We tossed Little Inferno into the iPad App Store fire yesterday, hoped for the best, and subsequently watched with potpourri in our eyes as it crawled its way up to #4 in the charts as of this writing. Thanks to everyone who wrote thoughtful reviews so far, both in the app store, and especially those whose quotes we totally clipped out and stuck all over our screenshots – see all five below!

To create this version of Little Inferno for iOS, we worked with the talented Gil Carmel (and Ron’s brother), who was the same fellow responsible for the iOS version of World of Goo.

Snuggling up with Miss Nancy: We’ve seen a few articles so far describing Little Inferno as a damning criticism of social/casual games. But to be clear – although Little Inferno has a lot of fun flamboyantly using social/casual game mechanics, the game is not mean to be a mean spirited attack on other games. In fact, a couple of us here at Tomorrow Corporation actually enjoy games like Tiny Tower, and My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic! (seriously, try it). So, while the satire aspect of Little Inferno is undeniably there, I’d call it more of a friendly ribbing – and certainly not the reason for the game to exist – really just a lowly tool in service of a simpler, hopefully more heart-warming, less game-specific overall message. Hope that helps! Do you have more questions for Miss Nancy? Ask below in the comments!

Here are the five App Store screenshots – click for full resolution versions:

BREAKING WEATHER REPORT! Tomorrow Corporation has just learned that Little Inferno for iPad will be available beginning this Thursday, January 31. It will joyfully melt screens of all iPad versions from iPad2 and up. Up up up.

We’ve also been informed that Fire Safety Spokesperson and cartoon dog named Sparky is calling for Little Inferno to be removed from the eShop. Video games these days can be dangerous! But weirdly, when I think of Little Inferno and the ideas it tries to ignite, setting things on fire is never the first thing to pop into my head. (Warning spoilers!) Also kitties.

UPDATE 1: As with the Wii U and PC versions, the iPad version will also ship in English, Spanish, French, Dutch, and German. Updates for Brazilian Portuguese and Italian will be coming soon for all platforms. Thanks again to our volunteer translators!

UPDATE 2: There will be GameCenter achievements available for those that choose to connect to GameCenter.

UPDATE 3: Just like the other versions of the game, Little Inferno on iPad is still 100% free of in app purchases, ads, spam, etc. You’ll get Just The Game and nothing else!

Good news for cold fingers! The toasty little fire that started on Wii U and PC is flickering to life on iPad – and ready very soon.  Actual date forthcoming once we know for sure.

Meanwhile, Mac and Linux versions are also coming together nicely, in parallel. Thank you to everyone who has requested to be part of the beta. While we haven’t been able to respond to everyone, our unpaid interns have taken note of the emails and will follow up when we’re ready to launch a beta – and we have more than enough, so no more volunteering necessary!

The IGF Finalists were posted last week – and I suppose we’ve been kindof speechless about it until now – Little Inferno was recognized in 5 of the 7 categories, with three nominations including the Grand Prize, and two honorable mentions. After expecting a big fat zero for an admittedly strange and controversial game, we’re kindof astonished. So thanks judges, and congrats to all the other nominees – looks like we’ll see you at GDC in March!

A Christmas miracle! Against all expectations, Little Inferno, the weird-little-game-that-could, has been steadily moving up the American Wii U charts, up to slot #3 #2 as of today – just ahead of New Super Mario, amazingly. What’s up there anyway? We hope to find out…!

Nintendo Life has just posted some of our initial thoughts on Nintendo’s Wii U eShop, and you can read similar thoughts from other developers here. To summarize, though, indie developers have good things to say about the service, and (my favorite thing) the MiiVerse seems to be well loved. The new year should bring even more indie games, including Runner 2.