Best new mobile games on iOS and Android – August 2022 round-up

metro.co.uk:

August has turned out to be the best month for smartphone games in a long time, with not a single dud and a rare 10/10 score.

Adrift in the traditional summer games drought, this month has seen a bizarre and wholly unexpected tidal wave of excellence arrive on mobile. From the ecstasy of finally being able to play Into The Breach on an iPad, or Papers, Please on a phone, this month also sees the arrival of the superb Dicey Dungeons and a console-perfect port of Descenders’ unique flavour of mountain biking mayhem.

iOS via Apple Arcade (Ironhide)

Originally released in 2018 as a free-to-play game, this is the re-balanced microtransaction-free version of Legend Of Kingdom Rush: Vengeance for Apple Arcade.

As ever, it’s an action-packed Tower Defense game that has you building and upgrading turrets, while guiding a hero and troop reinforcements to where they’re needed on the map. Although some of its tower types never manage to feel essential, that doesn’t spoil the fun.

Heroes now unlock as you progress rather than you having to pay for them, but other than that it’s the same game, and remains just as polished and addictive as other entries in the Kingdom Rush series.

Score: 8/10

iOS & Android, £4.49 (Lucas Pope)

Originally released for iPad in 2017, Papers, Please brought its unusual brand of high speed border guarding bureaucracy to tablets, but this month is the first time you’ll be able to play it on a phone.

With a lightly redesigned interface, to make it playable on an even smaller screen, no compromises have been made with either its content or timing, retaining its immaculately judged dance between doing your job and what’s morally right, just as it did in 2013 when it arrived on PC.

Q