Home screen replacements are a dime a dozen in the Play Store and more keep getting added all the time. The kings of the launcher scene have been ADW Launcher EX, Apex, Nova and GO Launcher. We know many of you have tried all of those. There was one that was released a while back called SPB Shell 3D. It was highly anticipated, but seemed to fail on multiple levels for many people. Especially in the price tag department.
Now it appears that the GO Launcher Dev Team is on a similar path with the recent release of their latest home replacement launcher project called Next Launcher. The new launcher does add in quite a few new fantastic looking 3D effects alongside a wide variety of customization. Next is all about flare and eye-candy really. Making your home screens and navigation fluid and visually appealing. You really need to watch the video to get a good grasp on how it looks and works.
It sure is flashy. It seems to have quite a few things that look to have some great potential. The 3D screen preview is very reminiscent of SPB Shell 3D, but with more functionality Instead of auto sorting apps this is just a clever and visually stimulating way to preview all your screens. The multiple select ability looks pretty nice as well. I know there have been plenty of times where I have wanted to clear off a series of apps from the home screen or grab multiple ones for a folder. It offers up some of its own custom widgets as well. Something that we all love, but hate to see locked into a launcher and not cross compatible. For instance the Switch Widget. It is a free widget that can be used with Next Launcher that allows you to create toggles, or switches, on your home screen. You saw that in the video above. Seems nice, but again, is it something we really need?
For now all I can personally do is look at the images and the video and see that there is potential for it to be great. It is so different that I am not sure I am prepared to take the time it would need for me to learn a whole new launcher set up and style though, especially at the launch price tag of $15.99. That ranks it up there with the likes of TSF Shell ($16.81) and SPB Shell 3D ($14.95). Neither of which persuaded me into spending that kind of money on a launcher. We applaud the GO Launcher Dev Team for their work on the launcher, it does look pretty slick and is no doubt worth the price tag they launched it at. Anyone out there interested in picking this up? If you do spend the money to snag it, be sure to let us know how it works out for you.
