Welcome to the weekly iPhone Quality Index (Qi) games round-up, giving you the LOWdown on the HIGH scorers every Friday on these hallowed pages.

As you may already know, Qi trawls the web for iPhone game reviews from the world’s most respected online and print sources.
Qi then applies its own magic formula to each site (such as 148Apps, Macworld, and Slide to Play) to establish a single definitive Qi score for each iPhone app and game.

Living out a Fantasy

Casting a magic spell or five over the great and the good of the iPhone pundits was Final Fantasy III, which has both rekindled a few memories and unlocked a beguiling 8.9 Qi rating this week.

Square Enix’s seminal role-playing game – revolving around four youthful and inexperienced warriors - caused a stir in the early '90s by introducing a job change system, and its impact 20 years later on iOS is no less pronounced.

Bespoke controls for the iPhone’s touchscreen have helped Final Fantasy III level-up all the way to the #1 spot, a point pursued by Pocket Gamer: “Battle menus are clear and concise, and you can directly tap on enemies to quickly issue weapon attack commands.”

Birds of paradise

Angry Birds’s bid for global domination shows no sign of letting up, as everyone’s favourite fiery fowl migrate to the sunnier climes of Rio de Janeiro on a desperate rescue mission.

Eight textbook reviews from professional iPhone bird watchers have propelled the winged creatures onto Qi’s leaderboard, a lucrative tie-in with the upcoming Fox movie Rio underlining the franchise’s contemporary importance.

In among Rovio’s 60 levels of catapulting carnage lie a talon full of gameplay additions, 148Apps eagle eyed reviewer explaining that, “many of the puzzles include ropes, hanging shades and elaborate trees that throw an extra challenge when compared to the original game.”

Road rage

Another Finnish studio Remedy has swooped – or rather careered – into contention with Death Rally, an explosive combination of cold weapons, hot wheels, and boiling blood.

Richly lauded for its console action-thriller Alan Wake and third-person shooter Max Payne, Remedy certainly looks to have found the perfect antidote to the mundane Sunday driver on iPhone.

You can get the up-to-date information about which games are reviewing best over at the Quality Index.