Time taken to play quickly: 20
Release Date: 04/03/2019
Platforms: Apple TV, Mac, PC, Switch and iOS
Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds
Mini Motorways is by the same developer as Mini Metro but tasks you with planning a road network rather than subway. You lay down roads, traffic lights and motorways to ensure enough cars can get to the buildings that pop up in your city as time passes....
Release Date: 29/09/2017, updated in 2019
Platforms: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One
Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds
Cuphead is a running, jumping and shooting game that looks like an old Mickey Mouse cartoon. You play on your own or with someone else and work across the screen, jumping gaps, shooting enemies and avoiding projectiles.
Release Date: 19/02/2015, updated in 2018
Platforms: Android, Apple TV, Mac, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS
Skill Rating: 4+ year-olds
Descend beautiful mountains, dunes and canyons on a snowboarding journey full of serenity and secrets. All you have to worry about is tapping to jump to avoid chasms, rockfall and other hazards. It’s simple and moreish due to the stunning landscapes...
Release Date: 30/11/2012
Platforms: Wii U
Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds
Nintendoland is a collection of Nintendo games was created for the Nintendo Wii U launch. It uses the console’s tablet screen to create specific roles for different players. In Mario Chase, the hiding player uses the tablet controller screen while the...
Release Date: 23/07/2014, updated in 2019
Platforms: Android, PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and iOS
Five Nights at Freddy's (FNaF) is a series of puzzle horror games with jump scares rather than blood and gore. You play the night-guard at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza and have to survive the night while in your office, checking the cameras and closing the...
Release Date: 25/03/2021, updated in 2022
Platforms: PC and Switch
Dorfromantik is a peaceful village-building strategy puzzle game for one player inspired by tile-based board-games like Carcassonne. You have a stack of hexagonal tiles and work to match their edges while creating areas of towns, forests and fields to...
Release Date: 06/01/2015
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and iOS
Mini Metro is a game where you create an ordered, efficient underground train system. It sounds like hard work, but the simple Tube-map visuals, calm music, and streamlined interactions make this relaxing, like sudoku. Dip your toe in this strategy...
Release Date: 08/02/2006, updated in 2014
Platforms: Wii and Wii U
Wii Sports, Wii Sports Resort and Wii Sports Club offer motion-controlled sports. Although these games are well known, the depth each of them offer is a best-kept secret. Games like bowling, tennis and boxing are easy to pick up but require considerable...
Release Date: 06/12/2018
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC, Switch and iOS
Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds
Conduct Together is a strategy game where you control toy trains along the overlapping train tracks. Each train can be started and stopped with a specific button. Other buttons change different points. The aim is to transport the people from one station...
Release Date: 16/09/2007, updated in 2021
Platforms: Mac, PC and iOS
Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds
Osu is a rhythm action game where you tap the screen in time to the music similar to the Elite Beat Agents games. This starts as a simple challenge but develops in speed and complexity. At higher levels, the games is an esport with people competing to...
Release Date: 28/08/2018
Drive futuristic cars to score goals with an oversized football. It’s another game that sounds ridiculous but is actually a huge amount of fun to play and requires a lot of expertise. What’s not obvious from the start is the level of control that...
Release Date: 30/06/2020, updated in 2021
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC, Switch, Web, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and iOS
Skill Rating: 6+ year-olds
Townscaper is a town building toy. You pick colours from the range available and click to put down a house in the sea. As you continue to add houses of different colours the game automatically orientates the architecture for you.
Release Date: 27/08/1992, updated in 2018
Platforms: 3DS and 2DS, DS, GameCube, Switch and iOS
Skill Rating: 5+ year-olds
Mario Kart is a go-kart racing game on Nintendo systems. You race against other Nintendo characters around different circuits, picking up power-ups, attacks and speed boosts. It is frantic and chaotic, but still requires skills to do well.
Release Date: 08/12/2017
Platforms: Amazon Fire, Android, Mac, PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Switch and Xbox One
Hello Neighbor is a stealth survival game with a horror feel. You try and sneak into the basement of their neighbour’s house to uncover a "horrible secret". The game responds to your strategy by setting traps along paths the player followed in...
Release Date: 29/10/2020
Platforms: PC
Skill Rating: 14+ year-olds
Teardown is a strategic game where you plan and execute a heist in fully destructible environments. Your objective is to claim the key cards that are hidden around the map. However taking one triggers the alarm, giving you only sixty seconds before...
Release Date: 02/11/2021
Platforms: Mac, PC, Switch and Xbox One
Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds
Unpacking is a meditative puzzle game where you unpack belongings into a series of spaces, each representing a stage in life. You get to know the owner of the objects by their possessions and circumstances. To finish a level you need to work out where...
Release Date: 30/07/2019, updated in 2022
Platforms: Apple TV, Mac and iOS
Sneaky Sasquatch is an adventure game where you sneak around in campsites and try to find food from coolers and picnic baskets without getting caught. From this simple premise grows a game with endless ways to play and explore its open world: race, play...
Release Date: 24/05/2016, updated in 2022
Platforms: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One
Overwatch is a shooting game but with the focus on teamwork and skill rather than violence. Along with games like Rocket League it has professional e-sports competitions where players compete for prizes.
Release Date: 04/08/2020
Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout is a whacky obstacle race where up to 60 people compete to get to the end of the course and advance to the next round. Drawing on TV shows like Takeshi's Castle, Wipeout or It's a Knock Out you have to control top-heavy...
Release Date: 25/07/2017, updated in 2018
Fortnite (sometimes misspelled Fortnight) rose to popularity via its Battle Royale mode where 100 players fight against each other in online battles to the death. While they play, using shooting, evasion and building skills to survive, a storm is...
