Last updated on January 4th, 2026 at 12:16 pm
Through the Darkest of Times – Education Game Review
Through the Darkest of Times is a Education/Strategy/Roleplaying game from www.handy-games.com GmbH, first launched in 7th May 2020.
It’s rated 12+ and currently has 25+ ratings on the App Store.
What Makes Through the Darkest of Times Stand Out
Dark times mean fear and risks. The risk to be caught by patrolling National Socialists, looking for people who publicly stand against their point of view. The risk of being beaten up or even killed by the German military because we‘re opposing the regime. The risk of losing everything, including our loved ones. This is how we live. This is how we try to survive. Through the darkest of times.
Plan, Act, Survive
You are the leader of a small resistance group in 1933’s Berlin, of ordinary people, from Jews to Catholics and Communists to Patriots who simply can’t stand aside. Your goal is to deal with small blows to the regime – dropping leaflets to spread awareness about what the Nazis are really up to among the people, painting messages on walls, sabotaging, gathering information and recruiting more followers. And all of that while staying undercover – if the regime’s forces learn about your group, the life of each member is in grave danger.
Experience history
Through the Darkest of Times is a historical resistance strategy game, focusing on conveying the somber mood of the period and the very real struggles of average people living in the 3rd Reich. Historical accuracy means that your small group of resistance fighters will not change the outcome of the war, nor will you prevent all of the Nazi’s atrocities, but you can certainly do everything in your power to save as many lives as you can and oppose the fascist system wherever possible.
Features:
● Experience the Darkest of Times in 4 chapters
● Fight for freedom, weaken the regime and lead your resistance group
● Plan activities, find collaborators and try not to get caught
● Feel the weight of responsibility as you make difficult decisions and face the dire consequences
● Beautifully illustrated expressionistic scenes and events
© HandyGames 2020
This Education game offers engaging gameplay and regular updates for mobile players.
Player Feedback
As a newer release, Through the Darkest of Times is building its player community. Early feedback suggests .
Recent Updates & Development
Latest Update: 17th July 2020
Recent improvements include:
Fixed problem that certain portraits could block pressing buttons close to them.
Some other small bug fixes.
Download & Availability
Through the Darkest of Times is available through the official App Store for iOS devices.
Get Through the Darkest of Times on App Store
Requirements: Requires iPhone 5s / iPad Air / iPad Air (Cellular) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina, Cellular) / iPhone 6 / iPhone 6 Plus / iPad Air 2 / iPad Air 2 (Cellular) / iPad Mini 3 or later.
Compatible with iPhone and iPad devices.
Player Experience Highlights
Community Insight:
This is a great game. It teaches many lessons on many levels. It is very nice that the average person can play and finish this very interesting game. All people and countries should heed the clear warning: Pride goes before a fall.
Handy Games and THQ Nordic have been on fire with releases like Locks Quest and Aces of Luftwaffe! Because of the consistency of quality, they have easily become one of our current favorite developers. With that being said, the purchase of Darkest Times was an automatic one for us. Most of Handy Games library consists of games that are uplifting to play. This game, however, is a bleak look into a nation that is turning to socialism. The eerie comparisons between what is happening in our country and what happened during the Nazi rise is what really sets the tone. Plans are to be made with your comrades in order to combat this new regime performing Marxism. But you must be careful. Nazi sympathizers come in all forms and can be closer than you know. We thoroughly enjoy playing this game…even when it gets stressful seeing your co-conspirators getting arrested.
We love it we plan on playing it with our mum (edit: so we did play it multiple times with our mum we actually succeeded and did play the game multiple times while our mothers group disbanded so its very fun and Ive never really dealt with big glitches and sometimes we deal with little tiny ones but this is a fun historical game and we recommend it on long flights or if your learning something :) fluffybreadcat out!) {another edit we agree with the one that says it should be part of a schools WW2 games idk if Im phrasing it exactly but it is good!}.
We love it we plan on playing it with our mum.
