Arcane Tower

As the last part of a roguelike trilogy, Diego Cathalifaud's Arcane Tower will be familiar to anyone who's already suffered through Power Grounds and Amber Halls.

I say 'suffered' not because those games were bad, but because their defining attribute was an often frustrating level of difficulty.

Arcane Tower is no easier, but it is a little less frustrating than its forebears.

As with its two predecessors, Arcane Tower is all about inching across a series of simple grid-like dungeons. Success means getting to the exit with your limited lives intact against ever-worsening odds.

When you move a space by swiping in the relevant direction, your opponents move as well. These enemies can be spiders, goblin archers, bats, and various other fantasy-themed fiends.

Each has their own distinct move-set and attacking capabilities - but then, so do you. Indeed, it's in this field of defensive measures that Arcane Tower distinguishes itself from its predecessors.

Once again, you can pick up power-ups that have been randomly scattered throughout each level. These include the usual array of fireballs, lightning bolts, teleporters, shields, extra lives, and so on.

The key difference here is that, when you collect these power-ups, they get added to a limited inventory at the bottom of the screen, ready to be deployed when you see fit.

This simple touch takes a fair amount of frustration out of the game, though none of the difficulty. You'll still die loads, it's just that you'll often do so with the lingering impression that you could have delayed your demise by making better use of your armoury.

Death in those previous games often felt inevitable and arbitrary, so this is undoubtedly progress.

As a result, Arcane Tower is the best game in this punishing trilogy. It still lacks the fizz, pop, and impeccably condensed tactical scope of something like Hoplite or Lamp and Vamp, but it's a tight and challenging addition to the roguelike genre nonetheless.