FacesIn is a social network location aggregation service of sorts. What that means is that it allows you to log in to a number of social networks and then allows you to use your location and the location of your friends to help facilitate meetings. In other words, it’s an application that tells you when your friends are nearby using their location that they send out to various social media sites.
Here’s how it works. You open the app and immediately you’re given a selection of social networks. You can log into just one or all of them if you so choose. Currently the selections are LinkedIn, Facebook, Foursquare, and Instagram although we’ve been told that more will be added eventually. You can also log into MeetUp and Twitter from your profile page after you log in. Once you’re logged in the app will gather the data it needs. From there, you can check out your friends’ check ins, view a map showing your friends’ latest check ins, nearby places where you can check in, and a settings menu.
Once you’re all set up, the only thing you really have to do is wait. When a friend checks in somewhere close to you, you’ll get a notification letting you know that someone is nearby. This is cool for a few reasons. If someone you haven’t seen for a while is nearby you can go say hello or join them (if they prefer) and vice versa. It can be used for spontaneous meet ups with friends or colleagues. In the settings, you can also customize your notifications. You can turn them on or off or assign a quiet period where the app doesn’t notify you. There is also Pebble support.
That’s really it folks. It’s a very simple application that can bring you and the people you know closer together on the fly. You can also use this instead of apps like Foursquare to check into places which is a nice touch. The design is very attractive and follows the Android design guidelines. There are even parts of the app that use cards like Google Now, which we also thought was a nice touch.
In terms of functionality, this is a very clean application so you won’t run into too many bugs. If you sign into every social network, the first load will take a pretty long time but the app loads at nominal speeds afterward. There is no Google+ support but we have it on good authority that the developers are working on that. The only other issues people have are little things here and there. For instance, people who have the same contact across multiple networks can’t merge them into a single contact on FacesIn. So far, the development team has communicated very well with issues their users are having and that’s always a good thing.
We know some people might be concerned about the privacy of this application. However, believe it or not, privacy is not a big deal here. If you don’t want people to know where you are, you simply do not check in anywhere and you won’t show up on FacesIn. So participation is, in fact, optional if you use FacesIn and we liked that.
Overall, FacesIn is a really nice application. Obviously there will be some people who cannot use this app to its fullest potential. If you live in sparsely populated areas or don’t have a lot of friends who use social media check ins, you may not get the full enjoyment. However, if your friends list is active with their check ins then this is app could be a great chance to connect more with the people you care about. It’s free in the Google Play Store and between its great design, clean performance, and active development team, it’s a must have app if you’re a socialite.
It’s also worth mentioning that the developers are throwing a contest to celebrate their launch of FacesIn. They’re giving away a Samsung Galaxy S5, an HTC One M8, and a Nexus 5. The contest is quite easy to join. You simply share the app (from within the app) and get your friends to sign up. You can find the full details for the contest by clicking on this link. If you want to check out FacesIn, click the button below!
Check out the last indie app of the day: High Noon 2
April is coming to a close. Spring has officially started -at least in the Northern Hemisphere- and the days are starting to get longer and warmer. We also saw some pretty fantastic Android apps get released to the Google Play Store. As per the norm, you can watch it above or read it below. Here are the best Android apps of April 2014.
[Price: $4.99 with in app purchases]
First up is The Amazing Spider-Man 2 out of Gameloft. It’s your stereotypical action adventure game that features a super hero. You play as Spiderman as you take on both classic bad guys and new ones. The graphics are pretty good and the game play is enjoyable. However, it does cost $4.99 and also has in app purchases. People have complained about it but if you don’t mind that admittedly greedy monetary tactic, it’s not a half bad game.
[Price: $9.99 with in app purchases]
Baldur’s Gate was one of the classic RPG franchises of the late 90’s and now it’s for Android. It’s a little pricy at $9.99 but I’ve seen a lot of people state that they would fork out good money for console-level games and this is a console level game. It’s been re-imagined for mobile but all of the game mechanics remain pretty much the same. You can relive the classic or get into the franchise for the first time. It does also offer in app purchases but they’re mostly extras that do not affect the game play at all. If you’re an RPG fan, this is worth picking up.
[Price: Free]
Chrome Remote Desktop is an awesome application if you like to interface with your PC while you’re on your Android device. As the name implies, this app will let you remotely control your desktop from your Android device. You’ll of course need Google Chrome on your computer and need the companion Chrome app in order to make this work but as you can see from the screen shots, it does actually work.
[Price: $1.99]
Domo Icon Pack hit the Google Play Store and people seem to really enjoy it so far. It’s $1.99 and rocks an impressive 4.8 rating in the Play Store. The Domo Icon Pack features 1700 icons, a cloud-based wallpaper gallery, and the ability to search icons based on category. If you have a custom launcher and you want to try out some awesome icons, these may be for you.
