How do you move up the corporate ladder in your company?  We're guessing it isn't as fun as in Corporate Fury, where you receive your promotion by beating whoever has your desired job senseless in 3D arena brawls.

Cast in a semi-open world, you start off as a low-ranking production worker, just waking up after taking a brutal beating from your supervisor.  Your buddy Mike fills you in on what happened, since you've had a temporary bout of amnesia after all the head trauma you received.

Most of your time will be spent flitting between Frank's Goods, an in-game shop where you can purchase upgrades of all varieties, and Mike, who books your fights for you.  While the actual game world is restricted to a single office building, it is quite a massive indoor city, so you can spend plenty of time exploring and getting into some random violence.

Controls consist of an analog stick for movement and buttons for various actions.  Without any upgrades, you can jump, punch, kick and use a weapon - pretty basic. Once you start stocking up on special moves and advanced weapons (hammers, cannons, etc.), though, things get real fun, real fast, with some over-the-top moves and multi-hit combos (both on ground and up in the air).

Advancing the story isn't as easy, as some of the "co-workers" you'll be battling on your way to face the CEO are too powerful for a linear progression.  As such, you'll often find yourself spending plenty of time fighting just to earn points for upgrades.

In the tradition of irreverent open-world games, Corporate Fury embraces crude humor and overt sexual references, so don't bother playing if you're easily offended.    If that's not an issue, then prepare yourself for one of the most gratifying mobile titles I've seen in a while - all for $1.99.

[Swinecrafters]

First released to the iPad back in April, Mirror's Edge has finally made its way to the iPhone.  Despite being scaled down depending on what version of the handset you own, it makes for one fun and action-packed experience.

Set in a totalitarian future, you play the game as Faith, a member of the underground resistance movement.  As a runner, your job is to move information on foot, deftly avoiding the government's invasive surveillance systems.

Controls involve a lot of swiping gestures, most of which feel very simple and natural.  You run by swiping left or right, jump by swiping up and slide by swiping down.  The fighting system is also implemented using swipes, making combat a lot quicker to get into than conventional button-based titles.

While Mirror's Edge actually has an interesting plot, it's mostly glossed over on the mobile game.  Considering most mobile gamers' preference for gameplay over story, however, it hardly matters.  With exciting action, like wall-running across billboards and sliding through zip lines, this game is one fun bundle.

You'll literally need quick reaction time to survive, making each of the 14 levels a worthy challenge.  It comes with leaderboards that track your time through every level and a good amount of achievements, although we doubt they do anything for actual replay value.  The iPhone version also dropped local multiplayer, which is kind of disappointing.

With that said, Mirror's Edge remains one of the most exciting running-based action games to come on the platform.  It's a solid purchase for the $4.99 price.

[EA]

This is something that could turn out big. A new iphone app called Dreamwalk provides users with a geocaching game that raises the ante a little by getting local businesses involved. Users can use the software to seek out "treasures," just like any similar game. Except, in this case, participating companies get to hide their own prizes for players to pursue, allowing them to get new prospects through the door in the process.

When you launch the app, it shows you a map that details where prizes are hidden. There are three ways to collect bounty - Instant Prizes, Collector's Stamps and Treasure Hunts - all of which require going out into the real world. For Instant Prizes, you simply have to go to the marked location on the map to get the reward added to your onscreen prize bag. Tap that and get instructions on how to redeem. Do note that these are usually simple stuff, like free fries at a local restaurant or cheap tickets to a show.

Collector's Stamps, on the other hand, require you to travel to different locations, gaining letter stamps at each one that spell out the words to the final destination. Treasure Hunts work similarly, except you gain clues instead of stamps. Since they're harder, the prizes for these two are usually bigger (e.g. videocams and gaming consoles).

Because they've only just launched, there are only a few thousand hidden treasures across the US, most of them concentrated in large metro areas (think New York, LA and Washington DC). However, developers at Dreamwalk Pty Ltd are negotiating for new businesses to come in and, potentially, make the loot more lucrative for avid treasure hunters across the country. Participating merchants, by the way, can easily upload new prizes via Dreamwalk's website, which will then turn up on gamers' maps.

