Civil War: 1863, a new game from Scottish studio Hunted Cow, achieves that rarest of strategy gaming feats: balancing accessibility with depth and challenge.
On first glance, you might see hexes and the Civil War setting and freak out that this is a serious strategy game, one full of numbers and variables and weird icons you'd need an almanac to decipher.
It's actually pretty simple. More Advance Wars than grognard. You tap on units to move and fire, you take it in turns, you manoeuvre around terrain that can afford advantages and disadvantages, and that's about it.
There's two singleplayer campaigns, multiplayer scenarios (hotseat only, though) and, topping it all off, some lovely little animated soldiers.
Civil War: 1863 is a universal app for both iPhone and iPad.
Civil War: 1863 [Apple App Store]