Best games
Best iOS games of 1997
The 9 best iOS games released in 1997, ranked from 3,591 critic and player ratings.
The best iOS game of 1997 is Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, with a critic score of 92/100 — updated September 2026.
How this ranking is built
- Games are ranked on the aggregated critic score out of 100 imported from IGDB and Metacritic, never on Tier's own grades.
- A game only enters the ranking with at least 30 external ratings, so a single enthusiastic review never outranks a proven classic.
- Community grades from F to S are shown next to every game, and only stated as a fact above 5 Tier ratings.
- Release window covered: 1997.
- 9 games are listed on this page, carrying 3,591 ratings between them.
- Rankings are recomputed hourly; this one was last rebuilt on 28 September 2026.
Top 9
01
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Having been awoken from his eternal slumber by the reappearance of Castlevania, Alucard must once again face the evil minions of darkness. Use your vampiric powers, along with weapons, potions, and other magical relics to change the tide of battle. A mixture of platform and role-playing action with many hidden areas and secrets. Can you discover them all?
92
/100
02
Pilot Brothers
The case of the stolen elephant! Elephant... Rare... Striped. ...has been kept for many years by an animal trader named Karbophos. Being unable to overcome abuse, it escaped and found a home at the zoo in our city. This is definitely Karbophos's work. To the zoo!
89
/100
03
S
Final Fantasy VII
The Western release of Final Fantasy VII (released as Final Fantasy VII International in Japan) included additional elements and alterations, such as streamlining of the menu and Materia system, reducing the health of enemies, new visual cues to help with navigation across the world map, and additional cutscenes relating to Cloud's past.
85
/100
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Having been awoken from his eternal slumber by the reappearance of Castlevania, Alucard must once again face the evil minions of darkness. Use your vampiric powers, along with weapons, potions, and other magical relics to change the tide of battle. A mixture of platform and role-playing action with many hidden areas and secrets. Can you discover them all?
92
/100
02
Pilot Brothers
The case of the stolen elephant! Elephant... Rare... Striped. ...has been kept for many years by an animal trader named Karbophos. Being unable to overcome abuse, it escaped and found a home at the zoo in our city. This is definitely Karbophos's work. To the zoo!
89
/100
03
S
Final Fantasy VII
The Western release of Final Fantasy VII (released as Final Fantasy VII International in Japan) included additional elements and alterations, such as streamlining of the menu and Materia system, reducing the health of enemies, new visual cues to help with navigation across the world map, and additional cutscenes relating to Cloud's past.
85
/100
04
Final Fantasy Tactics
Lead epic battles in a new FINAL FANTASY world. Betrayal and darker dealings await in Squaresoft's game of war. Fight hundreds of battles across dangerous 3D terrain as an ancient blood feud awakens a deadlier foe.
83
/100
05
Tomb Raider II
Tomb Raider II is the second game of the Tomb Raider games series. It is an action game with platforming and puzzle-solving elements, similar in concept and gameplay to its predecessor. Most of the gameplay consists of traversing hazardous 3D levels utilizing Lara's athletic skills and solving environmental puzzles. The sequel puts more emphasis on fighting enemies, adding many human foes to the mix. Additional weapons include a harpoon gun, a grenade launcher, and an M16 rifle. Automatic pistols replace the magnums from the first game.
80
/100
06
Carmageddon
Take the wheel as Max Damage as you plow scores of vehicles unlucky enough to be in your way in Carmageddon, an action racing game. Your soundtrack will be the sound of crunching metal, the splatter of motor oil on the windshield, and the screams of skidding tires. With a white-knuckled grip on the wheel, you'll have the choice of 23 crash mobiles (from a terrifying monster truck to a high octane Dragster) and 30+ levels of hellish fury and motorized terror.
80
/100
07
Shadow Warrior
Shadow Warrior is a first-person shooter video game developed by 3D Realms and released on May 13, 1997 by GT Interactive. Shadow Warrior was developed using Ken Silverman's Build engine and improved on 3D Realms' previous Build engine game, Duke Nukem 3D. Mark Adams ported Shadow Warrior to Mac OS in August 1997. The game's improvements included introduction of true room-over-room situations, the use of 3D voxels instead of 2D sprites for weapons and usable inventory items, transparent water, climbable ladders, and assorted vehicles to drive (some armed with weapons). Although ultra-violent, the game emphasized tongue-in-cheek humor and contained some sexual themes (although less blatantly than in Duke Nukem 3D). A combination of Duke Nukem 3D and Shadow Warrior was published by GT Interactive in March 1998, titled East Meets West.
73
/100
08
THE KING OF FIGHTERS '97
The King of Fighters '97 is a 1997 fighting game produced by SNK for the Neo Geo arcade and home console. It is the fourth game in The King of Fighters series. It was ported to the Neo-Geo CD, as well as the PlayStation and the Sega Saturn in Japan only.
