Hey guys!

We’ve hit the ground running and 2012 is shaping up to be an incredible year. It’s hard to believe February is here already and it’s time we caught you up on some awesome fan-made content!

Our remarkable community never ceases to amaze us and we get a huge kick out of showcasing your skills and creativity. As always, be sure to send through your favourite creations and we’ll do our best to give them the credit they deserve.

Just email fans@halfbrick.com or send us a link on Twitter!

Here’s a selection of the latest gems to catch our eye.

CAT PLAYS FRUIT NINJA ON IPAD!

Could this house cat be leading a double life as a ninja? Maybe it’s the real life Puss In Boots? We may never know but one thing is for sure: this clever kitty has some crazy Fruit Ninja skills! Watch as it turns an iPad into a super expensive cat toy and racks up a score of 128 points! Now we truly know why Ancient Egyptians worshipped cats.

FRUIT NINJA CUPCAKES

Ninjas hate fruit… but they love cupcakes!! Watch these amazing creations come to life in a cool time lapse video by Joey The Caking Girl. We worked up an appetite just watching this video and even those pesky bombs look delicious! I know what I want for lunch tomorrow.

FRUIT NINJA: THE MOVIE FAN MADE TRAILER

Roll out the red carpet; some budding directors have created a live action trailer for Fruit Ninja: The Movie! This would undoubtedly be a massive blockbuster hit if it existed and fans are now clamouring for an official Fruit Ninja film! That’s not likely to happen any time soon but we’d never say never! How do you think it stacks up against our first ever trailer for Fruit Ninja?

FRUIT NINJA NAILS

Feast your eyes on this incredible Fruit Ninja nail art by Nina van Oordt! We couldn’t believe how detailed these tiny creations were and can’t imagine how much time and effort they would’ve taken. Be sure to visit Nina’s deviantART page for more amazing nail art!

PROFIT BIRD SCHOOL PROJECT

This awesome picture was drawn by 8-year-old Liam Brockwood of Portland, Oregon. Liam is a huge fan of Jetpack Joyride and his favourite vehicle is by far the Profit Bird. He’s prestiged the game on several devices and currently sports this awesome artwork on his school-yard locker. The masterpiece was created as part of his second grade school work and we think it definitely deserves an A+!

It’s been an amazing year for Jetpack Joyride and the lovable Barry Steakfries has now entered the hearts of millions of people around the world! Thankfully, Barry’s heroics haven’t gone unnoticed and Jetpack Joyride has received remarkable coverage and stacks of great praise to close out the year.

The game was a staple on ‘Best Of’ lists the world over and we couldn’t be happier with the awesome response! This has further fuelled the fire at Halfbrick and we’re super excited to bring you even more awesomeness and game changing updates in 2012.

We’re also totally stoked to offer Jetpack Joyride FREE for a limited time as a special thank you to our brilliant fans who made the year so incredible.

Here’s a quick wrap-up of what the media had to say about one of Halfbrick’s biggest releases to date.

AWARDS & ACCOLADES

Gamasutra – Best of 2011: Top Mobile Game
“The game is a masterful rendition of the one-button platformer, offering tight arcade mechanics, constant gameplay variation, and loads of bonus content to unlock.”

TUAW – Best iPhone Game App of 2011
“Barry Steakfries has to be one happy camper today. The hero of Jetpack Joyride from Halfbrick Studios was the runaway (or shall we say fly-away?) winner of the voting for the best iPhone game app of 2011.”

UGO – iOS Game Of The Year
“We poured more time into Jetpack Joyride than just about anything else and its use of missions and achievements kept us going back again and again and that’s why it’s the iOS Game of the Year.”

GameRevolution – Best Mobile Game 2011
“We don’t review too many mobile games at GameRevolution, but Jetpack Joyride deserves special attention.”

App Store – Rewind 2011 iPhone Game of the Year, Runner-Up
“We love assuming the identity of Barry Steakfries in this fun, high-flying adventure game.”

TouchGen – Best Arcade, Editors’ Choice Awards
“The best of its genre, highly addictive, and kept fresh with frequent updates.”

