and the card is photographed and its information stored. Or type the information in manually. 3…

BOOKS in Focus 1 See how many pages are left in the chapter here. 2 Read your book here. Tap anywhere around here to see how many pages you have left to read (see 14). 3 Tap here or slide right to go to the previous page. 4 Tap here or slide left to go to the next page. 5 This shows how much of the book you’ve already read. Tap it for a chapter list. 6 Tap here to see bookmarks and highlights you’ve added to the book as you read. 7 Search the book for a word or phrase. 8 Tap here for a controller that lets you change the brightness, font, text size and other option. 9 The Sharing icon. Tap it for iOS sharing options. 10…

ITUNES in Focus 1 Tap here for a pop-up window that lets you filter music according to its genre. Available genres include Blues, Classical, Country, jazz, metal, rock, greatest hits and more. Choose the Tones option to view ringtones. 2 Tap the Featured tab to see what’s hot and what’s new. The Charts tab gives you the best selling songs, albums and music videos on the iTunes Store. 3 Tap here for your wish list, songs you’ve identified using Siri (see the Siri guide for more details) and tracks you listened to as previews. 4 Scroll this line of albums left and right for more options, or tap See All to open the New Music page. 5 The iTunes Store’s shop window. Tap a price to buy a song or…

An introduction to iCloud Drive and the Files app 1 In the Settings app, tap your name at the top of the screen, tap iCloud and scroll down to iCloud Drive. If it isn’t on already, turn it on. You can now save your files in the cloud and access them from any Internet device. 2 Open the Files app and under Locations, tap iCloud Drive. Here you see the files stored on your iCloud Drive, arranged by their apps. iCloud Drive is also accessible through other Apple devices, and www.icloud.com. 3 You can open an iCloud document on your iPhone, if you have the iPhone version of the app that created it. Just open the folder for the app in question (here we’re looking at Pages) and tap a…

Updating iOS and Apps 1 When a new version of iOS is available, the Settings app is badged. Open it, go to General > Software Update and your iPhone checks with Apple to check if there’s a new version for you. If there is, it gives you an option to Download and Install. Tap the link to do so. 2 The update downloads. When advised to do so, tap Install Now; you might need to connect your iPhone to a power source if the battery is low. After your update has installed, your iPhone restarts. Of course, if you turn on Automatic Updates, all this is done for you. 3 When app updates are available, your App Store app is badged. Open it, and tap the badged icon in the…

SCREEN TIME in Focus 1 To open Screen Time, go to Settings > Screen Time. You can also get to the Widgets screen by swiping right from the Lock screen, or the Home screen, and tapping the Screen Time widget near the bottom. 2 A summary of how you’ve been using your iPhone on each day of the week. Tap a bar to see how much you used it on that day. Also shown is your daily average time, and whether this is up or down. 3 This link takes you to a more detailed breakdown of what you’ve been doing with your phone, and when. 4 Tap here to schedule downtime for your iPhone. During this time, only apps you choose to exclude can be used. It’s great if…

Using the Notification Centre 1 Notifications now arrive as a roll at the foot of your screen. Swipe it up to review them, or down to replace them with a Notification Count. Get to Notification Centre on an unlocked phone by swiping down from the top of the screen. 2 To clear a single notification, swipe it left and tap the Clear button. To delete all notifications received from a given app, tap the X next to the app name and then the Clear button that replaces it. All those notifications go. 3 Swipe an incoming notification left and tap Options to mute notifications from that app for an hour or the rest of the day, view the settings for that app’s notifications or turn off notifications for that app…

Here at Essential AppleUser Magazine, we’ve long been fans of devolo’s excellent homeplug devices. Plug one into the mains near your router and connect it with a supplied Ethernet cable, then set up the other bundled homeplugs anywhere in the house, and they use your home’s electrical cabling to carry your network data. Individual plugs offer Wi-Fi hotspots and/or Ethernet ports, so you can make cabled and wireless connections to the homeplug instead of directly to your router. At last, you can have Wi-Fi throughout the house, even a long way from the router, and cabled Internet access without having to drill holes in the walls and trail cables under the carpets. These latest devolo homeplugs conform to the newx Wi-Fi 6 protocols, which give up to 50% faster wireless…

Airpulse’s latest offering, the P100X stereo Bluetooth speaker, should appeal to those who like their tech to be beautiful as well as practical. Inspired by traditional FM radios of old, it has a gorgeous mesh finish at the front and back, and an elegant cherry wood speaker casing at the top and sides. Sound-wise, it features a pair of custom-designed 10w tweeters and a 4.5-inch 40w mid-woofer, for 60w in total. The tweeters use an oval-shaped diaphragm to deliver a better high frequency response, accurately reproducing even the highest audio frequencies. The mid woofer is a 4.5-inch unit, featuring a hard anodised aluminium alloy cone suspended in a heavy, rigid cast magnesium alloy frame. The device connects to your audio source via Bluetooth v5.1, supporting the aptX HD codec, or…

