There is a lot of crap out there in the world of iPhone games. It’s really easy to get into the development scene, so if you have even a little bit of programming knowledge, it doesn’t take much time or financial investment to get something up and running on the platform. This means that a lot of really smart, creative, motivated people are seizing the opportunity offered by Apple, and creating games free of the critical eye of the investor. This also means that a lot of dumb, yet motivated, people are creating games when they probably do need the critical eye of an investor looking over their shoulder. A little editorial control never hurt anyone.

With well over 15,000 games available in the iTunes App store, there is a lot of crap to sift through. I am an avid iPhone gamer, and I hope to use this game column as a platform to offer suggestions and highlight the good stuff. This will just be the first batch of suggested titles. Check back in the future for more.

Popcap Games, Inc. is just one of the many companies pushing out iPhone games. Pretty much anything with their stamp on it can be considered a good game. There are two in particular that Popcap has released for the iPhone that have really monopolized my attention: Plants vs. Zombies and Peggle.

Plants vs. Zombies is probably the most appropriately named game in the history of game titles.  You play as the  plants and you fight the zombies. It’s a strategy game where you are gathering energy to grow plants in order to create an impenetrable line of defense against an onslaught of zombies. I don’t usually enjoy strategy games, but Plants vs. Zombies quickly became a huge addictive exception. A simple interface combined with a great sense of humor makes this game totally playable for anyone.

The other title I mentioned was Peggle. I love Peggle. Peggle, as far as I am concerned, is the second coming of Tetris. I have bought and beaten Peggle on three different platforms. I played it and beat it on my DS, on my Xbox, and on my iPhone. Keep in mind that among these three versions, there are almost no discernible differences. I played the same game three times just because I could. Peggle is basically a pinball game. You bounce a metal ball against blue and orange pegs that disappear once they have been hit. Once all the orange pegs have been destroyed, you are greeted with the most beautiful, rewarding level-ending achievement in the history of games. This is what Peggle is really all about: reward.

As your metal ball bounces about, a tone plays for each consecutive peg you destroy. This tone raises slightly in pitch for each destroyed peg, and a meter fills up on the left side of the screen. You can hear and see your score get higher and higher with each recurring hit, and when you have finally destroyed them all you can’t do anything but hurry to the next level to go through the whole joyful experience again. Peggle is awesome.

There are two other notable titles from Popcap games, which are both excellent, but not quite as amazing as the Plants vs. Zombies or Peggle. I think it is because they don’t start with the letter P. They do both begin with the letter B, though, which is really just the letter P with an extra hump. Bookworm and Bejeweled are also available on the iPhone.

Bookworm is a sort of word-search Scrabble game. You are given a board of letters and it is up to you to create words. The bigger the word, the more points. There are things that impede your progress, like burning letters that threaten to end the game, and there are colored letters which create special bonuses and opportunities for extra points. An excellent game, but nothing particularly original.

Bejeweled is the last recomendation from Popcap, and there isn’t a whole lot to say about it. You have probably played it before as there are all kinds of free variations of it over the internet. You just keep matching sets of three colored gems until you realize that you have lost about four or five hours from your life. It’s a very addictive, very replayable game.

There is one other Popcap game available for download called Chuzzle. It doesn’t start with a P or a B, so I refuse to play it.

More recommendations to come!