Wanted to see if any good mobile games had come out recently. Thought I’d start with last year’s “mobile game of the year,” seemed a good place to start.
But even that turns out to be… a gacha game with micro-transactions. Even the _mobile game of the year!_
Where are the games like Monument Valley? Or the old Geodefense, way back on the original iPod Touch.
True, Baba is You is great! I played it, on Xbox I think. And that might be part of what’s going on.
Mobile chipsets are so powerful these days that the best games on mobile are… many of the same games that are best on PC and other platforms!
There’s no longer any reason for a good game to be exclusive to mobile, or to exclude mobile.
But to win mobile game of the year, they probably need to be mobile exclusive, otherwise they’d just win for another platform.
Infinity Blade series is peak mobile gaming for me. Mobile-first controls, cool setting and atmosphere, great gameplay with a decent difficulty curve, stunning graphics??!!
Truly felt like the mobile equivalent of a AAA game.
Afaik, most decent mobile games (that aren't cashgrabs) live on Apple Arcade right now. At least they did a few years ago when I last checked it.
That isn't a reason to overlook the game entirely though. Sure, the gacha system is a scourge on gaming, but if you just ignore that part, games like Genshin Impact and Honkai Star Rail are also free open world RPGs with solid gameplay, fantastic music, and compelling story.
As someone who despises mobile games, Genshin and HSR are actually legit. Admittedly I play the PC versions like 90% of the time but they are nothing like a typical mobile game. You don't need to spend a dime to fully enjoy the game, you end up doing it because the game is fun, and frankly spending money on these two games gives you very little advantage. Also there are no annoying ads popping up every 5 minutes (in fact there are no ads at all).
... Did you actually play to confirm that tho? Hoyo games are compromised by being live service resulting in limited daily progress, not by money. Funnily enough money barely gets you anywhere in their games.
I wouldn't say they are. Genshin in particular (which I play) has barely any incentive to spend money other than clearing a monthly dungeon called the Abyss. The maximum possible monthly rewards give you 600 of the premium currency. For reference, just doing the daily missions will get you that much in 10 days. In fact a common complaint among high spenders is that the game isn't hard enough.
Neither does the game advertise premium currency deals to you. You could play the entire story so far and never see a dollar price on screen.
I guess as a point of reference - I used to also play an actually bad mobile game where monetization was definitely the key factor. Genshin is not that.
I don't play star rail anymore, but i do play genshin. I am f2p (not counting an impulse spend but that was once) and I'm doing great. Hoyo doesn't make games that force you to spend.
The story is fun, the gameplay is easy to learn, and the difficulty goes up when the player is ready ie, a test. The only reason you would spend money is cuz *you* want too.
I spent on Navia, a then new character that I wanted. I didn't have enough time left to grind for primogems, so instead of waiting for a rerun, i spent a few bucks and got her. Completely my choice, nothing about her is necessary to the game.
> That isn't a reason to overlook the game entirely though.
If it's pay to win I don't play it. I don't know if either of the games you mentioned is pay to win, but if paying even gives the player a significant advantage it's worth overlooking.
I mean it's kind of pay to win? But not really. Let me explain. In Genshin, the only endgame is a hard PvE dungeon called the Abyss. To get the best rewards, you have to clear in three minutes. This is achievable while not paying anything, with sufficient game knowledge and careful spending of resources. Big spenders can clear the Abyss in about 10 seconds, but that's way overachieving for no additional benefit. There isn't even an official leaderboard to brag about.
I'm aware that most mobile games put monetising first and the experience second, but with Genshin it really is the other way around. If monetisation is the only thing holding you back, I'd say you're depriving yourself of something pretty special.
(Don't join the community though. We're a bunch of unfunny morons and losers)
> I'm aware that most mobile games put monetising first and the experience second, but with Genshin it really is the other way around.
It sounds like an actually ok game then. I don't have a problem with devs making money, the way Riot did it with League of legends with cosmetic skins being a good example. 2007 Runescape as well.
Might give geshin a try in this case, especially since there isnt like a leaderboard thats just a comparison of who spends the most like most mobile games.
Lol, I wasn’t sure if others would remember it! Didn’t know if it was actually popular at the time, or if I was one of only a few who played it.
The sequel, GeoDefense Swarm, was also good
Try 'Youtube Playables'. No ads, no downloads, no microtranactions, just YouTube trying to keep you on their site for as long as possible by having decent mobile games.
