UNO: Arcade Edition - Apple Arcade Review

---

Genre: Card

Developer: Mattel163

Publisher: Mattel163 Limited

Release Date: June 5th 2025

Available On: iOS, iPadOS, tvOS

Reviewed On: iOS

---

UNO is one of the most beloved card games of recent times. The game first came out in 1971, and it remains more popular now than it has ever been. In 2018, Apple released UNO! Mobile is a free version of the game that you can play anywhere, at any time. Last month, Mattel163 released UNO: Arcade Edition, another version of the game exclusive to Apple Arcade. Like any other release of the card game on a console, UNO: Arcade Edition is just another way to play. The game features unique modes and boasts considerable longevity. There are nearly one hundred achievements to earn and numerous customisation options. However, the game is just UNO, with not much else to it.

DIFFERENT WAYS TO PLAY

For anyone unfamiliar with the game, UNO is a card game in which you are dealt seven cards at the beginning. Most cards you get dealt are one of four different colours: blue, red, green or yellow. Most of these cards have a number on them, and you need to play all of your cards until you have none left. The first player to discard all their cards wins. If another player plays a card, you can either play a card with the same colour or number. That is the basic explanation of UNO's rules, but there are a number of different cards that alter the gameplay and can give you an advantage. Special cards include +2 cards, where the next player has to draw an extra two cards from the deck, reverse cards change the direction in which players draw a card, and skip cards make the next player lose a turn. UNO offers an endless number of strategies, and although it is conceptually simple, it always feels fresh and engaging.

UNO: Arcade Edition for Apple Arcade is simply the game on your phone, without much else. There are three different game modes to choose from: Single-player, Quick Match, and Custom Rules. Single-player mode is designed for play against CPU opponents, making it ideal for offline gaming. Unfortunately, after playing UNO: Arcade Edition for a little while, the single-player mode is easily the worst. The CPU players are extremely easy, and I never lost a match in my time with the game. If you have one card left to play and the CPU chooses a different colour card to play, it always selects the colour card you have left. It was not challenging in the slightest, and I expected the CPU players to pose a greater threat.

Quick Match mode was my favourite and the one I spent the most time on. It is the same as single-player, but you are now playing an online match against other players. I won quite a few matches, but I also lost just as many. Other players can be tough, and it got very tense at times. Quick Match is the mode people will enjoy most. For me, I always got into a match, and the game never failed to match me with other players. I have heard from different people that UNO: Arcade Edition on Apple Arcade can be laggy and sometimes fails to connect players. I did not experience this during my playthrough, but it's worth noting. 

Custom Rules is an online mode that allows you to alter the gameplay slightly. UNO already has several variations, and people enjoy playing with different rules. You can change the rules so that every card a player has is shuffled up and dealt again, you can disallow all wild cards in the game, and you can change the rules so that every played card has to correspond to the colour of the last card dealt. There are a lot of options to play with in this mode. I prefer the regular rules of UNO, so the custom rules are not something that interests me. However, many people like to change the gameplay, and this mode does that well enough.

UNLOCKABLES

As you play UNO: Arcade Edition on Apple Arcade, you will unlock dozens of achievements. These achievements can change the look of your cards, the appearance of the card table, and provide new profile pictures and frames for your avatar. These are a nice addition and do give you some replay value. The customisable avatars, cards, and card table are more of a gimmick than something worth pursuing. They are fine, but they weren't enough reason to continue playing the game. 

UNO: Arcade Edition for Apple Arcade is better suited for short bursts of play rather than extended periods. The gameplay itself is fun enough, but the music is very bland during matches and the button you press to say "UNO" gets annoying very quickly. There are options to lower the voice and sound effects in the game, and I guarantee that many players will want to do this almost immediately.

UNO: ARCADE EDITION - APPLE ARCADE: VERDICT

UNO: Arcade Edition on Apple Arcade is a fun enough casual game for fans of the physical card game. It exists as an alternative format for playing the game, offering a few different modes to choose from. Quick Match was enjoyable, but the single-player mode was tedious and far too easy to complete. Custom rules have good potential, but it isn't my preferred way to play the game. The achievements are fun to collect, but there is very little reward aside from some customisable options. Overall, UNO: Arcade Edition is a decent addition to Apple Arcade, even though it's as basic as you can get.