It’s always nice to come across an app that does something a little bit differently, or takes an existing idea and puts its own unique spin on it. Especially considering that everyone is talking about Netflix’s new undead action romp, Army of the Dead. Zombies, Run! does exactly that, and it helps you to get fit as well. It’s part adventure game, part fitness app and part interactive story. The concept might sound a little strange at first but it makes perfect sense when you start using it, so you just have to trust us that it works. Zombies, Run! is an app designed to help people who want to run, but lack the motivation to actually get out there and do it. The incentive in this case is to…

TRANSLATE in Focus 1 These are the languages you’re currently translating out of (left) and into (right). Tap the down-pointing chevrons to choose another language. 2 This is the last thing you typed into Translate. 3 This is the translation of the English you typed in. As you selected German at the top of the screen, it’s translated into German. 4 These icons are; Switch to full-screen mode for the translation; save the translation as a favourite; and look up a highlighted word in the dictionary. 5 Tap Play to read the translation out loud. 6 This is where you type the text you wish to be translated. Tap here to bring up the virtual keyboard. 7 Tap here and speak what you want to be translated instead of typing…

MUSIC in Focus 1 This is the main page of the Apple Music streaming service, where albums, artists and playlists tailored to your tastes are suggested for your listening. 2 Tap here to see your account details. You can change your username to a specific Music app nickname, choose more of your favourite artists, replace the silhouette with a photo and add some personal details. 3 Top Picks is a range of playlists from bands and artists curated by the Music app to match your tastes, gleaned from what you’ve listened to. Tap one to play the tracks. 4 The mini-player shows the track you’re currently playing. You can tap it to expand it to full-screen size, with all the usual audio controls available to use. 5 You can use…

NEWS in Focus 1 Today’s date, which is always important on a digital news app. 2 This is Today, the News app’s main page. Scroll for top stories, trending stories and more. 3 You can watch videos directly from the News app. Just tap the Play button and the video plays, right there in the story. 4 Stories in the News app are tagged with how long ago they were uploaded to the Internet, so you know how recent your stories are. 5 Front-page news stories are usually illustrated with photos, videos or other such graphics. If you scroll the page, you get to see a range of news stories, trending stories, top videos and articles selected especially for you. 6 This is the Today icon. It takes you back…

APP STORE in Focus 1 The App Store’s Today screen gives you the pick of the best of the new releases, chosen every day by Apple’s editors. Scroll up for the apps that were chosen on previous days. 2 Tap here to get to your account details, redeem a card, send an app as a gift, update apps, and check on the apps you’ve previously purchased, or sign out of the App Store. 3 These are the apps, and a feature highlighting a range of apps, that have been chosen by Apple’s editors as the choice of the day. Tap one for information on that particular app, and the opportunity to get it. 4 Tap here to get to the Today screen, as seen here. The Today screen is a…

Features of the Files app 1 When you first open the Files app, you see three icons at the foot of the screen. The Recents icon shows you documents you’ve recently opened, and Shared gives access to those you’ve shared with other people. The Browse icon lets you look through your files. 2 The Files app has an improved search facility. You can restrict your search to recents, files on iCloud Drive, or the specific app whose folder you’ve opened, and can also add ‘tokens’ to restrict the search to (for example) specific file types or production dates (e.g. ‘last week’). 3 The first four options on the Browse screen include On My iPhone (documents you’ve stored locally) iCloud Drive (documents stored on your iCloud service), Shared (files shared with…

Using Live Text 1 Point your iPhone’s camera at text or numerals, and tap the icon that appears (bottom-right). A menu gives options regarding the text. You can also tap and drag to select a portion of the text instead of all of it. 2 You can copy and paste it into any app that uses text, or share it directly to that app. It sometimes needs a little editing after it has been imported, especially if the original text is presented in an unusual font. 3 Tap a text field in an app that utilises text and in a pop-up menu, you can select Scan Text. You can then use your camera to copy text from your environment, directly into the app’s text field. 4 Live Text can read…

Using Focus Filters to hide app content 1 To customise a Focus, open the Settings app and select the Focus option. Choose the Focus you want to customise, or press the + screen in the top-right corner to start a new Focus from scratch. To use Focus Filters, scroll the screen up to find the Focus Filters section. 2 Tap Add Filter and you arrive at this screen, from where you can apply filters to four apps, namely Calendar, Mail, Messages and Safari. You can also set System Filters, allowing you to set the appearance of your iPhone to Dark Mode or turn on Low Power Mode. 3 Tap Calendar and you can choose which calendars to show with the Focus in question. For example, for the Work Focus, you…

Using AirDrop for file transfer 1 Send files to other Apple devices using AirDrop. Switch on Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, then go to Settings > General > AirDrop and decide whether receiving via AirDrop is on or off, share only with Contacts, or share with everyone. 2 Select a file, photo, or video you want to send by AirDrop, and open it. Tap the Sharing icon (the page with the up-pointing arrow), and then tap AirDrop in the pop-up window. Tap the person to which you want to send the file, and it’s sent. 3 If you accept AirDrops from everyone, when you’re sent an AirDrop file, you have to accept it first. AirDropped files are accessible from their host apps: Safari links open via Safari, photos via the Photos app,…

