Heads up, mobile gamers. Tiny Thief, the latest title backed by Angry Birds maker Rovio, is out now for iOS and Android devices.

Developed by the Barcelona-based studio 5 Ants, Tiny Thief is the second game released under the new Rovio Stars third-party publishing initiative. Set in medieval times, the game is described as 'an atmospheric, beautiful stealth based adventure featuring point-and-click style gameplay, off-beat humor, mind-bending puzzles, and memorable characters.'

Players assume the role of the Tiny Thief, a blond hooded hero who must use his kleptomaniac ways to outsmart opponents across six 'epic quests' and save a princess and kingdom in danger. Along the way, players will square off against enemies like the Dark Knight, rogue pirates, dragons, evil sheriffs, and even a giant robot.

'The game throws some seriously mind-boggling puzzles at you, with tons of surprising interactive gameplay elements along the way,' according to the App Store description.

The release comes after Rovio back in May announced plans to boost its game lineup with selections from third-party developers. The effort, dubbed Rovio Stars, is the Finnish game maker's first foray into publishing games that were not developed in-house.

The first Rovio Stars game Icebreaker: A Viking Voyage launched in early June for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch devices. That game has not yet landed on Android.

Meanwhile, Angry Birds fans continue to wait it out for Rovio's new top-secret addition to the franchise. Without revealing too much (or anything at all, really), the gaming company last month teased its 'most thrilling and action-packed game yet!'

In the meantime, gamers can pick up Tiny Thief in the App Store or Google Play for $2.99. For more, check out the video below.

In the retailing wars with Apple Inc. (AAPL), score one for Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN)

A judge's ruling that Apple violated U.S. antitrust laws by colluding to increase e-book prices gives retailers such as Amazon added flexibility to sell digital books more cheaply and gain market share. The decision may also lead to greater government oversight of the iPhone maker's ability to control pricing in other markets, such as music and movies.

'Amazon emerges as the winner from all of the activity related to e-book pricing,' said Tom Forte, an analyst at Telsey Advisory Group in New York. 'The company seems to be free to price the way it wants to, which, by Amazon's standards, is aggressively to gain market share.'

Apple used agreements with publishers to fix prices of e-books, a federal judge in Manhattan ruled yesterday. Those deals helped the company sell reading content that boosted the appeal of its smartphones and tablets, while forcing Amazon to raise prices on some books and abandon the one-size-fits-all pricing that lured users to its Kindle readers. The verdict stands to give Amazon more leverage in negotiations with publishers.

While sales of e-books have exploded in the U.S., they still make up only 20 percent of the market, and those gains are slowing. Last year, e-book sales rose 44 percent to $3.04 billion after more than doubling in 2011, according to the Association of American Publishers.

The U.S. government and 33 state attorneys general sued Apple and five of the biggest publishers in April 2012, claiming the Cupertino, California-based company pushed publishers to sign agreements letting it sell e-books under a model that raised prices and harmed consumers.

Apple fought the lawsuit, seeking to fend off greater oversight and continue the agency model of letting content owners rather than retailers set prices, while generating income by taking a commission.

'Apple is using that agency model in a number of contexts and they chose to use it in part for e-books because they were using it in other contexts,' said Scott Kessler, an analyst at S&P Capital IQ.

Apple is the world's largest seller of music, and established the pricing model where tracks typically sell for 99 cents and albums for $9.99. With movies and television shows, where there is more competition from cable companies and online services such as Netflix Inc. (NFLX) and Hulu LLC, Apple has a less rigid pricing model.

By adopting a new model with higher e-book prices, Apple sought to force Amazon to change its pricing, the plaintiffs argued. At the time, the online retailer was selling titles for $9.99, often below cost. E-books now have a wider price range. More than 650,000 e-books sold by Amazon cost $4.99 or less and more than 1.2 million are $9.99 or less, the company said in May. Currently, the digital version of Dan Brown's 'Inferno' sells for $12.99.

U.S. District Judge Denise Cote said Apple lost the case, in part, because of statements by its deceased founder, Steve Jobs, that government lawyers said showed Apple was targeting Amazon. States are seeking triple damages for overcharges, according to Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen's office. Another trial will be held to determine Apple's penalty.

'Any financial penalty is pocket change for Apple, but this decision can have a long-term effect,' said David Balto, a former policy director for the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. 'The government can extend this beyond books.'

The ruling gives Seattle-based Amazon leeway in an industry that already accounts for a significant portion of its revenue. Amazon began selling e-books in 2007, and four years later, books for Kindle readers surpassed print sales.

Media, which includes digital content such as books, music and movies, will make up 26 percent of Amazon's total sales in 2014, according to Dan Kurnos, an analyst at Benchmark Co. E-books will account for about half of that, he said.

Amazon's aggressive pricing means the online retailer's massive scale ends up benefiting customers, Kurnos said. Amazon has aligned itself with antitrust laws that seek to protect consumers, making its model difficult to contest, he said.

'Competitive practices are for the benefit of the consumer,' Kurnos said in an interview. 'When was the last time you saw someone get in significant trouble for cutting prices too severely?'

Drew Herdener, a spokesman for Amazon, declined to comment.

While this ruling doesn't affect authors and consumers because the agency model had already been phased out by the publishers' settlement with the government, the decision may pave the way for Amazon to become even more powerful in the book industry, according to Paul Aiken, executive director of the Authors Guild.

