My mom loves number puzzles, so I recommended her the laudable Threes, which would go on to win Apple's 2014 game of the year. But it was already too late: The clones had gotten to her first.
She was playing 2048, which was being cheered in the press as "the indie hit made in just one weekend". She didn't know it was a free public mod of 1024, which was a free clone of Threes, a finely-tuned experience designed by the well-respected Asher Vollmer (with well-respected artist Greg Wohlwend), and sold on the App Store for $2.99.
One year after the puzzling and provocative Threes cloning controversy—where the free clones ultimately reached many more players than the premium original—the developers are offering a new free, ad-supported version of the game. Vollmer tells the Verge that Threes' paywall "has always felt like a misstep."
Try the game that started it all for free on the App Store or Android Marketplace. And if you like Vollmer and Wohlwend's work, also check out TouchTone, a puzzle game about the surveillance state.
