Macworld ’09 has come and gone, and we’re slowly getting back to our day-to-day schedules. This year’s keynote by Phil was neither extraordinary, nor were there any surprises for us [Ed: Looking at the sidebar poll results, you guys seem to think the same]. As we get going with our lives, a lot of us would return to our iPhones (or iPod Touches), browsing through the vast collection of apps available in the App Store. Here are some apps that we think are crazy, addictive and should get you hooked to the screen.

Fieldrunners

I was made aware of this terrific game only recently after someone mentioned its name on my twitter stream. And now, I refuse to take my eyes off the screen. So much so, that I often find myself putting the phone in Offline Mode, just so that I’m not disturbed by annoying phone calls in the middle of the game. From developers Subatomic Studios, Fieldrunners ($4.99 – iTunes link) is a completely addictive strategy game, much like the tower-defense games we’ve seen in recent years.

Fieldrunners is basically a strategy game that involves you defending your tower from different types of enemy troops by placing four different types of weapons in their way. You are given a certain amount of money to start with and you have to buy weapons and place them in strategic locations, effectively making sure that none of the enemies reach your tower. Every enemy you kill earns you reward points and money, which you can use to either buy more weapons or upgrade existing ones. As the game progresses, the enemies become more difficult to kill. Once the enemy count that successfully crosses over reaches twenty, you’re defeated. You are given four different weapons to resist the enemy troops – higher the damage caused by the weapon, higher the damage to you in terms of money. Yes, it’s that simple.

What makes Fieldrunners such a special game is how well the developers have worked on every aspect of the game. The game is marvelous and there is absolute attention to minute detail in graphics. The sound, apparently, has been created by a well-known sound designer. To be more specific in placing the weapons, you can zoom in and out of the map using two fingers, as you would in the Photos app. Inspite of the hundreds of weapons firing on the screen and so much activity in the game, there is zero lag. Fieldrunners may seem like a simple gameplay concept, but you’re sure to be addicted to the game for a couple of hours at least (provided you’re skilled enough to know what location of weapon will cause more damage). The only issue I faced during almost two weeks of testing is that if you receive a phone call during the game and you’re using a custom ringtone, after the call, the game resumes without the sound. It only comes back if you quit and re-launch the game.

I’d like to point out two issues here. A couple of weeks of playing the game, you’ll master the art of gaming the system. Yes, the current version does let you game the system, so I’m hoping it is improved in the upcoming version. Also, I really hope there’s a universal scoreboard. Would be really nice to see how the world is faring.

Crazy Tanks

This one’s so crazy, I had to slow down my system clock to watch myself play in slow-mo. Believe me, the tank you play with in this game moves around like crazy. Games couldn’t get any more exciting than this. Once you’re in the game, it’s hard to let go off the iPhone or take your eyes off the screen.

The goal of the game is simple – steer the green tank around and kill every enemy you see. The game makes excellent use of the iPhone’s accelerometer to steer the tank around and is very sensitive to play with. You shoot by tapping the screen (Remember the demo we saw?). As you progress through the levels, enemy count and complexity increase. While you start off level one with just enemy tanks, future levels also bring in enemy turrets. There are various powerups you can pick up while moving around that give your tank special capabilities.

Unfortunately, that’s all there is to the game, so far. Although the excitement of moving around killing enemies never dies down, the game tends to get a little monotonous in a matter of minutes. I’d blame this on the absence of any kind of perks in the game like weapon upgrades. I’d really like to see the ability to upgrade the tank somehow. Also, one of the very important fundamental aspects of any game, that Crazy Tanks misses out on, is points. You only progress through levels, you’re never assigned points. In fact, the game does not have a concept of points at all.

I’d still highly recommend getting Crazy Tanks. The game’s a very good time killer and if you’re simply addicted to Fieldrunners, Crazy Tanks is a good refresher and for just $0.99, worth every penny.