Innovation is an overused and abused word in the technology industry but if you strip it down to the basic principle of “new ideas”, it’s clear that there’s a lot of it going on in mobile games. When you gather some of the best examples together, you realise how many new ideas are out there. For example, there have been some creative experiments with the idea of interactive fiction, from the round-the-world thrills of 80 Days to the beat-the-censors story of Blackbar.

There are games that play with sound in new and interesting ways: Papa Sangre II is played entirely by listening rather than looking, while Dark Echo visualises your sounds on the screen. Both are – and this may not be a coincidence – among the creepiest mobile games available.

Some games get you moving in the real world: wandering in the case of Ingress; jogging for your (virtual) life with Zombies, Run!; and even dancing with Bounden. Smartwatch games like Lifeline: Silent Night and Spy_Watch play with the potential of storytelling on your wrist.

Games exploring real-world issues include Endgame: Syria and Papers, Please and others splice together new genres, such as Framed, with its motion-comic puzzles, and ambient grow-’em-up Prune.

Even for familiar genres, there are new ideas: Twofold Inc finds a new twist on match-three puzzling; Capitals reinvents the competitive word game; and Midnight Star finds a way for first-person shooters to work well on touchscreens.

Read on for a list of 50 games trying new things on your mobile devices, often below the limelight at the top of the app store charts.

One final, important point: the games in this list are innovative, but they’re also great. Technical invention or genre crossovers married to a poor game are of little value to players. What the developers of this selection have managed is to ally their new ideas with fun gameplay.

80 Days
Android/iOS (£3/£3.99)
Phileas Fogg’s famous journey around the world, reworked as an interactive steampunk-themed novel. It’s a very clever idea, but that cleverness never gets in the way of the story: you’ll want to read and play it several times to try different routes.

Adventure Time Game Wizard
Android/iOS (£3.96/£3.99)
In its regular adventure mode, this is a fun platform game based on popular cartoon Adventure Time. But the real fun comes when you start drawing your own levels – on paper or on screen – sharing them with other players and trying out their efforts.

A Study in Steampunk
Android/iOS (£2.99/£3.18)
Publisher Choice of Games has released a succession of interactive novels, with the innovation being its engine for wrapping the story around your decisions. This is a great example: 277,000 words of narrative with you in the central role.

Blackbar
Android/iOS (£1.22/£2.29)
One of the apps exploring a blend of literature and gaming, Blackbar is a game told through text – censored letters between its principal characters where you have to guess the words hidden by the black bars. Also check its prequel, Grayout.

Blown Away
Android/iOS (Free + IAP/£2.29)
This is an engaging platform game starring a cheerful hero named Hendrik, who wears “teleporting shoes”. They’re the key to the game’s twist on the genre: you teleport around the levels rather than jumping, which brings new puzzle-solving possibilities.

Bounden
Android/iOS (£2.99/£2.29)
You’ll want your partner in this game to be someone with whom you’re comfortable sharing personal space. It’s “a mix of Twister and ballet” as you both hold your smartphone and follow its instructions to dance together to classical music.

Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons
iOS (£3.99)
A beautiful story, as you control two brothers trying to find a cure for their sick father. You control both brothers at once with onscreen joysticks, but it’s the narrative – and a now-famous twist – that packs an unusually emotional punch.

Capitals: Free Word Battle
iOS (Free + IAP)
Words With Friends did a great job of turning Scrabble into a multiplayer mobile word-battler. Capitals is really inventive, though: a word game that involves capturing tiles on a screen and conquering your opponent turn-by-turn.

Clumsy Ninja
Android/iOS (Free + IAP)
Clumsy Ninja may be getting on a bit now but it remains one of the most innovative character-driven games on mobile. You train up the initially klutzy warrior through mini-games, but it’s the console-quality animation that gives him bags of character.

Code Warriors: Hakitzu Battles
iOS (Free)
How do you make learning to program more entertaining for children? Getting them to battle giant mecha-robots with their fledgling JavaScript skills is how Code Warriors approaches it. Children can battle alone or take on their Facebook friends’ bots.

Crashlands
Android/iOS (£4.22/£3.99)
The developers say this game is a “crafting RPG”, which neatly summarises its gameplay. After crash-landing on an alien planet, you have to forage, fight and craft your way in the world. The way the game opens up the more you play is excellent.

Dark Echo
Android/iOS (£1.49)
A spooky game that relies on “visualised sound” to explore its 80 levels. That means you make sounds which ping off the obstacles around you in the game’s world, making pretty pictures on screen. The enemy you face, though, is far from pretty…

Does Not Commute
Android/iOS (Free + IAP)
This tears up the traditional driving game format by putting you in charge of a small town’s rush hour – controlling all the vehicles. Expect plenty of crashes, although it’s fun rather than frustrating, and includes a practice mode to refine your skills.

