6 brain-testing iOS games
Give your mind a workout with these IQ-stretching apps
Sometimes it’s nice to wake yourself up on the commute to work with a nice little brainteaser. Be warned, though – these particular iOS games are not easy, but if you relish the idea of having something to challenge you on your phone, then step right in.
The ultimate in brain-testing games, Human Resource Machine ($4.99, Universal) attempts to make programming fun and accessible. If you’re not a huge fan of logic, steer well clear – but if you’ve always wanted to try the terrifying art of learning how a computer thinks, then this will really test you. There’s a mysterious, slightly creepy overarching story about the apocalypse, too. What more could you want?
Threes! (Free/$2.99, Universal) can be played one-handed, as there is only one thing you can do: swipe. Threes! tasks you with one goal, which is to make bigger numbers. You do that by swiping matching numbers into each other (they giggle every time), making them bigger. You carry on, at least until you run out of matches and the game totals up your high score. Then, you play again. And again. You’ll never be done with Threes!, and you’ll never be satisfied with your high score. In a good way.
The Room (Free, iPhone; 99¢, iPad) is more narratively-driven than most other puzzle games, although it might take a while to figure out what the narrative is. The Room is a bit like a video game version of a Japanese puzzle box, as you twist and turn and walk around a confusing yet beautiful cabinet, poking and prodding until you find a secret compartment containing a key that hopefully opens up another secret compartment. It’s also absolutely beautiful.
Some of the best puzzles are the most simple. You can play them over and over, chasing a high score or next level, and never worry that you don’t understand what’s going on. With Hundreds ($2.99, Universal), you tap gray circles until they total 100. If they touch when they are red, you die. It’s a game of fast-paced tapping and adrenalin as you try to avoid the various traps and other floating circles that mean your doom.
It’s really satisfying to swipe a touchscreen and see it transferred into digital calligraphy, and Blek ($2.99, Universal) plays on that – create a gesture, like an arced line, and the game automates that gesture over and over. The goal is to touch all the blue dots, but not the black ones – your gestures have to be perfect to get each level right. But watching your gesture repeat without you means letting go of a certain amount of control - can you do that?
Probably the most cuddly game on this list, Alphabear (Free, Universal) is for word-lovers. Letters appear on a grid, and you select them one-by-one to create words. Longer words mean more points, words with rare letters in – like Scrabble – are worth more. And there’s the sweet little addition of the titular bears. After each level, they’ll say a prewritten sentence like “Life is better when you have ____” where the blank is filled in with a word you’ve played that round. Hilarity ensues.