With Amazon able to discount e-books at will, that will make digital titles more appealing and could increase pressure on brick-and-mortar bookstores, Aiken said. Fewer bookstores will also only increase Amazon's negotiating power with publishers. For those chains that do offer e-books, like Barnes & Noble Inc. (BKS), competing with Amazon will be even harder considering that in the past it's sold best-selling digital titles at a loss.

'If one is concerned about competition in the book industry, a healthy retail sector is critical,' Aiken said. 'That now seems to be very much in doubt.'

Apple argues that it wasn't fixing prices and was trying to create more competition in a market dominated by one player.

'Apple did not conspire to fix e-book pricing and we will continue to fight against these false accusations,' said Tom Neumayr, an Apple spokesman. 'When we introduced the iBookstore in 2010, we gave customers more choice, injecting much needed innovation and competition into the market, breaking Amazon's monopolistic grip on the publishing industry. We've done nothing wrong and we will appeal the judge's decision.'

The company's appeal isn't likely to prevail and a final penalty could be in place within a year, said Christopher Sagers, a law professor at Cleveland State University. The ruling may put Apple in a similar situation as Microsoft Corp. (MSFT), which faced increased oversight as part of its deal to resolve antitrust charges. The software maker was subject to periodic status reports to check whether it complied with its settlement with the government.

'We're likely to see pretty broad, invasive government monitoring,' Sagers said. 'This case could have a big effect in how they set up new businesses.'

To contact the reporters on this story: Adam Satariano in San Francisco at asatariano1@bloomberg.net; Danielle Kucera in San Francisco at dkucera6@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Pui-Wing Tam at ptam13@bloomberg.net

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Path is preparing to cross to the Windows Phone mobile platform - one of the more 'private' mobile OSes currently in play, with its marginal marketshare compared to the dominant duo of Android and iOS. Which sounds like a perfect fit for a private social network. Path co-founder and CEO, Dave Morin, confirmed to TechCrunch the network is 'coming to Windows Phone in full partnership with Nokia'.

Path was also named as one of the forthcoming apps at the launch of Nokia's new Windows Phone flagship, the Lumia 1020, taking place in New York today, as Nokia announced a new imaging SDK specific to that device.

It's unclear whether Path will be exclusive to the Lumia 1020 at this point, or available on any Windows Phone handset. We'll update this post as soon as we confirm.

It's also unclear whether the partnership means Nokia is part-funding development of the Windows Phone version of the app but it seems likely. And if not Nokia, then Microsoft - who has been spending considerable cash encouraging developers not to overlook its third ecosystem.

What is abundantly clear is that Nokia is hoping Path can be the Lumia 1020′s Instagram substitute - in the absence of the real deal. In a press release announcing the partnership, the pair play up the photo filter aspect of their partnership:

Path with Nokia will bring more than 50 free and premium filter effects; along with high resolution & deep zoom imaging capabilities that allow users to capture and share those personal moments and every day works of art. Path users can also share their location, what music they are listening to or movie they are watching as well as express thoughts and moments, chat with private messages, and share emotions with no words through fun-loving stickers from the Path store.

Path has been eyeing up Windows Phone for a while. Back in March Morin told Pandodaily it was 'beginning work on Windows Phone'. At the time he also said Path was committing to the Windows Phone platform because 'we believe that the product is really good' . And last year described himself as ' bullish on Windows Phone '.

Nokia has also been been working hard to support the wider Windows Phone ecosystem by spending time trying to convince developers to port flagship apps across ( see: Instagram, for instance), and also making its own apps - such as its Here mapping software - available to the whole WP ecosystem, not just its own Windows Phones. At its last device launch event, the Lumia 925, it made much of Hipstamatic's Oggl being available on Windows Phone.

Path's arrival on the Lumia 1020 is another Windows Phone stepping stone that Nokia will be keen to shout about - especially in light of the ongoing absence of Instagram. But a private social networking app, however well known, does not detract from the fact Nokia has been forced to unbox a 41MP cameraphone on a platform without the current photo-sharing social network du jour.

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After two years in beta, Valve's wildly popular Dota 2 is finally finished-or, at least finished enough for an official release. The beta ended earlier this week, and you can grab the latest version of the free-to-play game right here on Steam. You won't be alone. Dota 2 is by far the most popular game on Steam, with over 321,000 active players I write this. Team Fortress 2, Steam's second-most-popular title, has less than one sixth the players right now.

Because Dota 2 is so popular, Valve is rolling out the official version in waves. The server infrastructure behind the game is being updated to prepare for the expected influx of new players, and Valve doesn't want those servers to be swamped. I just tried to download Dota 2 and was told that I'm number 1092 in the launch queue. Apparently, I'll get an email when my turn is up. No time estimate is provided, though.

We've seen high-profile game launches distrupted by server issues, so I can understand why Valve is taking a slower approach here. The developer is adding server capacity for an additional 450,000 concurrent players, but figuring out exactly where to deploy all that new hardware is challenging, according to the release FAQ. Valve wants to ensure players in various regions all have a good experience.

Now that the beta is over, what's next? Mac and Linux versions. Both are 'currently in testing and will be available soon.' You should be able to access early builds through the program. The Linux version is particularly intriguing given Valve's apparent interest in using that OS to power its own console.