40 Best iOS Games Of All Time

29. FTL: Faster Than Light

Release date: April 3, 2014

Developer: Subset Games

Technically, we may have made an exception for FTL as well, since it debuted on PC two years before it showed up on iOS. That being said, it struck us as yet another game that really came into its own on mobile, and since it was the product of a two-man development team who initially took to Kickstarter to fund it, we think everyone can find it in their hearts to welcome it onto the list.

If you’re a member of the “games should be challenging” club, FTL is definitely for you. It’s an uncompromising look at what it might be like to be a starship captain if we really had the technology to fly around between galaxies, and while the developers may have had Star Trek in mind when they were putting this game together, trust us when we say that Kirk and Picard never had things quite this difficult.

“Brutal” is a word that comes up in more than one critic and player review, so you know Subset Games did something right when those same people are also giving it high scores. Bonus points go to this one for simply porting the Advanced Edition directly to mobile, skipping the original version when the devs could have probably sold both iterations to iOS gamers. The touch controls work so well that you’ll never know it wasn’t intended for tablets first, yet another reason we feel comfortable including FTL here.

Just remember not to hurl your iPad in frustration when you die. Again.

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