BEST NEW APPS 2018 UPDATE
BEST NEW APPS 2018 ANDROID
BEST NEW APPS 2018 DOWNLOAD

First, they made One Deck Dungeon following a successful Kickstarter in which they hit their time estimate goals with impressive accuracy. We swear this isn’t going to be a placeholder for “developer who made our favorite game of the year” (whoops, spoiler), but Handelabra gets the call here anyway, as Czech Games Edition did last year. Honorable Mention: Istanbul, Onitama, Hardback This is a great combination that leads to async games finishing in unexpectedly quick times, without sacrificing anything from the really fun underlying game. And, better yet, you won’t have to open the app all that often compared to other games. Anytime you open up an async game of Isle of Skye you are going to have to make some important decisions. Isle of Skye avoids the problem altogether by having relatively few actions required by players and making each action have meaningful depth. Some get away with it by having a lightning fast server connection and game loading time (see Race for the Galaxy) while others, quite frankly, don’t get away with it at all (see Stockpile). Many games have way too many interactions needed during a game. Isle of Skye is one of the best asynchronous games out there because the game is suited perfectly for the format. We all make mistakes, it happens, we’re just glad Digidiced took the time to fix them, kudos to them for that. Some early bugs really got in the way of the game, but thankfully Digidiced did an amazing job of fixing those issues and the game, as it currently stands, is a very good port. If you read our initial review, do yourself a favor and read it again now. Isle of Skye had kind of a rough start in app form. Honorable Mention: One Deck Dungeon, Morels Clever wraps tough decisions in an ingenious game, and can be played in just a few minutes, you will be glued to your device trying to get a better high score. Clever is a point-chaser’s dream come true as you can, and likely will, spend dozens and dozens of plays trying to beat your high score.

BEST NEW APPS 2018 DOWNLOAD

What a disappointment that I didn’t download it sooner. People posting screenshots of high scores and some weird stuff about foxes. Over the next few days, however, that darn Twitter feed kept having mentions of Clever pop up.

BEST NEW APPS 2018 UPDATE

Sure, we update our comprehensive database with links, but I was deep in playing another game for review at the time so I didn’t purchase Clever immediately. I was so out of the loop that Clever didn’t even register with me when the app was released. However, if my Twitter feed is to be believed, roll-and-write games are having a bit of a moment in the board game world. I get whiffs of the latest hotness from my Twitter feed, Reddit, and the occasional research trip to BGG, but my group has never been one to keep up with the latest and greatest in the board game world. I don’t follow physical board games terribly closely. Honorable Mention: Indian Summer, Among the Stars It was a great surprise when the Hardback app hit app stores so quickly after physical release and so quickly after the Paperback app. We consider Hardback a surprise because it was new in the physical game world this year and the Paperback app was already out there and great. The game always offers quality online play. The game breezes by rather quickly, although you can ramp up the required winning score to extend things, and provides a great way to spend ten minutes or so. The variants are meaningful, not just small tweaks on the base game, truly adding a lot of variety to the base game. The solo mode in this game works well because the AI is very strong and there are a handful of variants you can toggle on or off which keep things fresh. In Hardback the cards are letters and you use them to spell words, pairing matching genres to activate additional card abilities. Like traditional deck builders, players use their initial hand to purchase better cards, and score points, to build up a stronger deck to buy better cards and score more points. Hardback is a word game, deck building combo that is the spiritual prequel, but mechanical sequel, to Paperback.

BEST NEW APPS 2018 ANDROID

Could it be? Yes! System notifications had finally arrived (again), and they actually worked! Android owns some of the blame on this, but regardless, we are glad we can play this game and get a ding whenever it’s our turn in asynchronous games. All hope was lost as Playdek is notoriously expected not to update their apps, but a seemingly innocuous “Updates Pending” message earlier this year had Lords of Waterdeep listed. This promptly broke Waterdeep’s system notifications. A few days/weeks later, Playdek updates the app to provide working notification, hooray! Within a day or two of that, however, my phone updated Android versions which introduced significant changes in the way notifications are done. The one thing that really bugged me was lack of system notifications. It was the same decent port iOS had, and the game is a classic. Lords of Waterdeep was finally released on Android last year.

Best new apps 2018