Just like the game it homages, Terror of Hemasaurus is loads of fun that only gets better the more players you add. Unfortunately, it can also be just as repetitive over longer sessions. It’s a great bit of stress relief, and the story is interesting enough to be worth paying attention to. The sheer level of chaos when you really start going to town is certainly something to behold, and there are some aspects that make me giggle no matter how many times I see them. It’s a worthy successor that all fans of Rampage should check out.

A couple of hours of fun with only coin-hunting to keep you busy afterwards isn't substantial enough. If you want Mario on your iPhone, Super Mario Run does its best to approximate the trappings. On the other hand, if you're looking for a top-shelf auto-runner to play, it's-a not him.

The graphics are cute and colorful, though unfortunately not enhanced for Retina Display devices, and I really like the assortment of animals that bring different elements to the gameplay.

Perfect Cell blends all these different elements together seamlessly, and creates an experience that feels like its own.

Rune Raiders is simple, but it isn't mindless. It packs several layers of strategy into a casual frame. More than that, it's rather charming, with characters and quips to make you smile.

It’s not quite enough to propel the game to the must-have status of some previous WarioWare titles, but there’s still plenty here to like.

It seems the developers set out to make a throwback to some of their favorite old-school platformers, with awesome graphics and solid controls, and at this they completely succeed with Paper Monsters.

An excellent port showcasing a psychedelic flair in its retro-visuals that seems to be quite prevalent in iOS arcade titles (and for good reason). Add in the quick pace, large number of levels and wide variety in difficulties, and you've got a great game worth checking out.

A great game to enjoy, with gorgeous visuals and a ton of really sharp physics puzzles to work through. I just wish I could have avoided the mind games that came along for the ride.

We were surprised to see a rather paltry list of added features in iBomber 2, appearing to be little more than a map expansion despite the addition of a few fun new weapons.

While Kaptain Brawe may not be the perfect intro to the genre due to its difficulty levels, it does offer an excellent story and clever writing that ought to draw longtime fans of adventure games into its clutches quickly.

The only thing that I didn't really like about McGuffin's Curse is, perhaps, the controls.

It starts off fairly slow but escalates quickly into a tactical nightmare, which is either a good or a bad thing depending on your view of puzzlers.

As a cohesive adventure, Prime World: Defenders is probably the most well-rounded tower defense game I’ve seen in awhile.

I'd love to see Duke Dashington expanded on from here, I think there's more that can be done with the concept in either new content or finding new ways to play that existing content. But for a mobile-friendly platformer, I sure had fun with Duke Dashington.

If you're the kind of person who is willing to make sacrifices for console-style gaming on mobile, and doesn't care if a game is a particularly good fit for mobile, then you'll enjoy Heroes and Castles 2. If you need something that can be enjoyed in short bursts or can be dropped at a moment's notice, if a lack of commitment is a feature not a bug for you, then I'd probably stay away from this.

Its various parts may not be terribly original, but the whole package together is a surprisingly great experience--especially for being free. I’d say that’s worth painting the town red over.

On the whole, I recommend Stagehand. The game is so well-made that it provides a ton of fun for those who enjoy chasing high scores. And if you like pay-once games with no distractions from the core experience, this is for you. But perhaps you're just used to the status quo of high score chasers now having loads of bells and whistles, or you need something deeper than just a high score chaser. This isn't the right game for everyone, but it is undeniably quality stuff, and could just hit the spot for you if you want a no-nonsense endless game.

It's just flat-out an exceptional game, even a dozen years after the fact. The control difficulties will make for some annoying miscues, but it's as good as you can expect for this type of game on a touch screen.

You can feel the passion for the classic games dripping from every pore, but you can also feel the budget crunch as the team tried to stay within their means. The world just isn’t as alive as some of the older games, but there are still plenty of joys to be had here with a fair bit less frustration to boot.

One thing that keeps the game from true greatness is that it gets very repetitive. This is particularly in the beginning where you only have one character and axe to throw and no sword yet. However, as you engage the match and level up (hard to do in the last-man standing mode) you will see additional perks and (sword or multiple axes) weapons available.

