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If you are searching for iPhone adventure games, take a tour of this article with really interesting and engaging apps.

They are a good fit for those times when you want to live an adventure in your iPhone’s small screen.

You will also find many interesting stories in these apps. Some are focused on travel, some on horror and some on mysteries. From old-school to more modern iPhone apps with great graphics, take a look at some of the best adventure games for iPhone and iPad.

iPhone adventure games to check out

The Walking Dead: A New Frontier

If you thrilled to the first two versions of Telltale Games’s take on The Walking Dead, you’ll enjoy this latest installment, too.

But even if you’re new to the mobile series, there’s plenty to enjoy with this zombie apocalypse game, which places an emphasis on character interaction and the emotional burden of decisions made.

Batman: The Telltale Series

Telltale Games brings its unique brand of narrative adventure to the Dark Knight in Batman: The Telltale Series. Telltale’s more story-based approach lends itself well to an aspect of the Batman character that is rarely so well-explored in more action-oriented titles: the dual identity and constant tension between Batman and Bruce Wayne.

The first episode of the game comes free, with subsequent episodes available as in-app purchases. With the release of episode 5: City of Light, you can now play through the story in its entirety in one go.

Her Story

Are you a fan of true crime shows such as Serial and Making a Murderer? Here’s a similarly themed game for you budding Sherlocks out there. Sam Barlow’s Her Story has you doing the detective work and piecing together a mystery surrounding a woman being interviewed about her missing husband.

Armed only with a mothballed computer and an antique police database, you must search through the files for short video clips of the woman’s seven police interviews to unravel the whole story. To say more would spoil the experience.

Game of Thrones

Enter the world of Westeros in Telltale Games’ adventure game based on the hit fantasy TV series Game of Thrones. Players take control of the scions of House Forrester, minor bannermen of House Stark, in the great struggle for the throne of the Seven Kingdoms.

Telltale Games’ signature high-stakes, timed decision-making is particularly apt for the Game of Thrones episodic game, with players having to think on their feet as they make tough choices in the battlefield and within the murky politics of the court. With the release of the sixth episode, “The Ice Dragon,” users can play the entire game in one go.

République

Watch your step! République is an episodic stealth adventure by Camoflaj that immerses you in a fictional surveillance state. Armed only with backdoor access to surveillance cameras and security systems, you must help the young girl Hope escape and evade a gauntlet of guards.

Intuitive touch controls allow players to easily hack objects and switch among cameras, giving you quick one-tap control for helping Hope evade guards and pick up mission objects and collectibles. With the release of the fifth chapter, Terminus, players can finally play through the entire story, as Hope takes on the repressive Overseer.

Mr. Robot: 1.51exfiltrati0n.apk

This tie-in game for the popular TV series takes the same slow-burning formula pioneered by Lifeline and pushes it in interesting directions, even as it intertwines with the events of Mr. Robot’s first season. The game masks itself as a messaging app from in-show corporate titan, E-Corp, sitting in a lost phone that you found and picked up.

From there, you start receiving messages from a mysterious hacker’s collective that wants your help to “reset the world.” It’s a slowly unfurling technothriller story that plays out from your smartphone screen.

Day of the Tentacle: Remastered

Turn back the clock and experience a point-and-click classic with Double Fine Production’s remastered edition of Day of the Tentacle. This sequel to the original Maniac Mansion, Day of the Tentacle has players guiding a lovable bunch of misfits through a comedic time travel odyssey as they work together to keep a purple mutant tentacle from taking over the world.

The new edition features remastered graphics and sound effects (as well as the option to play through in the original low-res mode). You also get commentary from some of the game’s original creators such as Tim Schafer and Dave Grossman.

Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP

Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP is an audiovisual experience wrapped around an adventure game. You take control of the Scythian as she explores a pixel-art fantasy world, doing battle against strange creatures with her sword and using the magic of “sworcery” to solve arcane puzzles.

The gorgeously rendered world and soundtrack are accompanied by some fun writing for Archetype, the narrator, who is best described as a silly, hipster Conan the Barbarian. This game doesn’t break through the fourth wall, because it never bothers to build one in the first place.

