Free iPhone games are good. Free iPhone games that are worth playing are much, much better. Rooting out the worthwhile free-to-play iPhone games on the busy app market can be a heck of a chore, but the search is far easier when you have some good recommendations behind you. Here’s part one of our guide to the best free iPhone games according to genre: Arcade/Action, Role-Playing, and Board/Card Games.
TOP 5 FREE IPHONE ARCADE/ACTION GAMES
Paper Toss — Tossing wads of paper into a garbage bin is one of those little rites of passage that comes with working in an office environment. It’s also fun for inexplicable reasons, and so is this popular digital version of the national sport of the office gopher. Electric fans make your shots a little more challenging, as does the background verbal abuse from your cubicle neighbors.
Assassin’s Creed: Altair’s Chronicles Free — A lite version of Assassin’s Creed: Altair’s Chronicles, which is a beefed up port of a Nintendo DS game. All the stealth, sneaking, and quiet killing of the original game made it into the iPhone adaptation, and then some. Even the free version of the game has enough substance to keep you busy for a long time.
Trace — An iPhone classic that was built around the device’s touch screen. Draw and erase platforms with your finger to help guide a little stick dude around and over obstacles.
Dropship — Dropship, a futuristic shooter game with vector graphics, is one of the App Store’s best free titles. You search for stranded friends while battling the deadly pull of gravity and dodging enemy fire. A virtual space captain’s work is never done.
Dactyl — Dactyl does not involve the breeding and fighting of pterodactyls, but don’t be too disappointed: the reality is certainly a fun game in itself. Dactyl is a frantic bomb-diffusing game that works a bit like a Whack-a-Mole machine that’s been cranked up to 11 and infused with a lot of coffee.
TOP 5 FREE IPHONE ADVENTURE/RPG GAMES
iMobsters — You probably know how the online mobster scene works by now (and rest assured, your mother is ashamed of you). iMobster is an online mob-building game that sets you to raising a “family” of your own, whom you use to expand your influence and take down rival dons. It’s fun, it’s detailed, and it’s free.
Perilar Lite — Perilar Lite recalls the oldest days of the classic Ultima RPG franchise, when men were men, and women were pixelated. You begin by creating your own hero, who fights turn-based battles on a quest to save the world. The Lite version of the game caps you at level 10.
Parallel Kingdom — Parallel Kingdom utilizes the GPS on your iPhone to turn your ho-hum neighborhood into a kingdom boiling with conflict. You play in real time, and can engage your neighbors as enemies, or live peacefully. If the guy next door has been pitching cigarette butts on your lawn, this is probably a good time to get even.
Zenonia Lite — Zenonia is an action-RPG that is a must-get for fans of The Legend of Zelda or Ragnarok Online. You explore a top-down world bustling with colorful enemies, collect tons of items, and build up your skills according to a skill tree. There’s lots to see and do.
Nethack — If you feel like role-playing games have been coddling you, spend a few hours with Nethack–provided you can live that long. This classic roguelike RPG features a full-fledged set of graphics, but if you want to revert to ASCII cockatrice attacks, that’s an option too.
TOP 5 FREE IPHONE CARD/BOARD GAMES
Sol Free Solitaire — Seven free solitaire games in one easy app. If you feel like getting away from it all, go to some high, lonely place and indulge in the most popular Solitaire app that’s up for grabs at the Store.
3D Checkers — It’s hard to mess up checkers, but 3D Checkers does the classic board game a lot of good with a 3D perspective, board art, and customizable themes. You can play against the AI, or human-versus-human on the same device, or peer-to-peer via Bluetooth.
Push Cars — Push eco-friendly electric cars around the “board” to get them out of the city, and punish the gas-gulpers by making them crash. Think of it as an environmental message delivered by God.
Poker by Zynga — Zynga still has a lock on the online pretend-Texas HoldEmPoker market, and Poker by Zynga is honestly still one of the best offerings in the genre. More than six million players log in to the game every day, so you’ll never be hanging for competition.
Card Ace: Blackjack — With Card Ace: Blackjack you can satisfy the itch to play 21 with your pals, or with a stranger. The game’s interface is intuitive, and there’s even a text chat that you can use to pour out swear words when you inevitably go over 22.