The humble platformer has come along way since Chuckie Egg and the like, with all manner of styles and stories making up the genre. Once the preserve of the dedicated arcade machine, the platform genre soon found itself a firm favourite in the living room on the first home computers and consoles.

Smartphones are now so ubiquitous that many decent platformers are available for your mobile; however one has stood out for us recently for three good reasons...

Robot Wants Kitty

Format

iPhone

Price

Free (for limited time)

Where

iTunes

The first is that it is to be found on iTunes free of charge for a limited time; the second is that there have recently been some important updates to the title; and third is that it's a very good game indeed.

Apart from the ludicrous storyline (robots with cat fetishes have rarely been documented, and where a fetish has been found in our mechanical cousins; 99 per cent of the time it's dormice that get the brunt) the game pretty much gets everything right.

Graphics are simple yet effective and controls are highly responsive, meaning any frustration is down to your lack of skill as opposed to any unfair in-game mechanic.

The initial download consists of a variety of game modes, as they don't seem varied enough to call them different levels. These game modes develop the theme of getting your hands on the cat by changing the way you interact with the environment (teleportation, etc.) and at the point powerups are made available. Regardless of the mode the powerups, whilst delivered in a very linear fashion, come at just the right pace. There are save points throughout, and levels are timed enabling you to post your best via Game Centre.

The updates to the game include something called Kitty Connect (a 69p add-on) with which you can play levels created by other players and share ones created by you; and there are also five new levels which will also cost 69p with which to extend interest.

The whole thing adds up to a very enjoyable experience, and as it's free - at the time of writing - we can't help but recommend it.