Grim Fandango Remastered

Step into the shoes of Manny Calavera, travel agent to the dead in the remastered version of the classic adventure game Grim Fandango. First released in 1998, Grim Fandango melds Mexican folklore, film noir sensitivities, and a healthy dose of humor to create a fun and memorable adventure game.

Double Fine’s remastered version features improved graphics, an orchestral score, and a wealth of extras like developer commentary and concept art. About the only thing that hasn’t translated well is the obscure 90s adventure game puzzle design, which can be counterintuitive to modern gamers.

80 Days

Inkle Studios’ latest piece of interactive fiction is the remarkable 80 Days, a steampunk adventure based on Jules Verne’s classic novel “Around the World in 80 Days.” As the loyal valet Passepartout, you accompany your master Phileas Fogg in his globe-trotting journey through an alternate Earth filled with automata, artificers and airships.

Players must race through the world’s great cities, discovering new routes and stumbling across mysteries while exploring each city through a “choose your path” interface. Discover the fastest routes, balance your finances, pack the right inventory in your limited luggage space, and you just might win Fogg’s epic wager and circumnavigate the world in 80 days.

Broken Age

Double Fine’s adventure Broken Age, the game that helped start gaming’s crowdfunding revolution, goes mobile with the release of Act 1 on the App Store. The first act of Broken Age tells the story of two teens, each struggling against traditions that bind them.

Deep in the bowels of a starship, Shay Volta is trying to escape the clutches of a stiflingly maternal AI, while Vella Tartine has been chosen to be sacrificed to a mysterious monster in order to save her village. Gorgeously rendered 2D graphics, a neat soundtrack and a genuinely well-built adventure make Broken Age Act 1 a keeper, and we’re sure many gamers eagerly await the release of Act 2.

The Silent Age

Armed with a time travel device and stuck between a dead future and a present that ignores him, it’s up to Joe to save the world in The Silent Age. It’s 1972, an age of free love, Cold War and the blowing winds of social change. Of course, all that seems to have passed by Joe, an average guy scraping by as a janitor living a life of soul-crushing tedium.

His life changes, however, when he’s suddenly confronted by a dying man who seemingly appears out of nowhere to hand Joe a time travel device and a dire warning: Unless Joe acts now, humanity will be extinct in 40 years.

The Wolf Among Us

The developers behind the wildly successful Walking Dead game have released a new narrative adventure with The Wolf Among Us, based on the critically acclaimed “Fables” comics by Bill Willingham.

As Bigby (as in Big Bad) Wolf, the Sheriff of Fabletown, it’s up to you to investigate a bloody murder that has set the hidden fairytale creatures of Fabletown on edge. Hard choices and dark secrets await in the first episode, “Faith,” with further episodes available as in-app purchases or through a Season Pass.

Ryan North’s To Be Or Not To Be

Imagine William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” as a choose-your-path gamebook, and you get Ryan North’s “To Be or Not To Be”, which has you playing the part of Hamlet, Ophelia or Hamlet Senior on their insane adventures.

Powered by Tin Man Games’ Gamebook Adventures engine, the app takes full advantage of the digital format by accompanying the text with music, sound effects, hilarious achievements and an end-game “Haml-o-Meter” and a statistics page that compares your choices with the Bard’s.

A particular delight is the wealth of illustrations by a variety of webcomic greats such as Kate Beaton (Hark, A Vagrant), Zach Weinersmith (SMBC), and Matthew Inman (Oatmeal). Incredibly hilarious and brilliantly executed, “To Be or Not To Be” will make sure you’ll never look at Shakespeare the same way again.

Panmorphia

An impressive first entry from Indie developer Lydia Kovalenko, Panmorphia straddles the divide between traditional and casual adventure, providing a leisurely, dream-like journey through a puzzle-dazzled world.

A Short Tale

Although it wastes most of its narrative potential, for anyone who just wants to play a game chock-full of fun and unusual puzzles while exploring a charming and nostalgia-inducing environment, A Short Tale provides plenty of entertainment for a few hours.

