Watch Dogs Phone App: ctOS

While your friend is having a good time hogging Watch Dogs, while you fiddle with your smart phone waiting for a turn, download the Watch_Dogs Companion: ctOS (for Android and Apple), for free.

The app is a fun way to interact with real world Watch Dog players. The app doesn't have any of those awful in app purchases or the energy system which is destroying the mobile gaming industry. 

The app allows you to play a mini-game with someone on Xbox, Playstation, or PC. It puts you in the position of the police helicopter that we've all run into playing games like GTA. As you fly your helicopter over the other player driving his car you can deploy police vehicles and perform hacks to street lights and more. Similar to most open world driving games, the more bad things you do the more your heat level goes up, or stars. As the player in control of the helicopter, as the driver racks up heat points this allows you to do more things.

There is only one game mode. It is basically just a check point race while you try to prevent them from reaching all the check points in a specified time, that can be extended.

After a match both the winner and the loser gets experience points. Of course the winner receives a lot more. I have ran into situations in the app though. If we disconnect or if the other player realizes he is going to be defeated and quits out, you will receive no experience no matter how far along in the match you were.

That is if you even get into a match. I spent most of my time waiting at the "searching for player" screen just to play a 45sec game.

When you level up in the app it allows you to unlock abilities and upgrade your police. I suggest upgrading the steam pipes first as this allows you to do a significant amount of damage to your opponent. The upgrades to actually make a big difference and helps give you an edge on the map. I am not sure if the game pairs you with better players the higher level you are or not. I have played against a big range of skill levels.

You can also kill your opponent. However this doesn't deem a win. This allows the other player to re-spawn and still has a big chance to finish the game. The game either ends when the time is ran out or the player reaches all their check points.

There is a game Editor that allows you to make check points and the starting point but that's about it. I was hoping for a little more options in this, maybe even different game modes.

Overall its a pretty decent companion app to go along with the game. It will be interesting to see how other developers use mobile devices to connect to their game world. This can be a good and bad thing for our gaming future.