Endgame: Syria
Android (Free)
Basing games on real-world wars can be tricky – this exploration of the conflict in Syria had to be reworked as  Endgame: Eurasia to get an iOS release. On Android, it’s uncensored and, two years after its release, still makes you think hard.

Evoland
Android/iOS (£3.49/£3.99)
A love letter to role-playing games (RPG) in the form of a game that evolves its way through the genre’s history. It starts as the kind of monochrome RPG that you might have played on a Game Boy, and ends up as a lush-looking 3D adventure.

Framed
Android/iOS (£1.74/£2.99)
This has been described as a “motion-comic puzzler” – the first in the genre. It’s a good description, too: you play the game by rearranging animated comic-strip panels to progress through its story. An atmospheric jazz soundtrack adds to the appeal.

Guitar Hero Live
iOS (Free + IAP)
In 2015, console gamers were rocking out in their living rooms once more with a new Guitar Hero game. This time though Apple TV owners could join in: the iOS version of the game can be played on the TV, complete with its own guitar-controller bundle.

Her Story
iOS (£3.99)
Fancy playing detective? Her Story is a gripping murder-mystery based around video footage of interviews with the chief suspect. Your job is to watch the clips, think of new search terms to mine the video database, and figure out the truth.

Ingress
Android/iOS (Free + IAP)
Less a game, more a way of life for its keenest fans: this is the best example of location-based gaming yet. You choose a side in its sci-fi plot, then explore the game’s environment as you wander around the real world, working alone or with fellow players.

Letterpad: Free Word Puzzles
iOS (Free + IAP)
On iPhone and iPad, Letterpad is a simple, addictive letter-puzzles game, where you find words relating to more than 200 themes in 3x3 grids. Its innovation comes with its Apple Watch edition, with the game working smoothly on the smartwatch.

Lifeline: Silent Night
Android/iOS (83p/£1.49)
One of several games here designed to run across your smartphone and smartwatch. Like Spy_Watch, the gameplay here happens via notifications, with prompts for you to influence the game by interacting with stranded astronaut character Taylor.

Midnight Star
iOS (Free + IAP)
First-person shooter (FPS) games can struggle on touchscreens, without a mouse and keyboard, or joypad, to control them. Midnight Star had an impressive crack at rethinking the genre to work well for touch, ensuring you can pinpoint-aim while moving.

Minecraft: Pocket Edition
Android/iOS/Windows Phone (£4.99/£4.99/£5.39)
An obvious choice, perhaps, but even for seasoned players, Minecraft is capable of constant surprises as you explore its blocky landscapes. The game that forged a new genre from open-world crafting – and one whose mobile version is improving fast.

Monument Valley
Android/iOS/Windows Phone (£2.99 + IAP)
Some parts of Monument Valley are familiar but it’s the way this architectural puzzler puts them together that feels so fresh. You have to slide, twist and flip the scenery in its geometrically beautiful levels to solve the mazes. Wonderful.

Motion Tennis
Android/iOS (Free + IAP/£3.99)
Remember how you could play tennis on Nintendo’s Wii by swinging your arms in the real world? Motion Tennis performs a similar trick with your smartphone and an Apple TV or Chromecast plugged into your TV. You’ll need a firm grip on your phone, mind.

Neko Atsume: Kitty Collector
Android/iOS (Free + IAP)
The world’s only – as far as we’re aware – cat-collecting game. This Japanese game is as quirky as they come: you place food in your garden to attract cats, logging them in a virtual “catbook” and hoping for rarities. Cute  and very addictive.

New Star Soccer
Android/iOS/Windows Phone (Free + IAP)
You can play FIFA on your smartphone or tablet, and it’s impressive, but New Star Soccer has done the best job of rethinking football for the small screen. Retro graphics belie deeply addictive gameplay and pixel-perfect touch controls.

Papa Sangre II
iOS (£3.99)
Another older game whose ambition has yet to be bettered: Papa Sangre II is played with your ears. You explore its creepy afterlife world through sound alone, with monsters and traps to avoid, and the voice of Sean Bean guiding you (you hope) to safety.

Papers, Please
iOS (£5.99)
Papers, Please makes you a border guard for the fictional dictatorship of Arstotzka, telling its story through scanned papers and shifty travellers. Bleak but thought-provoking, it may even shape your views on real-life immigration debates.

PrideFest
Android/iOS (Free + IAP)
PrideFest may not look that innovative: it’s a familiar city-building social game. What’s new is its focus: it celebrates the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) community, with Pride carnivals central to the game as your city revives.

Prune
Android/iOS/Windows Phone (£2.99/£2.99/£3.09)
“A love letter to trees”, according to its app store listing, Prune is one of the most relaxing games you’ll play, but also one of the most imaginative. You have to grow your tree with gentle swipes on the screen, seeking out the sunlight.

