2009 signals more than the end of a year. In the first few weeks of July 2008 the App store launched and since then we’ve had the iPhone 3G, OS3 and the iPhone 3G S. It’s been an incredible year and 2009 started with a bang. There are some fantastic applications on the app store and some awful ones, so I asked some of our team to let us all know about the applications that have stuck and a quick roundup on each.

For me it has to be Beejive .This app, although expensive is a great messenger client, supporting all the popular services, Facebook and more. It even allows file transfer, picture taking, push notifications or instant email if you prefer. I use this app almost every day, and it just keeps getting better and better.

NetNewWire had a great RSS reader service online, and a great app for the iPhone, so when they discontinued their service earlier this year I thought that was it for the app, instead they converted the app to work with Google Reader, and managed to make it even better than it was before. Ok so it’s a little laggy, but other than that it’s fantastic.

Finally for me, Twitteriffic. This twitter application has suited me better than just about all of the others and some of the more popular ones out there. It’s simple, clean and functional.

For me there are so many great apps for the iPhone that narrowing it down to three was hard enough especially as so many new ones are coming out every day.

For now, I’ll leave the rest to the other editors on the site and of course, you are welcome to leave your comments with us as well. For now, have a great new year! See you in 2010!

Mark Crowle-Groves

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From Lewis Burton

Tweetie 2

The first version of Tweetie has been on my device since I first discovered it, as of a few months ago atebits had developed a much more advanced you simpler Tweetie 2. This has stayed on my device since because of the functionality;

- Lists

- Scroll to refresh

- Built profile editor

It also has all the features of the other twitter clients;

- Tweeting

- Photo tweeting

- Url shortening

Overall it is a very solid twitter client. Although many people have complained that their is no choice of themes I find the UI sufficient and clean. On the whole would give it 9/10 stars. Tweetie 2 would gain the extra star if it could tweet the current song that you are playing as I find this to be the only feature that needs to be implemented.

Sketchbook Mobile

Sketchbook I by far my favorite drawing application. Mainly because of the choice of brushes’ and the fact that you can customize them. You can customize the brushes in many ways such as size, opacity and spacing. Sketchbook also has an intuitive UI, instead of having a menu bar it has a small circle that opens up the brush panel. Sketchbook has may ways of exporting your finished artwork such as exporting it to your camera roll, emailing it or you can take advantage of the layers feature and email it as a layered psd. Overall in would give it 10/10 although their is still is room for improvement.

Boxcar

Boxcar is the best notifications system that I have found. It supports many social networks such as Facebook and twitter. Although Facebook is an extra cost it is fully worth it. Boxcars notification system can also launch the service that it is notifying, for example if you got an @ reply on twitter it would launch your twitter client. Boxcar can also be configured to hide part of your tweet if you would like to make it more private. Overall I would give it a 7/10. It could be improved a lot by making the alerts faster because their have been times where an hour after I have received a direct message the notification will pop up. Otherwise this is one polished application.

Trism

Trism is my favorite puzzle game. It combines multi-touch and the accelerometer amazingly. It is very challenging yet it dose not get boring. It is based around making matches of three or more triangles (trisms) you make matches by sliding the bars of triangles up and down or side to side. Whilst doing this you must disarm bombs by matching them with other trisms, you must also break lock by matching them too. Also while playing the game you will make special combinations of trisms that will have special properties. Overall I would give this game a 9/10. It could gain the extra mark by having more obstacles.

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From Sean Nicholls

This years selection of iPhone apps has been one of the best, developers came out with some of the most innovative and most fun games of the entire iPhone AppStore to date. Where past years might have been marked by quantity over quality releases, I’m confident after 2009′s show of releases, we’re going to see some great apps in 2010.

My favourite app in 2009 is possibly my most expensive paid app, which isn’t saying a lot -I’m normally a financially conscientious purchaser of iPhone Apps (I can haz free?). Purchasing a copy of Asphalt 4 for iPhone was a big step out of my normal free-zone, but having seen a preview in the apple keynotes prior to its release, I was confidently assured it would be worth every penny of the $3.99 I paid.

Asphalt 4 was the first, and quite possibly still is the best, 3D burnout-style racing game on iPhone/iPod Touch. Unlike some other titles which will go nameless, Asphalt is a great pick up and go title. You can easily blast through a game or five while waiting for a bus, and even when not as games go its replay-ability meter is off the charts; with nitro boosts and takedowns its like having my favourite racing game of all time (burnout) on the iPhone -nothing beats crashing opponents cars into the guard-rail while waiting for your delayed train ride home.