Why short mobile games keep winning me over

I used to feel guilty about dropping big mobile RPGs halfway through. Then I realised the phone is a different kind of device — I play it in gaps, not in long sittings — and the games built around that truth are the ones I finish.

A short level is a gift. Lantern Hollow and Legends of Slots both get this: you can open them, do one meaningful thing, and close them without feeling like you abandoned a mission. That's respect for the player's actual life.

It doesn't mean short games are shallow. Gridlock Blocks has some of the hardest puzzles I've faced this year, but each one is self-contained. Depth and brevity aren't enemies.

These days when I review a game, one of my first questions is: can I put this down cleanly after five minutes? If the answer is no, it had better be very, very good at everything else.