I love grappling hooks in games. There's nothing more pleasant than swinging around to get from place to place, because running is for chumps. Who wouldn't want to swing around to get places? If Tarzan ran around everywhere, would he be as cool? No, he would not be. As such, I have collected 4 of the best games on iOS that feature this mechanic prominently in different ways.
This particular commuter-centric Favorite 4 might lean more to the train side of mass transit than the bus side, but that doesn’t make it any less relevant. Anyone who’s used a commuter train to get to work knows just how noisy they can be. Screeching wheels, blaring overhead announcements, business folk screaming into their cell phones, and so on. That’s why it can be important to have a couple of time-absorbing iOS games that can be enjoyed with or without sound waiting in the wings.
Infinity Blade II
Okay so this might seem like a bizarre choice but there’s logic behind it. Completing Infinity Blade II’s story doesn’t generally take long, and once it’s finished it becomes a kind of meta-game about loot grinding. Not much call for atmospheric music and sword clangs there. Besides, the developers themselves suggest that turning off the sound can even improve performance on older devices. Bonus!
Hook Worlds
Rocketcat’s refinement of their hook-swinging formula is a fantastic “endless runner” kind of game that offers up four unique variations on the formula. While the music and sound effects are certainly top notch it’s the one-of-a-kind visuals and character design that really make these worlds feel complete.
Wizorb
I still think combining brick-breaking with RPG elements is ingenious. Doing so with a fantastic 16-bit retro aesthetic is even more brilliant. With or without the sound muted it’s a treat to play, but without the sound it gives us the added benefit of not getting the music stuck in our head for the whole day.
Legends of Yore Full
This cute and simple-looking Roguelike is actually much more complex than it first appears. It’s even got pets! However none of its complexities involve the audio, which is about as simple as one would expect given the visuals. Relevant to the pixilated theme, yes. Necessary to enjoy the all the massive amounts of content, no.
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:: WORLDLY DELIGHTS
Rocketcat Games have made a name for themselves in the iOS gaming scene with the popular and critically-acclaimed grappling hook games Hook Champ and Super QuickHook. While they are working on a 99 cent "top-down shooter/RPG" project," their next game returns to the grappling hook concept with Hook Worlds. Unlike Hook Champ and Super QuickHook's adventure levels, Hook Worlds is focused on endless levels, like the Avalanche mode from Super QuickHook. This means that you'll be swinging forward through levels, outrunning hazards chasing you, trying to keep from falling to your doom, while trying to advance as far as possible and collecting coins along the way.
The hook of Hook Worlds is that there will be multiple endless worlds to play through, each featuring a familiar character in the 'Hook' series universe, with their own gameplay twists. The initial launch version will have three worlds to play. The first is Curse of the Watcher, which has you playing as Theodore "Gramps" Hooker from Hook Champ and Super QuickHook, trying to outrun one of the demons (first seen in Hook Champ) and avoid being blasted by the demon's gigantic death laser. To help him, Gramps has the recharging rocket boots that will be familiar to veterans of the series. The other two modes will not feature the rocket boots, but have twists new to the series.
Hook Gunner has you playing as Zelle, who has a forward shooting gun available to take out obstructions and enemies in her way. The gun only features 6 shots, but recharges over a short amount of time. Finally, Cybergnome 202X has you playing as a gnome in a futuristic city, with the ability to switch gravity in midair, similar to Gravity Runner. This means that you can die by falling upwards. There appear to be icons that you can pick up to reverse your gravity in mid-air as well, which could help or be a hindrance towards further advancement. However, these 2 modes also appear to be experimenting with and expanding on the already familiar Hook series gameplay. Interestingly, while unconfirmed, it appears only Hook Gunner mode has coins in it, which could alleviate some of the concerns by Super QuickHook players that the Avalanche and Eruption modes were more focused on coin collection than on survival.
A trailer has been released showing off each mode briefly, with a promised release date of early November. Similar to Super QuickHook, early adopters will get "exclusive bonus content." The game will launch at 99 cents, and the developers have mentioned that additional worlds, and of course new hats for the characters, could be added post-release, as has been done with each of the previous Hook games in the series. Check out the recently released trailer below, and check out Rocketcat Games' Twitter account for new updates, and their blog for concept art and insight into the game's development.
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