App reviews: Touchdowners, TickTick

Touchdowners

Touchdowners is a silly game. And that's just fine for a distraction on a summer day. Players are put in charge of a team of three football "players" - whose movements are limited to pinwheeling their arms around. They face off against three similarly equipped opposing players. You can move your pack of players up or down the field.

The aim of the game is to score a touchdown, of course, though in this game, that means touching the ball down into the end zone. This is surprisingly hard to do when your motion is so limited, and sometimes your teammates pile up under you.

You can play in a career mode - that takes you through opponents, tournament-style - an arcade mode or a two-player mode that could get cramped if you're playing on a phone. (Still fun, though.) You can watch ads for in-game currency to unlock more characters.

Free, for iOS and Android.

TickTick

A beefed-up to-do list app, TickTick lets you create lists with things to do but also lets you assign them to days in your calendar, snooze them for a later date when things get crazy, and assign tasks their appropriate importance. You can also set reminders for those tasks, so you can actually cross them off your list at some point.

TickTick could be a bit complicated for those who aren't used to unifying their to-do lists and calendars. Taking a spin through the tutorial is a good idea to make the most out of the app.

The free version gives you the option to make up to nine lists with 99 tasks each. There is also a pro version ($27.99 a year or $2.79 a month) that lets you integrate with other companies' calendars and puts unlimited tasks and lists at your disposal, among other features. If you're really looking to get everything in order, it would be a worthy upgrade.

Free, for Android and iOS.