Race the Sun
iOS (£3.99)
You may have seen futuristic racing games before but Race the Sun comes with a clever concept: the world that you zip your solar glider through changes every day, as you race constantly against the sunset. It’s very hard but rewarding too.

Roblox
Android/iOS (Free + IAP)
Roblox has been described as gaming’s equivalent of YouTube: where players make their own games and share them with the community. The results can be brilliant: even a quick browse will reveal a few dozen that you’ll want to play.

Ryan North’s To Be Or Not To Be
Android/iOS (£4.88/£4.49)
Shakespeare diehards beware: this game lovingly takes a sledgehammer to the play Hamlet, reimagining it as a “second-person nonlinear branching narrative format”. It’s part book and part game, and always mischievously entertaining.

Scribblenauts Unlimited
Android / iOS (£3.96 + IAP/£3.99 + IAP)
A colourful puzzle-adventure with a startling twist: your character’s magic notebook, which summons any object you want in an attempt to solve puzzles. It should be impossible but the system can cope with most things your imagination comes up with.

Shadowmatic
iOS (£2.29 + IAP)
Another clever idea: a puzzle game based on rotating objects to make shadow shapes on a wall. Yes, one of them is a rabbit, shadow puppet fans, but there are plenty more to provide a challenge. And for those who find it tough, you can buy hints.

Skylanders SuperChargers
iOS (Free + IAP)
Activision’s Skylanders games – and their physical toys – have been big hits with children. The latest iOS version breaks boundaries by matching its console versions – and also with its physical tablet stand and “portal” that you buy separately.

Spider: Rite of the Shrouded Moon
Android/iOS (£1.61/£2.29)
Games where you play a spider are pretty thin on the ground but this makes the life of an arachnid a bewitching experience. You creep around a mysterious manor catching insects but also solving the mystery of why the mansion has been abandoned.

SPL-T
iOS (£2.29)
Another inventive new approach to puzzle games. Here, you start with a blank black screen. Tap, and it divides in half. Keep tapping and it keeps dividing, according to logic that becomes clear as you play. Bends your brain inside out, in a good way.

Spy_Watch
iOS (99p)
One of the early examples of a game created just for smartwatches, this puts Apple Watch owners in charge of their own espionage agency. Your spy reports in from the field on your watch via notifications, and you direct them on missions.

Swapperoo
iOS (79p)
Another puzzle game that involves matching three things of the same colour, but with some inventive twists, Swapperoo’s uniqueness comes in the different rules by which certain tiles play, as well as “freeform” stages that vary each time you play.

The Room Three
Android/iOS (£3.99)
All three The Room games could qualify for this feature: they offer tactile physical puzzles to solve, tailor-made for touchscreens rather than any other gaming device. The Room Three is the best looking yet, with ingenious puzzles to solve.

The Sailor’s Dream
iOS (£2.99)
Any game from developer Simogo is guaranteed to think well outside the norm. The Sailor’s Dream is as much a story as a game: a sailor’s life refracted through a hazy filter of narrative and music. It’s unlike anything else on mobile.

This War of Mine
Android/iOS (£10.99)
The innovation in This War of Mine is that it puts you into a war game – but you’re not playing the soldiers, rather the civilians trying to survive in a war-torn city. You craft, trade and scavenge for your life, with some tough decisions to make.

Thomas Was Alone
Android/iOS (10p/79p)
One of the few games where a rectangle takes the title role – and certainly the best story of the lot. This “minimalist game about friendship and jumping” pairs stripped-down gameplay with a story that grabs you and doesn’t let go until the end.

Toca Blocks
Android/iOS (£2.99)
Aimed at children, this is as much an open-ended creative toy as a game, with no scores or specific goals. It’s like a side-on Minecraft, with kids able to build and destroy different kinds of blocks to create anything they like, with superheroes thrown in, too.

Twofold Inc
Android/iOS (£2.99)
Another example of a developer finding new shapes into which to twist the match-three puzzle genre. Your task is to connect same-coloured tiles, emptying bars at the top of the screen, while planning several moves ahead. It’s brain-dizzyingly clever.

Vainglory
Android/iOS (Free + IAP)
Vainglory’s innovation lies in bringing one of the most hardcore game genres – multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) – to touchscreen devices. It works beautifully, too, with the fast response times and the frenetic action fans of the genre demand.

You Must Build a Boat
Android/iOS (£2.29)
Endless-runner games have been popular on mobile since the excellent Canabalt. You Must Build a Boat does a great job of twisting the genre into a new shape, working in match-three puzzle elements as well as clever power-ups and personalisation.

Zombies, Run!
Android/iOS/Windows Phone (Free/Free/£1.49 + IAP)
There are plenty of apps trying to get you jogging but how many of them involve being chased by zombies? That’s the sharp idea behind Zombies, Run! but it’s more than just scary sound effects: there’s a great story here that will help you stick with it.

Contributor

Stuart Dredge

The GuardianTramp

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