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Athenion might not have the pedigree of some other deck-building card games available for mobile, but that shouldn't put you off. This is a game that's packed full of bright ideas, fresh new gameplay modes and enough content that you can lose hours of your life to.

Battles take place on a 4×4 grid, and see you taking it in turns with your opponent to lay down cards. You draw up to five cards from your deck of forty at the start of every turn.

These are the units you're playing in the fight, and they range from hulking monsters to flighty fairies, from magical trees to fearsome undead dragons.

Your cards have arrows on them that you show you which direction they can attack. You'll also notice a bunch of other numbers on the cards. These let you know the hit points a card has, how powerful its attack is and how many soul points it grants you.

Those soul points let you attack your opponent and they're the key to victory. The first player to lose all of their own hit points is the loser.

There's a lot more going on than that though. For one thing you need to pick from one of six different factions before you even get to the fights.

These factions have different strengths and weaknesses and figuring out which of them best suits the way you want to play is the first step of a pretty long journey.

Different factions have different special moves as well. Some let you link together cards to make them more powerful, others are all about sacrificing weaker units to create pockets of dark magical energy. One lets you build giant rock walls that you can use to protect some of your units or power up others.

There are single-player challenges, regular events and much, much more as well. You're never short of something to do in Athenion, and the pace of the matches lets you get a lot of them in in a single setting.

The Good

There's a staggering amount of depth to Athenion. It's going to take you a good while to get to grips with the basics and once you've done that there are layers and layers to peel back. Every time you win you'll figure out a new strategy and every time you lose you'll be trying to find a way to right that wrong.

The game looks amazing too. The cards all sport a brilliant anime art-style and you'll want to collect all of them just so you can check them out. The speed of the fights is a massive plus too – they deliver huge chunks of tactical action in the sort of short-blast sessions that are perfect for mobile play.

On top of that there's a brilliant community to the game, and you never have to wait long to find an online battle. There are a number of different modes that let you practice with different decks, take part in intriguing events and fight it out in ranked and casual multiplayer matches.

The Bad

There's a pretty steep learning curve here, so if you're not in for the long haul then you might be better finding your card-based fun somewhere else. Even when you've got the basics down you've still got a lot to learn and it can be punishing to come up against an opponent who knows more than you do.

There are also a lot of currencies, crafting materials and other rewards to figure out. The game does tell you what they do, but the tutorials are pretty brief and you're left on your own for a lot of the time to try and get to the bottom of things.

Overall

Athenion might not be the easiest game to understand, but once things start clicking it becomes something really rather special. There are some brilliant ideas here and they're woven into a bright tapestry of gorgeous visuals and wonderfully paced mobile play.

It won't be to everyone's taste, and it's fair to say that some players are going to put it down before they've even got to the good bits, but this is one CCG that it's well worth sticking with.

8.2

OVERALL

Replayability 8.1

Game Controls 8.2

Graphics 8.7

Sound/Music 8.2

Gameplay 7.8

FREE

Athenion: Tactical CCG

ZERO-bit Company Limited

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AZ Rockets (Free) by Itatake is a challenging arcade game that tests your reflexive skills. If you enjoyed recent games like Lichtspeer and Highwind, then you'll like AZ Rockets in your collection.

Life has been fairly stressful for me lately, unfortunately. So whenever I have some downtime, I just want to sit down and relax with some games on my phone or tablet. As much as I like puzzle games, sometimes even those can stress me out a bit. When that happens, I turn to other games, such as arcade games, to take my mind off of my troubles. When I saw info on AZ Rockets hit my inbox, I was curious, since it seemed to combine words and arcade games into one. AZ Rockets is also built in the spirit of the developers previous title, 99 Rockets, so if you were a fan of that, then this game should appeal to you too.

Free

99 Rockets

Itatake AB

$1.99

Lichtspeer

Noodlecake Studios Inc

$0.99

Highwind

Selva Interactive Sociedad Anonima

Visually, AZ Rockets is beautifully simplistic. If you like minimally designed games, then AZ Rockets was made for you. The game features simple color backgrounds and straight or curvy white lines that contrast nicely with the backdrops. The shape of the rockets are distinctive, and there are nice particle effects going on when the rockets hit their target. The typography in AZ Rockets is easy-to-read, despite being a mix of script and sans-serif fonts. The colors for backgrounds are a fantastic mix of soft pastels and bold hues that don't overdo things. Animations are smooth and fluid with no lag on my iPhone 8 Plus. The ambient soundtrack is atmospheric, immersive, and rather soothing to listen to. Overall, AZ Rockets is a great minimalistic visual and audio package.

Even though AZ Rockets is an arcade style game, it's still level-based. Each stage gives players a limited number of rockets to start with, and they travel along the white lines on the screen. Letters, or groups of letters, are scattered about, and the goal is to hit each letter target with a rocket. They spell out words, which reveal themselves at the end, though it's not hard to figure out if you're a fast reader. However, you only have a limited amount of time for each level, and while you can get more rockets if you miss, you'll have to wait for them to cycle through, which means wasted time. AZ Rockets is about speed and precision — every rocket counts.

The controls in AZ Rockets are simple and intuitive. The rockets come in on the line automatically, with no effort from you. However, you need to fire them when they're at the right trajectory from the line to hit the targets, and this is done by tapping the screen. This is where geometry comes in, as you must tap at the right time for the rocket to be flung off of the line at the right angle to get the target. While it sounds easy, it's definitely challenging, especially on later levels with more curves and loops to worry about. While you do get more rockets if you miss, the clock doesn't stop and the other rockets must cycle through the track before coming back around.

If you played 99 Rockets before, then AZ Rockets should be instantly familiar to you. However, the difference is that while you have unlimited rockets here (99 Rockets only gave you, well, 99 rockets), you have to be quick on your toes because of the timer.

AZ Rockets is a free download, so anyone can get the game and play. However, it does have occasional ads, but you can get rid of them through a premium upgrade in-app purchase. This also gets you extra features, like more rocket shapes and starting from your last reached level instead of from the beginning.

You need to be quick and on-your-toes to hit all of your targets in AZ Rockets.

The Good

While AZ Rockets looks like a simple game on the surface, it's actually much more challenging than you'd ever think it was. The minimalistic aesthetic is pleasant on the eyes, and the sound design is delightful. The controls are simple and allow for the game to be played with one hand, but you do need to be on top of your aiming. This is definitely a challenge, and great for those who want a quick little game whenever they have a moment.

The Bad

As great as AZ Rockets is, I can see this getting a bit frustrating for some people. It's definitely not for those who are impatient, like to rush through things, and have bad aim when it comes to trajectories. I also feel that sometimes there just isn't enough time on some stages, making it feel almost impossible to beat since you're screwed over if you even miss just one target. This leads to frustration, as mentioned, which is never a good thing. i think that the difficulty level on some stages should be adjusted to be a bit more forgiving, but still keep the challenge in the game. You know, balancing tweaks.

The verdict

I'm always up for a challenge, so AZ Rockets is a gem in my mobile game collection. I enjoy the minimalism behind it all, and the music is great to listen to. Controls are simple enough for anyone to pick up and play, but this is truly a game that takes time and practice to fully master. I just hope to see some balancing tweaks made in the future so it's a bit less frustrating. Otherwise, this is a great little gem to test your skills.

AZ Rockets is available on the App Store as a universal download for your iPhone and iPad for free. There are in-app purchases.

8.7

OVERALL

Game Controls 9

Sound/Music 9

Gameplay 9

Replayability 8

Graphics 8.5

FREE

AZ Rockets

Itatake.com

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