Dead Synchronicity: Tomorrow Comes Today

Even with a few rough edges, Dead Synchronicity stands as a modern adventure classic, telling a dark, sad and brutal tale that will leave you wanting more, but equally satisfied.

The Trace

The Trace is a brief and easy but fun exploration-filled murder mystery that will have you engaged from beginning to end.

Contradiction

Whilst a lack of gameplay variety and a slightly lacklustre ending limit its appeal, Contradiction manages to provide solid FMV production values and an interesting mystery to solve.

 

Dream Revenant

A pleasant surprise that is both chilling and moving, Dream Revenant is an immersive, surreal narrative experience, although it’s currently marred by its many technical issues.

Tengami

This pop-up book isn’t just for children; if you’re looking for a peaceful interlude to while an afternoon away, check Tengami out.

Detective Grimoire

Detective Grimoire breathes some new life into the investigation/visual novel sub-genre with its compelling setting, characters and humour, undermined only by puzzles that are nowhere as enjoyable as the rest of the game.

DEVICE 6

If you’re looking for some absurdly fun puzzles and a truly unique storytelling experience, you’ll want to check out DEVICE 6 on iOS, but you’ll wish for a gameplay integration upgrade.

Blackbar

The unique Mad Libs-style text presentation of Blackbar’s sci-fi social commentary is certainly engaging, but it works better as an innovative reading experience rather than a fully-realized adventure game.

Lost Echo

A richly defined, innovative experience, Lost Echo is exactly what an iOS adventure should be, capturing the spirit of traditional adventure gaming with all the potential the platform has to offer.

Jacob Jones and the Bigfoot Mystery: Episode 1 – A Bump in the Night

While the first episode is a little uneven in its story and puzzle pacing at times, Jacob Jones and the Bigfoot Mystery is a delightfully stylish debut that makes me want to come back for more.

The Next BIG Thing

(Known as Hollywood Monsters on iOS.) Whatever its title, in the hands of Pendulo, the studio behind the popular Runaway series, you could almost call this game “the next sure bet”. As expected, the offbeat comic adventure set in a 1940s Tinseltown filled with real-monster movie stars is creative, bizarre, and superbly produced, though it does get a little hairy at times.

The Journey Down: Chapter One

Yo, listen mon! Dis HD remake of a delightful point-and-click freeware adventcha is all kinds of island fun. With a reggae and jazz-infused soundtrack, Jamaican accents and character models based on African tribal masks, this first of four parts has a distinctive style all its own, and it’s entertaining as well, patterned after the classic LucasArts titles of old.

In other words, somewhere between Elaine Marley and Bob Marley!

It gets better with these iPhone adventure games.

BlindSide

Who says great adventures need good graphics? In fact, who says they need graphics at all? Certainly not indie developer epicycle, who have created a unique audio horror adventure that’s not to be missed. Awakened in the middle of crisis with no eyesight at all, with monsters now lurking in the all-encompassing shadows, can you listen and feel your way to safety?

MacGuffin’s Curse

Two words: crate puzzles. Still here? If that prospect doesn’t scare you off, then you should enjoy this lighthearted comic puzzler, which blends an entertaining story about a man cursed to become a werewolf in moonlight with a series of progressively difficult obstacles to overcome, one locked room at a time.

You’ll activate switches, operate control panels, and shove lots and lots of crates to make a path in both human and lycanthrope form alike, chuckling all the way.

Broken Sword: Director’s Cut

One of the best adventure games from the 90s comes to the iPad in style with Broken Sword: Director’s Cut.

And Broken Sword does retro gaming right, redesigning the interface for the touchscreen in a way that actually adds to the game. In addition to the classic story, the iPad gets some exclusive content, so even if you are just hoping to relieve the good old days, you’ll find something new. And for those that didn’t play the original, this is a must-have download.

Swordigo

On the more hack-and-slash side of things, there is Swordigo. This platformed adventure has fun puzzles, nice action and epic boss battles. You’ll start out with a sword, but you’ll soon add spells to your bag of tricks, which are used both for fighting and interacting with your environment.