Release Date: 23/11/2017, updated in 2019
Platforms: 3DS and 2DS, Amazon Fire, Android, Mac, PC, PS Vita, PS3, PS4, Wii U, Xbox 360, Xbox One and iOS
Although Minecraft – where players place blocks to build structures, sculpt the landscape and create adventures – is the best-selling game of all time, some of the best aspects of it are little known. Along with the exploration, building and...
Release Date: 16/11/2018, updated in 2020
Platforms: Android, PC, Switch, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and iOS
Among Us is a strategy game where crew-mates prepare their spaceship for launch by completing tasks. However, one of the players is an impostor intent on sabotaging the ship and killing the crew. As the game progresses in real-time the impostor...
Release Date: 14/07/2017
Platforms: Android, PC, Xbox One and iOS
Adopt Me is one of the most popular Roblox games. In a rudimentary way, it simulates daily life. You can build a home, look after pets and make friends. Like many Roblox games, it's the combination of an avid community of players...
Release Date: 15/06/2016, updated in 2022
Platforms: Amazon Fire, Android, Mac, PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and iOS
In this game, amateur game-makers create simple online games that often mimic real-world grown-up scenarios, like working in a pizza restaurant, surviving natural disasters, escaping prison, scuba diving or playing hide-and-seek. The library of games is...
Release Date: 01/01/2019
Platforms: Amazon Fire, Android and iOS
Skill Rating: 2+ year-olds
The Toca Boca, Toca Life, series of games comprise what are essentially toys in electronic form. They build on the Sago Mini games for 6-10-year-old children. Recreating interactive everyday settings like shopping, hospital,...
Release Date: 01/11/2014
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC, Xbox One and iOS
Welcome to Bloxburg is a simulation Roblox game where you take on daily activities in a fictional city. Drawing on gameplay from The Sims, you care for your character and keep their mood positive, by building and customizing your house, learning skills...
Release Date: 17/09/2020
Platforms: Mac, PC, Xbox One and iOS
Impostor is a space survival game like Among Us. It is a community-created version of that official game on Roblox as Impostor, but also on Minecraft as a couple of minigames called Among Us and Impostor. The Roblox game is a version of Among Us for...
Release Date: 16/10/2020
Platforms: Switch
Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit (Mario Kart Live, MarioKart Home Circuit) is a kart racing game with a difference. You play on the Switch but use it to control a real life Mario kart that races around...
Release Date: 29/10/2021
Crab Game is a competitive action game where you play mini-games based on the Squid Game Netflix show challenges. Similar to Fall Guys, each requires you to be the last player standing to claim the win. Here, however, the game has a darker feel with...
Release Date: 01/04/2019, updated in 2022
Platforms: PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S
Totally Accurate Battle Simulator (known as TABS) is a fighting game where you choose different armies and troops to battle each other in an automatic simulation that models their offensive and defensive abilities. Once set up, the fight is largely...
Release Date: 19/01/2017, updated in 2023
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS
Bed Wars is a game played on Minecraft (since 2017) or Roblox servers (since 2021). It's a team game where you start on an island and must protect your bed and build bridges to attack other teams' beds. The trick is the ecosystem of items and crafting...
Release Date: 15/12/2020
Platforms: Android, Switch and iOS
Skill Rating: 3+ year-olds
Pokemon Cafe Mix is a puzzle game. Similar to the icon-connection challenge of Disney Tsum Tsum, you play as Eevee and delivering orders in a cafe by linking Pokemon icons in a ring. It's a low pressure puzzle with a swirl-to-connect interaction that is...
Release Date: 29/01/2019
Platforms: Web
Krunker (Krunker.io and Krunker Free) is a shooting game where you compete against online opponents on various maps. As you level up you unlock weapons that help you in the game. It's unusual because you play it in any web browser with no need to...
Release Date: 17/11/2020
Blankos Block Party is an online game where you collect and create custom characters based on toy figurines. Along with the built-in modes of racing, platforming and shooting, you can also plug and play your own levels in a similar fashion how [link to...
Release Date: 24/11/2017, updated in 2018
Platforms: Android, PC and iOS
Granny is a horror adventure game where you are locked in a house by a creepy grandma. You wake up in a dark room and have to carefully work your way through the house to escape without being caught. It's noted for the tense gameplay and jump scares.
Release Date: 31/08/2015
Phantom Forces Roblox is a popular shooting game on Roblox. Phantom Forces isn’t available on iOS or Android. It's a shooting game played in an online arena in teams. Although it looks simple, it offers a high-skill challenge similar to [link to...
Release Date: 19/09/2019, updated in 2022
Platforms: Apple TV, Mac, PC and iOS
Hot Lava is a running and jumping game where you mustn't touch the floor because it's covered in lava. It takes the childhood playground game online as you work to cross nostalgia-filled maps on your own or with other players
Release Date: 04/04/2019, updated in 2021
Islanders is city-building game where you carefully place structures to earn points from their geographic location and relation to other features and buildings on your islands. Earn enough points and you unlock new buildings and eventually the chance to...
Release Date: 13/08/2013, updated in 2017
Platforms: Amazon Fire, Android, Mac, PC and iOS
Geometry Dash is a running, jumping game. It features over 20 stages where you play as a customisable small cube, which you used to dodge 2D obstacles to the rhythm of electronic music using a single button to control the cube. If you hit any of the...
Release Date: 29/10/2018
Platforms: Android and iOS
Garena Free Fire (also called Free Fire Battlegrounds, Free Fire, Garena Free Fire-New Beginning) is a shooting game like Fortnite but only played on mobile phones and tablet devices. It is highly popular for its online battles where 50 players search...