Finally. PuzzleQuest just hit the App Store so iPhone and Touch owners can get their game on over the holidays. But what’s this? It’s the first of a trilogy?

PuzzleQuest: Chapter 1 – Battle of Gruulkar sells for a mighty US$10 and is described as the first chapter in the trilogy of the Puzzle Quest Challenge of the Warlords for the Apple portables.

Each chapter will include the ability to store characters, spells and high scores so you can carry your character from chapter to chapter. This first 68 meg or so download is said to include about 20 hours of gameplay culminating in a battle with Gruulkar, leader of the Orcs.

What the game’s description is not clear about is whether this is a new story or if we’re getting the same game, only doled out in three $10 chunks. That would sort of suck if it were true.

[Thanks Veselov ]

The top searches this holiday season on Google Product Search include four video game-related pieces of hardware… and Uggs. So strange.

Topping ths list of millions of recent search queries conducted on Google Product Search in the U.S. is, you guessed it, the Wii. Number two is the Wii Fit, followed by the Xbox 360 in the number four spot and the Nintendo DS in the number five.

The full top ten includes lots of ‘i’s and one Ugg, while the Video Games and Toys category is dominated by video games.

All Categories
1. nintendo wii
2. wii fit
3. ipod touch
4. xbox 360
5. nintendo ds
6. ipod nano
7. uggs
8. nikon d90
9. zune
10. digital picture frame

Video Games and Toys
1. bakugan
2. guitar hero world tour
3. webkinz
4. gears of war 2
5. call of duty world at war
6. rock band 2
7. elmo live
8. wii music
9. fallout 3
10. littlebigplanet

By the way, if you’re planning to run out to a story to pick up some Bakugan for this holiday, good luck with that. When we tried every store was totally sold out.

Google Holiday Shopping

The new iPod Touch 2G runs at 532MHz as opposed to the 412MHz of earlier models – including the iPhone 3G (the G’s mean something different, don’t worry about it) and Handheld Games suspect there may be undocumented differences in the GPU speeds as well.

After some experimentation, the four iterations of the device are ranked as follows:

1. iPod Touch 2nd Generation
2. iPhone 3G
3. iPhone (original)
4. iPod Touch 1st Generation

This YouTube clip is meant to illustrate the difference in app loading speeds between the four models, although it would probably have been more visually effective if he has hit the icon on each at the exact same moment.

As it it, though, this is a bit like watching Rick Wakeman playing loads of keyboards at once.

2nd Generation iPod Touch Faster than iPhone [Touch Arcade]

The four other players are all computer controller, but do a fairly good job of keeping things interesting. To play you just tap on countries to move your armies about or invade other bordering countries.

The game is fairly simple, so simple that over time it can get a bit repetitive, but it’s free. Also, according to developer Sillysoft Games, there appears to be a paid version, Lux Touch Dlx, in the works. Let’s just hope it offers up online play, pass-the-device play and some amped up graphics.

Oh, for the love of god, include a save feature next time around. If my bid to conquer the planet is defeated by a PR call one more time I’m going to kill someone.

We believe that multi-touch will be everywhere in a few years, already seeing it now with Jeff Han’s Perceptive Pixel, Microsoft’s Surface, and the iPhone. When the multi-touch platform develops further and end in the hands of more consumers, they would want to play games on it. Oculusia is one exciting example of how these can be designed and implemented.

In case creating the game wasn’t enough of an achievement, Thomas notes that they also built the table itself. Damn fine work gentlemen!