Ninja Breakout by XIMAD now available – Panda vs ninjas!

Ninjas! Pandas! Ninjas and pandas!! XIMAD is on a role lately with games for BlackBerry smartphones and their latest free game has just been released. Ninja Breakout is a classic shooter game. You are the panda, fighting off the ninjas as they fall from the sky. Clear them out, and you progress to the next level. Of course, there are special power ups along the way to help you out, as well as obstacles to be overcome so you may get at those pesky ninjas. As to be expected from XIMAD games, the Japanese inspired sounds, music, and graphics are bright and detailed, and game play has no lag. With 40 levels of play, this game will entertain you for quite some time.

Ninja Breakout is free and ad supported. However, if you’d like to remove the ads, you may do so via in-app purchase. This is a first for XIMAD, as they usually just offer up a free and paid version. I like this new streamlined method. This way you always know what you’re getting before purchasing, without having to search first to see if there is a trial or ad supported version first. The ads don’t hinder game play at all, and in fact are only seen when you complete a level, before continuing to the next. You can purchase the ad-free version at any time for $1.99.  If you like the panda vs ninjas theme, be sure to check out XIMAD’s Ninja Shooter too!

For more information and to download

Ninja Breakout from BlackBerry App World[qrcode pix=180]http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/content/46071?lang=en[/qrcode]

Photo Translator Version 1.0 for BlackBerry Released!

SHAPE Services has long been known among BlackBerry users for their awesome IM+ and IM+ Talk apps. Now here’s yet another reason to know them, they have just released Photo Translator Version 1.0 for BlackBerry smartphones! After a long round of beta testing, the app is finally officially available for download.

First, what is Photo Translator? Though the name kinda gives it away, Photo Translator lets you take a photo of text in any language and it translates it for you! Pretty cool, right? Check out some more of the features:

• Accurate Text Recognition
• Translated text can be saved to Memo, sent by email, or used in other apps.
• Save results for later reference and quickly search through them.
• Supports English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Czech, Dutch, Greek, Chinese Traditional, Japanese, Korean, Thai, Arabic, and many other languages.

 

Check out the images below to see how the app looks:

Urbanspoon gets an update – Now compatible with BlackBerry 6

Urbanspoon is a great website for people that enjoy eating out. You can check out restaurant reviews from food critics, bloggers, and everyday people. In 2009 Urbanspoon released a free app for BlackBerry to help people like me, who can never seem to decide where to eat. It’s a simple concept. First you enter the area you want to search for restaurants or let Urbanspoon use your GPS location. Once it finds that area, it presents you a slot machine type interface with 3 tumblers. The first is for the neighborhood or area, the second is the type of cuisine, and the third is cost. You can choose for any of these categories to be locked, for example if you ONLY want Japanese restaurants to show, you would highlight that option and then click the little lock below. After that you can click or shake your device (depending on what BlackBerry you have, of course) and the tumblers spin. The application randomly chooses an area, cuisine and price range for you look at. If you click on the name of the chosen restaurant you can get details such as contact info, maps, and you can even open up the mobile version of the website which will take you directly to the reviews and information for that restaurant.

It’s a fun app that can help you make some very important decisions like what to have for lunch Tuesday or where to take that blind date your friend hooked you up with. Best of all, it’s FREE and there is a version for all devices running OS 4.2.1 or higher, and was recently updated to include devices on BB6. Urbanspoon is supported in Canada and the US as well as Australia and the UK. Pick it up today at the link below!

For more information and to download Urbanspoon from BlackBerry App World

 

Source: CB

NORAD Tracks Santa for Christmas

NORAD Tracks Santa for Christmas By Courtesy of 21st Space Wing Public Affairs

Officials from the North American Aerospace Defense Command have begun tracking Santa Claus’ via their web site that went live Dec. 3, 2010.

U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Carlin Leslie

 

PETERSON AFB , Colo., Dec. 6, 2010 – For the 55th consecutive year, the men and women of the North American Aerospace Defense Command are preparing to track Santa. The NORAD Tracks Santa web site,www.noradsanta.org , went live Dec. 3 and features holiday games and activities that change daily.