Swordigo is one of those iPhone adventure games that gets the interface right, so you spend your time fighting enemies in the game rather than the control you have over it. If you love iPhone adventure games like Zelda, you’ll love this one. Perhaps a bit too light on the story side of things, but it is a fun romp.

Mirror’s Edge

Mirror’s Edge may have the name and story of the console version, but it’s turned the original on its side. Rather than simply port a watered-down version of the game to the iPad, EA redesigned the first-person experience of the console game into a third-person side-scroller and somehow managed to do so without losing the action and excitement of the original.

As Faith, you will run and jump your way across the rooftops of the city, all the while evading authorities as she completes her mission. It’s a fun (if somewhat short) thrill ride.

The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition

The Secret of Monkey Island is one of the most famous and beloved classic adventure games ever released. It was developed and published by Lucasfilm Games in 1990, featuring a young man named Guybrush Threepwood, who has a dream to become a fearsome pirate.

Back in the day, The Secret of Monkey Island was one of the first adventure games to completely avoid death as a gameplay mechanic, instead encouraging exploration. And you can be sure that there’s a lot to explore in The Secret of Monkey Island. The game takes place on Mêlée Island, where Guybrush encounters many memorable characters and humorous situations.

The lost fountain

An exciting journey in which you will visit an abandoned island in order to find a healing fountain. Explore ruins of the ancient civilization. Complete tasks, apply the found objects. Break temple gates, find secret passes and other secret places.

Distraint: Pocket pixel horror

Play as a young man who has stolen all properties of a poor old woman. He was punished. He got into a gloomy mansion full of traps and weird inhabitants. Explore a strange house, interact with the objects you find and try to escape!

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Milkmaid of the Milky Way

Adventures of a milkmaid who becomes a member of a galaxy spaceship crew. Travelling among stars the main heroine will face evil alien empress taking energy from people. Cope with aliens and bring back stolen energy!

Corpse party: Blood drive

Take a girl along gloomy corridors of an abandoned school. Help her avoid traps, hide from evil spirits and other supernatural creatures. Interact with the characters you meet on your way, look for the clues to find and rescue friends. Pick up batteries for a flashlight, medicines and other useful objects in order to survive in that horrible place.

Nelly Cootalot: The fowl fleet

Exciting adventures of a pirate whose name is Nelly. Help the heroine rescue birds stolen by insidious baron called Widebeard. Start a dangerous journey, interact with characters you meet on the way, solve puzzles and find a villain. Don’t leave feathered friends in trouble!

The secret of Chimera labs

Find out what a secret research laboratory deals with. Move along the corridors carefully, complete tasks and look for evidence. Clear out what kind of research and experiments are done here. Stop a crazy scientist!

Mysterium: The board game

Explore a mysterious mansion and find a murderer together with a group of psychics who called a ghost to help them. Play as a ghost living in a mansion and give hints to other players or play as a psychist and decode the messages of the ghost. Special cards will help to examine the scene of murder and find evidence.

Beneath a Steel Sky

Beneath a Steel Sky offers a very different world: a dystopian vision of an industrial future, where civilisation is confined to skyscraper cities and segregated by class. Abducted by armed police from his home in the wastelands, you play Robert Foster as he attempts to navigate around the dark metropolis and escape back to the wilderness.

Despite the fact that death is around every corner (save often), the game has a healthy sense of humour, partly embodied in your robot sidekick, who’s none too pleased at having to make do with a vacuum-cleaner chassis for half the game.

Sadly, this ‘remastered edition’ hasn’t had the same love as Monkey Island, keeping its 1994 artwork, with only minor improvements to sound and cutscenes.

Flight of the Amazon Queen

As LucasArts has yet to bring its Indiana Jones games to iOS, Flight of the Amazon Queen will have to do: the globetrotting adventure Pepsi to Indie’s Coke. Joe King (yes, really) is the star here, and his adventures take him to jungles, ancient tombs and all the fun holiday locales you could hope for.

