Strategy games

Everything on this shelf is turn-based or close to it. You are given time to think, and a loss is usually traceable to one specific decision rather than a slow hand.

Cards account for a good part of it. FreeCell shows every card from the start, so a lost deal is genuinely your fault; Spider Solitaire hides more and scales from one suit to four; 12-in-1 Solitaire bundles the rest of the family, daily deals included. Traditional board games sit alongside — Backgammon Duel, English Checkers, Ludo Star and Ultimate Yatzy — the four of them covering most of a rainy childhood.

The other strand is command. Ultimate Tower Defense puts the thinking into the build order — what you place before a wave arrives, and what you sell once it turns out wrong — while Stick War Saga hands you the whole economy: miners, swordsmen, and the constant question of whether to grow or attack.

Our own Link Lab is filed here too, on the grounds that grouping tiles correctly is mostly about what you decline to commit to.