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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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Masterpiece Coloring (Free) by Simple Simple is a pixel perfect adult coloring book. If you've been wanting a creative new way to find your zen, and you appreciate pixel art, then this may be your perfect match.

The trend of adult coloring books seems to have died down a bit, at least from what I've noticed. They're still pretty popular among those who use them to relax, but I definitely don't see them mentioned as much anymore. Still, they're fun and tranquil ways to take your mind off of things for a bit. I fell in love with Pigment a few years ago, but I've always wondered — when can I just color in some pixel art? And now I got my wish with Masterpiece Coloring.

Free

Pigment – Adult Coloring Book

Pixite LLC

Masterpiece has a simple and clean interface that makes it easy to pick up, get some coloring in, and then get out. There's a brief intro that shows up on the first launch of the app, which explains the basics, but then it's out of the way and gone forever. Masterpiece has three sections in the app that are laid out in the bottom toolbar: Library, My Artwork, and Settings. No frills, no fuss to deal with. Just scroll through your selection of pixel drawings, find one you like, and just color. It's simple, fast, and incredibly responsive with no lag. The developers have done an excellent job making this one incredibly accessible for everyone.

The first step with Masterpiece is to find something to color in. The free download gets you some drawings for free, but you can also opt for the full collection of art with Masterpiece Premium, an in-app purchase subscription. It costs $2.99 per week, $7.99 per month, or $39.99 a year, and grants you access to all art for the duration of your subscription.

Once you find a drawing that piques your interest, just tap it to select it, and then you're in the Painting screen. Each drawing has a predetermined color palette, and you'll see all of the colors appropriately numbered at the bottom.

The colors are numbered because they go in certain places for the best result. To see what I mean, perform a multitouch pinching gesture to zoom in on the pixel art, and you'll find numbered boxes, which represent an individual pixel. The colors are labeled as such to show you where they go on the drawing.

You can tap each block to color the pixel individually, or touch-and-drag to paint in the color as you normally would. If you color out of the boundary, there's haptic feedback to let you know. At the bottom is an undo button, and you can also use the eraser to erase unwanted color. I love the haptic feedback, because otherwise I would not know that I strayed past the lines.

There's a nice variety of drawings in Masterpiece that range from simple ones with a few colors to more complex and intricate ones with many more hues to paint with. This means you can pick something up to keep yourself busy while waiting around in line or spend a few hours with, nitpicking over every last pixel. It's a good selection and offers something for all skill levels.

When you finish coloring a drawing, Masterpiece shows you a time lapse video of you painting it. It's fun and entertaining to watch, and you can save the video clip to your Camera Roll. You can also send it to Instagram or share it via the Share Sheet. If you choose to Edit again, you'll erase all the colors and start over. Any finished or in-progress drawings end up in the "My Artwork" section.

Masterpiece Coloring combines retro pixel art and adult coloring techniques into a true zen experience.

The Good

Masterpiece Coloring is a charming and unique adult coloring book that I find simple and intuitive. The app is simple, fast, and incredibly easy to use. The drawings are a nice variety of objects, and there's a nice range for colors to paint with. The celebratory animation when you're finished painting is cute, and the time lapse clips are entertaining.

The Bad

While Masterpiece Coloring is a great coloring app, it feels a bit restrictive with the predetermined color palettes for each drawing. I think there should be an option to have your own color palette if you want to truly get creative with things. Hopefully this can be considered in the future.

I'm also not a big fan of subscriptions for coloring apps, honestly, but the price seems fair if you get a lot of value from the app. Fortunately, Masterpiece comes with over 100 drawings for free, which should keep you busy for a while before you need to consider subbing.

Another note is the fact that the app is iPhone only, so you can't paint pixel perfect drawings on your iPad for now.

The verdict

I tend to get stressed out easily, so I'm always looking for new ways to help me relax. Masterpiece is helpful in doing that, and it's going in my repertoire of things to help me calm down. I love pixel art to begin with, so this coloring app is perfect for my needs. There's a lot of variety too, from simple drawings that only take minutes to more complex ones that require more time. The celebration animation and time lapse videos are also a nice touch, bringing a smile to my face each time. A stylus is recommended.

I just hope to see the option for custom color palettes in the future. An iPad version would also be perfect.

Masterpiece Coloring is available on the iPhone App Store for free. There are in-app purchases.

9.3

OVERALL

User Interface 10

Lasting appeal 9.5

iPhone Integration 9

Is engaging 9

Does it well 9

FREE

Masterpiece Color by Number

Simple Simple

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