Sadly, like Simon the Sorcerer, this hasn’t been properly optimised for iOS and also like that game it’s affected by bugs and crashes. That’s a shame, because the action underneath is a fun romp that never takes itself too seriously.

Machinarium

A beautifully drawn adventure about an adorable robot in search of his metallic other half. It breaks convention by not featuring a single line of dialogue, but that’s not to say it’s without humour; and the puzzles are tough enough to keep the grey matter engaged.

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

More like an interactive story than a game, this anime adventure first found Western success on the Nintendo DS. You spend an awful lot of time tapping through dialogue, but it’s all so charming and silly that it doesn’t seem to matter. Besides that, the memorable characters and satisfaction of pinning the right piece of evidence on a slippery murder suspect make this something everyone should try.

Puzzle Agent

Another Telltale game, but moving away from the ‘use hammer on nail’ style of the past towards traditional maths, logic and lateral-thinking brain teasers. The story concerns Nelson Tethers, sole employee of the FBI’s underused Puzzle Solving Division, who is dispatched to investigate missing erasers at the White House. Wonderfully silly.

McPixel

Concerned all these adventures may be too time-consuming? McPixel has a novel take for you: each scenario gives you 15 seconds before something explodes. You have that brief time to avert disaster. Whether you succeed or blow up the world, you’re presented with another puzzle straight away.

To The Moon

To The Moon [$4.99] is an experience that depends almost entirely on the way its story unravels, and the exceptional music backing it. Spoiling the story, any bit of it, beyond the premise would be doing any potential player a tremendous disservice.

And while I can offer up all kinds of praise for the audio, it’s not as though that’s easy to convey through text. So what should I write here?

Let’s start with this: To The Moon is an amazing journey through the memories of a man who has reached the end of his life, and as long as you don’t mind the fact that the gameplay doesn’t involve much more than walking around and clicking on things, you really ought to play this…

Faraway

It’s hard to hear the word Faraway and not think of Eliss [$2.99] developer Steph Thirion’s forever-in-development constellation creating game, but while I’m not sure if that one will ever actually see the light of day in the meantime there’s a new Faraway in town that’s stolen my heart.

Officially titled Faraway: Puzzle Escape [Free], the game makes no bones about being a “modern tribute” to the all-time classic Myst. You’ll explore 18 different temple ruins solving various types of puzzles in order to open the path ahead and continue marching onward.

There’s also quite a bit to discover, too, including hidden pages from your father’s diary which will help flesh out the story and explain why you’re doing what you’re doing. Or you can just solve puzzles, it’s up to you!

Year Walk

Hello, gentle readers, and welcome to the Classic Reload, the monthly feature where we wander out into the snow to look for horses. Each month, we take a look at a classic game from the App Store’s past to see how it holds up in the here and now.

It’s a chance to revisit old favorites, reflect on their place in the overall iOS library, or simply to take a deeper dive than our reviews typically allow. I try to pick a varied selection from month to month, but if there’s a game you’d really like to see featured, don’t be shy.

You can let me know by posting a comment below. Since the schedule is planned well in advance, you might not see your suggested game soon, but it will be added to the master list for future consideration

Red’s Kingdom

As was hinted at last month, our little pal Red has gone to the casino in a new update for Red’s Kingdom [$2.99] which just arrived this morning.

Similar to the huge update the game received in early March, this latest update includes two new areas to explore, the fishing port called Roth Ennis and an area called Rath Crom which is home of the famous The Golden Nut casino, and more than 50 new levels to explore and solve. You can also expect to run into several new types of enemies and even some new puzzle mechanics.

The Forgotten Room

The last of these iPhone adventure games is The Forgotten Room. Play as a detective and find a girl who disappeared in the abandoned mansion. You are going to deal with paranormal phenomena. Reveal gloomy secrets and prove that there is something supernatural in this mysterious house.

If you liked this article with iPhone adventure games, you should check out these articles as well:

• Best Sports Apps for iPhone
• Best Arcade Games for iPhone and iPad
• Best iPhone apps of the year
• Best iPhone Action Games To Pass Time

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