The characters make the game, and while the pacing is a bit up and down through the course of the story, the ending more than makes up for any bumps along the way. I’m less sold on the side-stories and exploratory bits, but the overall experience is one worth checking out.

It sounds cliched, but it's hard to believe I'm playing a game of this caliber on iOS. All too often we see games that sacrifice gameplay depth for visuals or vice versa. Other than a few minor glitches, Ravensword: Shadowlands is the real deal, and is an excellent open-world RPG with a decent story, ample content, deep character customization and beautiful visuals.

It's perhaps limited as it's focused toward amusement and tallying up the endings versus telling some kind of grand, cryptic story with it. But if goofy animations for solving cryptic puzzles sounds like fun to you, download this. You'll have a good time.

Deadcraft isn’t what I would call fancy dining, but it’s a lot better than it looks. It’s a solid survival-based action-RPG with a few unique elements that make it more engaging than the average entry in that category. It’s a shame it doesn’t have a catchier title or more striking visuals, because I can’t help but feel people are going to miss it with things being what they are. If you’re not totally sick of zombies or survival RPGs, make sure you give this one a shot.

Read Only Memories: NEURODIVER feels like a weird sequel in how it didn’t end up being what I hoped for, but still had me glad it exists and enjoying it more or less all the way. The music, art, and interactions elevate this to an essential for fans of 2064: Read Only Memories, but I still like the original game more.

General fans of the genre can find many better games to choose from simply due to how much of a sea change there has been since 2009 in this genre, and most of those choices are cheaper to boot. Those interested in playing a Rune Factory game would probably be better served checking out Rune Factory 4 Special or Rune Factory 5. That mainly leaves those who are interested in exploring the past, those who have devoured all of the other good farming games, and people with a lot of specific nostalgia for this entry. If you find yourself in one or more of those groups, then sure, you could do a lot worse than this.

Right now, there's a solid package of soccer gameplay, just one that could use a lot more tweaking and finalization, even though it's in general release.

With NBA 2K25, the Steam Deck now delivers a fantastic portable basketball experience at feature parity with PS5 and Xbox Series X. With a bit of tweaking, it looks and runs great, and I’m glad to see 2K finally bring all the features to PC after many years. If you own a Steam Deck and were hoping for a good experience with NBA 2K25, 2K and Visual Concepts have delivered. Just be aware of the microtransactions in some of the game modes though.

There's no shortage of puzzle games on the App Store, but I can say that Help me Fly is one of the truly worthwhile ones.

Instantion contains 50 levels, with each level taking at least a few minutes to figure out even if you're quite fast to pick up on things, making for a fairly meaty puzzler.

If you have an iPad, then you owe it to yourself to check out this arcade shooter.

If you have a couple of bucks to spare, Dungelot is the way to go. For those who have exhausted that game, or those who aren't keen to spend money, I can now at least say that Dungelot 2 is almost as good.

This feels like a game primed for time attacking, but there are no systems in place to support that kind of long-term mastery. At the very minimum, though, you'll get a couple of hours of fun out of it, and if you get into its meta-goals, you might find quite a bit more.

Feral Interactive have done a brilliant job here in bringing another true PC classic game to mobile devices. If you enjoy strategy games and don’t mind spending a bit of time adjusting to the interface, I can’t imagine anything better for you than Total War: MEDIEVAL II. I enjoyed my time with Total War: MEDIEVAL II on iPad a lot more than iPhone though. If I had a bigger screen on my iPhone, I might’ve enjoyed it more, but the iPad Pro version looks and feels amazing.

ATONE: Heart of the Elder Tree is if nothing else a unique experience, and it’s nice to see it make a relatively unscathed trip to the Switch.

I already thought Peglin was fantastic even in its early access state. While some balance issues hold it back a bit, it is an essential on Switch if “pachinko x roguelike" sounds good to you. I also love that the developers made full use of the Switch hardware features by adding good rumble, full touchscreen support, and button controls making it so that you can play however you want. Now we just need a physical release.

