First App ‘Officially’ Announced for iPad

Posted on January 27th, 2010. Written by Damon.

iPhone media around the world today received a press release about the first company that has officially stated that they are altering their iPhone app(s) for the larger iPad device. Ironically it is a very simple game that we find in our newspapers everyday, Crosswords. It is now inevitable that we will find out about the new Tablet Apple is announcing at it’s event today. Read on to find out more about Crosswords and it’s upcoming jump to the iPad.

Chicago, Illinois — January 26th, 2010 — Stand Alone, Inc. Crosswords iPhone App. The company has been refining the digital Crossword solving experience on the iPhone since the App launched at the opening of the App Store. In keeping with this aggressive innovation, Stand Alone has been fervently preparing to be among the first to modify their Crosswords App for the new form factor. With the influx of traditionally print media coming to the tablet, it’s only fitting that Crosswords also be at the forefront!

Crosswords currently lets iPhone and iPod touch users download and solve daily puzzles from over 30 of the top newspapers, including the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Village Voice, the Onion and many more! With a custom keyboard, intuitive interface, and ease of downloading new puzzles, the Crosswords App has seen great success. The game touts a 4.5 star iTunes rating, compiled from over 1700 reviews, and players recently completed over half a million puzzles.

Ben Gottlieb, President of Stand Alone, says, “we’re dedicated to innovating the most efficient, fun, and intuitive Crosswords App, and that certainly extends beyond the iPhone.” Crosswords was just released for the Palm Pre and Pixi, and extending compatibility to new, App friendly hardware is at the forefront of their development road map.

“The main constraint in developing a Crossword app for mobile devices has been the distinct lack of screen real estate,” Says Gottlieb. The success of Crosswords is certainly due to Stand Alone’s dedication to building clever workarounds, including creating a smaller, custom keyboard and an intuitive, yet extremely low profile interface. “We have been anticipating the Apple tablet as the greatest piece of hardware for App developers since iPhone itself, and Crosswords will be even better on the new device.”

The Tablet version of Crosswords should keep the core functionality of the original, but optimize the user interface to be more reminiscent of its newspaper roots.  Users will still be able to use the integrated hint and look up systems, import or download new daily puzzles, enjoy the expanding catalogue of free puzzles, and enjoy in-app support for premium subscriptions to puzzles such as the New York Times. “The goal,” says Gottlieb, “is to utilize the larger screen, but keep both the functionality and the sleek, intuitive, custom design that our users love.”

Current Features:

• New puzzles every day from over 30 publications

• Intuitive, one tap downloads for all of today’s puzzles

• Quick puzzle sorting by recently played, date or provider

• Nearly unlimited puzzles from tons of different sites

• Support for puzzle importing

• US, UK, French and Australian puzzles

• Puzzle completion tracker and timer

• Leader boards compare solving speeds

• Facebook and Twitter support for auto posting your times

• Hints let you peek at clue letters (or the entire puzzle!)

• Access to Wikipedia definitions, Wiktionary, Answers.com and Reference.com

• Detailed puzzle meta data

• Massive catalogue of classic puzzles at the tap of a finger

Crosswords is currently available for the iPhone (and iPod touch) for $9.99.