This annual round-up is here to highlight the former and shun (in the nicest possible way) the latter.
While Temple Run sparked an outbreak of high score fever in the autumn, and Infinity Blade II easily lived up to its "most anticipated iOS sequel ever" billing in December, which were the best-reviewed games of the entire year?
To answer that very question (strangely enough), here's the Quality Index (Qi) round-up for 2011.
Aggregating the reviews from the world's best websites, such as 148Apps, Pocket Gamer, and Gamezebo, the Quality Index uses a unique metric to create a single definitive score for each iPhone title.
Attack is the best form of defence
In Chillingo's twist on the popular tower-defence template Anomaly Warzone Earth, you play as the attackers for once, outmanoeuvring and outsmarting the enemies.
On that subject, Anomaly Warzone Earth has managed to strategically triumph over all of the other games on the App Store to take first place on Qi's top ten iPhone games of 2011 list.
A surprise entry at #2 was Devokir's ice-breaking physics game Amazing Breaker, which scored highly for its innovative gameplay, which has you fragmenting items made of ice, using various types of bomb.
World of Goo has also made it onto our prestigious podium, as 2D Boy's charming indie puzzler got the iOS port it was so patently crying out for.
With its offbeat humour, unique art design, and physics-driven puzzling, World of Goo is always, err, jolly Goo-d fun. Sorry.
Halfbrick's endless-flyer Jetpack Joyride, meanwhile, was one of the most widely acclaimed iPhone games last year, proving a big hit among critics thanks to its compelling structure and simple high score gameplay.
Many bitter Jetpack Joyride rivalries continue to this day, I can tell you, and there are probably more starting up right this second across the planet.
Qi's Top 10 iPhone games of 2011
| Pos. | Game | Qi rating | Reviews |
| 1. | Anomaly Warzone Earth | 9.7 | 5 |
| 2. | Amazing Breaker | 9.4 | 8 |
| 3. | World of Goo | 9.3 | 8 |
| 4. | Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery | 9.3 | 5 |
| 5. | Infinity Blade II | 9.2 | 11 |
| 6. | Where's My Water? | 9.2 | 10 |
| 7. | First Touch Soccer | 9.2 | 6 |
| 8. | Contre Jour HD | 9.2 | 6 |
| 9. | Jetpack Joyride | 9.1 | 12 |
| 10. | Flick Soccer! | 9.1 | 6 |
N.B. While we only display the average score to one decimal place, the list is generated to further significant figures. We just don't show them all.
And, naturally, this is a static graph based on live listings which are subject to constant change as new releases and reviews emerge.
In order to provide a regular marker of the critical zeitgeist, however, we will continue to round up the best of the iPhone games released each month to provide definitive Qi top tens throughout 2012.
Quality Index