Stuttery control issues aside, Blazing Star features some of the most intricate shooter gameplay you can find in the vast pool of shmups available on the App Store.

This isn't called Virtual Boxing, or Street Boxer, or Extreme Boxing. It's called Real Boxing for a very good reason, and it lives up to its name impeccably well.

In its current state, Temtem is moving in the right direction and is absolutely worth your time on Switch as long as you’re ok with the online-only aspect of it. I still have issues with the lack of any sort of offline support for a portable system like Nintendo Switch, but the core gameplay loop and amount of content available with the 1.0 launch is well worth the asking price. The Switch port is also very good considering the hardware and how it runs on other platforms as well.

If you skipped the original Norn9 release, play that first for sure. If you liked it or end up liking it, Norn9: Last Era is essential for all it adds to the universe. It really pushes the envelope for a fandisk and feels like a blend of that and a sequel release thanks to everything included. On its own, it is hard to recommend Norn9: Last Era, but fans of the original will find a lot to love here.

If you're willing to overlook the fact that movement in the game can sometimes be genuinely frustrating, On The Wind is a pleasant way to wile away your time.

It's rare to find a game that embraces such an enjoyable mechanic.

As sad as it sounds, it's rare these days to find a free-to-play game that offers a good balance between actual gameplay and having to pay for extras via freemium elements. For the most part, Zombiewood does a great job hitting that balance.

Mimpi is adorable, the artwork is amazing, and the puzzles are both challenging and simply fun to play through. Silicon Jelly and Crescent Moon have a winner on their hands, and I highly recommend folks check it out.

Twisty Planets probably won’t be converting any non-fans to the genre, but for those that appreciate this brand of puzzle-platformer, it’s well worth playing. I’m a fan of the gravity mechanics, and there’re plenty of levels and enough of a difficulty curve to keep players busy for awhile. Veteran and newbie fans of the gameplay should simply check it out.

It may be be acting as a prelude to the bigger Hellraid game but The Escape holds its own very well and is highly recommended.

While there are some moments that frustrate or drag a little during its runtime, Smelter is quite impressive on the whole. It’s not difficult to spot its inspirations, but it does its own thing well enough that it avoids the pitfall of feeling like a lesser copy. Fans of 16-bit action games will definitely want to give it a look.

Even with its faults, it’s still a game that is worth checking out. The moment-to-moment action is a blast, and it’s hard not to appreciate its enthusiasm.

I’m genuinely surprised at the jump in production values and quality from the second game to OPUS: Echo of Starsong – Full Bloom Edition. If you enjoy memorable stories and great music, this is essential. Even with the few technical issues and downgrades compared to the PC version, OPUS: Echo of Starsong – Full Bloom Edition is superb on Switch and one of my favorite games on the system this year. OPUS: Echo of Starsong joins 13 Sentinels and Triangle Strategy as the top tier Switch games of 2022 and I hope it eventually makes the jump to iOS in the future alongside a nice Nintendo Switch physical release.

Fae Farm is a polished farming sim with a magical flavor that excels of the genre greats in many areas, but also one that falls short in some key ones. The repetitive dialogue and character designs right now are the big caveats. While the latter is subjective, Fae Farm can address the former and truly reach its full potential. I look forward to seeing how it evolves through patches and content updates, but right now Fae Farm is worth checking out if you’re a fan of the genre. It is like a magical remix of the greatest hits in the genre, but one that is chock full of things to do with its own charm.

Just like the classic games that inspired it, the gameplay in Monkey Labour is incredibly simple on the outside but contains subtle complexity and depth which is hard to master.

So there you have it. Impossible Road is an impossibly hard, impossibly addictive and impossibly impossible game.

There's so much that could have been amazing about Heroki. It just falls so short, and it genuinely makes me sad. It pains me for so many reasons to say bad things about Heroki because of what the game could potentially stand for. But as a game? It's just not great.

