There are times when you have a few minutes to kill, such as waiting in a queue, at the bus stop and so on. These iPhone games are perfect and can be learnt and played in just seconds.

The gameplay is very simple, the controls consist of either tapping or swiping, and they can be immediately started and played without having to spend an hour learning them. Pick up your iPhone and play any time you feel like a break or have a spare minute.

Questy Quest

Price: Free | By: Mighty Games | Size: 103 MB | iOS: 9.3 or later

Questy Quest is game in which you battle your way through a series of bruising bouts with various monsters and creatures hell-bent on your destruction. However, it is not the usual type of fight game in which you perform various kicks, punches and combination moves. All you have to do is tap the screen at the right moment.

The top half of the screen shows you and your opponent face to face and you are armed with a sword. The bottom half of the screen has a curved or circular track. On the track is a target or pile of gold coins and a bar or paddle as the game calls it.

Tap to begin and the paddle moves along the track and the screen must be tapped the instant it passes over the target or pile of gold. This initiates an attack on your opponent.

The paddle then reverses direction, a new target or gold appears on the track and you must tap the screen when the paddle passes over it. More targets and gold may appear and the paddle switches direction each time.

Get it right and you repeatedly bash the bad guy until you win the fight. Get it wrong and the fight is over, but you can try again. It may not sound like much of a game, but it is quite hard to keep up with the tap, tap tap as the paddle moves back and forth over targets. It is frustrating when you miss by a millimetre and have to start again.

Extra items are available, such as potions, that help you in your quest to win a series of fights, such as a lightning bolt, double power hits, a shield and a freezer that slows down the bar/paddle, making it easier to play.

The game is seriously addictive and is good fun. There are rewards to collect, campfires to set up, quests to take part in, gold to be earned, achievements, and lots of bad guys to beat.

It is free if you don't mind adverts but paying removes them. It's your choice.

Sky Ball

Price: Free | By: Ketchapp | Size: 172 MB | iOS: 7.0 or later

Sky Ball is one of those games that are based on a very simple idea but are frustratingly hard yet highly addictive. Once you start playing you cannot stop and you simply must have one more go.

You control a ball that can be moved left or right by swiping horizontally across the screen. It rolls into the screen on a platform which looks rather like a plank of wood in a 3-D perspective view.

The platforms are short and when one ends there is another that comes into view below, but usually slightly to one side. The aim of the game is to keep the ball rolling and bouncing on the platforms for as long as you can.

As the ball flies through the air from a bounce or by running off the end of a platform, it is hard to judge landing on the next platform because there are often several to choose from and usually only one is right. The others are too far away or are to the left or right and the ball falls into the void below.

Some of the platforms have dots, chevrons and other markings and other rewards that you can pick up. You can also earn diamonds (or whatever they are) and these enable you to select new balls or platforms and give the game a different look. There are daily bonuses to collect, too.

There are a few other games that involve a ball rolling along a runway suspended in the air, but Sky Ball is different. The app is ad-supported and they are irritating as you might expect but they can be removed with a reasonably small payment (UK £2.99). It is a game that you can pick up in seconds, but you won't be able to put it down for at least an hour.

Shape Escape

Price: Free | By: Tastypill | Size: 39 MB | iOS: 8.0 or later

Shape Escape is a game in which you control a ball that is caught up in some sort of rotating mechanism. On early levels there is a single circle or polygon shape with one or two spikes. The shape rotates and tapping the screen at just the right time makes the ball jump over a spike.

The aim is to avoid the spikes because they burst the ball and end the level. It must be bounced over each of the spikes until it reaches a gap in the shape's edge. It then falls out. At first, it falls into the tray at the bottom of the screen and the level is complete. Later on there may be two polygons and the ball falls from one to the other. To make it harder, they may contain different numbers of spikes and rotate in different directions.

More complex shapes than these appear in later levels but the gameplay is the same – avoid the spikes and keep going until the exit hole comes around as the shape rotates. There are 50 levels to master and diamonds to be earned.

Shape Escape is free, but not if you want to keep your sanity. I don't think I have ever seen so many adverts. However, they can be removed with a payment (UK £2.99) and after 10 minutes with the game you will either delete it or pay up.

It is actually worth it and it is challenging and addictive fun.