71
/100
09
Game Dev Story
In Game Dev Story starting from a small office and a few thousand dollars in the wallet, you will need to hire the necessary personnel to develop the first game of the newborn company. This is how the list of candidates runs: there is a good programmer, an artist a bit scarce and a designer not bad; each of them, thanks to their skills, can give a more or less relevant hand in the realization of the project. Once everything is ready you must finally choose the kind and type of game to be realized, keeping in mind that some combinations will get married much better than others. In Game Dev Story player can choose the platform on which to develop the project, and here things start to get very interesting. Game Dev Story in fact traces the last twenty years of the history of the video game industry, reproposing it in the form of an exhilarating parody: we start from the first computers, and then see almost all the major portable and home consoles announced. The names of companies, games and platforms have been revised, but are entirely traceable back to the originals; the Game Boy becomes the Game Kid and Microsoft is now Microx. However, in addition to the order in which the consoles are launched, the developers have chosen to keep even the success they have had at market level, which, on the one hand makes it even more pleasant to relive these twenty years from the inside , on the other hand, the player can easily predict big business and flop: nobody will be so crazy to develop a game for Virtual Boy (pardòn, Virtual Kid), while immediately supporting the fees of PlayStation and PlayStation 2 could lead to big boxing. There are also annual awards, in which a jury rewards the best games of the year in the various categories. In the course of developing a project, however, the player will never remain with his hands: he will have to instruct his employees in order to cultivate their skills, buy the development kits of the various consoles, send announcements and look for new staff. It is essential to keep the interest of the fans high, create hype and see the players line up days before the game, while sales can increase thanks to good reviews in specialized magazines. And yet, making a sequel to a successful game means starting the odds with good odds that the game sells, while the player can decide whether to invest everything in an ambitious project or make small titles in a very short time, until a budget has been reached. high enough to be able to make and place your console on the market.
70
/100
Final Fantasy Tactics
Lead epic battles in a new FINAL FANTASY world. Betrayal and darker dealings await in Squaresoft's game of war. Fight hundreds of battles across dangerous 3D terrain as an ancient blood feud awakens a deadlier foe.
83
/100
05
Tomb Raider II
Tomb Raider II is the second game of the Tomb Raider games series. It is an action game with platforming and puzzle-solving elements, similar in concept and gameplay to its predecessor. Most of the gameplay consists of traversing hazardous 3D levels utilizing Lara's athletic skills and solving environmental puzzles. The sequel puts more emphasis on fighting enemies, adding many human foes to the mix. Additional weapons include a harpoon gun, a grenade launcher, and an M16 rifle. Automatic pistols replace the magnums from the first game.
80
/100
06
Carmageddon
Take the wheel as Max Damage as you plow scores of vehicles unlucky enough to be in your way in Carmageddon, an action racing game. Your soundtrack will be the sound of crunching metal, the splatter of motor oil on the windshield, and the screams of skidding tires. With a white-knuckled grip on the wheel, you'll have the choice of 23 crash mobiles (from a terrifying monster truck to a high octane Dragster) and 30+ levels of hellish fury and motorized terror.
80
/100
07
Shadow Warrior
Shadow Warrior is a first-person shooter video game developed by 3D Realms and released on May 13, 1997 by GT Interactive. Shadow Warrior was developed using Ken Silverman's Build engine and improved on 3D Realms' previous Build engine game, Duke Nukem 3D. Mark Adams ported Shadow Warrior to Mac OS in August 1997. The game's improvements included introduction of true room-over-room situations, the use of 3D voxels instead of 2D sprites for weapons and usable inventory items, transparent water, climbable ladders, and assorted vehicles to drive (some armed with weapons). Although ultra-violent, the game emphasized tongue-in-cheek humor and contained some sexual themes (although less blatantly than in Duke Nukem 3D). A combination of Duke Nukem 3D and Shadow Warrior was published by GT Interactive in March 1998, titled East Meets West.
73
/100
08
THE KING OF FIGHTERS '97
The King of Fighters '97 is a 1997 fighting game produced by SNK for the Neo Geo arcade and home console. It is the fourth game in The King of Fighters series. It was ported to the Neo-Geo CD, as well as the PlayStation and the Sega Saturn in Japan only.
71
/100
09
Game Dev Story
In Game Dev Story starting from a small office and a few thousand dollars in the wallet, you will need to hire the necessary personnel to develop the first game of the newborn company. This is how the list of candidates runs: there is a good programmer, an artist a bit scarce and a designer not bad; each of them, thanks to their skills, can give a more or less relevant hand in the realization of the project. Once everything is ready you must finally choose the kind and type of game to be realized, keeping in mind that some combinations will get married much better than others. In Game Dev Story player can choose the platform on which to develop the project, and here things start to get very interesting. Game Dev Story in fact traces the last twenty years of the history of the video game industry, reproposing it in the form of an exhilarating parody: we start from the first computers, and then see almost all the major portable and home consoles announced. The names of companies, games and platforms have been revised, but are entirely traceable back to the originals; the Game Boy becomes the Game Kid and Microsoft is now Microx. However, in addition to the order in which the consoles are launched, the developers have chosen to keep even the success they have had at market level, which, on the one hand makes it even more pleasant to relive these twenty years from the inside , on the other hand, the player can easily predict big business and flop: nobody will be so crazy to develop a game for Virtual Boy (pardòn, Virtual Kid), while immediately supporting the fees of PlayStation and PlayStation 2 could lead to big boxing. There are also annual awards, in which a jury rewards the best games of the year in the various categories. In the course of developing a project, however, the player will never remain with his hands: he will have to instruct his employees in order to cultivate their skills, buy the development kits of the various consoles, send announcements and look for new staff. It is essential to keep the interest of the fans high, create hype and see the players line up days before the game, while sales can increase thanks to good reviews in specialized magazines. And yet, making a sequel to a successful game means starting the odds with good odds that the game sells, while the player can decide whether to invest everything in an ambitious project or make small titles in a very short time, until a budget has been reached. high enough to be able to make and place your console on the market.
70
/100
Frequently asked questions
What is the best iOS game of 1997?
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night currently tops the ranking with a score of 92/100 across 815 ratings. Ranking updated September 2026.
How is this ranking built?
Games are ranked on their aggregated critic score out of 100, with a minimum vote threshold so a single glowing review never outranks a proven classic; the Tier community's own F-to-S grades are shown alongside each game.