To celebrate the holidays, Bottle Rocket Apps has developed new missions, characters and holiday theme for its popular iPhone and iPod touch game, “Doodle Bomb”. The new version, available to existing owners of the game as a free download from the iTunes App Store, adds a holiday theme as well as new missions to continue to challenge players.

Doodle Bomb is one of the most popular physics puzzle games on the iTunes App Store, with more than 1 million downloads since its release in early 2010. The game features physics driven bombs, strategically placed machines, and hilarious characters and sound effects. It’s easy to pick up and play, but difficult to master, requiring strategy, timing and precision. The game has been played more than 7 million times, and players have already completed more than 25 million missions, in less than a year.

This free holiday update gives Doodle Bomb fans 12 new challenging missions on which to earn “Bomb Badges,” plus a new present machine that acts as a springboard to send virtual bombs hurling into hard to reach places. The game’s cast of characters has received a holiday facelift as well: the enemy soldiers and bomb-bouncing rats have dressed up for the season with hats and antlers.

“We wanted to give our fans an update that didn’t just provide new mission content, but also gave them a reason to go back and explore the missions they have already played to see what has changed in the Doodle Bomb world for the Holidays,” said Bottle Rocket’s Matt Johnson, designer of the game. “Nothing gets people into the spirit like giant peppermints falling out of the sky and rats with antlers toting shotguns!”

Since its release at the beginning of the year, Doodle Bomb has garnered critical acclaim from industry review sites, including a MacWorld Editor’s Choice Award and being named as one of the five best doodle games of the year by Appolicious. The game consistently receives great customer reviews, and even celebrity interest: in a recent Entertainment Weekly interview with actor Neil Patrick Harris before hosting the 2010 Video Game Awards, he praised Doodle Bomb as a “great game,” saying that it was one of his favorites!

Bottle Rocket’s Doodle Bomb is available for both the iPhone and iPod touch and is compatible with the iPad. The new version of the game can be purchased on the iTunes App Store now for $0.99 (U.S.), or downloaded for free by existing users.

Dan Frakes explains why NPR News for iPad is an essential free favorite:

Who said Internet audio killed radio? NPR for iPad proves that networks can embrace the Internet to make their radio and Web offerings even more compelling. Like NPR’s iPhone app, the free iPad version lets you browse NPR news, shows, and podcasts; you can read or listen immediately, or save audio programs to a playlist you can listen to at any time. The app also lets you listen to streaming audio of many NPR-affiliate stations across the country. But the iPad app adds emphases on the multimedia-friendly areas of NPR’s coverage—Arts & Life and Music topics—and takes advantage of the iPad’s larger screen to make it easier to find content and more enjoyable to consume it. It’s public radio on-demand, and it makes NPR appealing even to the NPR-agnostic among us.

The work of iPhone applications and mobile solutions developer Bottle Rocket, it’s both priceless and free from the Apple iTunes App Store. NPR News, which broadcasts news, current affairs and all things cultural across the US via around 800 public radio stations, is one of several excellent applications from the company. Macworld caught up with Bottle Rocket’s Calvin Carter to find out more about the iPhone developer.

Q. When people come to you to create an iPhone application do they have a clear idea what they want?
A. Most companies and individuals that contact us about a custom iPhone app have a good…
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