The yearly iTunes freeze, the time where Apple shuts down their digital storefront so that their workers can enjoy the holidays, is happening as we speak, but the App Store isn't quite as frozen as it used to be. Several years ago when Apple would freeze the App Store it meant basically nothing worked for an entire week, including releasing updates, releasing new games, changing prices, and even the top games charts wouldn't budge. Nowadays it's a little more flexible, and although submission and approvals are indeed on hold, if you're a developer who previously submitted a game to Apple and had it approved prior to the freeze and then scheduled it for release on a date that's during the freeze, it would still be able to launch. That appears to be what happened with Cinco Paus [$4.99], which is the new game from 868-HACK developer Michael Brough.
If you're familiar with Brough's previous games like 868-HACK [$4.99] or Imbroglio [$3.99], you'll know they're very tightly designed affairs built around emergent gameplay. There are many little things you'll only discover through playing and learning the structures of the game as you go. It's why they're so wildly popular with strategy gamers and have such longevity. Cinco Paus seems to want to crank all of that up to 11. One example: The game is entirely in Portuguese. No, don't run off to adjust the language settings on your device, it's in Portuguese on purpose. It's anybody's guess as to why that is, but it seems that it's ...