Really, Astra stands out among other orbital platformers for its unique art and great feel. But it is a trying game, and one that caused me to quit constantly and go play something else, to the point that it was difficult to proceed.

Convergence: A League of Legends Story is a game I definitely recommend on another platform. In its current state, the performance is a bit too variable for my liking on Switch. If it sees more optimization through updates, I’ll feel differently. Right now, it is an excellent platformer with polished gameplay and level design, but one held back by technical issues on Switch. I hope this does get fixed because the genre perfectly suits Nintendo’s hybrid system. This is definitely one of Riot Forge’s best releases so far, which makes the Switch version all the more disappointing.

If you were looking for a Professor Layton game, I regret to say you won't find anything like it here. If, however, you liked Ace Attorney and want something along similar lines, this is probably of interest to you. Be forewarned, it's not nearly as challenging, robust, or manically enjoyable as that series, but it serves the appetite well enough.

What keeps Baby Nom Nom from the reachable pinnacle it should strangle is the limited amount of levels. Even though I sped through the app, I will come back for seconds, thirds, and more.

Guerilla Bob does a great job raising the bar for how a top-down dual-stick shooter should be packaged.

The general course layouts may lose their shine after a while, but the core gameplay and fun tricks you can pull off with Ace Cards ensure that the moment-to-moment action rarely lets you down. As long as you’re fine with the heavy cost of failure, you’ll likely get hours upon hours of joy from this curse.

Folks that don't like tilt-based games may be turned off by Crazy Hedgy's control scheme, but I implore you to put those feelings aside and check this game out.

It's certainly one of the better virtual control schemes and you'll only occasionally find problems with it, especially when required to jump and attack, but overall, it retains the engaging gameplay from the original.

All told, Amateur Surgeon 3 is a fun game the first time around, hampered by an obtrusive and almost necessary freemium system.

Although a bit easy, Spyder is really fun to play. In my opinion, this is one of those games where the journey is more important than the destination. If you’re looking for a casual game that you can enjoy without any issues, Spyder is a great game to try on Apple Arcade.

Sometimes you need to punch something, and Unstoppable Fist is good for those times. Five or ten minutes of being down chickens and scorpions can cure any woe, especially if you let yourself sink into the absurdity of it all. But for longer-term excitement, you should probably look elsewhere. There's only so far a dude standing on a trashcan can go.

A challenging title, and it's one that requires players to commit to an unusual control scheme.

Liqua Pop's base gameplay is so solid and unique that, with just a few additions, it could be one of the premiere matching games around. As it is now, it's still a novel game with plenty of enjoyable points, and although it's missing some variety, I still think it's worth checking out.

I'm surprised by how much I dig the virtual controls; Halfbot and Vlambeer did a heck of a job translating the action to the touchscreen and then making it feel as natural, and as split-second responsive as the game's PC and Mac counterparts.

Rocking an excellent tone and a visual flair reminiscent of a new age 8-bit game. It's highly stylized and fitting, especially when you factor in the retro-infused music that plays over the action. It's good stuff.

Doraemon Story of Seasons: Friends of the Great Kingdom makes some improvements on the first game and tells a reasonably engaging story involving everyone’s favorite robot cat from the future. It does what you would expect a Story of Seasons game to do, but it doesn’t do a whole lot more than that. We’ve already seen the trick of adding Doraemon and his wacky inventions to this kind of game, so it feels less fresh this time around. At the same time, it doesn’t significantly mess anything up either. While it’s lacking somewhat in inspiration, farming fans who need a reliable fix will find enough to enjoy here.

The presentation is top notch, there's plenty of content and it's the closest racer to Wipeout that I've played on iOS so far, which is certainly not a bad thing. If fast and frenetic racing is for you, look no further.

Even with its minor faults, Ash is one of the better RPGs available in the App Store. It tells an engrossing story with characters that are full of personality and emotion. It's definitely not the most complex game when it comes to character progression, but the gameplay is fun and a nice change from some of the more convoluted RPGs out there.

