Spider: The Secret of Bryce Manor
Tiger Style Games
US$2.99
Spider is a beautifully hand-drawn platform adventure game in which you play (you guessed it) a spider that has wandered into an abandoned mansion. The ensuing story unfolds as the spider wanders from room to room and discovers what happened to the Bryce family and why they are no longer in the house. Control of the game is all touch based, and players can jump around the distinctive-looking levels with simple gestures on the screen, catching insects to eat and spinning webs by simply "drawing" patterns with their finger. Unlike many of the games listed here, Spider moves at a far more relaxed and civilized pace, and it does so while moving towards a very satisfying conclusion.
One Man Left
US$0.99
Although it looks like a shooter, it's quite the opposite. Rather than blast the bad guys with your thumbs, in Tilt to Live you do exactly what the name implies; tilt the device to steer your ship away from the bad guy blobs. Pick-ups allow you to go on the offensive, unleashing freeze-rays and cluster missiles, but the core skill set here is akin to the Pacifist mode in Geometry Wars. It gets remarkably frenetic, and features online leaderboards with both Facebook and Twitter integration so you can get super-competitive with your friends.
Newtoy
US$0.99
The MacDaddy of online word games. Forget Scrabble, Newtoy's Words with Friends is the de facto, go-to asynchronous social word game for iPhone. Pretty much everyone plays it. So much so that it's a great ice-breaker when you meet someone for the first time and notice they have an iPhone. Conversations usually go something like this; "Hi, nice to meet you. You have an iPhone? Great! Do you play Words with Friends?" This is invariably followed by "Oh my god! I LOVE that game! Even my mom/aunt/grandma/dad/first girlfriend in college/dog/budgie/one-legged second cousin/congressman/priest plays it!" Believe us, it's the best.