Dreamwalk's beauty is that it is a win-win for all parties involved. Businesses get very hip marketing and users get a chance to win loads of free stuff around their area. An excellent concept that's totally worth the free App Store download.

[Dreamwalk Mobile]

Mindjet's desktop app is one of the richest, most powerful mind-mapping tools I've seen.  Their mobile effort, Mindjet for iPhone, isn't half bad, squeezing a healthy dose of capabilities and excellent usability that should satisfy most professional users.

There's nothing complicated about what it does: the app lets you perform various operations for your mind maps. The big deal here is, you've got it on your phone, so inspiration can strike anywhere and you can immediately put it down without skipping a beat.

Upon opening, it takes you a map management screen, where you can create, edit and rearrange maps (up to 100x the handset's screen size) stored on your iPhone.  Creating and editing is very intuitive - double-taps on any level lets you edit the node, change various properties (like shape and color) and add a variety of details (including remarks, dates and completion percentages).  It works exactly how you'd expect it to on a small, multi-touch display, which is fantastic.

Uploading and downloading of maps to your computer is also possible, although this led to some amount of confusion on my part.  The process is not straightforward, requiring you to go through a web service to be able to share files between your devices.  If you encounter an error, make sure to check that files have an OPML extension (not XML).  Simple renaming works.

Overall, Mindjet for iPhone is a very useful mind-mapping application (with a look similar to iThoughts).  It's nowhere near as robust as the desktop counterpart, but for simple creation and editing needs, this is great.  Pricing is a little over the top, though, at $7.99.

[Mindjet]

Fonolo's deep dialing service, available from their website, is one bowl of awesome.  Able to skip levels off a company's phone structure, it can single-handedly make calling customer service lines a tolerable undertaking.  And now, that same convenience is available to mobile users via the Fonolo iPhone app.

"Press 1 for blah..blah..., Press 2 for blech..."  Sounds familiar?  If you're like most of us, you find that activity a drag.  Moreso, if you have to do it repeatedly on a regular basis.  The new app lets you bypass all of those minutes-draining automated recordings and jump right to the person you actually want to talk to.

You'll need a Fonolo account to use the app, which will automatically sync your dialing history on the iPhone and your online use of the service.  It also keeps an online database of your favorites - the specific parts of company's phone tree that you frequently use, so you can just jump right into it the next time you call.  Want to record conversations?  It has that, too, saving the audio files directly to the cloud.

The iPhone interface is pretty good, although the app itself is particularly slow.   Navigating between screens sometimes takes a few seconds, making it a pain to go through the company's stored directories.  Hopefully, they can remedy the speed problem with a future update.  Even at the current configuration, though, it should still prove a more efficient option than having to go through the same tiring motions every time you call.

Unless Fonolo can remedy the app's performance issues, using the web interface actually sounds like a better idea.  On comparison tests, it does appear to work faster, majority of the time.  Still, for a free app, this is incredibly useful.

[Fonolo Website]

Boys, the long wait is over. Dirty apps, complete with nudity and all sorts of mature content, are now allowed at the App Store. First one to break the cherry is an app called "Hottest Girls", which includes "2,200+ images of topless, sexy babes and nude models."

The change in App Store policy comes as a part of the iPhone OS 3.0 update, which now includes a facility for implementing age restrictions in applications running on the handset. As such, "Hottest Girls" is an approved app, duly marked as "rated 17+" for "frequent/intense sexual content or nudity".

Not that the $1.99 adults-only app is any more interesting than staring at a wall. It's just a small piece of software that displays a bunch of photos according to categories, with no real special functionality whatsoever (save for a ratings facility that will supposedly drive future content). You may as well just visit a free adult hosting domain and take a gander at the stuff they have to offer. As the first official adults-only iPhone title, though, the creator should be looking at some decent money from people downloading it for the novelty value alone.

Expect big things from major adult content providers, who finally have a lucrative mobile platform for promoting one of the web's biggest and longest-running industries. Will the other download services (e.g. App World, Android Market) follow suit?

Photo Credit: Gadget Lab