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GamerBlipsApple’s iPhone and iPod Touch have no tactile buttons at all for gaming. But it doesn't matter. The ‘prod mechanic’ is ideal for a platform sometimes problematic when it comes to precision controls and the simplistic, single finger approach has given us a whole bunch of addictive, immediate, accessible games. Here are 10 of the best.
Canabalt
The Flash sensation makes a flawless leap to Apple devices. Stab the screen and your running guy soars through the air. If your timing’s off, he soars straight into a wall or falls to his death. With distant ‘creatures’ laying waste to the city and a gritty dystopian feel, Canabalt offers more atmosphere than most one-button games; great attention to detail (crumbling buildings; birds scarpering when disturbed; pieces of machinery abruptly falling from the sky) helps the game justify is slightly ambitious price-point.
Mr AahH!!
This vaguely bonkers game from PONOS resembles Capcom’s 1987 arcade classic Bionic Commando stripped of everything bar the fun bit: swinging Spider-Man-style from platform to platform. As your guy flies through the air, tap the screen and he lets go of the rope, aiming to land at the centre of the next tower. Over time, wind and gravity up the challenge and towers become absurdly slim. Miss a tower and your chap emits a chilling ‘aaaahhhhh’ as he plunges to his grisly off-screen doom. Three screams and it’s all over (after which point you’ll have ‘just one more go’—about fifty times).
Orbital
Using Geometry Wars-style graphics that make anyone with a soul go “ooooooh”, this precision shooter is all about timing. Your gun automatically swings back and forth and a tap flings a ball into space. Once it stops, the ball expands until it hits an obstacle. To remove a ball from the playfield, you must hit it three times with other balls (which, in turn, each need hitting three times). Have a ball return over the wonderfully named ‘death line’ and it’s game over. A ‘gravity mode’ with balls acting like planets adds to the fun.
Kamikaze Robots
In a future that’s decidedly cartoon-like and polished, rather than grim and dystopian, goofy low-tech robots feel out of place. Naturally, the only way for such robots to gain kudos is to hurl themselves down steep hills, performing spins and jumps, aiming to beat opponents and not explode before the bizarre race’s finish line. Controls are simple: touch the screen to spin your metal pal anti-clockwise, aiming to ensure its feet (rather than another body part) hit the slope. Graphics and sound are ace, and although the game’s momentum is knocked slightly by annoyingly regular loading it’s still a one-touch classic.
Star Trigon
Namco’s little-known arcade game is perfectly suited to Apple handhelds. Your character spins around planets and prodding the screen launches him into space, hopefully at another planet rather than into the inky blackness (or, as this game would have it, ‘funky Japanese Manga-style outer space of cartoon death’). The point of the game is in your launches forming triangles to snare aimlessly drifting Uchujin and grab power-ups before your air runs out. It’s all very jolly, if frustratingly difficult during later levels, and also highlights how single-prod games can have fairly complex mechanics under the hood.
