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The official Twitter app for the iPhone is great, but falls down in one crucial area: there aren’t enough cutesy monsters battling it out. If this bothers you as much as it does us, Twimon is an app worth getting excited about.
The iPhone app bills itself as “a new kind of Twitter client that lets you raise your own personal legion of monsters and raid outposts in real-world locations”.
Remind you of anything? As its name makes clear, Twimon is a cross between Twitter and Pokemon, with location-based features reminding us of social iPhone apps like Foursquare and MyTown.
You can tweet, check and reply to mentions and messages, and access search and Twitter lists as usual. The location-based game is wrapped around those features, and sees you send your monsters out to ‘conquer’ outposts — real-world businesses and venues.
You can choose whether to tweet your game activities or not. That’s good news if you’d be vaguely embarrassed about letting all your Twitter followers know your ‘Can-Do Clayman is on a rampage at Fire & Stone’.
Conquering outposts earns you rewards, including more monster eggs, while also awarding you titles — the equivalent of Foursquare’s mayorships. As your monsters grow, they level up, Pokemon-style.
The game is free to download and play, but there’s an in-app shop that sells power-up items and monster eggs. Disappointingly, they’re priced in dollars ($0.99 per item), although when you tap to buy, the cost translates to 59p a pop.
We’ve been playing with Twimon, and it’s certainly quirky and fun. We’re not sure if it’s aimed at kids or adults, but it may be destined for cult status. It certainly won’t make us ditch the excellent official Twitter app. Even so, it’s an interesting and innovative game that might even give Nintendo a few ideas.
