
This early scene was all I needed and Inmost had me hook line and sinker. One that stuck with me was a sombre walk in the shoes of a frail old man while an unknown voice waxes poetic. Some of the best moments of Inmost came completely out of the blue. Behind all that, there’s a tender and tragic story about grief. The world of Inmost is teeming with supernatural beasties from dangerous slime to possessed corpses and towering, Lovecraftian goliaths it’s a full-blown supernatural horror. I had absolutely no expectations when I started Inmost and it quickly shot to the top of my mobile must-plays.Ĭoming from a small two-man Lithuanian studio via indie publisher Chucklefish Games ( Stardew Valley, Wargroove) Inmost casts the player as three separate playable characters from different times (and worlds) all with different playstyles, controls and puzzle-solving mechanics. Simple actions, like running and climbing ledges are incredibly smooth. Each character handles differently but is limited to directional commands and a single action button.

It’s one of the most polished indie horror games I’ve ever seen. The App Store and Google Play are littered with indie horror adventures that try and capture the same grim and terrifying tone of indie classic Lone Survivor but none have been able to quite marry lo-fi pixel art and bone-shaking horror like developer Jasper Byrne did (the exception being the recent Darkwood). Inmost is the game that most took me by surprise on Apple Arcade. You won’t be disappointed and you WILL NOT STOP. If you’re currently climbing the mountain of Apple Arcade games, do yourself a favour and give Grindstone a gander. Grindstone actually gives you the option to leave peacefully with all your gear intact early on in each level but this is a game about guts and glory and the risk of losing it all makes painting the mountain red all the sweeter. Get hit three times and you will lose all your loot and precious grindstones. However, the perpetual critter culling (understandably) angers the horde and as you progress through each level, the critters are given the chance to fight back.įor example, if you land next to an angered enemy, Jorg can lose a heart (he has three in total).


Once a few grindstones have dropped, there’s almost no stopping Jorg from clearing out entire levels with one fell swoop. That is until you string together enough kills (10 or above) to spawn a grindstone, which allows you to jump from one colour to another, opening the gates for sheer annihilation. As a colour-matching game, you can only jump between critters that share a colour at first (e.g. Using simple swipe controls, you must chain together as many critter murders as possible.

You play as Jorj, a sword-wielding Viking who traverses a dangerous icy mountain like a pinball of death and destruction. Rounds of Grindstone are short, sharp and outrageously brutal. But developer Capy has taken the often sinister aspects of the genre and use them as a force for good by nixing any and all free-to-play elements (such is the Apple Arcade credo) and giving Grindstone some personality something you just don’t see in the genre. Coffee runs, lunch breaks and important work meetings have all been top-and-tailed with a quick bash on Grindstone.Įvery time I recommend it, people are quick to judge the colour-matching gameplay because, often, their only experience is with games like Bejeweled or Peggle, or worse, some of the insidious gambling-adjacent free-to-play games littering the App Store and Google Play. Despite dabbling with every single game Apple Arcade has to offer, Grindstone is the one title that keeps pulling me back in.