Incredible, and a fun way to learn history.
Interesting and very very difficult game. Very educational.
We love this game already two days ago we got this game its very cool we think this is the best World War II game on the App Store.
This masterpiece doesnt seem to have gotten nearly the attention it deserves. Far from just being a history lesson, its a deep and addictive strategy game. There are interesting decisions to make about risk versus reward and making the most of your characters strengths. Its difficult but not too difficult. The gameplay seamlessly integrates with a story that illustrates everyday life at the time.
We think this game should be included every schools curriculum when covering WWII. Not only does it do a wonderful job of teaching history, but it connects you to it in a way that textbooks fail to. Without ever displaying a single swastika, the creators were able to characterize the sheer terror that was spread across Germany when Hitler became chancellor, and eventually the world. You really feel for these characters. You see just how quickly everything changed for so many people. You see how quickly things are capable of changing now. Seriously, support this game. The knowledge it provides is priceless, and the experience youll have in playing it will stick with you for a lifetime.
Heres the deal. This is genuinely a great game. We feel like they did a good job balancing out the difficulties with different events (risky + high reward vs low risk + average reward). It does give a sense of foreboading. The only problem we have with the game is that can sometimes be hard to move around the map. Sometimes we would try to click to drag/zoom out in the map and it cancels our actions so we have to start over again. Another thing we notice is that sometimes it prevents us from doing any action despite all requirement met. Its not a requirement issue that Im missing cause the whole screen freezes and we cant even exit out of the event to refresh. So we have to close to whole app to start over. We also suggest adding a skip button for the transitions between each chapter. This is bc: again our screen freezes and sometimes we accidently press the menu button and it gets stuck therr DURING the transition sceens. And also sometimes im replaying the game and want to skipthe transitions. Honestly, this game iz wonderful. Lovely and charming artwork, a great idea for a game, andI enjoy living through historical eventsbut we think the controls need a bit of work bc sometimes it glitches and ends up frustrating us.
First things first The story portion of the game is amazing, and really hits home the tragedy of the nazis, and it had us on the edge of our seat the whole time and really hit hard. Just simply wonderful, and the little moments present encapsulated a horror not easily understood with just detailed knowledge. Even though we are a WW2 Buff (made the mistake of reading a portion of the nightmarish Nuremberg Trial testimony) and have read a lot into Nazis and their awfulness, as well as have family who have suffered from the Holocaust, the story hit home like almost nothing else. With that said, the resistance mission portion of the game felt rather unpolished and unclear, and a lot of things didnt make sense (ie actions from one time period dont affect another, people get into disputes on missions way too much, you have a hard limit of five agents, and it is almost comically easy to save your agents from the SA prisons and interrogation areas whereas it can be very difficult to do something such as have an anonymous interview with a journalist in 1936). There also isnt a lot of replay ability. With that said, it is still somewhat good as a game and the story makes up for a lot of it.
Love the game, we have been playing it constantly since we downloaded it. Our only gripe is there needs to be a way to skip the opening scenes and credits. It gets old after your 20th play through. Also there is a bug that prevents you from completing a mission involving passports. No support in 2 years it appears.
We love the game but we cannot hit CONFIRM to start a mission. This is absurd!! Please fix and itll be 5 stars.
We love everything about the game! It truly is amazing. But when planning missions it take 15-20 tries to hit either confirm or cancel because the buttons are so close to the selectable players. Its extremely frustrating and almost makes it unplayable on mobile.
User feedback from Apple App Store
App Details
- Version: 1.0.11
- Size: 720.72 MB
- iOS: 13.0 or later
- Languages: EN, FR, DE, JA, RU, ZH, ES
- Content Advisory: Infrequent/Mild Cartoon or Fantasy Violence, Infrequent/Mild Mature/Suggestive Themes, Infrequent/Mild Realistic Violence
- Developer: www.handy-games.com GmbH
Last updated: 17th July 2020 | Genre: Education, Strategy | Developer: www.handy-games.com GmbH