GAMES OF THE WEEK - The 5 best new games for iOS and Android - December 20th
Hello again and welcome back to our long-running GAMES OF THE WEEK series. If you're looking for the best 5 games which have hit the iPhone, iPad or Android stores this week then you've landed yourself at the exact right place at just the right time.
Here's where we discuss the best five games that have launched over the last week, across any of the aforementioned devices. 'But, wait a minute!' I hear you exclaim, 'There are loads of games out every week, you must have some restrictions!?'
You're right, we do. With this article, we pay no heed to the droves of subscription services (Apple Arcade, Google Play Pass, GameClub, Hatch, Playond et cetera) which have launched onto mobile platforms, and we also don't factor in things like Steam Link or Google Stadia which allow streaming to our handheld devices. That means that our list is a finely curated list of brilliant, fresh titles which you can download and play without subscribing to, or installing, any third-party initiative. Of course, there are some great games on those services, but, let's focus on the stuff you can grab right now.
This week we've got a really wide selection of games for you to rifle through, from an AI-powered adventure game through to a frantic swipe-powered brawler. It's a wild selection this week.
Remember, if you're looking to check through some of our previous selections then you can always do that at our Games of The Week Hub, it's a great way to find games to fill out that empty storage space on your phone. Or, if you like your news in bitesize chunks, delivered straight to your palm then maybe follow us on Twitter.
Anyway, without any further delay, click through on the big, blue button below to find out more about the 5 best new games for mobile this week.
1
Ladderhead - iOS (New) / Android (New)
Hello hello, what's all this then? Our first game in this week's selection is Ladderhead, it's a surreal dive into the adventure genre - complete with disruptive art and music. You take on the role of a man locked into a strange limbo state between time and space, a groundhog day which requires a set series of events in order to break its sequence.
Hello hello, what's all this then? Ladderhead is delightfully anti-convention, situations and scenarios are twisted and alien, and the off-kilter art style and sketchy, floaty music compliments the game's intention to keep you focused, but on edge.
Helllo hello, what's all this then? But it's really the core mechanic, the ability to force your own death and discard your own attempts in the chance of pushing forward. Your inventory persists throughout your endless lives - so grabbing something within your dying breath is something you'll do more often than you might initially think.
Ladderhead - Trailer from karolis dikcius on Vimeo.
Ladderhead is available now on iPhone and iPad via the App Store, you can also grab it on Google Play for Android.
2
AI Dungeon - iOS (New) / Android (New)
From a quirky game about ascending a building in a timeless limbo to a game about diving into a dungeon of (probably not, but it sounds good) endless possibilities. AI Dungeon is a text-based adventure game where the dungeon master isn't just a computer in a bad mood. No, instead it's an AI, or specifically an "extremely advanced artificial intelligence" which uses "a massive deep neural network." What does that really mean? It doesn't matter too much, but the gist of it is that it's smarter than your average AI and is willing to attempt to resolve almost every input you can think of.
If that sounds interesting, and you'd like to dive into a game then now's the best time to act on your impulses - it's free to download until the end of the year.
AI Dungeon is available now on iPhone and iPad via the App Store, you can also grab it on Google Play for Android.
3
Cats are Liquid - A Better Place - iOS (New) / Android (New)
I was quite surprised to see Cats are Liquid - A Better Place on this week's release list. I really enjoyed the original title in the series (Cats are Liquid - A Light in the Shadows) when I played its PC release back in 2015, and didn't realise that there was a sequel on the way.
Much like the first title, it revolves around a particularly fluid cat - more than the meme-reference of a name might infer - which can jet along by ducking, but also jump quite generously. You navigate the world using a combination of delicate timing and patience. When it boils down to it, it's a juicy platformer with some really fun art design and well-balanced puzzles - at least if it follows in the footsteps of the first - which give it a moreish pull that most platformers can't manage.
Despite my initial thoughts when I spotted it among the new releases, Cats are Liquid - A Better Place is free to play. I'm not 100% sure on the monetization but assume there is some because the game costs on PC.
Cats are Liquid - A Better Place is available now for iPhones and iPad via the App Store, and on Google Play for Android.
4
My Winter Album - iOS (New)
Did you play Vestigium when it released earlier in the year? Well, Tepes Ovidiu is back again with another puzzle game made in the code-free BuildBox engine, and this time it's incredibly festive. My Winter Album is all about rebuilding shattered Christmas memories. That might sound a little grim, it's not so bad, it instead revolves around reconstructing a sequence of dioramas by rotating them around the window.
It's a fun little perspective puzzler and it's incredibly time appropriate with its festive theme.
My Winter Album is available now for iPhone & iPad, via the App Store, as well as Android devices through Google Play.
5
Oddman - iOS (New) / Android (New)
I played Oddman earlier on in the year while at the Develop Conference down in Brighton. It was among the indie showcase, and while I can't remember who ended up taking away the prize (I believe it was the touch-typing RTS) Oddman has stuck with me since. I'm extremely glad it has finally released, as it turns out I've quite missed it.
Oddman is incredibly simple, it's a game of swiping or holding and dragging. Each level has you dropped on an island, other creatures are there too - sometimes there are objects and traps as well. You swipe to lunge at enemies or fling yourself into the air. You can swipe quick, you can swipe slow, you can swipe one-hundred times in a minute. There are no stamina bars, but your power reflects your input. It's incredibly fun, there's some levelling up progression based around power, health, special attacks and skins and it's just plain and simple fun.
Oddman is available now for iPhone and iPad via the App Store, you can also grab it on Google Play for Android.
