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App Army Answers: What's your favourite underappreciated gem from App Store history?

The troops ponder upon which games you may have missed out on

App Army Answers: What's your favourite underappreciated gem from App Store history?
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iOS

Time moves fast on the App Store - forget to track the latest games one week and you may never find them again.

There are plenty of both free-to-play and premium games that have been largely forgotten, so this week on App Army Answers we're chucking some of our most beloved titles at you to raise their profiles.

Do let us know if any of these have taken your fancy, and please throw some more recommendations at us in the comments!

Danny: As a bit of a rhythm game nut, I wholeheartedly recommend Groove Coaster Zero. It's a free-to-play update of the original Groove Coaster, but with tons of base content and promotional songs.

Tunes range from in-house Taito techno to saccharin-sweet J-pop, and each track has its own distinct flavour. You only need to use one thumb to play - it's both deceptively simple and fiendishly moreish.

Kym: Personally, I love little puzzles games like Escape: The Room. I remember this one in particular being challenging, but not absurdly difficult as some puzzle games are.

It made me think outside the box. It's an easy game to pick up and put down when you've only got a few minutes to play, like during your lunch break!

Ben: Siralim is like the love child of Pokémon, Persona, and a roguelike. You travel around these really large randomly generated maps, completing quests and extracting "cores" from the demons you encounter.

When you have five of the same cores, you're able to summon that monster and it will follow behind your character wherever you go and fight for you. It's surprisingly really deep, with perks and stats to upgrade on both your character and your monsters.

It's very challenging and free up to the point your character reaches level 15. After you buy the full game you could play indefinitely - there's no level cap. Great RPG!

Conor: For something loaded with nostalgic vibes, I recommend Kayos. It's a rage-inducing modern day cube runner with fast paced gameplay and a fresh new soundtrack. chanandler: I'm still playing Puzzle Craft and Starbase Orion years after they launched. Puzzle Craft is good fun, with simple to pick up and play with building elements.

Starbase is a classic 4X space game, quite deep with great gameplay, but don't expect too much visually. This one is all about the strategy though and for that it can't be faulted.

Sjoerd: I highly recommend Principia. it's a sandbox game where you can create just about anything and everything.

Ever wanted to build a car that can walk, shoot and fly? Or want to create a minigame but don't know how to code? Then Principia is the game for you. It's takes a couple of hours before you know exactly what everything does, which adds to the challenge.

I've played it for over 100 hours now, and it's still my go-to iOS game. You can build your own creations or play other people's levels thanks to the engaged community they have too. If you check out the trailer, you'll see a couple of my creations - the elephant and the wooden mechanical walkers!

I also recommend Incredipede. It's a really cool and weird game where you can create weird-looking creatures to complete levels. The art-style is amazing, and the levels are challenging.

You can add limbs to an eyeball and add muscles to make everything move. It's a great game that deserves to be in the spotlights.

Quincy: I'll toss my hat into the ring with my all time favorite turn-based strategy game, Ravenmark. It has a great storyline, and has some of the most exciting and epic strategic battles on iOS.

I've played the The Banner Saga, a game that has been hyped up by everyone, and have not finished it to this day because the characters in it just didn't do anything for me.

Ravenmark's developer is a very small team from Singapore that put out a product that most major studios can't even compete with.They never really got the push they needed, and now I believe they've moved on to making a console game. It's one of the few premium games I'd recommend to everyone.

rncry: Hunters 2 is pretty great. It's essentially a Space Hulk game before Space Hulk was released on iOS, by the devs who later went on to make Warhammer Quest. Brad: Swordigo is a lost and criminally under-appreciated gem wrapped in clumsy, yet somehow lovable, PSone-era graphics. From the wonderful platforming and satisfying combat to the "Metroidvania" backtracking and great boss fights, it's right up my alley. Quite possibly my favourite iOS game. Tyler: My favourite under-appreciated game is Supershot Slowmo Shooter. This game is a superhot FPS where you control time. All you're equipped with is a pistol and the ability to slow-down time.

