Brandon Lancaster - 2/7 - Android Police - Android News, Apps, Games, Phones, Tablets

Brandon Lancaster

Brandon says he likes to live life on the edge. By that he means eating ice cream for breakfast and wearing house slippers to class. Aside from all of the ballsy action he partakes in, he's a mass communications student that spends much of his time studying or tinkering with his phone.

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Feb

[Review] Despite Lacking A Few Features, Powow By HandMark Delivers A Sleek Messaging Experience To Android

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in App Reviews, Applications

Powow: Text Messaging is an alternative messaging app made by Handmark, the company that produced One Louder Apps. Now, I know that you're thinking about all of the other messaging apps on the Market and want to know what makes this one special. The fact of the matter is that only a small percentage of the endless waves of similar apps are worth using, and despite missing a couple key features, Powow is one of few I would consider fully committing to.

Features

As I mentioned before, this app does miss a few key features, but we'll get to that later.

Feb

[New App] Redditastic Is A Fantastic Way To Add Reddit To Your 3.0+ Homescreen

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in App Reviews, Applications

Okay, so Redditastic isn't technically an app, but it is a pretty sweet widget that lets you throw your favorite subreddits on one of your homescreens. Unfortunately it's only currently available for devices running Honeycomb or ICS, and it probably won't see any previous builds of Android simply because scrollable widgets aren't supported by them unless you use a custom launcher. That being said, if you do own a supported device, this Reddit widget is definitely one to check out.

Overview

What's cool about Redditastic is that it lets you create individual widgets for each of your favorite subreddits. You can also choose to have the feed populate with hot, new, top, and controversial threads.

Feb

[Hands-On] Magic Portals Teleports An Addictive Portal-Like Sidescroller Onto Your Android Device

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in Game Reviews, Games

Seeing as I'm hopelessly addicted to Portal and Portal 2, I was pretty excited when we came across Asantee's new game Magic Portals. Basically, it's a physics-based puzzler that revolves around the whole portal concept. While it obviously isn't exactly unique, it is absolutely entertaining and fun to play.

Gameplay

So as I said before, the whole game is based on portals - hence the title. As we all know, portals aren't really a magical phenomenon, though. They are the result of a rather complex portal gun created at Aperture Science. But for the sake of this game, portals are shot out of the characters hands using magic spells, and I guess that's cool too.

Feb

[Game Roundup] Get Your Game On With These Five Hot Titles From January 2012

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in Games

Osmos HD

Osmos HD, by Hemisphere Games, made its jump to the Android Market in late January, and brought with it some insanely relaxing gameplay. It was previously available on computer and iDevices, so you may have played it before it became available on Android. However, if you haven't played it already, the concept is ridiculously simple, but oh-so awesome.

Basically, you control a tiny little lifeform called a 'mote', and aim to consume or avoid being consumed by other 'motes.' It may sound odd, and way too simple to be fun, but that's just not the case. The game is relaxing, captivating, and has hypnotizing graphics and soundtracks.

Feb

[App Roundup] Check Out These Five Super-Cool Apps From January 2012, You'll Be Glad You Did

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in Applications

Last Updated: February 5th, 2012

Wikipedia

Wikipedia is the go-to site when you need to find accurate information quickly. Well, mostly accurate information, right? Right.

Well, searching through Wikipedia's 20 million articles to find that bit of information to prove your friends and colleagues wrong is now easier than ever with the official Android app. You'll also be able to save articles for reading later and even share what you find.

Ironically, we came across Wikipedia's Android app during the SOPA blackout even though it had been out for 4 days prior.

Wikipedia

SwitchMe

This app is for rooted users only. Make sure you read up on how to use SwitchMe, because it could potentially damage your device if used improperly.

Feb

Download New Dropbox Beta For Android v2.0.9 With Automatic Uploads, Get Up To 5GB Of Extra Storage For Free

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in Applications, News

The guys behind the official Dropbox Android app have an enticing present for everyone to check out. They just released an experimental beta v2.0.9 that includes a brand new automatic Camera Upload feature. There are definitely third party apps out there that offer this same service, but it's nice to see the official version updating with some fresh new features.

Here's what you'll find:

The app can now automatically upload photos and videos in the background using Wi-Fi or your data plan.
No more size limit. So upload to your hearts content.
If there are network issues, the upload will resume when those issues are resolved.

Feb

[Hands-On] Cartoon Wars By Gamevil Is A Great Time-Killer, Nothing More

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in Game Reviews, Games

You may know Gamevil as the developer of the ever-popular Zenonia and Baseball Superstars series, and a bunch of other awesome games, but their latest leaves something to be desired. Similar to their earlier title Cartoon Wars: Gunner+, Gamevil's latest installment - Cartoon Wars - uses a well-know (if not overused) game concept, which is just a nice little time-killer at best. That being said, it's still fun to play and does a good job at keeping you occupied.

Gameplay

The story behind the war that is tearing Cartoon World apart is one of oppression and slavery. The Black and White Tribe had been enslaved by the Color Tribe for generations, until they figured it was time for a revolution, so they went up in arms and marched into war.

Jan

[Brilliant] The Humble Bundle Lets You Pay What You Want For 4 Hot Indie Android Games, All While Supporting Charities And Developers

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in Applications, Games, News

The Humble Bundle has been around for a couple of years now, but I have never heard of it. They're known for bundling up indie games, letting purchasers set their own price, and dividing up the profits among developers and charities. This is just an absolutely fascinating concept, and the first ever Android bundle has arrived!

The games in this Android bundle include Anomaly Warzone Earth HD (our review), Osmos HD (our review), Edge, and World of Goo. What's even more awesome is the fact that these games are not only DRM free (so you can download them as many times as you want), but they are also cross-platform.

Jan

[Review] Amuse Lets You Browse Tons Of Websites Like Memebase And Ragecomics On Your Mobile Device Through A User-Friendly Interface

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in App Reviews, Applications

Amuse has been out for some time now, and there certainly are apps like it, but we decided this one was worth mentioning simply because it works great and has an insanely high rating on the Android Market. The function of this app is very simple, it basically provides you with a mobile feed consisting of the most popular 'entertainment' sites like Rage Comics, Demotivators, 9gag, and many more. Populate the app's home screen with your favorite sites from the list, and see a feed of content directly from the site in an easy-to-consume mobile layout.

UI And UX

Right from the start, I noticed that this app was very well made.

Jan

[Review] 11 Bit Studios Revolutionizes The Tower Defense Genre With Anomaly Warzone Earth HD

Posted by Brandon Lancaster in Games, Reviews

You may have heard of Anomaly Warzone Earth HD before, and while it isn't new to Android, it is new to the Android Market. 11 Bit Studios released this game exclusively into the Amazon Appstore some months ago, but now it's fully out in the open for everyone else to enjoy. What's so great is that this game is both fresh and entirely unique. Hearing that about a title coming out of the tower defense genre sounds weird, right?

First Things First

Before we go any further, allow me to explain just what makes this game so unique. While it technically can be categorized with other TD games, it's actually the complete opposite.