iPhone Game Developers World Championship 2010: The Round 2 Review

You still don’t need a degree in mathematics to realise that the Pocket Gamer iPhone Game Developers World Championship is the most spectacular, exciting, and talked-about faintly football-related tournament taking place this summer.

(If you ignore Portugal 7 - 0 North Korea, that is.)

Here in Bath, England, we’ve been privileged to report on a second round of group games that has delivered goals, shocks, humiliations, and early exits for a pair of big, big names.

Between them traditional footballing powerhouses Germany and Italy have amassed seven, yes seven, FIFA World Cups.

Yet at the Developers World Championship Germany stand on the brink. Mathematically still capable of progessing, the Germans would have to produce a miracle of Eucharistic proportions in their final group match to survive...and some.

Current world soccer champions, Italy, can’t even rely on divine intervention to save them, since their campaign is already finito.

Humiliated by Scotland in their opening game, a single goal defeat on Sunday consigned them to an early flight back to Turin. Arrivederci to the Azzurri, indeed.

Fans and journos alike have witnessed a host of nail biting clashes between app developers from all corners of the Earth – a testament to the talented and diverse array of mobile studios, indie houses, and bedroom coders that continue to support the iOS platform.

In arguably the two prime ties of the second round, hosts England cover drove three into India’s nets, whilst Hong Kong’s star striker, Alive 4-ever, kept the Asian island in the competition by shooting a stunning five goals past the walking dead Australian backline.

Furthermore, thanks to an incredible number of votes by the Danish and Serbian Pocket Gamer faithful, their respective heroes produced stirring second half comebacks, the likes of which haven’t been seen since Liverpool v AC Milan in Istanbul five years ago.

As I’m sure you can gather, the action has been high-octane, the competition fierce, and luckily for app-lovers everywhere, there’s plenty more where that came from!

Over the next four days of gripping action, high-profile names like Edge (France), Doodle Jump (USA), Flight Control (Australia), Chaos Rings (Japan), and Mystery Mania (Denmark) will join the party.

With only Iceland, Austria, Italy, Portugal, and Honduras already at Heathrow, 27 different nations, games, and developers still have an eye on the knockout stages, urgently seeking your help to pull them through to the Last 16.

So, make sure you pledge your allegiance, register your vote, and tune in for the latest results from this, the Greatest iPhone App Show on Earth.

Confused? Click here to go to the iPhone Game Developers World Championship info page.