Proving that you can’t keep a good sequel down, Gameloft today announced that the sequel to the hit iOS first person shooter N.O.V.A. was coming back to the platform. Sadly no dates were announced, but if past announcements are anything to go on I would expect it within the month. I’m actually surprised that N.O.V.A. 3 took this long to come out, Gameloft seems to have slowed their release schedule down quite a bit.

So you’ve opened that new present you’ve been waiting for all year – a brand new shiny (or perhaps, hand-me-down) iPod touch, iPhone or iPad. No doubt your loved ones scrimped and saved and pooled their money for this revolutionary and/or magical device.

Now what to put on it?

If you’ve got an iPad, Virgin Media’s Project Magazine is a must have. All iPods touch and iPhone NEED Facebook… What about GAMES?

Whether you’re using your own hard earned money or that iTunes gift card your least favorite cousin sent, your choices are many and all purchases are final – we’ve  put together a quick list to give you a good starting point.

Read on for the advice!

Rage/Rage HD – id Software

Rage is a showcase of what kind of graphical prowess the iOS devices can throw forth. Sure Epic’s Infinity Blade is slightly prettier but it had a full team of guys working day and night for months to create it.

Rage for the iOS devices (Rage for 3G and 3G S, Rage HD for iPhone 4 and iPad) was made basically on a whim by John Carmack and polished by a handful of guys over the course of a week or so before release. It’s a testament to id Software’s ingenuity and a brave new direction for the company. And it’s pretty, oh so pretty.

Angry Birds - Rovio

Everyone has it. Everyone else has already beaten it. The game is a simple tower defense game with an addicting difficulty curve and fun, eye-catching graphics. It’s a nice way to wile away your time. With the new Mighty Eagle in-game purchase insta-win button, it can even relieve all that stress it’s been creating for you!

There’s even a festive, seasons version with snow and holiday things.

Fruit Ninja – Halfbrick

Fruits fly across the screen and you swipe your finger to cut it. Simple right? Think again. Fruit Ninja is amazingly addictive and has several different modes and challenges, as well as multi-player.

It’s an easy way to relax with something simple in Zen Mode but switch over to classic or Arcade and you will curse yourself for not looking closely enough or swiping just too far. It’s a brilliant little game. Kids love it, too.

Words with Friends/Words with Friends HD - NewToy Inc.

Addictive, spare time, turn-by-turn scrabble. All your friends have it, why not prove once and for all that your vocabulary is bigger than theirs? The folks at NewToy have created one of the most per

sistent Apps on the App Store because it’s so simple, and has changed little. Everyone knows how to play, everyone can play. The HD version is exclusive to the iPad.

Warning: Do not play with loved ones.

Plants Versus Zombies - PopCap Studios

Skip the iPhone version, which is scrunched and hard to aim. The iPad is what this game, originally a flash-based browser game, was created for. It’s a bizarre premise: horrifically mutated plants shoot things at hordes of approaching zombies, but it’s maddeningly addictive.

On the nice, big, beautiful screen of the iPad the entire game pops. The best we can liken it to is playing with a cartoon. It’s on the expensive side, but the challenges, sense of humor and addicting gameplay make it well worth it. Every family iPad should have it, and “professional” ones too! (Admit it… You’re going to play games!)

Enjoy your holidays – be careful and don’t let your new toys consume your focus. If you have any stories or other suggestions be sure to leave them in the comments!

Telltale Games’ episodic video game version of ‘Back to the Future’ for PC and Mac finally has a release date of December 22 according to the developer’s blog.

Telltale has gone for a more cartoonish look for these games and it look to be a fresh, interesting take on the series after it first premiered 25 years ago. Telltale Games is best known for employing many talented former LucasArts employees and the most recent set of Sam and Max games.

If you purchase the BTTF game direct from Telltale you also get a free DVD when the series of games ends. Preordering will also donate a dollar to the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research and a free copy of Puzzle Agent, also from Telltale Games.

Due to the generous offer of Tin Man Games, we are holding a contest here on Nukoda and on the Touch of Gaming podcast to give some copies of the 3 game book apps away. If you are like me you remember playing Fighting Fantasy and Lonewolf books as a kid. I say playing, because these books had you using dice and keeping track of your stats on a sheet of paper. At their heart there were choose your own adventure books, but with plenty more awesome.