MORE LINKS

New York Daily News – Best Tablet Game
TechCrunch – The Top 20 iPhone and iPad Games Of 2011
Entertainment Weekly – 10 Best Game Apps of 2011
Joystiq – Best of the Rest
TechnoBuffalo – Favourite iOS Games From 2011
Digital Spy – Top Handheld Games of 2011
USA Today – Game Hunters’ Top 10 Video Games of 2011
TouchArcade – 2011 TouchArcade Staff Favourites
VideoGamer.com – iOS Games of the Year 2011
Wired – The 20 Best Videogames of 2011
The New Yorker – Year In Apps

En garde! Fruit meets fairytales in the juiciest iPhone game this year -- Fruit Ninja: Puss in Boots!

The suave fruit-slashing swashbuckler, Puss in Boots, faces a challenge that would make Sensei proud. His search for the Magic Beans brings him to developer Halfbrick’s legendary hit game Fruit Ninja. Prepare for a journey full of familiar and fruit slicing action he encounters a huge variety of new and exciting challenges!

Fruit Ninja: Puss in Boots features the all-new Bandito mode! Slice through a series of increasingly exciting challenges to become the greatest Fruit Ninja warrior ever! Each stage thrusts you into never-seen-before fruit frenzy adventure: Massive fruit from the Giant’s castle, precision and timing challenges, all-out fruit onslaughts with new obstacles And for the first time EVER: Throw down against the most-requested addition in Fruit Ninja history -- the tomato!

Real Banditos must put their best blade forward because scoring is based on the number of fruit sliced, ninja reflexes and slicing efficiency. A true produce warrior can attain massive high scores and upload their best to Global Leaderboards to compare against friends and the best players online!

Bring your blade to Desperado mode -- an enhanced and re-mastered version of the Classic Fruit Ninja game that introduced 70 million players to the world’s biggest dojo! But this time, you will face even more fruit, unique waves and Puss in Boots’ elusive Magic Beans from the DreamWorks Animation feature film!

Finally, bask in the fruit-stained glory of Puss in Boots’ own exclusive ninja Stash, featuring a whole range of unique customizable content, including new backgrounds and blades with elements from both the film and Fruit Ninja.

Stay juicy, amigos!

There’s not much more to say! After months of hard work and preparing for Halfbrick’s biggest game launch of 2011, we’ve finally made it and you can now play Jetpack Joyride on your iPhone and iPad!

The reviews have begun to flood in and we can be happier at the response to the game so far. We’re going to continue to update with the first new content coming very soon, so rest assured that more will be coming and we will be supporting our fans!

REVIEWS

Touch Arcade -- “I believe this is the highest praise a games journalist could possibly give a game.”
PocketGamer -- “A miracle, by all accounts.”
TouchGen -- “Jetpack Joyride is a delightfully challenging arcade romp that no iOS gamer should be without.”
IntoMobile -- “Jetpack Joyride is, quite simply, an amazing game.”
AppSpy -- “Jetpack Joyride trumps them all by packing together gorgeous designs with fun gameplay and replay value that’s bursting at the seams.”

Join Barry Steakfries as he breaks in to a secret laboratory to commandeer the experimental jetpacks from the clutches of science evildoers. After lift-off, simply touch the screen to ascend and release to descend, raining bullets, bubbles, rainbows and lasers downwards as you fly towards higher and higher scores!

The official trailer tells the story of how Steakfries goes from a humble gramaphone salesman to a high-flying action hero! Created by the same minds behind Fruit Ninja, Jetpack Joyride is Halfbrick’s biggest mobile release of the year and is set to make a big splash all over the world. It will be available worldwide on September 1st as a universal game for both iPhone and iPad!

Follow along on Facebook!

Fans around the world will definitely know of the game we have been working on for several months now -- Machine Gun Jetpack! It has received amazing coverage and lots of great buzz, but over time the game evolved so much that it became even bigger! Announcing Jetpack Joyride, the game formerly known as Machine Gun Jetpack, releasing September 1st and absolutely packed with content!

