The free iPhone game Trawler Report: Real Racing GTI revs its engine while Hybrid: Eternal Whisper and Magical Tower Defense supply the geek points

Halloween is nearly upon us, but it doesn’t yet seem to have sparked-off that many themed games. Sure, if you plumb the depths of the Entertainment section you’ll find a few supposedly scary soundboards and the like, but it’s hardly the sort of thing us refined iDevice types deign to spend our precious time on.

However, we’ve still got high hopes that next weekend will bring some spooky seasonal discounts to a number of titles that can vaguely be tagged with the ‘scary’ descriptor, so be sure to keep your eyes peeled on Pocket Gamer come Friday afternoon.

Sadly, since the convention of super-peggling - the art of tactically timed freebie price drops - dictates that you can only make your games free for a few days, you may well have missed out if you wait for the next Trawler report. Still, you can be sure we’ll have yet another batch of freebies next week too, just like the batch you’ll find below.

The best free iPhone games on the App Store

Hybrid: Eternal Whisper Lite
By Gamevil
What is it? It’s an action RPG
Type Demo

Gamevil’s probably best known for bringing one of the iPhone’s premier role-playing games, Zenonia, to iPhone, but they’ve been busy since. Hybrid: Eternal Whisper is another roleplaying game from Gamevil, but it’s more about action than fetching item X for character Y.

The Lite version features a sample of the rapid-fire battling that the full version’s infested with, and lets you upgrade your character’s skills - demonstrating Hybrid: Eternal Whisper’s RPG chops.

Zenonia’s probably still our favourite Gamevil export, but if you’re more a fan of action than Zelda-style storylines, check out Hybrid: Eternal Whisper.

Magical Tower Defense
By Valueware
What is it? It’s, errr, magical tower defence
Type Demo

Yes, you may groan, but it’s been ages since we’ve featured a tower defence game on the Trawler Report, so we thought we’d treat you to another one.

It’s fairly standard fare for the genre - you place ‘towers’ along a pre-determined path and hope for the best as a trail of invading enemies trundles past. The towers in question this time are magicians of various types, some powerful, some cheap and so on.

Magical Tower Defense is cuter than the average, though, sporting some cute cartoon visuals. As with most tower defence freebies, you’ll easily be able to while away an hour or so on Magical Tower Defense.

Super KO Boxing 2
By Glu
What is it? It’s a great cartoon boxing game
Type Demo

Boxing’s one of those genres that you have to do well. There may not be masses of them on the market, but there are probably fewer gamers willing to lay out the cash for a boxing game than a footie one.

Thankfully, Super KO Boxing 2’s good enough to rope in even non-Boxing fans.

It’s an over-the-top cartoon brawler where you view the action from behind the head of your boxer. With a great, bold visual style, Super KO Boxing 2 injects each of its characters with a hefty prescription of style.

The Lite version lets you don your gloves against three opponents from the full 12 to become the champion of Weenieville - the full version’s first chapter.

The Deep Pinball Free
By Gameprom
What is it? It’s Pinball in the briny deep
Type Demo

Many moons ago, the predecessor to The Deep - Wild West Pinball - featured on the Trawler Report when it was made a freebie to prepare for its successor’s emergence from the deep.

These days, Gameprom’s a little more App Store savvy, and has prepared a pair of Lite versions of its two pinball games rather than giving away either for free.

Still, they both offer some of the most convincing pinball action available on the App Store. To put it simply, playing them feels just like playing the real thing. Yes, that does mean The Deep Pinball and Wild West Pinball can be a little bit frustrating.

You only get one ball to do your worst, and there are no online high score tables to let you show off to the rest of the world, but The Deep Pinball Free is still a great way to get those fingers trained up for the real thing.

Pick of the Week

Real Racing GTI
By Firemint
What is it? It’s a Volkswagen-sponsored version of Real Racing
Type Full... Demo... both!

For our money, Real Racing’s still the best realistic racer available on iPhone. However, it’s also one of the only games not to succumb to the tendency to aggressively price drop whenever sales start to slow down.

Granted, it’s not £5.99 any more, but if you’re used to splashing out on 59p titles, Real Racing’s still a bit of a leap.

However, you can now get a taste of this great racer for free, because there’s now an ad-funded version of it. Volkwagen has done the honours, showing off a handful of its new GTI models in Real Racing GTI.

It includes five cars and three different types of race to check out. Real Racing’s great. Get convinced.

Crap Apps Box of Shame award

Dance Cat Piano Lite
By Creation
What is it? It’s cat screams over a backing track
Type Demo

Do you like the sound a cat makes when you unwittingly step on it? Or the mewling cry it emits when it wants something?

If the answer to either of these is 'yes', then maybe Dance Cat Piano deserves a place on your Home screen, but if you’re not a fan of attention-seeking shrill discordance, you really need to stay away from Dance Cat Piano.

It gives you a touchscreen piano, each key setting off a feline cry we wouldn’t recommend listening to with a cranked pair of earphones. You can even add a backing track to offset your wails. Despite trying for some time, we couldn’t get anything approaching a tune out of this crap app. Or maybe I’m just not enough of a cat person