Welcome to the 237th edition of Android Apps Weekly! Here are the headlines from the last week:
- Microsoft made some big announcements for Project xCloud this week. The first is an actual release date of September 2020. Additionally, it’ll bundle with Xbox Game Pass for $15 per month for a fairly decent two-punch game streaming and game playing experience. It also works for both PC and Xbox. Google announced a few new games for Stadia this week, but we think Microsoft took the crown.
- Google Play Pass launched a $30 per year subscription tier this week. The usual fee is $5 per month so the yearly plan saves you about 50% over the course of the year. It’s a decent way to go if you want to use Play Pass and plan to for a while. Additionally, Google Play Pass is expanding beyond the US and now includes Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, Spain, and the UK.
- Netflix is offering a new promotion. The company launched a game about the movie The Old Guard. The game is available now and ends on July 19th. It gets interesting when we get to the prizes, though. The person with the highest score gets 1,000 free months (83 years) of Netflix, valued at $13,000. Hit the link to learn more.
- TikTok is in trouble in countries all over the world. Instagram may swoop in and collect. The social media site is preparing a TikTok-like feature that should launch in early August. Instagram Reels started out in Brazil, France, Germany, and India and should see a worldwide launch early next month. Hit the link to learn how it works and more about Instagram Reels.
- Twitter was hit by a fairly big hack this week. The hack targeted huge names, including Bill Gates, Apple, Elon Musk, Uber, and many others. It was apparently a social engineering attack according to Twitter. There are some rumors as to how it all happened but we’re not 100% certain of the details yet. Hit the links to learn more.
Layton: Unwound Future
Price: $13.99
Layton: Unwound Future is the latest mobile port from the popular Professor Layton series. It’s technically the third one in the franchise, but it’s also one of the most popular. It’s a mystery adventure game where players solve puzzles and progress through the story. The series has a unique art style and solid mechanics. It’s a bit expensive, but there are no in-app purchases and the port is a faithful remake of the original.
NotificationHistory
Price: Free
NotificationHistory is a simple app for notifications. It lets you save your notification history to your phone for future reference. The app works offline and stores your history on your phone. Additionally, there are some categories for organization and you can read old notifications at will. There is also a clear all button in case you want to wipe everything. It’s a free app with ads and it may be useful for older Android devices without a notification history.
The Game of Life 2
Price: $3.99 with in-app purchases
The Game of Life 2 is a mobile remake of a classic board game with some life simulator elements. Players create a life, move around a game board. The game board spaces act as decision nodes. Players decide what paths to take based on where they land. The game works offline and it has pass-and-play multiplayer for those who are stuck without the web. There is also online multiplayer if you want that as well. It’s actually pretty well made and played well in our testing. There are some in-app purchases but they are more or less optional.
Peacock TV
Price: Free / $4.99-$9.99 per month
Peacock TV is the new streaming service from NBCUniversal. It was announced months ago but is now available for a wider release this week. It features NBC programming along with movies from several major movie studios. The service actually has a free variant with 13,000 hours of free programming. The subscription bumps that up to 20,000 hours. Comcast subscribers can pay $4.99 to remove ads while everyone else pays $9.99. The app has some issues and the release has been rather rough. It’ll likely improve over time but we recommend approaching with caution at first since the app seems to be a little glitchy right now.
Tales of Crestoria
Price: Free to play
Tales of Crestoria is a Tales mobile game and it’s not too bad. The game play style, animations, and music are very reminiscent from most of the games in the series. We couldn’t actually test this one because it doesn’t officially launch until basically right when this article goes live. However, we can’t imagine Bandai messing this thing up since they have so many popular and well-made gachas already. Most of the negative reviews are just people angry that the game launched to Google Play a few days sooner than it actually opens up to the public. It’ll bounce back.
Thank you for reading! Read more here:
- 10 best mystery games for Android
- 10 best video streaming apps for Android
- 15 best board games for Android
- 10 best Android customization apps
- 15 best gacha games for Android
If we missed any big Android app or game news, tell us about it in the comments or hit me up on Twitter!