You my friend need orna in your life, amazing geo Game with an amazing dev who started as a solo, and eas able to grow into a small company himself ! best part ? No micro transactions besides asteics!
The best ones from these last few years are mostly PC ports really.
* Slay the Spire
* Slice & Dice
* Peglin
* Loop Hero
* Balatro (unofficial fan port)
* Cultist Simulator
* Don't Starve
* Dead Cells
* Stardew Valley
* Terraria
* Vampire Survivors
* Super Auto Pets
* Bloons TD6 or 5
* Any emulator with some good roms (prefer turn based games if I'm playing on touch)
These are all on Android BTW
I agree. Something like angry birds was .99 and that was the full game. I am not a mobile gamer but probably had 4 games on my phone back then, now I have zero games installed.
Mario Run did it perfectly. Release a fun demo with enough content to get you hooked, and then make the entire game a purchase. See what you're buying, and then buy it, and then you have it. Perfect business model.
Flopped HORRIBLY. And now all of Nintendo's mobile games are the same shit everyone else is doing, and they're making tons of money.
They tried. They genuinely tried. Mobile gamers do not want a good deal. Somehow.
I didn't contribute to that, I paid for a ton of good mobile games, PlantsvsZombies1, WorldOfGoo,MonumentValley1&2, CutTheRope, FruitNinja, CatPhysics, the list goes on. Old games were the shit and were one purchase.
It's the youngsters that didn't know any better, and made mobile marker what it is today.
What's the deal with the misery porn ads where there's a mom and her daughter and sometimes a dumpster baby, and they're dying of exposure and it looks like the game is about saving them? But then the actual game is a fucking candy crush clone? But also, the games are called like gossip town or some weird shit? And you never actually get to the part where you're saving them from the tough shit but rather just rebuilding their restaurant. The world of mobile games is crazy in a bad way.
My kid was playing a game and this ad came up where the dad was beating the mom and kid and they had to move out and it was a candy crush game.
I remember my kid asking “why is the daddy hitting the baby?”
I was pissed. No more mobile games for the kid. They have a switch now.
I'd rather let my kid play GTA instead of mobile games.
It's actually less violent than most ads, and actually teaches them something.
Or if the kid's younger than 8-9 there are plenty of games on PC, I'd rather give them a laptop than watch them do this.
Joke's on you, I used to murder my customers with death rides on Roller Coaster Tycoon as a kid, and now I'm on death row.
/s (the death row part. I really used to murder my virtual customers)
Haha I remember when I was seven I was playing soldier of fortune (ultra violent shooter). Anyway I was shooting a dead dudes individual fingers off and working the face when my dad walked by and decided I needed a break from violent games.
Week later I'm banned from shooters and playing rollercoaster tycoon instead, doing the old classic gap in the track and kill everyone, or leaving individual guests stranded on small islands for the rest of time. My dad, not knowing what I was doing comments "see you don't need violence in games to have fun".
Yeah! I actually downloaded one in which the ad was the dad getting a new girlfriend and kicking the mother and daughter out to the streets. Then the game itself was "oh no, I got divorced and by restaurant was damaged by a storm, gotta rebuild it", and the money making mechanic was a candy crush alike. Also you had to learn gossip about townsfolk. At no point did I get to save anyone from a Victorian orphan's death.
don't forget the ones where the woman masterbates on a washing machine, and then the sequel where she gets a bunch of friends together to all to it at the same time.
look up all the commercials for that game, if the game was actually like those commercials, Id pay a full game price for that batshit story, but no, cant be like that in the real game
The most annoying thing about these IMO is you can only really make progress in the game for a few days before it becomes so “expensive” to keep progressing that you’re either gonna have to play like 500 more rounds to clean/repair/unlock the next thing or you can pay a few bucks to get the coins for it. They’re decently entertaining at first and then they _all_ plateau to the point you gotta either spend hundreds to keep continuing at a normal rate for the rest of the game or sell your soul to the game and play nonstop for weeks on end. Such trash.
It looks very dumb from the outside, but I actually think these games expertly tuned to pique interest and capture a certain demographic. And when I said "expertly" I literally mean I think they're employing experts who advise them on how to use psychological tricks to gain and retain their audience. The actual quality of the game is honestly not super relevant. A ton of games with super high numbers are just braindead dopamine stimulators.
