Whether you want to know how much time is left until the International Olympic Committee decides the host of the 2016 Olympics (Countdown to the Decision) or how much time until the 2010 and 2012 games start (Olympics London Countdown and Olympics Vancouver Countdown), there’s pretty much a countdown app for anything Olympic related.
Fortunately, there are more practical Olympic apps to occupy your time.
Games
There are already some quality Olympic-themed games for the iPhone.
Playman Track & Field boasts five Summer Olympic events, 12 characters and three game modes. This game has a unique control system and above-average graphics and is only 99 cents. This game will be enjoyed not only by fans of track and field, but by iPhone game aficionados of all colors. Olympic Sports is similar to Playman, but is worse in every way. I can deal with poor graphics, but this game isn’t responsive enough.
Finger Olympics 100M, Finger Olympic Swimmer 100M and Phonympics can be grouped together. The Finger Olympics games require you to make a running motion with your fingers while Phonympics has you tap your finger as fast as possible. As silly as they sound, both games are kind of fun the first couple of times, though they have little replay value.
Hold your own Olympics
Hottie Olympics is easily one of the most amusing apps I have ever seen, as they advertise it for men and women. As if a group of women are going to sit around a bar grading guys that walk by them…
I tried this app with my girlfriend and all it got me was a dirty look and a night on the couch. I guess she thought she deserved better than a 5.8 on the Olympic scoring scale.
Similarly, Score-Em is an app that allows you to grade things on your iPhone. But instead of being limited to Olympic-style scoring, this app has a number of different scales, such as thumbs up or down or the more traditional numerical rating. It’s always good to have options when rating your homemade Olympic events.
News and resources
I’ve always had partially nice things to say about the iApp Ventures series of sports apps, but Olympics Live (iOlympics) is well below the quality of the others. I understand it is tricky, because unlike a pro football app, there aren’t stats and standings during a non-Olympic year. Still, this app is nothing more than a bland list of stories and links that is dying to be updated with more content.
There aren’t many alternatives to Olympics Live, sadly. BBC Sport 606 offers news from the British news giant on many sports, including a section devoted to the 2012 Olympics in London. But this also is another bland app that is little more than a list of stories.
Medals 2008 boasts a list of the medalists from the 2008 games, with the option to sort by country or sport. This app is put together reasonably well, but for it to really be useful it should include more than one year.