Tin Man games has released a new series of gamebooks to help bring back the genre, and we are giving away copies of Gamebook Adventures 1: An Assassin in Orlandes, Gamebook Adventures 2: The Siege of the Necromancer, and Gamebook Adventures 3: Slaves of Rema.

To enter simply comment on this post letting us know if you’ve ever read a choose your own adventure book before, and which of the Gamebook Adventures titles you are most interested in. Remember, you need a US iTunes store account to claim the promo codes, Apple’s rules not ours. Be sure to leave your email in the comment form so we can contact you, the winners will be contacted by Friday November 5th. Good luck!

Game developer Valve today released an updated set of usage statistics, including those for its Steam for Mac digital distribution platform. There’s diamonds and lead depending on your point of view.

Bad news first, of course. Mac usage of the gaming service has dropped off since the big debut a few months ago. Originally around 8 percent, Mac usage has fallen down to about 5 percent of the total Steam audience.

Good news! Five percent of Steam’s 25 million users is still a significant audience. Add this to EA and Blizzard’s growing support for native Mac games – those developed in-house simultaneously with the PC version, rather than transcribed by a third party like Aspyr.

Apple seems to be taking notice, too. The recent Snow Leopard Graphics Update was tuned to clear up issues that Valve reported, so that’s definitely good.

More detail analysis after the break.

Now let’s put all that in perspective. The service kicked off with a free copy of Portal and a good amount of publicity. Many of those initial users might have been console gamers who computed on Macs and wanted to “represent” (note: Guilty party writing) and interest fell off.

Likewise, Steam has a global audience and 5 percent of the Steam audience falls pretty nicely in line with the overall Mac usage statistic (about 8 percent in the US and a little more than 6 percent worldwide)

The majority of them are playing on a MacBook Pro, although model year and the like aren’t quite broken down as much as we’d like. iMacs are the next biggest model on the list, but represent 25 percent of Mac users as opposed to the MBP’s forty-nine percent.

Judging by the “most used” displays and graphics cards, it would appear that the previous (mid-2009) batch of 13-inch MacBook Pros are the most popular devices. The cheaper end of the MacBook Pro spectrum and certainly not the optimum machine for some tasks.

Mac gaming still has a long way to go, but this is definitely a good sign. John Carmack’s QuakeCon keynote address touched on how much he liked Apple’s approach – the hardware/software control level makes it possible to do all sorts of cool things you can’t do on a PC.

When Apple switched to Intel chips, most people said it wouldn’t increase the software for Mac. Just four years later you’re looking at only a few niche and proprietary programs being Mac only and many really awesome ones that are ONLY for Mac.

Valve has done the same thing. Steam for Mac simply existing means that gaming on the Mac will improve, exponentially.

If you build it, they will come. Check the read link for full statistics.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2 will have a demo released prior to launch very similar to what’s currently available to gamers at Gamescom, a Lucasarts representative said. The demo will supposedly be available prior to the games release, rather than released day-and-date with the game, as is the current demo trend.

According to attendees, the demo begins with returning/cloned/duplicated protagonist Starkiller attempting to escape his prison on Kamino, steal a Tie Fighter and get off-planet. Controls are similar to the first game (which we didn’t really have any complaints about) and the imagery and feel is consistent with the first. Bringing back the one who sacrificed his life to start the Rebellion cheapens the first game significantly… but if it means more Starkiller, bring it on.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2 will be released October 26.

During his keynote, id Software found John Carmack revealed a tech demo of something he’s been doing as a “side project” -  Rage for the iPhone. A working demo showed the game operating at 60 fps using the Rage Engine (complete with megatextures) on an iPhone 4.

Carmack assures viewers that it will also work on an original iPhone as well, although a later poll of the audience seemed to indicate that he probably wouldn’t take it that far back, given the low demand. Graphics are on par, if not better, than anything that can be done on the original Xbox or PlayStation 2.”- I can kill anything done on a previous generation console,” Carmack said.

The mobile version of Rage is a small, cheap, version that’s meant mainly for showing off, Carmack continued. Ultimately, id is aiming to release Rage, then follow-up with smaller titles that tie into the PC release when it’s available. Rage for the iPhone should be released sometime this year, he said.

Sitting in the audience it was easy to see how smooth the game ran. It was controlled by moving around with the touch screen, pointing where you wanted to go in a fluid motion, no controller “interfact” or GUI on screen. It was impressive, to be sure and the fram erate was phenomenal.

