Why trust GreenbotReady for the weekend? y not use that time to explore some of the hottest new apps games for your Android devices? Five to Try is our weekly look at what’s fresh interesting on the ay Store, we’ve got another solid set of options to consider.
Do Button, Do Camera, Do Note from IFTTT are simple, effective apps that help you perform traditionally multi-step tasks between Internet services in an instant. Meanwhile, labre is an attractive new RSS reader, bble’s app update brings a big feature to the popular smartwatch. And if it’s gaming you want, we have Toca Nature for kids to explore, as well as classic fighter Garou: of the lves.
Do Button/Camera/Note
l three apps share a similar core interface, presenting various automated tasks to choose from.
Technically, these are three separate apps, but they all coexist within a system that you might have heard about: IFTTT, or, “If this, then that.” It’s a platform that lets users automate tasks across multiple Internet services—like sending data from a fitness tracker to a document in your Drive account— the three new Do apps essentially give you easy access to common functions.
Do Button is the most flexible of the bunch, letting you do things like turn on/off s Hue lights with a tap, set a Nest thermostat to a certain temperature, or automatically email certain people with a preset message (like, “Be home soon!”). Do Camera, on the other h, can immediately send a snapshot to an account, like Twitter, Facebook, or Evernote, letting you sort images on the fly based on what you’re shooting. And Do Note does much the same with fresh text missives.
You’re limited to three such action “recipes” per app for now, but they’re totally free plenty customizable. It can save you a lot of time spent fumbling through multiple apps, especially if you often perform a lot of the same tasks, so grab them see how Do apps can streamline your routine.
Toca Nature
Toca Nature’s simple sbox manipulation makes it a great pick for young kids, as you can drag your finger to plant trees, spawn animals, shape the earth.
Toca Boca’s many apps have done a great job of engaging children introducing them to interactive concepts without being overwhelming—or worse, uninteresting or ugly. Toca Nature ($0.99) is no exception, offering an alluring little world creation game that’s easy to enjoy filled with just enough wonder to warrant a stay.
Manipulating the terrain is done with simple drags of your finger, whether you’re planting trees (which also result in animals appearing), raising up hills, or digging out lakes. You can freely tweak retweak the l as you see fit, as well as zoom in to see the wildlife go about their lives lightly interact with them. There isn’t much more to it than that, but the accessible sbox design makes Toca Nature ideal for younger players.
labre
labre’s sleek interface uses Material Design, plus you can pull in your Feedly account for easy syncing across devices.
oking for a Material Design-friendly RSS reader to complement the rest of your llipop apps? labre might do the trick. It’s attractively designed across its stard dark themes alike, it packs in a lot of information within a small space. You’ll see large small boxes for synced stories, complete with images, which also helps break up the flow of content.
Thankfully, labre plays nice with Feedly, so you can sync over an account, or you can just start adding your favorite websites’ feeds keep everything self-contained within the app. I hit a couple of refresh-related bugs in this early version, but hopefully those will be sorted soon. And you can pay $2.47 to kill ads within this free app, but they’re pretty innocuous, so it doesn’t come off as a necessity.
bble
Actionable notifications come to bble via the updated app, which lets you set common responses send them from the watch without reaching for your pocket.
bble might be on the verge of announcing something totally new, but here’s a welcome twist: the watch you already have just became a lot smarter without you having to spend another cent. That’s because the Android app was updated this week to bring Android ar’s actionable notifications to the platform.
thout a touch display, the bble will never be quite as advanced as a full-fledged Android ar smartwatch. But now you can respond to messages notifications directly from the watch, whether it’s using preset replies (set within the app) or by choosing from options mapped to the watch’s side buttons. And this useful added functionality is only on Android—sorry, iOS users.
Garou: of the lves
Garou is an SNK fighting classic that’s better known as the successor to Fatal Fury. Old-school, technical brawling may not be a perfect fit for a touch device, but it’s still solid fun.
Despite the unusual title, Garou: of the lves ($3.99) is spun off from SNK’s classic Fatal Fury fighting series— this 15-year-old arcade favorite makes a solid debut on Android, despite encountering the same kinds of challenges that all fighters face with touchscreen input.
The h-drawn sprites look great, the diverse roster is appealing; also, for serious fighting fans, Garou has long been known as a complex, rewarding game to learn master. aying with the touch buttons isn’t ideal, especially due to the directional pad, but it’ll suffice for casual play on the go. Use an Android gamepad if you’ve got one to overcome input issues get the most out of this quality port.
