Touching Up III: TKO, Hahlo, Feeds, Live Search, and More

by Eric March on April 21, 2008 at 11:03 pm

Now with more electrolytes!

Gather round the campfire, kids, it’s time for another edition of Touching Up. In today’s episode, we’ve got news of a DDR-style drum banging game called TKO, MS Live Maps, a great big sack o’ Theme Builder icons, the first native Google RSS reader, and updates for Hahlo, GuitarChords, and iMemory. Sit a spell, won’t you? And pass the hot Cocoa Touch.

TKO – Total Kute Overload?
No, it wouldn’t be possible for that to have been any more forced. Nevertheless, if you’re a TTR fan, or perhaps a fan of its progenitor, Taiko no Tastujin (Taiko Drum Master), or you just want a sugary injection of unbearably cute anime, TKO has got your dosage. The object is simple and follows the TTR/DDR style of play: Hit the left drum (or is it the right?) when a red happy-puppy-face-dot is on the target line, and the right drum (or is it the left?) when a blue happy-puppy-face-dot is on the target line. The closer the happy-puppy-face-dot is to the center of the line, the better you score. Happy-puppy-face-dot.
TKO is not currently available on a repo, so you’ll have to download it here, SSH into your device, copy the app folder to your Applications folder, change permissions recursively to 0755, and away you go. Kawaii!! ^_^
(via iPod Touch Fans)

Microsoft Makes Live Maps iPhone/Touch Compatible
Not for nothin’ (but close to it), but Microsoft have created a Safari web app that has given iPhone and iPod Touch users (as well as Safari users everywhere) the opportunity to use Live Maps on the go. Was it worth the trouble? The jury says “not really.” I tried it out and didn’t really see a whole lot wrong with it — although there isn’t really much to recommend it over the native Google Maps app, either. Of perhaps more interesting note — at least to those who would like to make use of Microsoft Virtual Earth — is that they do seem to be working on a native version that should see a release through the App Store in June. If that’s true, then you’ll have a Virtual Earth app that works much like Google Maps, with panning and zooming.
(via Just Another iPhone Blog)

Hahlo, My Name Is…
For those of you who don’t want to jailbreak your iPhone or Touch, or who, for whatever reason, prefer web apps, then your favourite Twitter web app is about to get better. Hahlo 3 (the Legendary Edition?) is currently making the rounds on the beta circuit. Hahlo author Dean Robinson has been hard at work on adding new features and optimizing the app to bring you a marked speed increase, redesigned dropdown menus that are easier to navigate, easier screen navigation, and other miscellaneous changes. Look for its emergence from testing soon.
(via Just Another iPhone Blog)

Icons A-gogo
Like icons? Can you never have enough of them? Want to go stark raving hatstand changing all of the icons on your Springboard with Theme Builder? Then let iSpazio feed your unholy addiction. Just relesaed on the iSpazio source (http://repo.ispazio.net) is the iSpazio Icon Pack, which features 750 icons for Theme Builder covering all manner of categories, which should just about be enough to sate the icon pack rat in you for a week or so.
(via Just Another iPhone Blog)

Feeds: The First Native Google RSS Reader
Sure, MobileRSS is a great app, but does it do Google Reader? Nope. That’s where Feeds comes in. Feeds is the first native Google Reader client for the iPhone and iPod Touch that lets you read your Google Reader feeds from the comfort of your springboard instead of having to go through Safari. It is currently in its early stages, so it isn’t without its issues, but for those of you who want your Google RSS feeds in an easy to manage form through a good-looking app, Feeds will do it for you.
(via Just Another iPhone Blog)

GuitarChords 0.8 Means Better Shredding
So you got that sweet Fender Strat but you really need to brush up on your chord structures. Got a Touch or iPhone? Get GuitarChords 0.8. This latest update adds a veritable cornucopia of new chord options, the ability to store your favourite positions, and an all new scales feature with over 30 different scales to try out with the ability to scroll through the frets to see all of the patterns for each of the scale forms. You can grab it from the iSpazio source (http://repo.ispazio.net).
(via Apple iPhone School)

iMemory 0.4 Keeps the Noodle Sharp
Suffering from a bit of…uh…that thing…y’know…the thing…with the poor short-term memory. Oh! Poor short-term memory. Suffering from that? You need iMemory, which bills itself as a memory trainer. Okay, okay, so it’s just a game of concentration. But it has a timer. And variable grid sizes. And high scores that don’t seem to work. Did I mention it has a timer? It’s a game of concentration. It bills itself as a me– wait, I said that. So anyway, you can grab it from the iSpazio source. (http://repo.ispazio.net. I think.)
(via Apple iPhone School)