App review of the week: Super Bowl XLV vs. Football Playoffs 2011 Live
With thousands of new mobile applications entering the market every week, it's becoming increasingly difficult for consumers to identify the apps that deliver the best--and the worst--that smartphones have to offer. Appealing/Appalling is a weekly feature that separates the wheat from the chaff--from games to navigation tools to augmented reality solutions, we cover it all, encompassing both free and premium downloads and spanning all major operating systems. Read on.
(And click here for previous installments in this series.)
| Super Bowl XLV vs. Football Playoffs 2011 Live | |
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Super Bowl XLV/Super Bowl XLV Official NFL Game Program Available for: iOS Price: Free Not-so-breaking news: Super Bowl XLV kicks off Sunday, Feb. 6, when the Pittsburgh Steelers take on the Green Bay Packers for National Football League supremacy. Whether you're lucky enough to travel to host site Dallas for the game or merely watching from the couch (like my beloved New York Jets), NFL Enterprises has an app for you. The first and most innovative, dubbed simply Super Bowl XLV, is an interactive travel guide for fans making the pilgrimage to Cowboys Stadium--its elegant and intuitive design incorporates a 3D map of the North Texas region, complete with bar and restaurant recommendations, as well an interactive map of the stadium environs, including parking, concessions and restrooms. The app also spotlights official Super Bowl Week events and touts location-specific check-in tools. The Super Bowl XLV Official NFL Game Program updates the souvenir program concept for the iPad era, touting interactive content tracing the Steelers and Packers' respective roads to the title game. The app also boasts highlights of the 2010-11 season, milestone moments from past Super Bowl matchups and additional video features. Like its companion application, the Super Bowl XLV Official NFL Game Program is impeccably designed, with rich, detailed graphics and a wealth of information for NFL junkies and casual fans alike. Which raises a question: How can the NFL do stuff this savvy and engaging to promote its marquee event, then turn around and sign the soul-crushingly insipid Black Eyed Peas as the game's halftime entertainment?
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Football Playoffs 2011 Live Available for: iOS Price: $1.99 There are now roughly 7,000 sports applications in the App Store, including official releases from all the major professional organizations (e.g., the NFL, MLB, NBA and NHL), individual pro franchises, collegiate athletic programs and conferences, and respected media outlets like ESPN and Yahoo. At the opposite end of the spectrum, there's Football Playoffs 2011 Live, a shamelessly sketchy and brazenly unauthorized solution that still has the guts to crown itself "The best app for the playoffs in the app store!" Football Playoffs 2011 Live looks more like it was developed for a Palm Treo than the iPhone--without access to licensed NFL logos, team names, multimedia content or statistical data, it features nothing more than live scores, playoff bracket views and schedules, presented in dishwater-dull black and white. Compared to the most cutting-edge sports apps, the difference is as great as the chasm between those old vibrating electric football games and Madden NFL 11. Even worse, Football Playoffs 2011 Live costs $1.99 to download. The only way a football fan can waste money more egregiously is to bet on the Buffalo Bills to win a Super Bowl title. "Nothing works. This is a ripoff," seethes Football Playoffs 2011 Live's lone App Store user review. "Remove from the app store. How's this crap get on in the first place?" That's a good question. |
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