[Price: Free with in app purchases]
Farmville 2: Country Escape was released worldwide on Android this last month. Much like the Facebook game, the Android game has drawn either supreme enjoyment or complete hatred and that’s cool. Games with this level of social integration tend to make people angry when they get unwanted invites from them all day long. That said, the game is your essential Farmville experience. You grow things, craft things, expand your farm, and you can even transport goods back and forth to the Facebook version. Also, it’s free.
[Price: Free]
Google added a new member of their Google apps to the Play Store this month and it was Google Camera. The simplistic camera hit the Play Store to almost unanimous critical acclaim. The Blur Mode has been touted as awesome and people who have devices running 4.4 and up can enjoy popular photo styles like Photosphere and Panorama. It is a little simplistic and some may not like it, but as Google fanatics will no doubt point out, simplicity is kind of the point. It’s free in the Play Store if you want to check it out.
[Price: Free]
IFTTT, or If This Then That, is an application that allows you to create connections using simple If-Then statements. Here’s an example of how this works. You can create a function that states that if you favorite something on Instagram, then that image would be saved on Google Drive. The sky is practically the limit with this app and it comes with support for most of the most popular applications. This is a great app for pretty much everyone and you should check it out.
[Price: $1.99]
Impossible Road is a minimalist arcade game. How minimalist? The background is white and I actually didn’t like that much the game itself is fairly fun. You control a ball as it races down a road and you have the option of jumping off of the road at any point to try to land on the road further down. It’s $1.99 and it has a 4.3 rating in the Google Play Store. Most of the complaints mirror my own in that the game’s graphics are a tad too simple but the game itself is fun and really that’s all that matters.
[Price: Free with in app purchases]
Next up is Nitro Nation, a drag racing game that is a lot like the game Drag Racing or CSR Racing. It features phenomenal graphics and a fairly easy game play system. Plenty of people have complained about the in-game money mechanics as well as the horse power mechanics. If you can get passed the bugs which the developers are in the middle of fixing, the game itself can be pretty fun.
[Price: Free with in app purchases]
Earlier this month the Walking Dead: Season One game was released on Android. Included are all five of episodes of the game along with the DLC 400 Days. The first episode is free but everything else must be acquired via in-app purchase. Despite that, the game rocks a 4.5 rating in the Play Store. The graphics are phenomenal, the story is good, and the game play is enjoyable. If you’re a Walking Dead fan, this is worth every penny.
[Price: Free with in app purchases]
If you’re a fan of Wind-up Knight then Wind-up Knight 2 should be a familiar face. The game features a few of the same ideas as the first one but also includes enhanced graphics, more game play elements, and more. The free version is a demo and the paid version comes in the form of an in-app purchase. A few people have reported some release day bugs and issues here and there but updates are slowly fixing these issues. It’s definitely worth a shot if you’re interested.
[Price: $9.99]
Last on our list this month is XCOM. If the name sounds familiar it’s probably because you remember this as being a classic PC game and one of the best games of 2012. It has now been released on Android in all of its glory and includes most of the things everyone loved about the PC title. The graphics and game play are superb and people seem to be enjoying this title quite a bit. It’s a tad expensive at $9.99 but this is yet another console quality game to be released this month and if you’re into strategic 3rd person shooters, then it’ll be worth every penny.
If we happened to miss any great apps released in April, feel more than free to let us know in the comments!
Rumors of a so-called “Prime” version of the Galaxy S5 have been surfacing since the beginning of the year, and now a new report claims Samsung will release the device sometime in June.
The report is based on “industry sources” cited by Korean website Asia Today . While one story based on anonymous sources doesn’t normally qualify as solid information, this one does appear to corroborate earlier reports, including one based on our own sources.
Other Korean websites claimed the S5 Prime would be released in early summer. In addition, just days ahead of the release of the Galaxy S5 at MWC in Barcelona, a trusted source told Android Authority that T-Mobile would release a version of the Galaxy S5 in the US in June. At the time, we predicted that this version would be the Galaxy S5 Prime (tentative name), rumored to feature a Quad HD display, a Snapdragon 805 processor, and 3GB of RAM.
Besides specifying the release window of the S5 Prime, Asia Today claims that Samsung will focus on European and North American markets for this premium device, which seems a sensible approach for a device that will probably enjoy a limited production run.
While our speculation is based – for now – on rumors and circumstantial evidence, it looks more and more likely that the fabled premium S5 is in the pipeline.
Samsung obviously has reasons to delay the revealing of the souped-up S5 for as long as possible – the company doesn’t want customers to wait to make a purchase, or worse, choose competing devices from the likes of HTC, LG, or Oppo. However, if the rumors are accurate, some more concrete evidence of the existence of the Galaxy S5 Prime should pop up in the following weeks.