This second-generation STM ChargeTree makes a few minor, but welcome, changes from the original model. Like the original ChargeTree it’s available in black or white, and it once more charges a Qi-compatible iPhone, AirPods (with a wireless charging case), and an Apple Watch - all at the same time, using only one power socket. You just need a USB-C mains adapter of at least 20W. It’s not supplied, but they’re not hard to come by. As before, you charge your iPhone by resting it on the backward-leaning mat at the front of the ChargeTree Swing. It’s comfortably cushioned, and there’s an optional rubber raiser to fit over the foot if you have a smaller iPhone that needs the extra height. Also as before, your earbuds sit on a charging pad…

You can use this double-ended flash drive to transfer files between devices, and back up your photos and videos from your iPad or iPhone. Available in 64GB, 128GB or 256GB capacities, it has a USB-C 3.1 plug on one end, and a Lightning connector at the other. You can only copy media and contacts from an iPhone or iPad, using the iXpand app, but plug it into a Mac and you can copy any file. Transferring files to the flash drive is super speedy; it’s certainly faster than its predecessor, the iXpand Flash Drive Go. The iXpand app is easy to use too. It’s a great way of getting more from your mobile device’s internal storage, without clogging it up with things that could be stored elsewhere. Info// SanDisk www.westerndigital.com…

What a delightfully clever idea. At a glance, PowerPic looks like an attractive but unremarkable photo frame, but it’s also a powerful wireless charger that’s perfect for your Qi-compatible iPhone or AirPods. PowerPic is a solid, clear photo holder, with a black or white charging unit on the back. It houses a six-inch by four-inch photograph in landscape or portrait mode; which is held in place by a plastic cover, held on by a magnet in each corner. The whole thing slots into a black or white base. It looks excellent with a decent photo in place; right at home in any room. You connect it to the mains using a USB-C cable (supplied) and a 20w USB-C power adapter (not supplied). On a charge Of course, the PowerPic really…

The iPad is a near-perfect platform on which to express your artistic tendencies. Its large display and professional-quality surface and capabilities make for an excellent drawing pad. The iPhone, on the other hand, is a little more difficult. But with the release of Procreate Pocket, artists can now unleash their talents on the smaller screen. Don’t be fooled into thinking the iPhone version of Procreate is a cut-down release; it’s not. In fact, it’s matched with the iPad in terms of features, technicalities and abilities. There are hundreds of handmade brushes available, alongside a suite of tools and the new Valkyrie Graphics Engine – the latest, and fastest, 64-bit painting engine. Highlights include UHD canvases, up to 16k x 4k, a Dark Mode interface, a QuickShape feature for creating perfect…

Sites that collate Internet radio stations aren’t exactly thin on the ground, but Radio Garden does it differently. Instead of listing broadcasters by genre or country, it locates them on a globe which you can rotate on the screen, and zoom in and out of for a better view. Every shining dot on the map is a radio station (or for pedants, an Internet streaming broadcast). Click on a dot, or drag the globe until it’s in the centre of the circle in the middle of the screen, and that station plays. Using the controls at the foot of an iPhone screen and in the bottom-left on an iPad or Mac, you can play and pause the stream, or move to the next or previous local station. Tap the heart…

Ridley Scott’s original Aliens from 1979 was a ground-breaking piece of cinema. Set within the claustrophobic confines of a spaceship, the crew are hunted by an alien creature of immense death-dealing impressiveness. It was tense, scary as hell and the feeling of absolute terror seeped through the screen as the protagonist, Ripley, tries to flush the beast into the depths of space. Sadly, that sense of terror had never really been conveyed through gaming. True, there have been several Aliens-based games in the past, for all manner of systems (one of our favourites was a Doom Aliens mod, from 1994), and we did have space-based horror in the form of System Shock and Dead Space, but the Alien franchise always felt a little flat. However, 2014’s Alien: Isolation from SEGA…

Part game, part interactive movie, when Another World was first released for the Amiga it was more than just another game. It was a real interactive experience. Rather than falling into one of the established genres of the time, Another World was neither a puzzle game, a shoot-’em-up nor a platformer, but it was all of these and more. Playing it now it’s easy to forget how revolutionary it was at the time. The spookily realistic sprite animation still looks very nice, but it was gob-smacking in 1991. The game begins with a scientific experiment gone wrong, which transports the main character to a strange, dream-like world and so begins the adventure where you take on challenge after challenge as you try to stay alive and figure out a way…

Tengai or Sengoku Blade as it is know in its homeland, Japan, is a horizontal scrolling arcade shoot-‘em-up which was released in arcades in 1996; and via several excellent home ports at the time. Yet this iOS conversion somehow feels the most fitting of the home releases. Allow me to explain. As a long-time fan of the genre, I have always experienced issues with lifespan vs price when it came to purchasing stand-alone releases. Numerous shooter collections litter my games collection, but very few stand-alone packages join them. This is far from a criticism, but the genre itself lends itself well to short bursts of intense gameplay coated in rich, over-the-top visuals, sonics and a pumping soundtrack. This is perfect arcade fare, as a handful of credits offer fans their…