Games

Some of the only mobile games I play regularly are Unciv, Mindustry and funnily enough Wild Rift.

i think its a low barrier to entry which means the app stores are flooded with crap. i'd probably suggest avoiding mobile exclusive games by default

If you try to search the Windows Store, you’ll also get a whole bunch of terrible mobile-esque games. I think the issue is having a “Game Store” integrated into a device, that cannot morally turn away games of any kind or enforce their own prioritization. iOS pretty much needs to allow any kind of app to stay fair.

If we could have a third party App Store on phones kind of like Steam, I think perhaps they could set a bar of quality that allows genuine, meaningful $10 games to be sold there. But, that’s a sizable barrier for entry when most tinkerers that would install a store like Steam are on Windows PCs.

Templar Battleforce is solid.

Most mobile games are toss though, yes. Free mobile games, doubly so.

Almost all mobile games and apps are bad. Google Play accepts pretty much anything and is filled with trash

There’s a free game on iOS called Builderment. It’s basically Factorio without the hostile mobs. An automation game with unlimited resources so you can solely focus on optimization. I have over 500 hours in my current world.

Commenting in here so I can try out some of the games listed because I have found very, very few games that weren't totally trash - either shit quality or an endless begging for money.

The very few that I do enjoy are Word Feud, The Kingdom Rush series, Flow Free, Block Puzzle and only a few other ones.

If you want to play mobile games but don't want to wade through the shit to find the good ones, I recommend getting Google Play Pass, it's mostly premium games (and a few standard ones with ads removed). It makes it easier to find the good games cause you just look at the play pass games. I stopped playing mobile games for years until recently when I got this. There's some classics on it too so it's been nice revisiting some games I used to play on my iPod Touch as a kid.

It's tough to find one that hooks you in but not all mobile games are bad..right I'm playing harry Potter magic awakened and it has me hooked

Yes.

I have rarely encountered a game made specifically for the mobile market to be good. There are some ports of, what I call, real games that work well on a phone. There are some open source versions of things that exist on PC that give the same experience on a phone (like OpenTTD being a nice "rip off" of roller coaster tycoon).

There are only two made for mobile games I can even really give praise to: Galaxy on Fire 2. It's as good as those kinds of quick play arcadey space games can be without going full on Elite or Star Citizen. Perfect for a phone. The other was Synapse and I don't even think you can find it anymore. It was, at the time, the only turn-based tactical game like Firaxis' X-Com games. But since both of the newer XCOM games are officially on the phone, it's not a genre devoid of good stuff.

Half the time I hear about a mobile game getting popular or is touted in these kinds of questions threads, it's something like Clash of Clans. Just crap that lets you play for like 15 minutes every 24 hours unless you start shelling out money. 😮‍💨

Egg Inc. was alright but mostly yes.

I would just like to share Cat Bird with all of you. An excellent mobile first platformer that shows that on screen buttons can work.

• Stranger things 1984
• Hitman Go
• Lara Croft Go

Phobies is really good

Lots of great games, but as already mentioned the FTP are a mess. I subscribe to the Google Play Pass, which give me a pretty good selection of games with no ads or in-app purchases. Helps protect me from the crap out there so its worth it IMO.

Get yourself GeForce now and a Bluetooth controller, you'll never go back to Android games.

Highly recommend Dawncaster if you like Slay The Spire / deck builders. I think I paid $6 for it and I've probably played 40 hours or so. Just an honest to goodness straight up good game that happens to be on mobile.

No gache/gems/freemium nonsense/etc.

I would say that most are subpar. If you are looking for a recommendation then I've been playing Orna (search on the play store) forever now and it's a great time. As hardcore or casual as you like with an overall great community and a developer that is active and engages with us.