With each passing year, the need for a computer diminishes as enterprising developers contribute additional superpowers to iOS devices. One of the latest to arrive on the iPhone is optical character recognition (OCR), courtesy of Pixter Scanner. While there are plenty of solutions for turning an iPhone into a mobile scanner, few allow captured text to be converted to editable text – let alone translate it into 70 different languages. Pixter Scanner OCR does just that, recognizing typewritten (and in some cases, even handwritten) text in 32 languages. In our tests, OCR worked quickly with nearly 100 percent accuracy, even with a variety of different type styles.

Understanding classic poetry is hard enough, but memorizing it can be downright cruel. With archaic language, tricky rhymes, and unexpected rhythm variations, trying to remember the exact way William Shakespeare felt about the woman he loved can pretty much suck the beauty right out of it. Penguin Classics' Poems by Heart makes it easy (well, easier) to commit the classics to memory by turning the whole tedious process into a game, with level-ups and progress achievements that unlock as you learn.

If there’s one thing that all musicians tend to fret over, it’s pitch. That's a little easier to hear than to try to describe, but when you’re listening to your favorite song being tortured at a local karaoke spot, you’ll know when it’s not being kept in tune by some buzzed bar patron. There are more than a couple of competent iOS apps that use the built-in microphone and/or incoming audio signal, sample it, and check to see if it is indeed in tune, but Tunable puts a truly new, innovative spin on the overall concept. In the process, it delivers on the promise of being a one-stop tuning shop.

If good artists borrow and great artists steal, how do we classify the artists who break and enter but leave the real treasure behind? It’s not difficult to spot the commonalities between The Other Brothers and Nintendo’s classic Super Mario entries. Both are side-scrolling platform games, feature a damsel in distress, and are rendered in wonderful pixel art. Both even star a pair of silly mustachioed men who wear caps and overalls. But The Other Brothers sadly does not capture its spiritual predecessor’s signature feel.