It's the video game version of clickbait, though it functions slightly different.
One could make 10 versions of the same basic game.
One is "save your family", another is "see this anime girl naked", another is "become a super hero".
It's all about demographics, maximizing exposure. They're already getting the weebs with "anime girl". So now they're shooting for some other demographic with the "new" game. Once you get past a few simple things like sex and superheros and graphical eye candy, all the classic video game things, you have to get creative to reach untapped audiences.
You already have the game, now you just need the thin veil of a 'story' and some art.
There's someone out there who would play a candy crush clone if, for example, you surrounded it with a theme about carpentry(say, making classy furniture), or hunting, or fancy coffees, or pimple popping, or a hundred thousand other things.
Hosting is basically free, so the only question is, are there enough of potential customers to 'pay' for the work you sink into coming up with a new theme. 'Pay' in marks because maybe you aren't after money directly, but a portfolio of total downloads, or high ratings with people over X play time, or whatever analytics help you get into a different platform or market, or the whole project is a learning experience, or can be a learning experience for A.I. development.
Speaking of A.I. - Expect shovel-ware phone games to only get more prolific as A.I. advances. I mean, when all you need to do is create themes, you can automate a lot.
This was a thing with Evony (PC) back in 2009! They were famous for their ads which featured women that were nowhere to be found in the game itself (basically a Civ knockoff). They started out inviting you to "save" a terrified woman being held at swordpoint and the like (again, Civ clone), then moved onto the famous very scantily-clad women and taglines like "Play now, My Lord!" "Play discreetly, My Lord!" on the ads.
For whatever reason, algorithms are saying that's how you make money. It's like YouTube thumbnails, it makes no sense to have these excessively samey thumbnails but it works for some reason.
It's all how these algorithms feed you ads and content.
There is or was a mobile game that showed game play from a PC game in their ads. I think the PC game was Cossacks but I don't remember the name of the mobile game.
I keep getting ads for this game where you run backwards along a highway shooting zombies. Looked really fun, so I downloaded it and it was nothing like that. Like they must have gone through the effort to animate a totally made up game just to make their ad better. Bonkers.
There’s one I always see for this mobile add that has these little soldiers getting drip fed saliva from an ahego faced giant, fails to get it and falls down to fight enemies. I’m like why
Rise of Kingdom unironically is asking for more than 2 months for one upgrade… it’s not even close to the final upgrade too. I uninstalled a long time ago, but I wonder if I kept grinding that they’ll just make me wait 1 year for +1% unit hp or smthing
I actually still enjoy RoK as a free player. By the time the server gets to KvK I realize it's up to the whales now and then I re-roll on another server. I just frame my goal as helping the whales get set up, still enjoyable to play. YMMV.
Nothing better than "We've gone out of our way to render this gameplay so unplayable that you will have no choice but to continuously give us money in order to make it playable."
I think mobile games were peak when they were uncomplicated. Games like flappy bird, potty racer, etc. easy to pick up and you don’t have think too much to play.
Now mobile chipsets are powerful enough that the best mobile games are simply… ports of good console games, lol.
Indie games work well for this. Baba is You, Journey, etc.
Baba is you is the only game I've happily bought on mobile, but it doesn't count because it's just a port of the original pc game. I was however, and sadly, pleasantly surprised there wasn't a single ad once I bought it.
New games take this philosophy and ruin it
Choose between an obviously correct green doorway or an obviously incorrect red doorway.
Incredibly short identical levels where there is no downside to losing and no reward for a high score.
IMO Fruit Ninja is basically peak mobile game. You understand how to play within 2 seconds of opening the app, but there's skill involved so it's worth playing to try and get better, and it also makes use of the (somewhat) unique touch interface on your phone as a core gameplay mechanic. It's also something that's easy to pick up for 2 minutes and put back down if needed, so perfect to have in your pocket all the time.
I haven't played in a while so maybe nowadays it's full of garbage. But back in the day it was a masterclass of game design.
Every app I use was better 10 years ago. So many picture/video and music apps that don’t even exist anymore. Now what’s left look like it’s all from the same terrible company and they’re all filled with ads. It’s amazing to me that anyone still uses them.
> Every app I use was better 10 years ago.
