Game Troopers to help devs port games to Windows Phone & Windows; confirms release of 3 Xbox Live titles.

Game Troopers is a new game publishing service that was launched yesterday with the objective to help developers quickly port their games from other platforms to Windows Phone and Windows platform. The company will, when needed, even do the coding so as to make the game run on Windows.

"We want to make it easy for developers to decide to bring their game to Window. It shouldn't add any extra stress for your team," said Nicholas Reville, co-founder of Game Troopers. Game Troopers is founded by Space Inch. Josh Segall, co-founder of Game Troopers and CEO of Space Inch believes "there's a huge amount of potential on Windows and lots of indie game developers don't have a plan to publish their game. We solve that for them." Space Inch have some successful titles available on Apple App store ad Google Play. One such titles, "The love of money" went to #1 overall in the app store this year. Another title, "Tiny Troopers" has more than a million download on Google Play.

Game Troopers has also announced the release soon of three Xbox titles for Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8:

• Tiny Troopers
• Make it rain: The love of money
• Abyss

Tiny Troopers will be released on Windows Phone during the month of December as a free game with in-app purchases with more games to come.

Learn more about Game troopers and their titles here.

 

Use a Treasure Tag as a remote shutter for your selfies.

Selfies, selfies, selfies. Phones are getting better at this global sport of people taking self portraits and posting them to social networks. Remember the days when front facing cameras were limited to 1.3 or 2 MP? They have evolved lot thanks to companies like HTC for example, which recently released the HTC Desire Eye with a front facing camera of 13mp. But pixels are not all.

Alongside the race for the best camera, both back and front, emerged something we can call the selfie gadgets. We know the selfie stick, an accessory that comes in handy for taking group selfies with the help of the timer built into the camera software. The phone itself is clipped to one end of the stick. The selfie stick today is getting competition with ex-Nokia Treasure Tag. Or maybe not necessarily competition.

The Treasure Tag was designed so you do not lose your valuables. Attach it to your keys, wallet, the Treasure Tag will alert you when you're separated from your belongings. Microsoft Mobile, which now owns Nokia mobile division, has updated the Lumia Selfie app which takes advantage of the Treasure Tag and turns it into a remote shutter when taking selfies. Couple with the selfie stick and you have the complete selfie kit. Not only you won't have to struggle with the shutter button anymore, the updated Lumia Selfie also saves your masterpieces automatically.

If you're into the self portrait sport, make sure you get your Treasure Tag and update the Lumia Selfie from the Windows Phone store.

Facebook Messenger lets you send messages to people you don't know and vice versa.

Chances are you are among the 500 million souls on this planet using Facebook Messenger on their Windows Phones. Today, Facebook Messenger received a pretty big update in that you will be able to send messages to anyone using the Zuckerberg social network.  By anyone, I mean even people you don't know and it works both ways. So you may start receiving messages from strangers, like it or not. This feature has been available on other platforms for some time and I have not heard horror stories, yet.

Here's what's new in this update that brings Facebook Messenger to version 9.0:

• Improvements to make the app faster
• Now you can message people even if you're not Facebook friends
• Tap People to sync your phone contacts
• Enter anyone's phone number to start texting them from the app
• Add colorful drawings and text to photos from your cameral roll before you send them

Download the update here.

PhotoMic: a collage, meme creator for Windows Phone updated.

Once a luxury, our smartphones have evolved quickly to become a utility, take an important role both in our private and professional life. Our smartphones have also managed to oust the camera from our pockets and/or handbag thanks to the innovative apps available in the stores our phones are connected to. PhotoMic is one of those apps, designed to make life fun.

PhotoMic for Windows Phone is a free app that with your imagination lets you create comic strip right on your phone using built-in templates. With that you can flip, rotate your creation and add bubble callouts, sketch and other effects to them. With PhotoMic you will enjoy creating meme collages.

The app was updated today bringing it to version 2.0, making it a major update with the following changes:

• NEW: Bubble reset position
• NEW: Text rotation
• NEW: Text reset rotation
• NEW: Colored sketch, Sepia and cartoon effect
• NEW: More bubbles/stickers
• Adjusted settings for HDR effect
• Bug fixed: Bubble cropped if rotated
• Bug fixed: Bubble size back to default when saving to draft
• Fix and performance improvement

PhotoMic is free for download in the Windows Phone store.

IM+ updated with sound notification and lock display orientation.

The last time I posted about IM+ dates back to January 24 of the current year. The multi-platform messaging app has an update that was published today to the Windows store with the following changes and improvements

• Custom sound notification.
• Option to lock display orientation.
• Bug fixes and performance improvements.

I noticed that both the January and today's update contains the same option to lock display orientation.

 

IM+ currently supports Facebook, Yahoo!, AIM/Chat, ICQ, Sina, Mig33, Jabber, Yandex and more. Check it out in the Windows phone store:

1. AIM+ - free version
2. AIM+ - paid version ($4.99)

 

Weather Flow lock screen issue fixed and battery consumption improved.

No matter which mobile platform you use, choosing a good weather app is no easy task. The amount of such apps can make the hunt tedious, and chances are you'll miss the best one as you give up searching. I've been through that, so much that I had about 6 weather apps on my Windows phone. Only two remains and Weather Flow is one of them; It is probably the best weather app that allows the best customization experience tailored for Windows Phone 8.1. Weather Flow looks so good, it is hard to believe it was not made by Microsoft.

Weather Flow just got better today with an update that brings the app to version 2.0.0.2:

• Issues fixed with lock screen creation
• Improved battery consumption
• Lock screen fader
• Fixed live tile issues
• Clock widget

Weather Flow is $1.99 in the Windows Phone store and trust me it's money well spent. After all, the developer deserves your support for his hard work.

 

UC Browser for Windows Phone gets improved privacy management and more.

UC Browser is a popular multi-platform browser available on Windows Phone and Android. This third party browser is pretty solid and can even be used in lieu of the default Internet Explorer on our Windows phones if only users were given choice. It is a sad fact on Windows and Android phones, that we cannot set a default browser of our preference. This practice does not favor third party browsers like UC Browser or Surfy, which are very capable browsers. We can only hope this situation will evolve with time.

In the update published today, the team behind UC Browser has focused on improving privacy management. Incognito browsing has been improved to clear your mischiefs with better clearing of cookies. 

The other addition is better URL input which can more accurately predict the URL as you type in the address bar, making entering lengthy web addresses a breeze. Finally, the developers added an option that lets users switch off the forward and backward slide gesture.

UC Browser is a free browser that is available free in the Windows Phone store.

Frozen Free Fall: The new Halloween update is here!

Halloween maybe behind us - or maybe not - but Disney has published an update for its very popular Frozen Free Fall game for Windows Phone that adds 30 spooky new levels for kids and parents alike to enjoy. The update provides two new modes detailed in the change log below:

- 2 new game modes:

• "Feed the ghosts" and send them on their haunting way.
• Trick-or-Treat! Help fill up all the candy buckets!

 - Brand new power up - Peek-a-BOO! Quick! Olaf is covering his eyes! Make as many matches you can!
- Do you love the collectibles? Add to your collection 10 new Frozen Pumpkins!

Enjoy!

Frozen Free Fall is free for download in the Windows Phone store.