I got together with Luke Muscat, creator of Fruit Ninja and lead designer of Jetpack Joyride to chat about what you can expect with our biggest mobile release of the year. Don’t worry -- you will still be able to fly in the Machine Gun Jetpack in all its glory, but we’ve also added the Bubble, Steam, Laser and even Shark Head Jetpack to take for a ride! There’s no limit to the creativity we can bring to Jetpack Joyride and look forward to hearing just what the community is looking for in our future updates.

You’ll be riding in jetpacks, collecting coins, going for a spin in a huge variety of vehicles and even levelling up by completing in-game missions. On top of that, you can view your progress in The Stash, purchase new upgrades and items and compare scores online with your friends.

Jetpack Joyride is a huge package and one we’re incredibly excited to be releasing. It will be available for 99 cents worldwide as a universal app for both iPhone and iPad. Stay tuned for more information as we lead up to September 1st!

Touch Arcade news

PocketGamer news

Destructoid news

YOU are the ninja! The worldwide gaming phenomenon Fruit Ninja has now arrived for Kinect and Halfbrick could not be prouder to bring you the first ever Xbox Live Arcade Kinect title! Your arms are now blades, and the epic battle against the world’s most delicious produce is just beginning. Fruit Ninja Kinect is our evolution of the slice-em-up genre, where we worked tirelessly to utilise next-gen power for the juiciest combat ever!

With Classic, Zen and the frenetic Arcade Mode, Fruit Ninja Kinect includes all the action you know and love with precision control -- along with special features exclusive to Kinect. With Party Mode, four players can turn a normal night into a fierce tournament -- and the new Challenge system will reveal the true masters among your friends.

The whole team at Halfbrick is incredibly excited to bring you this next step in the Fruit Ninja franchise, and it is available for download on Xbox Live Arcade right now for 800 Microsoft Points as part of the offical Summer of Arcade promotion!

DOWNLOAD HERE!

Age of Zombies is now available for the Amazon Appstore, and to celebrate it will be free to download for launch day -- July 8th! We’ve created a sweet global trailer to showcase everything AOZ up until now, and we hope you can get involved with the ongoing Barry Steakfries saga!

DOWNLOAD NOW

FNK brings all of the action that millions of fans worldwide have been playing for over a year and takes it to the next generation using full Kinect support for slicing the world’s most perfectly delicious produce! Classic, Zen and Arcade modes are all available with online leaderboards and challenges, along with two brand new multiplayer modes exclusive to FNK.

Battle Mode pits two players head to head in a juicy melee where they must slice fruit of their own color -- but the white fruit are up for grabs and can be sliced by any player! Team Arcade is cooperative madness, featuring more fruit on-screen than any other Fruit Ninja game before.

FNK is officially part of Xbox Live’s Summer of Arcade promotion, so you can expect to see more news and announcements over the coming weeks leading up to release. Head over to the official page at Xbox.com to see all the media and marketplace content, and check out what some players had to say about their experience with the game at E3:]

NEW YORK TIMES
“I ran into this game by accident, and it provided the most fun I had in three minutes all week.”

DESTRUCTOID
“Fruit Ninja Kinect is surprisingly precise. In fact, it may be the most responsive Kinect game I’ve played to date, mirroring my actions one-to-one at a shocking smooth clip.”

CNN
“Conquering the Apple Store apparently wasn’t enough for these ninjas.”

GamePro
“I haven’t played many Kinect games that I really liked, but Fruit Ninja’s formula works incredibly will when paired up with the device, and plays like a natural party game.”

That’s pretty much all there is to it! We’ve just released a new update to Fruit Ninja HD for iPad (1.2.2) which resolves an annoying crash bug some of our fans were experiencing. However, that issue is no more thanks to the update, and to celebrate we’re putting the game on sale for the weekend! Over 60% off worldwide, you can now pick up FNHD for just US $0.99!

Simple as that guys -- get amongst it, and we promise to have more awesome content updates coming in the very near future!

DOWNLOAD HERE