Firetop Adventure is yet another platform scroller (seems like there's been a lot of those lately). This time the story is a little spooky: your job is to root out an evil entity that's turning harmless creatures into hideous monsters. Although FA is still a little cartoonish, it does have an advantage over its purely run-and-jump competition in that it gives you weapons against enemies, lets you blast through walls with bombs (my favorite), and has some interesting puzzles.

Over the years, I have written several columns about my annual trip to Uruguay where we go to visit my wife’s family and escape the Iowa winter. Search for “Uruguay” on SmartphoneMag.com and you’ll find my archived articles, which discuss devices, travel software, and learning Spanish. Here is my latest installment.

Listening to or watching podcasts is great fun. If you think they are boring, meaningless or can’t entertain you during, say, a long fight, you’re wrong. For example, watching all the clips of X-Play, played back on my VGA HP iPAQ 214 (thanks to Smartphone & PPCMag / iPhone Life’s Hal Goldstein for the gift!) could entertain me for long-long hours.

 After 11 years, we will be publishing a final 2008 issue of Smartphone & Pocket PC magazine and then suspend publication! We are working hard to make it the best Windows Mobile issue ever, a keeper, a reference guide. In 2009 we will publish Smartphone magazine’s iPhone Life. Below, I’ve attempted to answer questions that have been asked of me: 

Here are short summaries of just a few of the great posts published daily on the Smartphone & Pocket PC magazine blogs. We encourage you to read the complete post, post your own comments, and ask questions of the authors. Below each post we’ve placed the date of the post and the name of the person who wrote it. To find and read the complete post, go to the blog home page (smartphonemag.com/blogs) and use the navigation calendar in the right hand column to browse to the date in question.

1. Go to the Start >Settings >Buttons >Up/Down Control tab.
2. Adjust the slider on the “Delay before first repeat” field. If you hold the D-pad in the down or up position, it waits a brief period of time before scrolling.

These days, the line between what constitutes a plain old "cell phone" and a "smartphone" is becoming increasingly blurred. With each new generation of phone, more and more features and functions are being added, including e-mail, Web browsing, and increased media playback capability. Some may ask, "Why should I pay more for a ‘smartphone' when I can get ‘non-smartphone' that can basically do all the same stuff?

This is your chance: the impressive Skyfire browser is freely available until August 30. Also, this week there’s lots of device news, including the official announcement of the Palm Treo Pro, the September arrival of the first Android device (from T-Mobile), and Reviews of the HTC Touch Pro.

"Sunnysoft upgrades its Windows Mobile contacts manager Sunnysoft Contacts to version 1.5! Some new features include...

"Papyrus 2 brings many exciting new features, including: Search View for PIM item searching; Advanced filters management; Automatic attendees notifications, Popup selection effect for optimized display and much more! Papyrus 2 back-end engine was re-designing from the beginning and delivers the fastest experience for the pro user!"

Rumors are about that Verizon and Sprint will be offering the HTC Touch Diamond and HTC Touch Pro. Plus, there’s a great video on YouTube of the amazing Touch Pro interface. This week we’ll also note a few reviews of the new HP iPAQ 910 and leaked information about the Treo 850.