Halfbrick will open a whole new studio just for the Fruit Ninja sequel

In this case, it's 100 percent OK to let out a ninja cry like this dude. Those around you will understand once you tell them it's because you found out that Fruit Ninja creator Halfbrick plans to open a whole new studio just for the sequel to the iconic mobile game. The Brisbane, Australia-based game maker announced that, after a $3 million funding injection into the industry by state officials, it will open a new studio in Sydney and hire a new team to make the long-awaited second Fruit Ninja game.

"The new Sydney team will develop the next evolution of the Fruit Ninja games franchise," New South Wales deputy prime minister Andrew Stoner told Develop. "It will involve players launching a series of fruit to knock ninjas off their towers in a 3D world, with each fruit having special powers." In short, it will be remarkably different from the first game.

That's a relief, considering Fruit Ninja: Puss in Boots did enough to flesh out the classic fruit-flaying gameplay to be worthy of the word "sequel". According to Stoner, the game is due out in 2012 for iOS devices initially. Though, we're sure Halfbrick will go platform crazy with this version as well, slapping the game onto Android, Facebook and even Xbox 360 Kinect. This news almost gets us excited enough to act like this guy ... almost (NSFW):


[Via Pocket Gamer]

Are you psyched to hear that a new Fruit Ninja game is in the works? What do you think of the premise so far?

Club Penguin fires a salvo of fun with Puffle Launch for iPhone [Video]

Parents, secure the iPhones and iPads. If Club Penguin isn't going to slide onto Facebook anytime soon, we'll take the next best thing: the iPhone. Puffle Launch, first released as a mini game within the kids world of Club Penguin over a year ago, launches onto iPhone tomorrow, Sept. 15. The game, which will be available for the paltry price of $.99, puts players in control of Daredevil, one of the many Puffles available in the existing Disney-owned web game.

Just like in Club Penguin, kids can fire Daredevil from a cannon, careening into obstacles and collecting Coins. Better yet, those Coins can be transferred to kids' existing Club Penguin accounts to buy new items from the web game's store. As players advance through the game's many daring and dangerous aerial courses, they will eventually have to face the Crab Boss.

According to a Club Penguin representative, Puffle Launch is already played by 150,000 kids daily, and a new Puffle is adopted every second in the kid-friendly virtual world. (That amounts to more than 20 million of the little balls of love adopted in 2011 already!) With statistics like that, color us baffled as to why Club Penguin has yet to hit Facebook, especially considering the amount of preteens that are already active on the social network.

Hopefully, this is just the beginning of Club Penguin's expansion beyond its little home on the web and onto new platforms (aside from Nintendo's stable of consoles). Check out the game's trailer below, but you might not want to show the kids just yet, unless you're willing to buy it on every iOS device in the house.


Are you excited that Club Penguin has finally made it to iOS? Where or how else would you like to see the Club Penguin franchise go? Sound off in the comments. Add Comment