Carmack also states that iPhone projects could be ported over to Android devices, but that won’t happen for some time, but given the numbers of iOS owners versus Android owners (an informal poll showed 90 percent of the crowd had an iOS device) it’s something he sees as a long-term possibility.

The simple fact that’s it’s possible, with “one percent of the pixels in the real map” and running purely off of flash memory (which Carmack said was key to his success) shows just how versatile and scalable the idtech engine is. Porting the game shouldn’t be an issue, keeping PC and console gamers happy when the full version is released next year.

The iOS version of Rage is expected to be be “hundreds upon hundreds” of megabytes, which may be a consideration for people looking to conserve space on their iPhones and iPads. Due to the power drain, an option for a 30 fps version will be made available.

Carmack did not, unfortunately give any detail on Doom 4, but this made up for in many, many ways.

This year’s QuakeCon has arrived and the BYOC hordes are here in full force.

After a stint at the Gaylord-Texan id Software’s PC gaming free-for-all has returned to the Dallas Hilton-Anatole with tournaments, one of the world’s largest LAN parties, vendor booths and lots and lots (and lots) of free t-shirts.

This will be the second year id has hosted the event as part of Zenimax Media, owner of Elder Scrolls and Fallout developer Bethesda.

Now more than a multiplayer gaming event, QuakeCon is also a venue to showcase the newest games and hardware being developed by companies involved with id Software including booths selling clothing, computer peripherals, and software.

To be able to keep QuakeCon a free LAN party, it’s still highly dependent on volunteer work. Other than id employees, the volunteers run the show. These volunteers, often described as the crew, cover most aspects of the organization of the party. It’s still very much the “Woodstock of gaming”, and a past motto of a week of “peace, love, and rockets!” is here in full force.

An added emphasis this year is the panels, with topics ranging from founder John Carmack’s pet space and rocket project, to world-building and sound design. The event is still free with registration, available at QuakeCon’s website.

Stay tuned for the next three days as we periodically add updates and impressions of the latest games from id, Bethesda and other Zenimax companies.

Dallas-based id Software has just sent live its long awaited browser-based first-person-shooter, Quake Live, via the game’s website. The release comes just in time for QuakeCon next week, one of the largest gaming conventions in the country and one with a heavy emphasis on actually gaming (with a phenomenally successful BYOPC section). QuakeCon runs from August 12 to 15 this year.

Quake Live is a nominally free FPS designed to run on x86-based computers running Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X or Linux played through a browser plug-in and is a spiritual successor to its predecessor, Quake III Arena The game first appeared in 2007, entered an invitation-based closed beta in 2008, and has been in public beta since February. Quake Live runs an updated version of the id Tech 3 engine. Registration of a user account is available on the game’s website and free, although a paid, premium content version is optional. Currently supported platforms include Internet Explorer 7+, Mozilla Firefox 2+, and Safari 3+ web browsers running on Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Mac OS X 10.4+ (Intel only), and Linux. The browser plug-in does not make use of Flash to play the game, letting customers with even lower-power laptops play without unduly draining their batteries or roasting their laps.

Users can check out the game now at quakelive.com

While checking out the pictures on the App Store for SnoShred prior to downloading it for review, I began to become excited at the prospect of playing such a good looking Snow Boarding simulator on my iPhone.

What I wasn’t ready for was how unplayable SnoShred actually is. The design is basic, giving you the option to pick between a male or female character, which board you ride and a course from the paltry selection and your off. Once on the board though things begin to take a turn for the worst as you attempt to steer your surprisingly good looking character through gates and over jumps. This is rarely fun thanks to the poor motion control that forgoes any actual control over your rider, instead forcing you to turn your iPhone ridiculous amounts to make any change in direction occur.

Graphics are smooth, despite the bland textures of the snow grating after only a few minutes. But what good are graphics when in a mode where pulling off near impossible tricks is necessary to win. To pull off tricks in SnoShred you have to gain speed by pressing the acceleration button, below which is an area that must be held in order to jump. If you’ve acheived this, then you have to move your thumb back to where it was before to pull off tricks. Its far too frustrating to enjoy and could have been so easily fixed by moving the jump ‘button’ to the other end of the screen.

I really can’t recommend SnoShred to anyone looking for snowboarding action on their phone. Yes the game is pretty but there’s very little fun to be had here.

[Rating: 2/5]