5 High Quality & Free iPad Games

Free games on the iPad/iPhone - let’s face it, they aren’t always the same quality as you might expect from a paid-for game. Admittedly, sometimes they’re actually better though. Today I’ve chosen to focus on high quality free iPad games that are either premium, used to be paid-for, or are simply of fantastic quality – so grab your iPad, call your kids over, and be prepared for a good few hours of fun from this lot.
Hat-tip to Christiano for pointing out one of these superb games – thanks! Your comments and recommendations are always appreciated in the comments and we do listen!

Back To The Future Episode 1 (free until 7/31/2011)

Grab this one while you can, as the developers have chosen to make it free until the end of July and get you into the series. A compelling pure point-a-click adventure game based on the movies, fans will love exploring and following the story. There’s a good hint system for when you’re stuck, but mostly you won’t need it. There’s quite a few hours of gameplay in here and full recorded dialog with fantastic 3D graphics. It’s certainly one of the best adventure games I’ve seen on the iPad yet.

MetalStorm: Online

 A freemium multiplayer flight sim, MetalStorm is certainly a superb high quality production and the controls are perfect. Currently rated 4.5  stars but over 16,000 users, you really can’t argue with the numbers. Even though I’m really not a fan of flight sims, the controls were easy enough to make the game accessible, though I did find my arms tiring after waving my iPad around for 10 minutes. Play online with full game center support, or practice against waves of enemies; the basic gameplay is great and you’ll be hooked to accessing ever more powerful weapons and new aircraft. Now if only someone would port Privateer to the iPad with controls this good, I’d be a terribly happy boy.

Pucca’s Restaurant

For those of you who don’t know, Pucca is one of those Asian characters (Korean actually) that has found herself plastered on everything from clothing to lunch boxes, and here she is with a sponsored freemium game that’s basically a time-management Chinese restaurant sim. Though the game offers nothing particularly unique above other freemium sims, the production quality is great, it’s far too cute for it’s own good, and if you’re into these kind of games then there’s very little reason you won’t love this. Starting from a lowly 2 cooker shed with 4 tables, keep your customers happy and you can soon advance to make your own elite Happy House or Mandarin Palace. Now get cooking those Moon Cakes, they ain’t gonna cook themselves!

Popstar Physics – Save Toshi 2

Feeling strangely familiar to BoomBlocks on the Wii, PopPhysics has you hurling balls at blocks of various materials in order to knock them over and into zombies – because the balls don’t hurt the zombies and obviously they need to be killed indirectly. It’s strangely addictive, and even quite insanely difficult after the first 2 introduction levels. The levels are unique and just below the level of frustration for the really hard ones, so there’s certainly enough content to keep you playing for a while.

Candy Train

From the studio that brought you Plant vs Zombies, Candy Train is a simple puzzle game that sees you guiding a train around a mess of rotatable track pieces, above all making sure the train doesn’t crash. While it’s certainly addictive, there doesn’t seem to be an awful of variation that would keep you interested for long – but even so, a great little free puzzle game for kids and adults alike. Perhaps you won’t love it quite as much as the 37-year-old reviewer on iTunes though – “it really takes me back to a time when i was a young child and so innocent.”

That’s all, so let me know what you think of the games in the comments, or feel free to tell us all about another fantastic new free iPad game you’d love to feature – developers or passionate gamers are all welcome.