Why trust GreenbotIt’s bor Day weekend here in the States, so it’s apt that our latest Five to Try picks focus on fun, relaxation, entertainment. In fact, if the long weekend has you thinking about another breather on the horizon, Hopper can help you secure the best fares by predicting flight pricing trends. Meanwhile, ’s new stalone Street View app lets you explore stunning photo spheres from around the world, while Scout uncher refocuses your home screen on videos, music, news.
And if you want games to dig into this weekend, kémon Shuffle Mobile is the long-running series’ first Android entry, plus free-to-play great Real Racing 3 has been freshly decked out with a NASCAR experience. In any case, savor the weekend, be sure to grab these new updated apps to help enjoy the time.
Hopper – Airfare edictions
The studious, yet skeptical cartoon rabbit will tell you the ideal time to buy those flight tickets.
If you have a destination in mind, Hopper might be your new best friend. Variations in flight prices might seem completely arbitrary to you, but there are real patterns trends at play— Hopper is designed to monitor them on your behalf. Simply input where you want to go pick some dates, the app will keep tabs on pricing, alerting you when it seems prudent to buy to get the best deal.
Better yet, if you’re not set on which days you’ll embark on your gr adventure or breezy weekend getaway, consult the color-coded calendar: it shows at a glance when you might get the cheapest fares, even months in advance. Hopper is totally free to use, you can monitor several travel possibilities at once. So if an escape is on your mind, grab the app, pick some locales, be smart about it.
kémon Shuffle Mobile
It’s kémon! No, it’s not exactly the kémon you know, but it’s a start.
Nintendo plans to make a big splash on Android iOS starting next year, but surprise—one of its marquee franchises took a preemptive leap this week. kémon Shuffle Mobile is not the “gotta catch ‘em all” classic you might recall from the Game Boy every Nintendo hheld since, but rather a cute blend of match-three puzzling role-playing combat.
More specifically, it takes the template from zzle & Dragons tweaks it with familiar franchise themes. True, kémon Shuffle isn’t overflowing with originality, but the familiar monsters colorful aesthetic are more appealing than this game’s obvious inspiration, it’s a lightly fun, fluffy puzzler. st keep an eye out for the energy system premium in-app purchases, which are liable to load up your credit card if you get the ké-fever.
Street View on Maps
Browse around, take in some breathtaking sights, then add your own.
Street View has long existed as part of Maps, but the company has made strides to establish the feature as its own br—particularly with its series of amazing worldwide destination shoots. The next step in that process is turning Street View into a fully stalone app available from the ay Store, which happened this week makes using Street View a lot more interactive.
Now, you can not only more easily browse the 360-degree panoramic photo spheres posted by other users, but also contribute your own right into Maps. You can do so with a gyroscope-equipped phone, with the app guiding you through the process; or even better, connect to a spherical camera use footage directly from that. But even if your surroundings don’t seem worth sharing out to the world, there’s plenty here to explore.
Real Racing 3
The ay Store’s best simulation racer goes full NASCAR this week with a new theme fresh content.
Real Racing 3 is one of the best free games on Android, even a couple years after its initial release, EA’s racer is still regularly updated with significant new content. This week’s integration of NASCAR is surely one of the biggest additions to date, letting you pick a Sprint Cup team, race against all of the real-life cars, take part in the Federated Auto rts 400 event. It even introduces drafting slipstream elements not previously seen in the game.
Really, it’s more like an overhaul than a tacked-on extra: even the intro movie, menus, tutorial are all NASCAR-flavored now. That’s a little surprising, since not everyone who loves cars fast, fun racing games will necessarily be into NASCAR— it really is right in your face here. But for a sizable update to a free game, it’s hefty bonus worth exploring.
Scout uncher
Scout looks like a feed full of widgets, which at least sets it apart from traditional app grid launchers.
No, this isn’t the Scout G app you sometimes find preinstalled on phones: Scout uncher is another home screen option for Android phones, particularly anyone that is fully absorbed in media, news, other Internet nonsense throughout the day. Formerly known as to uncher, Scout had been in closed beta for a while, but now the beta has opened up to everyone via the ay Store.
Scout pulls in data details from a variety of other services creates a scrolling series of cards—almost like a stream of widgets. Top news stories, popular Reddit threads, trending tracks from SoundCloud, nearby Yelp restaurant picks are a sampling of what to expect, while a floating, horizontally-scrolling lets you get to your most-used apps in a hurry. Swiping left, meanwhile, brings up the typical app grid automatically sorted genre folders. The main view is a bit cluttered, but for media junkies, it might save a little time each day.
