This is a bad game. Do not play. You want more? Sigh. Fine. Doctor Who: An Unlikely Heist, which was renamed in an update to “Doctor Who: Hidden Mysteries” presumably because there was no unlikely heist in the game, is a hidden object game. I’ve no beef with hidden object games. They can be fun but they are very shallow, and usually, that’s fine. However, it’s not just a hidden object game because there’s a tenuous Doctor Who story here …
Kimono Cats is a very bad game. That’s it. That’s the post. Oh, you want a reason? Tch. Don’t you trust me? Ridiculous. Fine. Reasoning: You know those terrible mobile telephone games where you can only progress if you grind the same repetitive tasks over and over again, for no real reward, unless you pay for in-game currency with real-world money? Well, this is one of those games, only without any of the real-world money purchases, because it’s on Apple …
Squiggle Drop is a simple idea but done in such a way to make you feel monumentally stupid. The idea is that you draw a shape, which then (usually) drops down onto some objects and, hopefully, completes a task. So you might have a button that needs pressing, so you draw a brick and drop it on. Or there’s a chasm for a car to cross, so you draw a bridge. Things are somewhat more complicated when you need to …
Yes, it’s the same damn game as Zoo Keeper World and Simon’s Cat and Puppy Blast and 50% of the games on the App Store, but it’s polished and cute and as it’s on Apple Arcade has no IAPs or wait times or other nonsense that gets in the way of, you know, just matching three things and clearing the board of whatever it is that needs clearing. And sometimes, that’s all you want. Simple, pretty, puzzle fun.
The original Zookeeper was the subject of one of my very first posts on this here gaming diary over 16 years ago. Well, not quite the original game as that was a Japan-only GBA release called Zooo or something, but the DS version I played was pretty much the same game. Anyway, forward time on a bit and the world of match-3 puzzlers has changed a bit so you can’t just re-release Zookeeper and expect it to fit in. So …
I quite enjoyed the first game when I picked it up on the Switch cheap a while back, but never saw this sequel (or rather, second half of the story) appear on there. I noticed it was on Apple Arcade and so thought I’d play it there instead what with it being essentially free. Controlling it on a touch screen was actually more complex than perhaps it should have been, especially the zooming in and out which felt in inverse …
I’ve just got myself a new iPad so I’ve been flitting around some Apple Arcade games, and landed on this one. I’m not really sure what to make of it, because it’s a mostly-nothing game, and yet I got a bit sucked in. The aim is to create everything. Because, you know, you’re God and all. You do this by combining things you’ve already created. Many of these make sense, like fire and sand make glass, but a lot don’t …
I discovered that, since they added an Apple app to my TV, I could actually Airplay my iPhone screen on there, and with a PS4 controller connected via Bluetooth, I basically have another console. And then, Apple gave me another free month of Apple Arcade. And then, I spotted Nuts on there, when I was about to buy it for the Switch. So here we are. Nuts follows you, as a squirrel researcher, setting up cameras with which to watch …
At first glance this is a JRPG, but actually, it’s somewhat different. There’s a wrapper story (with really nice puppet stop motion animation cutscenes) about a brother who is writing a JRPG to entertain his sick little brother. The problem is, he doesn’t know how to code the AI, so he pretends to be the AI while his brother plays, and so, as him, you have to decide which enemies to have appear in the random battles. If you make …
I had no knowledge of what this game was going to be like, but from the screenshots I anticipated a narrative discovery game, hopefully with one or more toilets. Sadly, there were no toilets. But I was mostly right about the narrative discovery bit. Discoloured is a first person puzzle game, although the puzzles require discovery more than logic. You are transported to a 50s style diner, but everything is in black and white. By finding and activating red, green …
I was a big fan of Marble Blast Ultra on the Xbox 360, and this, apparently by the same team, coming to Apple Arcade was great… until I tried to play it and found it totally impossible to control with a touch screen. Then I realised I could use my 8bitdo controller with my iPad and, despite having to balance the system precariously on my lap, it actually worked well. Well enough to complete, even. So the game isn’t as …
What a lovely little game this turned out to be. It’s these tiny little Lego dioramas each with a little puzzle in – get you little lego boy to the other side of the screen, or make machinery do something, or build a thing in a certain way. It isn’t difficult, although one of the puzzles introduced a new gimmick which I completely missed so it stumped me for a while, but it’s clever and looks incredible and if you …
This was a very short Apple Arcade point and click adventure game from the makers of Machinarium. You have to complete little tasks for people, some of whom join you in your quest, and then when everyone is happy, you win. There’s not a lot more to say about it without spoiling anything, but it’s a nice little thing to play for the hour or so it lasts.
