Mobile games usually get a bad rep as they’re usually asset flips and/or MTX-ridden and/or ad-filled, etc., and I’m sure this is actually the case for most games on the app/play store. But are there any ones that are actually good, maybe just something to pass the time with?
Stardew Valley, which is an amazing harvest moon like game, and subnautica if your device is compatible.
Another good option is to download winlator from the internet and use it to play older Windows games. I play FTL on it. You could also play stuff like Civ probably. I think civ 5 has a touchscreen mode.
no, just get a steam deck
Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp went paid about a year ago and there are no MTX or ads anymore. You can also take a look at Epic, they offer a mobile app with giveaways of paid games just like they do on PC.
Slay the Spire: it’s the same game as on PC or any other medium. Fantastic game. Obviously costs the same as other places (about $10), but well worth it!
Pokemon TCG Pocket. I started early with this, so I have had no problem with being F2P, but I’m sure that late adopters would need to pay some amount to become competitive. Still should be playable F2P, though. Anyways, it’s amazingly unintrusive when it comes to real money transactions. No interrupting ads and you basically have to search for the in-game shop to find the microtransactions.
Roller Coaster Tycoon Classic. This one might have changed since I got it ~8 years ago. It’s a pretty good mobile version of the original game. I’ve spent a lot of time with this game.
Saving this threat for later.
I’ve been playing old electron engine game like icewind Dale & Baldur’s gate. Even Neverwinter nights runs & plays great.
Emulated? Ported?
Fully ported, mod & module compatible! There is potentially infinite playtime in Neverwinter nights cause of it.
Dayum. Sold.
They are the enhanced edition ports i would imagine. Ive played through icewind dale fully on my foldy information rectangle. Played through most of bg1 and going to play the err midqual? Between bg1 and bg2 called siege of dragonspear before i go on to bg2. Characters can be imported between all three.
I really like the polybridge series of games. Bridge puzzle game worh great mechanics.
Lots of good PC ports. The Kotor series and Baldurs gate 1 and 2 and icewind dale ports are good.
Autochess is fun. Lots of opportunities to spend money but none are important, just cosmetic.
Balatro is good (if you like that game as i do)
And also a series of games called “doors” are fun to pass the time. Like a puzzle box where solving one element opens another until the door is opened.
It is 99% crap on the stores though. I tend to get ports and emulators for most of my mobile gaming.
Slice and dice, infinitnode
I lost a full day to that free demo
I mean… not sure if it counts as mobile but the entire history of console gaming up to few years ago works on emulators, so that’s a VAST choice. Sure you might dislike 99.99% but if there is even 0.01% you enjoy, that’s hundreds of games if not more!
Check https://search.f-droid.org/?q=emulator and consider a BT controller.
Not all of them are enjoyable when played on a small touchscreen, so the question is still relevant: which ones actually work well for the form factor?
Fair enough, hence why I mentioned the BT controller but OK so might want something more compact, say if you are walking around or in the subway for 1 stop.
That’s not my situation so naively I’d suggest stuff like https://hexgl.bkcore.com/ or (and sadly I can’t put my hand on it right now) those who rely on accelerometer, this way you don’t even tap on your screen.
That being said I think there are also now Web based emulators that do have controller overlay. This way you use your entire screen real estate but also use the device it as a controller. There is no haptic feedback but works relatively well, I used that for WebXR on mobile.
Edit: it wasn’t any of these but still gives the idea https://forums.libretro.com/t/rgpad-a-universal-gamepad-overlay/41134 https://github.com/ShawnHymel/phaser-plugin-virtual-gamepad/
can’t forget about NetherSX2. It’s a little bit of a pain to set up but it gives you all the PS2 options.
Out of curiosity why is it not on F-droid?
I don’t mind installing myself the
.apkviaadbbut the more I learned about how positively strict the process to publish to it is (via https://github.com/Mentra-Community/MentraOS/issues/1168 ) then I also take absence from F-droid as potentially warning side a project isn’t truly open or rely on proprietary parts or anti-pattern.Good question, I think it might have something to do with it being useless until you download a region iso or something. I can’t really speak to it though.
baba is you is pretty good.
I must have spent days playing Smash Hit
Yeah game-enjoyment is subjective. Mobile games dob’t require a 2-hour tutorial before full game starts so people play them. I seen people play the “ad-spam” games on bus without being bothered by the ads.
Anyway go play sakura blade story mode on mobile the soundtrack is awesome.
For games currently out and available:
• Slay The Spire ( a bit more than just something to pass the time with IMO, but again, it’s a direct port from PC )
• SuperTuxKart ( I personally don’t like the mobile version over control issues I have, but it’s still real fun IMO, if you like good kart racers )
• Feudal Tactics ( definitely a time passer on smaller maps )
• HyperRogue ( trippy non-Euclidean game )
• Shattered Pixel Dungeon ( I suck at it, but it’s a fun enough dungeon crawler )
• Mindustry ( PC port is more my style, but fun base defense resource extraction game overall )
For games to come out hopefully soon:
• Maze Mice ( I’m addicted to that game and am half tempted to buy it on mobile when it drops if the dev provides a way to buy an APK for the game instead of going through g••gle play. Think Superhot meets Pac-Man meets roguelite ( rougelike? ) )
There’s a free mobile game called sky that I’d highly recommend, it’s extremely calming but also very well made.
Unciv