The web site is available in seven languages: English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, and Chinese. The web site will stream videos, captured by NORAD “Santa Cams,” from cities along Santa’s journey Dec. 24.

This year, children are able to track Santa through Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, and TroopTube. To follow NORAD on these Santa-tracking tools, type in “@noradsanta” into the search engine to start your tracking.

Also, beginning at midnight MST Dec. 24, visitors to the website can watch Santa as he prepares his sleigh, checks his list, and goes through all of his preparations to ensure he has a successful journey.

As soon as Santa takes off from the North Pole, children can also track him with up-to-the-minute updates on Google Maps and Google Earth through the NORAD Tracks Santa web site.

Santa trackers will begin answering phones and replying to e-mail at 2 a.m. MST (4 a.m. EST) on Dec. 24 and will continue until 3:00 a.m. MST (5 a.m. EST) Dec. 25. Children of all ages can then call the NTS toll-free number 1-877-Hi-NORAD (1-877-446-6723) or send an e-mail to noradtrackssanta@gmail.com.

The NORAD Tracks Santa program began in 1955 after a phone call was made to the Continental Air Defense Command Operations Center in Colorado Springs, Colo. The call was from a local youngster who dialed a misprinted telephone number in a local newspaper advertisement. The commander on duty who answered the phone that night gave the youngster the information requested — the whereabouts of Santa. This began the tradition of tracking Santa, a tradition that was carried on by NORAD when it was formed in 1958.

The NORAD Tracks Santa program has grown immensely since first presented on the Internet in 1998. The web site receives millions of visitors from hundreds of countries and territories around the world. In addition, a live operations center is occupied for 25 hours with more than 1,200 volunteers each year who receive hundreds of thousands of phone calls and e-mails from families around the world.

 

Officials from the North American Aerospace Defense Command have begun tracking Santa Claus’ via their web site that went live Dec. 3, 2010. U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Carlin Leslie Download high res image

BlackBerry Desktop Manager For Mac Updated With Support For The Torch 9800 & More Languages

@Moestepp let me know that RIM updated BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac to version 1.0.4 build 10 with a few changes. Here is what’s new according to the release notes:

• Japanese
• Korean
• Simplified Chinese
• Traditional Chinese
• This build also provides support for the BlackBerry Torch 9800 Smartphone.

BlackBerry® Desktop Manager 1.0.4 synchronizes your organizer data (calendar entries, contacts, tasks, and notes and memos) between your BlackBerry device and your Mac computer. If you have an iTunes library on your computer, you can synchronize your music to your device.

For more info or to download Desktop Manager for Mac go to blackberry.com/mac..

Desktop Manager for Mac Updated to v1.0.4, Provides Support for Torch 9800

Desktop Manager for Mac has been updated to version 1.0.4, and now offers support and connectivity for the BlackBerry Torch 9800. According to the release notes, it also provides improvements to device connectivity, synchronization, and fixes minor bugs, along with support for 4 languages: Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, and Traditional Chinese. Checking for updates from the application menu doesn’t seem to bring up the new version, but you can download it here.

Hopefully we’ll see a significant update in the near future, as Mac users have been suffering through the lack of features for some time now. Most importantly, the ability to restore or load new OS’ should be a top priority.

Are any other BlackBerry users also Mac users? What feature would you most like to see integrated into Desktop Manager for Mac?

Twitter for BlackBerry Losing “Beta” Label, Full Version Launches Tonight [from a Alliance member http://www.berryreporter.com]

Update: Now live! If the application doesn’t automatically prompt you to update, head to Options and select Check for Update at the bottom.

Beginning tonight, BlackBerry users will start seeing an update to Twitter, officially bringing it out of beta. According to RIM, the open beta was made available in April to gather community and user feedback, much of which was taken into consideration when updating the application along the way. Unfortunately, this official non-beta version won’t provide support for multiple user accounts, but with any luck we’ll see the feature implemented in future versions.

This new version will feature “Go to User”, which provides access to any user’s profile from anywhere in the application using the auto-complete functionality we’ve seen rolled out in previous updates. Additionally, the updated version will include support for at least 7 new languages, including: