Crazy Monkey Spin (iPhone)

Delivering on two of gaming’s favourite things - collecting stuff and monkeys - Digital Chocolate’s latest iPhone effort, Crazy Monkey Spin, is about as much fun as you can get for 59p/99c.

You play a little monkey who has to save countless trapped members of his extended family (apparently inter-species coupling is fine and dandy in the world of Crazy Monkey Spin) from the evil caretaker who’s hijacked the zoo.

To save the animals, you have to swing between pegs until you reach their cages. You do this by swiping in the direction of the next peg, timing your swipe with the monkey’s swing momentum to achieve the right distance.

Of course, no game with monkeys in it would be complete without bananas, and Crazy Monkey Spin has thousands of them. They serve as the game’s currency, and if you collect enough you can purchase special hats that grant new abilities such as being able to float, stick to walls, and change direction mid-leap.

The game’s cartoon visuals, though attractive, occasionally stutter and the music is repetitive and annoying. Luckily these niggles don’t affect how the game plays and there's the option to import songs from your iPhone’s music library if the music gets too much.

It’s great fun, if slightly by-the-numbers, and the extra modes - Quick Play and Balance - are excellent additions to the Story mode. There are achievements to be unlocked for various feats, which you can view from the menu screen.

It’s all dependably well-rounded in the way that Digital Chocolate games tend to be, spreading an entertaining play mechanic across a generous lot of increasingly varied levels. It’s not going to redefine iPhone gaming, but it does Digital Chocolate justice.