The roles have been reversed in Rovio’s upcoming mobile game set to launch later this month. That’s right; this time around it’s those evil pigs that are taking center stage in a new game called “Bad Piggies”, a spinoff of the popular Angry Birds franchise.

Rovio hasn’t released a ton of information on the game just yet but we do know that this will be a completely new type of game play. There aren’t any Angry Birds to be found nor are there any slingshots in sight, the company says. Simply put, we’ll get to see the pigs’ side of the story.

“We’ve had a lot of fun creating a totally new and unique gameplay experience,” said Petri Järvilehto, EVP Games at Rovio. “There’s so much more to these pigs than what is seen in the Angry Birds games, and Bad Piggies is the first glimpse into what’s going on in the imaginative and ingenious minds of the pigs.”

Rovio made a name for itself with the popular Angry Birds franchise that first flew onto the scene in December 2009. The most recent installment, dubbed Angry Birds Space, was downloaded more than 10 million times in just three days en route to becoming the fastest-growing mobile game of all time. Bad Piggies will be the third major game launch for Rovio this year.

Look for the title to be released for Android, iOS and Mac on September 27. Rovio says versions for Windows Phone and Windows 8 will follow soon after. In the meantime, Rovio suggests checking out the Bad Piggies website for the latest news from the little green guys.

Three of the biggest telcos in the UK have won in their bid to offer a mobile wallet partnership to consumers.

The European Commission had been mulling over a bid by Vodafone, Everything Everywhere and O2 to offer a unified way to pay for goods with a mobile phone.

Dubbed Project Oscar, the mobile wallet initiative is set to go up against the likes of Google Wallet using NFC technology and it is hoped that the scheme will be seen as a safe alternative to using cash cards for transactions.

Although the EC has given this proposal the greenlight, Google and Three were two big names that were opposed to the payment scheme. Three because it thought Project Oscar was monopolistic and Google looked to be protecting its own mobile payment service.

Effective solution

Everything Everywhere, one of the partners, however is pleased with the result, saying in a statement: "At the heart of the JV (joint venture) is a desire to bring to the UK an easy and effective solution for businesses to create and for consumers to enjoy mobile marketing and wallet services.

"With EC clearance received, the job of getting the JV up and running as quickly as possible can begin, starting with the hiring of the necessary people and the creation of the new company."

According to Everything Everywhere, it is the discount side of the platform that consumers will see first. Essentially the scheme will mean that phone users will be offered a bevy of brand discounts and offers if they opt into the service – essentially codes to get money off in restaurants and the like.

This is only the beginning, though, eventually the deal, according to Everything Everywhere, "will give consumers a simple and secure shopping experience, allowing them to purchase goods and services using their handsets in physical locations such as shops, using contactless technology, as well as online."

ARM has told TechRadar that the impending arrival of 4G networks in the UK is "really important" to getting the next generation of mobile tech into the British market.

ARM's director of mobile solutions, Laurence Bryant, explained that the next generation of smartphones need access to data faster, and also how that throws up new challenges.

"I think it's going to be really important," Bryant told TechRadar. "Clearly today the handsets have got to the point where you are doing more and more on the devices.

"What's going very quickly in this market in terms of what you can do in terms of features and what you get [in terms of data] is increasing what you want to do on your mobile device.

"You can go a long way on 3G and you can go a long way with Wi-Fi but clearly LTE brings benefits.

"You 'chat' more frequently on the network… and when you have large amounts of data you want to be able to process that information quickly.

"Having a diverse range of processing support is vital as you are doing more and more on your devices.

"We are packing all the computing performance you need into a handset. I think that's why LTE 4G is a fundamental part of how the mobile experience will evolve and OEMS are putting this together in a more seamless smart device."

Super or smart?

ARM's CEO Warren East has suggested in the past that 4G combined with more capable handsets meant he arrival of a new category of 'superphones', and Bryant highlighted the Samsung Galaxy S3 as a good example.

"A whole combination of things make a smartphone a superphone for me," said Bryan.

"It's a short-lived thing and it's what defines the latest and greatest in smartphones. If you want an example of a superphone today then it's the Samsung Galaxy S3."