Over the past few years, the iPhone has quickly become the digital hub of casual puzzle gaming. Whether you are into playing a matching game like Bejeweled, a shape game like Tetris, an item search game like Jewel Quest Mysteries or a numbers game like Sudoku you can find an app for that on the iPhone. Hardcore gaming developers have realized that the future lies in iPhone and have sidestepped control-pad based APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) to join the touch screen revolution. Andrew Cakebread, founder of Massive Hadron Games (I'll let you solve the puzzle of that name yourself), is one such developer and he's created an instant winner with Tilestorm for the iPhone. Cakebread combined his love of robot gaming.

Tilestorm draws on Cakebread's love of robot gaming as well as the public's interest in sliding-tile puzzle games. The goal of the game is to get Eggbot, aptly named for a robot shaped like an egg, from one position on the map to the other. In order to do this the player must move around platforms to create an unobstructed path for Eggbot. This may sound like your basic tile-sliding game, but there are some interesting nuances. Some of the more difficult levels move past basic tile sliding to incorporate a "sticky-tile system." On these boards, tiles will often stick together, and you will need to figure out which of the other tiles to move around to separate them. Also, a tile need not be adjacent to another tile to be stuck together. So as you shift one tile left or right, you may see one or two other tiles moving simultaneously. Cakebread states, "The sticky tiles are a completely new and original game feature, an some of the later levels are on par of difficult to a Rubik's cube." Some gamers may find this new feature to be too difficult, but I for one found the sticky-tile system to be a refreshing take on the tile-sliding genre. After you've mastered basic tile sliding, you'll definitely see this upgrade as a new and exciting challenge.

My biggest peeve with iPhone puzzle games is the lack of depth involved. Especially in puzzle games, gamers are often given only about 10-25 puzzles to solve. For a modest $1.99 to $2.99 price tag, that isn't much to complain about. However, the puzzles either fall in the category of too easy or too difficult, leaving gamers frustrated on both sides of the spectrum. Tilestorm bucks the trend in puzzle games, giving gamers a whopping 100 puzzles to work from for $2.99.

There are 25 puzzles that take place in four differently themed landscapes: Industrial, Egypt, Medieval, and Jungle. In many puzzle games, you'll often see the same board layout reused and rehashed. This is not the case in Tilestorm. Nearly, each board is in some way unique. So, you won't find yourself playing on the same board, just with different shaped tiles to move around. There is also an insane attention to detail given to each landscape. Some of the Jungle boards may just have a few trees, while others will have Totem Poles and Temples. Tilestorm delivers vibrant 3D graphics without any slowdown or frame rate issues. Other puzzle games like Newtonica and even the "Dexter" iPhone application often suffered from long load times. It's clear that Cakebread did his due diligence in focusing on the gamer's overall experience.

Each landscape has it's own unique music bed. My favorite landscapes are the Egyptian and Jungle boards, both for visuals and for music. The pyramids, Sphynx, and temples, coupled with the ambient track really help to bolster your involvement in the game. I would have liked to hear Eggbot deliver a few different sound bites each time a board was completed. As it stands, Eggbot is silent throughout the game.

Where would a game, featuring a character called Eggbot, be without Easter Eggs? For old school gamers who love poking around for Easter Eggs, there are several in Tilestorm. However, I've been sworn to secrecy and am not at liberty to discuss them.

For $2.99, Tilestorm is an exceptional value. The game is loaded with 100 puzzles that are sure to give even the best tile-slide-puzzle champion a challenge. At this point there is no downloadable content available for Tilestorm. Cakebread is currently considering the possibilities of level updates as well as a Puzzle-of-the-Day feature.