The free iPhone game Trawler Report: Reverse Maze, Pogo Games, Feed Al

Greetings, one and all. We’re approaching that final push before we can all take a bit of a break from the troubles of work and concentrate on arguing with our families instead.

To get you through the clock-watching drag of pre-holiday existence, we’ve got a batch of fine free iPhone games for you. This week’s bunch should keep your minds nice and toastie even if the rest of you isn’t.

As always, we finish with our weekly Crap App pick, this time donated by our very own editor, Rob Hearn. I didn’t ask how he stumbled upon the execrable 101 Way To Say I Love You To Your Wife – suffice to say he got married earlier in the year.

‘Nuff said.

Reverse Maze
By Ironshod Games
Type Full

You know those physical maze games, where you have to guide a loop on a stick around a twisty wire that buzzes whenever you touch it? Imagine having to do that with your sense of direction flipped around entirely. That’s Reverse Maze for you. One of the most brain-meltingly fiendish concepts you’ll find on the App Store, it artfully throws together a bunch of neon-drenched obstacle courses which you must negotiate by sliding your finger around in reverse.

It’s a rather narrow premise, but it’s one that’s been executed with the utmost precision. In fact, about the only thing that’s out of place is the between-level score screen, which rather oddly seems to have been lifted straight from Flight Control.

Get Reverse Maze here.

Pogo Games
By EA
Type Full

EA’s popular free flash game website has finally come to iPhone in the shape of Pogo Games – a collection of five of the most popular games on the site. Each is a fun (if basic) casual experience, from the balloon popping of Poppit to the WordFu stylings of Word Whomp.

You can pay to upgrade to an ad-free version, although if you’re a Club Pogo subscriber you get to upgrade for free. It looks as if the Weekly Badge Challenge will eventually require payment, too.

It’s a shame that the online leaderboards are tied to Facebook (I speak as a non-FBer), but there’s more than enough free fun here to warrant a download.

Get Pogo Games here.

Steam Wars
By Illogika
Type Full

In my review of Steam Wars way back at the start of this year, I criticised the game for lacking variety in its single-player mode and multiplayer in its... well, it just lacked multiplayer.

Now that it’s free, it’s worth revisiting to focus on what it did right. It’s a good looking game, for a start, presenting a fine steam punk universe in which steam-powered robots do turn-based battle on tiny planetoids.

It plays pretty well, too – sort of like a slower, smaller-scale 3D Worms. As that suggests, Steam Wars isn’t as fun as Team17’s series, but it’s still well worth a shot.

Get Steam Wars here.

Pick of the week

Feed Al: A Finger Physics Odyssey
By Mobliss
Type Full

Finished Cut the Rope? Hankering for a similar fix of ball-dropping star-collecting physics gameplay? Feed Al isn’t quite as good as ZeptoLab’s game, but it’s an excellent way to cope with any withdrawal symptoms, and is a fine game in its own right.

Your Collector ball hangs suspended at the top of the screen, ready to be dropped. When it does, it behaves suspiciously like any other ball, bouncing and rolling realistically. More importantly, it’ll collect any stars that it touches along the way.

Your role is to move around the level furniture (smashing obstructing glass blocks, forming a ramp out of others) in order to ensure it collects as many stars as possible before it drops off the screen.

Feed Al is one of those games that pinches ideas from half a dozen other games – there’s a bit of Peggle here, a smidgen of Finger Physics there – but it manages to tie them all together very nicely indeed.

Get Feed Al: A Finger Physics Odyssey here.

Crap apps

101 Way To Say I Love You To Your Wife
By Mohamed Hegab
Type Full

It’s not that I disagree with the sentiment of 101 Way (sic) To Say I Love You To Your Wife (not when there’s a chance that Mrs Mundy might read this column). It’s just that its execution is so nauseatingly tacky and amateurish.

Laughing at iffy grammar is a bit of a cheap shot, but I had to stifle a chuckle when I read this app’s blurb: “How Many Times You felt love for your own wife.. but the words doesn't came out clearly .. we are here to prove that words not everything”

Thanks goodness for that, eh?

The app itself is a groansome list of ways to express your love for your other ‘alf, presented in the gaudiest way possible. From the tone of the “advice,” it’s probably been lifted from a self-help book or advice column of some kind – and seemingly one from the 1950s.

One of the “Ways” here actually advises you to leave a tip for “the lady who is there to wait on you 24/7” when you’ve finished dinner. No, really. I’ve taken a picture to prove it.