I know what you're thinking: we've reviewed this before, back in the mists of time (2007), when QVGA was still a novelty and nHD was merely a gleam in OPK's eye. Yes, Micropool has been around the Symbian world forever, but it's still the game I install first on every single new smartphone and I still play it for 15 minutes a day. Every day. Making (gulp) 27,000 minutes of pool time since I first started playing the game. Oops.
.jpg){kind=icon}
Roller coasters and RC buggies are not a natural pair. However, the developers of Buggy Coaster have done just that. This 2D sideways scrolling game somewhat defies classification. Racing games usually require you to follow the path ahead, in this game you have to draw the track for yourself, while hitting bonuses and avoiding traps. It’s a unique formula, and requires fast reactions. Is it a good challenge, or just too fast?
If you're old school enough, just old enough, you may guess this game from the title. Being close, but not quite the same as 'Galaxian', the breakout arcade classic that followed on from Space Invaders back in the mists of time. At the time, a whole raft of arcade copies sprung up, all with slightly different names and slightly different gameplay, but the heritage was obvious. As it is here, with plenty of swooping alien spaceships to blast out of the sky in a blaze of colour and sound. And - what do you know - it runs on every Symbian device from the last four years and in fact plays better on the E71/E72/E6 than on the larger screened Symbian devices - who'd have thought it?
With stunningly clear animated graphics, Traintiles is an increasingly frantic 'arcade puzzler', seeing you rotating track segments in order to keep various trains running smoothly and headed towards their destinations. It's immaculately (and cutely) presented and just about the only negative I can throw at it is that the levels get very hard very quickly - if you have a quick enough mind and quicker fingers then Traintiles is a must-buy.
As games go, they don't come much simpler than this - Copter It 2! - part of the 'one button' genre where it's all in the timing of a single tap (or, at least, a tap and hold). As you might guess from the title and from the screenshots below, it's all about keeping a helicopter flying through a never-ending sequence of caverns and general obstacles. With average game time being around a minute, Copter It 2! is definitely in casual game territory, but there's something charming about a game that's this simple and yet this hard...
Pipe Mania was all the rage when I was young, with the player assembling randomly presented pieces of pipe into a plumbing layout through which water/goo can flow, all against the clock. The time pressure, and the way you never seemed to be given the corner piece you actually needed, combined to make Pipe Mania addictive and frustrating in equal measures. BR Pipes Qt Free is the latest implementation of the idea for Symbian and it's nicely done. And very, very hard. We're talking blood vessel popping hard.
.jpg ){kind=icon}
Whether you’re a wordsmith or bookworm, you’ve probably played Scrabble or one of its online alternatives. Symbian has not been supported by the likes of “Words with Friends” and WordFeud – until now. Thanks to Word Tiles Multiplayer, you can put your vocabulary and spelling to the test against your friends and anonymous Internet players. So if you know your triple word score from your double letter score then this is a game for you.
.jpg){kind=icon}
What’s cooler than low-temperature physics? Physics-based puzzle games on your smartphone of course! Think of games like Worms and Angry Birds – see what I mean? Yes, we all love physics simulations, even if we don’t realise it. Cut the Rope is another massively popular physics-based puzzle game where you have to swing candy on a rope into the waiting mouth of your pet monster. Read on to find out how well the game translates to Symbian from iOS and Android.
If you’re the sort who likes to sneak up on your enemies then a submarine simulator is probably the game for you. The Silent Hunter series of games has come to Symbian – in more of an arcade style than a simulator, but that doesn’t lessen the fun. This game lets you try your luck as a German U-Boat captain in World War 2, taking on the British fleet. You’ll have to be aware of the limitations of your boat and use all your cunning though.
Pitched as "Succeed as the ultimate sports-sheep! Run in the top leagues, earn prize money and buy your way into sheep boot camp", what we have here is a one-button casual game that impresses for its presentation, challenge and sense of fun. While commendable, all this isn't enough to raise Barnyard Dash into the top flight of Symbian gaming.
