Blog Posts by Ben Silverman

What would you do with 10,000 iPhones? How about lining them up and knocking them down for the sheer amusement of watching that much technology be reduced to extremely fancy dominoes?

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Though 3D gaming has yet to catch on the way Sony and Nintendo had envisioned, that hasn’t dissuaded other companies from pushing the dimensional envelope. Oculus, makers of the soon-to-be-released Rift headset, have been blowing minds with their incredibly cool virtual reality tech, but none more tenderly than the mind of Paul Rivot’s awesome 90-year-old grandmother.

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Keeping up with the deluge of games flooding the App Store is a daunting task. Plenty of iPhone owners just pick a game or two and stick with ‘em, either because they’re overwhelmed by options or they just seriously love Angry Birds that much.

That’s too bad. iPhone gaming might be dominated by a few big brands, but dig just a little deeper and you’ll find some of the best game experiences on any platform. Here are 10 recent iPhone games that absolutely deserve a spot on your handheld.

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Thief (Credit: Square-Enix/Eidos Montreal)You can’t keep a good criminal down.

Despite the lack of a number in its title, Thief is formally the fourth game in the vaunted stealth franchise. It’s a name that should be instantly familiar to gamers of a certain age and persuasion, as the prior Thief games pretty much wrote the book on first-person stealth. The next game, which is due out in 2014 for the PC and next-gen consoles, recalls its former glory while borrowing a few pages from a more recent stealthy hit, Bethesda’s Dishonored.

Set in a grungy Victorian town called simply “The City,” the game stars series mainstay Garrett, who is out to stick it to The Man by scurrying about the dank streets and mercilessly pilfering from the

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BioShock Infinite (Credit: 2K Games/Irrational Games)How do you improve a classic? It’s a question that haunts anyone attempting a sequel or reboot to a beloved franchise, and more often than not, it’s answered with a resounding “you don’t.”

But don’t tell that to game design auteur Ken Levine and his team at Boston-based Irrational Games, because they’re not really listening.

Instead, they’ve been working on making BioShock Infinite, releasing Tuesday for the Xbox 360, PS3 and PC, as good a video game as humanly possible. For well over four years they’ve been at it, hoping that time and a budget of over $100 million yields a title that compares favorably to the groundbreaking 2007 shooter BioShock -- something the first sequel, the underwhelming BioShock 2 (crafted by a totally different team), couldn’t quite manage.

It certainly isn’t an easy task. Levine recently admitted as much, telling the New York Times that “it’s getting harder to ask someone to spend $60 on something that’s merely a good effort,” and that it has to be “different and really special.”

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Please dress like this for the wedding. (Credit: The Hobbit/Video screenshot by Amanda Kooser/CNET)Nerd bells are ringing. Ian McKellen's latest geek dream role will be as officiant at buddy Patrick Stewart's wedding.

By Amanda Kooser, CNET

Few actors have gathered as much geek street cred as Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart, with credits for "Star Trek," "The Lord of the Rings," and "X-Men" between them. Now, there's news of a crossover most of us didn't see coming: McKellen says he will officiate at Stewart's upcoming nuptials.

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John Riccitiello (Credit: Getty Images)All is not well at Electronic Arts.

John Riccitiello has resigned his position as chief executive officer, the massive game publisher announced Monday. Ricitiello will formally step down on March 30, ending a six-year run. He’ll also leave the company’s board of directors.

Former EA CEO Larry Probst, who held the position from 1991 to 2007, will act as a temporary CEO while the company searches for a replacement.

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Toa Mata band (Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/opificiosonico/)You can build a lot of cool things with Legos, but we weren’t aware “functioning band” was one of them.

That’s just what Italian sound designer and all-around musical genius Guiseppe Acito managed to create, however, and the result is as adorable as it is awesome.

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