While it looks old, and has virtual joysticks, Max Payne is every bit the great game it was 11 years ago. I wish Rockstar had put more love into the port, but for costing me 1/25th of the original game, I'll cut them some budgetary slack.

Minor issues aside, I had a ton of fun with Graveyard Shift.

Arachnadoodle is definitely a hidden gem on the App Store, combining many tried and true gameplay elements in to a very fun iPhone game that I highly recommend downloading.

Hungry Shark is a cute, fun, simple game that's pretty hard to put down.

Clearly a "must have" for nostalgia value.

If I had to come up with one negative about Cows vs Aliens, it would be that it's really just a one-trick pony.

Gobtron is one of those games that could be recommended just based on the weirdness factor alone, but it's also a unique take on a defense game and is really pretty fun anyway. It's a bit too short and light on content, but what's here is worth playing if you can deal with the low brow nature of the game.

Its biggest strength and weakness is in its diversity and although it'd be nice if it took a little more time with its more innovative mechanics, the fact most every level is wholly its own is a decent trade-off, even if it does feel like some great ideas get left behind.

Despite these shortcomings, and the fact that retro RPGs have been done to death, Dragon Fantasy offers a lighthearted and enjoyable take on the genre that practically everyone can enjoy.

The serialized story idea is tough to wrap your head around in a RPG and figuring out a way to balance gameplay with variety and story is going to be a serious challenge moving forward. If they can pull it off, Emissary of War could be something truly special.

Fling a Thing is a sharply put together a package, assembled with a care to simple refinement that we often see in the indie space.

Super Cyclone has some fun ideas, such as the star-gates and alien nests, which ensure the gameplay is more interesting than simply shooting enemies endlessly.

Even though Blockolicious ends up light on the content, it's still a decent little Match-3 game with enough interesting gameplay elements to stand on its own. The visuals, music and overall presentation also do a good job complementing the core gameplay and making the game stand out.

Whether the stars are right for Cthulhu Saves the World may depend on how much you love Lovecraft. If you're just looking for a good retro-RPG, you might want to wait for the patches before giving this one a try.

The main challenge with Ichi isn't so much solving a puzzle - with the tricks at your disposal, solving puzzles becomes largely trivial. The real difficulty comes in solving the puzzles in as few taps as possible.

While it doesn't exactly innovate on the genre, it's still something I find myself coming back to, forever intent on nudging my menagerie over the next performance plateau.

If you're in the market for a new platformer that puts a lot of effort towards replicating an old-school gameplay feel (in all regards) with new-school gameplay ideas, Brick Roll is an excellent game worth checking out.

If the onus is on the multiplayer to give Pocket Titans legs, it needs to be tweaked a little bit, but I think there's more than enough here already to satisfy.

Tit for tat, Spirit Stones isn't quite the same level of quality, but it's certainly good enough and different enough to merit trying out.

This is basically a straightforward shot of pure, distilled Great War Game campaign, served up fully at a more than reasonable price for the amount of enjoyment found within.

All in all, it's a very solid gamebook, and if you've enjoyed any of Tin Man's other conversions of Livingstone's work, it's a journey worth embarking on.

Grinding out coins and unlocking the crazy cast and cool arsenal is an okay way to pass the time, but there's still a certain bland taste to the whole affair that keeps Random Heroes 3 from being anything more exciting than that.

Even with its failings, I still think it's a good game that may not live up to the highest standards of Sid Meier's name, but certainly doesn't tarnish it.

Combining a respectful homage to its source material with a decent battle system and loads of unlockables, Final Fantasy: Record Keeper is the real deal in my book.

It's odd to say that a gorgeous game like Last Voyage can be shallow, but it kind of is, albeit in an interesting way.

As a premium game, Lumino City's price feels right on the mark. There's no boosts or IAP involved, you simply need to deduce your way to the game's conclusion. In that sense, it's a perfect pickup for old school adventure fans alike.