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5 Android apps you shouldn't miss this week! - Android Apps Weekly

Welcome back to Android Apps Weekly! This week we talk about Nintendo, some big Google Play changes, and a few fun new apps and games. Check it out!
By
May 15, 2015

NYTimes Android Apps Weekly
Sponsor: NYTimes

[Price: Free with subscription]
The NYTimes recently went through a lot of trouble to overhaul their application. Included in the massive update was a complete design overhaul that follows the standards of Holo and Material Design and it does look great. Add to that the world class news coverage, a few good features like Twilight Mode and the ability to customize your news reading experience, and you have an application that’s definitely worth checking out. It is subscription based but you can try out the application for free and read a few articles every month without buying anything so it can’t hurt to try it out. We’d like to thank The New York Times for their support of Android Apps Weekly.

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Welcome back to Android Apps Weekly! Here are your headlines for this week:

  • Corbin Davenport has made headlines before by getting emulators to work on Android Wear and he’s at it again. This time he used a Mini vMac II emulator and managed to get the old Macintosh II OS running on Android Wear. As you can guess, it’s buggy and terrible, but it does work and that’s awesome.
  • Earlier this week, Google announced that they are going to shut down editing in Map Maker. This comes in the footsteps of the now infamous edit that shows an Android peeing on an apple. This decision is likely to prevent things like that from ever happening again.
  • Sega made an announcement that they will be removing games from the Play Store that do not meet their standards. It’s really just some housekeeping but some believe that the games aren’t good enough while others believe the games aren’t making enough money. We don’t know which games are getting canned yet.
  • The Google Play Store got a new feature this week. Developers can now allow users to pre-register for apps and games that aren’t out yet. If you pre-register, you’ll get a notification when that app or game becomes available. There are a few titles using it already and this can help generate buzz for their new content.
  • In our last headline this week, Nintendo has announced that they will be releasing five games by the end of 2017 with the first coming out this year. We have no clue what kind of game it’s going to be but Nintendo did say that they weren’t porting old games to mobile. I guess we’ll see how this pans out when the first game gets released.

For even more Android apps and games news, updates, and releases, don’t forget to check out this week’s newsletter. There you can find the full range of stuff that happened over the course of the week. If you’re so inclined, you can even sign up with your email address and we’ll send you the newsletter to your inbox every single Friday so you can stay up to date.


HeroCraft Z Android Apps Weekly
HeroCraft Z

[Price: Free with in-app purchases]
HeroCraft Z is a new RPG released by NGames. It features decent graphics powered by the Unity3D engine, a full campaign mode, and the ability to assemble and build your own team. There are some online components as well that include a PvP arena. You can collect over 50 companions with various abilities for strategy. It’s a Freemium game through and through, but it is free to play and isn’t half bad.

Get it on Google Play

Snake Rewind Android Apps Weekly
Snake Rewind

[Price: Free with in-app purchases]
After a few weeks of waiting, the highly anticipated Snake Rewind game is now available on Google Play. As you’ve heard, this is a revamp of the classic Snake game that adorned the cell phones of old and the mechanics remain largely intact. The controls are a bit wonky as they rely on position based tapping and there are in-app purchases which feels a bit weird, but overall it feels like a positive experience and a good source of nostalgia with a cheap price tag.

Get it on Google Play

Bleep Android Apps Weekly
Bleep

[Price: Free]
Bleep is a new messaging application from, believe it or not, BitTorrent. The idea here is privacy. Messages are stored on user devices and not in the cloud like normal while every message sent is encrypted and the encryption keys are store on user devices and not in the cloud. There are various ways to sign up, the UI isn’t half bad, and you can invite people using your public key similar to Blackberry Messenger. If you need privacy, this is a great way to do but do beware of those release day bugs.

Get it on Google Play

Trumpit Android Apps Weekly
Trumpit Photo Messenger

[Price: Free]
While Bleep focuses on security, Trumpit totally doesn’t. The premise of this photo messaging app is that photos you send shows up on the recipient’s device above the lock screen. They can then interact with it if they want or swipe it away quickly and go back to using their phone. It’s a fun premise, especially if you love sharing photos with people. Of course, I can see this going very badly if you know someone who likes to take inappropriate photos. In any case, it’s totally free and worth a shot. Just beware of any release day bugs.

Get it on Google Play
Trumpit Photo Messenger Android Apps Weekly

Seabeard Android Apps Weekly
Seabeard

[Price: Free with in-app purchases]
Last up is a game called Seabeard which is a new game that saw some moderate success on iOS. Our own Andrew Grush likened the game to a kind of mix of Zelda: Windmaker and Animal Crossing. It features colorful, cartoon graphics a lot of content for you to do, and plenty of other features. It’s been noted that in-app purchases are a tad heavy but with a little bit of patience, you can get passed that obstacle. It’s free to play and it’s available right now.

Get it on Google Play

Wrap up

If we missed any great Android apps or games news, tell us about it in the comments below!