This year has without a doubt been the year of the iPhone and more to the point, the year of the iPhone mobile game. The launch of the Apple (AAPL) iTunes App. Store earlier in the year unleashed a torrent of new games and iPhone applications onto the world. Although most of the early releases tended to be rehashed versions of existing game concepts, adapted for the iPhone experience, as 2008 progressed, our friends the game developers, have started to get to grips with the uniquely new technologies. Which have helped define the iPhone as THE mobile gaming experience to be reckoned with and hopefully with the game developers just getting warming up, who Knows what 2009 will bring!
Oh yeh! and you can make a phone call if you really want.
As the year draws to a close we asked our thumbthug.com mobile gamers to weigh in on what they felt were the best iPhone games of 2008.
10. Tap Tap Dance/Tap Tap Revenge Opinion was pretty much split were tapping was concerned. Both Tap Tap Dance which is a Dance Dance Revolution style game and Tap Tap Revenge which is basically Guitar Hero for the iPhone scored high this year both for playability and just shear down and dirty fun. But if we had to give it either way it would probably go to Tap Tap Revenge because, lets face it, more people want to be lead guitarist in a rock band than a backup dancer for Britney! The online element also helps to add depth to the gaming experience.
9. SimCity EA has done a great job in porting this game over to the iPhone maintaining all of it's engaging and addictive gameplay qualities. The downside is that there are still a few bugs in the system that need to be sorted but EA are working on them and have promised to have them resolved shortly. That said, SimCity may have scored higher this year if it were not for this.
8. Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart 3D Really not much to say about this game apart from it's just a fun driving game that uses the iPhone's accelerometer to steer. If you are a fan of games like Mario Karts on the Wii, you will be a fan of Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart 3D on the iPhone. Just don't try and walk down the street whilst playing it, lampposts are harder than they look.
7. Super Monkey Ball Another just down right fun game that makes great use of the iPhone's accelerometer technology and i would not have expected anything less from SEGA. Just watch-out for the motion sickness!
6. Bejeweled 2 This game seems to become everybody's favorite regardless of what platform it is thrown onto. It just goes to show that great gameplay out weighs great graphics every time.
5. Tetrus Classic, classic and again a CLASSIC!
4. Enigmo Voted "Best iPhone Game" at Apple's WWDC '08 this fun puzzle game also seems to be a favorite of the thumbthug.com crowd. If you are the shoot 'em up type cell phone gamer then this game is probably not for you but if you like a game that is fun, challenging and makes you think then you are an Enigmo!
3. Trism Another game to take full advantage of the iPhone's tilt and touch gameplay, Trism sits somewhere between Tetris and Bejeweled in the game style highraki. Yes Fun, Yes Addictive!
2. Topple If you love to stack you will love Topple, this very addictive "How high can you go?" game is both funny and fun at the same time. Drag, rotate and stack your blocks and when they fall, drag, rotate and stack some more. Oh, and it's FREE which might account for some of it's ranking.
1. Rolando Without a shadow of a double, Rolando is the Thumbthug.com Gamers iPhone game of 2008 and I mean overwhelmingly, we are talking "Obama-esc" landslide. And i have to say that we here in the thumbthug.com office tend to agree. This puzzle game utilizes all aspects of the iPhone's gaming technologies to great effect. Hats off to ngmoco, Inc for creating the iPhone game of 2008.