When you move, time moves. Supershot Slowmo Shooter is the only FPS on the App Store where you can watch bullets fly by your head, and at 99 cents the game's a steal if you ask me.

squarezero: Incoboto is not only an excellent puzzle platformer, and gorgeous to boot, but it's also one of the few iOS games to pull off pathos and humour at the same time.

Under the cute graphics there is a moving story about greed, loneliness, and the possibility of redemption. It was one my favourites games of the year on any platform and it saddens me to this day that it did not make any ripples in the general gaming community. Oh well!

JJE: The Spatials never got the attention it deserved. One part base builder, one part 4X space strategy, and one part RPG; it's as close to playing an episode of the original Star Trek as it gets.

There's a good number of planets to explore, which gives it a distinctly open-world feel. There's also a space station home base and facilities that you need to build and grow, crew members to hire, and unique skills to level up. When it first came out I couldn't put it down.

It's a gentle game with a modest story that crosses multiple genres elegantly. These reasons alone make The Spatials a hidden gem. It's a small piece of wonderfulness in a catalogue otherwise full of violence, greedy timers, and meaningless leaderboards.

Aces High: My choice has to go to id Software's on-rails shooter, RAGE HD. No, I haven't lost my mind. When John Carmack first boasted way back in early 2010 that he was going to bring console graphics to mobile, he really wasn't kidding.

When he delivered the RAGE universe to mobile as a rail shooter, many were perhaps understandably disappointed. Not me though. On-rails or otherwise, RAGE HD still delivers the App Store's most satisfying head-shots bar none, and nearly five years on, it remains one of the best looking games too.

It even has great motion controls. Seriously, I implore you to give this wonderful shooter a try. If you're usually anti-rail shooter though, just be sure someone is around to help lift your jaw off the floor.

Marko: If I had to choose one, it would be Ridiculous Fishing. It's a great time waster and you don't need to put much brain power into it. You can play it for less than a minute, or for hours on end (as I did). Kainen: Happy Street is a town-building game that I used to play so much that I had to delete it. It's full of minigames and puzzles to solve. The game starts small, but as you build up your town you soon find yourself with a vibrant, living town filled with funny characters. Even though it's free-to-play I never paid for anything and had hours of fun. I warn you though - it's very addictive! Muneeb: My favourite game that didn't get much attention was Sir Benfro's Brilliant Balloon. In the game you have a balloon and you have to catch fireflies to keep on floating. The game is short, and not very challenging, but it has a beautiful atmospheric quality to it thanks to its environments and music. curtneedsaride: Crimson Gem Saga is a beautifully drawn RPG originally made for PSP. It featured turn-based battles and exploration like the Final Fantasy games, but it's much better looking in my opinion.

I think the voice acting is decent and the soundtrack is great too. It really fed that adventuring hunger I have. Maybe I'll play it again one day! The sad news is that it currently doesn't work on iOS 8 and hasn't worked properly since iOS 5 or 6.

Alex_Gol: Little Inferno is an atypical sandbox set in fireplace where you burn all sorts of strange stuff and see how it reacts to fire. The game has a zen-like quality to it, where you don't need to strain yourself too much to move forward.

The combo mechanic brings some puzzle elements into the game - you guess what a combo name refers to and choose the appropriate items to burn. It's a great modern day satire on video game addiction as well as a great time-waster with a succinct background plot. Truly a hidden gem on mobile.

The App Army have spoken! If you'd like to sign up, please have a gander at our App Army application article. What's your favourite underappreciated gem from App Store history? Let us know in the comments below!
Danny Russell
Danny Russell
After spending years in Japan collecting game developers' business cards, Danny has returned to the UK to breed Pokemon. He spends his time championing elusive region-exclusive games while shaking his fist at the whole region-locking thing.