Gem Miner 2

Ever since humankind decided that a price tag could be placed on lumps of rock, we’ve dug deep and dug greedily.

Gem Miner 2 is a continuation of this very human desire to acquire shiny and lumpy inanimate objects. Your character risks life and limb to burrow into the earth, hoping that behind the next wall lies untold riches or a highly sought-after relic.

Taking its cue from the 8-bit classic Boulder Dash, Gem Miner 2 combines a simple premise with some surprisingly deep and engaging gameplay. Using your trusty pickaxe, you’re able to cut through the earth in your quest for saleable items - which include coal, iron, and gold - but caution is highly adviseable.

You’ll encounter dark and light rocks, the latter of which can prove deadly if you dig beneath them and fail to insert wooden supports. Digging down comes with its own dangers, as you only have a finite supply of ladders in your inventory. Hazards such as water, fire, and choking coal gas make your life even harder.

To round it all off, your actions are limited by a stamina gauge. Activities such as climbing ladders and smashing through soil reduce this gauge, and once it reaches zero you have no option but to wait for the rescue team to arrive.

You’re transported back to the surface in one piece, but all of the items you’ve collected are taken from you. Consuming sandwiches or resting helps to top-up your vitality, and prevent this from happening.

Gem Miner 2 is divided into two modes: Expedition and Freeplay. The former offers a series of missions, each of which has an objective.

During these missions you’re usually expected to find an object or collect a certain number of something, but you can also pick up items and sell them at the shop on the surface. Doing so grants funds which you can use to purchase more equipment, making your life a little easier below ground.

Freeplay offers the same gameplay, but instead of giving you defined goals it lets you dig to your heart’s content, uncovering valuable commodities and ancient relics as you go.

Gem Miner 2 is, as the title suggests, a sequel. Impressively, it manages to improve on the original game with sharper graphics, more complex gameplay, and a wider selection of modes. The combined challenge of Expedition and Freeplay will keep you glued to your phone for quite some time.

It’s not entirely perfect, though. The touchscreen control system can occasionally throw up some issues. To chop into a wall you simply have to push towards it, but this often leads to unintentional hacks when you’re in a hurry.

It’s possible to temporarily disable your pickaxe to allow for error-free movement, but the process is fiddly and slows the pace of the game down.

Despite this quirk, Gem Miner 2 remains a solid purchase for those of you who desire a spot of risk-filled action-adventure on your mobile phone. It fuses puzzle elements with resource-management and exploration, making for a unique experience that few other Android titles can boast.