Couldn't agree more. They recently "updated" my banking app, and made it around 100x worse than it originally was. It's been a buggy mess for over a year. Fuck Truist.
This is capitalism in a nutshell. It drains the soul from anything it touches and reduces it to a machine trying to grab as much money as possible. Sad.
Mobile games back in the day were about making something fun that made good use of the unique inputs touchscreen had to offer.
Mobile games now are about mega companies making shitty but addicting game loops designed to milk you of your money, and never be beatable.
There are still fun games, but most devs (myself included) just don’t bother with mobile anymore because you’ll never even be found on the store u less you have insane amounts of money to advertise, and to get that money you typically need to ruin your game with said shitty micro transaction game loops
I had an app that made a few bucks, someone made a crappy free clone, pumped it full of ads and microtransactions, and it became the top grossing app on the app store for a long time, probably made millions. After that I was like fuck it, made all my apps free, went back to my day job.
Oh my fuck, that is fucking horrible. This, this is why all mobile games suck now. Even if you manage to break through you still get screwed, I’m so sorry that happened to you.
It’s subjective.
There’s just lots of bloatware, lootbox/gacha and bad mobile games in general right now.
But currently there are still good phone games out there. You just have to wade through all the front page headiners.
Some older games are also more refined now.
Tons of great smartphone games these days, just fork over 5-10 bucks for a paid one. Slice and Dice, Dicey Dungeon, Slay the Spire, Game Dev Tycoon, Vampire Survivors, Unciv etc
Maybe, but let's not ignore the awesome ports now possible due to better hardware. Try some games on this list:
* Papers, Please
* Stardew Valley
* This War of Mine
* Minecraft
* Terraria
* Don't Starve: Pocket Edition
* Muse Dash
* Poly bridge
* Unciv
* Mini Metro
* Castlevania: SotN
* Dead Cells
Yes, you have to pay an IMO perfectly reasonable price for most of them, and that's fine.
Let me add to this list:
- XCOM 2
- Total War: Rome, Medieval 2
- Baldur's Gate 1, 2
- Icewind Dale
- KOTOR
- Neverwinter Nights
- The Bard's Tale
- Northgard
- Shadowrun (all three games)
Ports: Wreckfest, Life is Strange 1 & Before The Storm, Battle for Bikini Bottom, Grid Autosport, Brotato & VampireSurvivors, Bridge Constructor (most of them, for example Portal, yes Valve Portal)
Expensive ports: Squeenix Final Fantasy
Mobile: Rush Rally 3, Rocket League Sideswipe (EOL but servers are still up)
Dude the best mobile game I’ve ever played was Galaxy on fire 2. That shit was heat, and I still have it downloaded and play it every once in a while. It has a decent story, great gameplay, and a ton of customization. Hell, it even has its own in game economy.
As well, it has not 1 but 2 great DLCs that add new ships, weapons, gear, star systems, and story!
Fishlabs, huh?
2 was obviously a huge improvement, but I still have nostalgic memories playing the first GoF as a kid on like a sony ericsson phone or something. I actually thought Deep 3D was the better of the two. I loved the deep sea theme more, and the depth limits + fish catching was pretty immersive for the time.
Back then, we were happily slicing fruits and flinging birds, not stressing about loot boxes and in-app purchases draining our wallets faster than a speeding bullet!
Lots of games are getting better, but it's easy to feel like they're getting worse because of the ways the industry is evolving, in particular online multiplayer games. Whenever one comes out that's *not* a huge scam, people get so excited. Plus couch co-op is surprisingly sparse these days, usually reserved for side-scrollers and the odd shooter.
Single player games are for sure better now though.
Weirdly, the YouTube app has Flash games built in now. They're generic versions of old popular ones. A Farm thing, some Tower Defense, that one with launching bombs in an arc.
https://youtube.com/playables/UgkxMYb8szzWt5VeS7WoQoXGi1NE6p3GWsYM?si=AJF8JqlFD6y3LKg_
Enshittification. Players opting in for ads and paying for win. Gives platforms the ammo they need to double down on ad tech. You're now seeing playables on youtube as well. It's gonna get so much worse. Just check the paid games section, it's almost like a haunted house. People want ads and enshittification? That's what they'll get.
Or if you go back about 15 years ago you hit the true pinnacle of mobile gaming. Before smartphones and touch screens. I'm talking about Tetris and Snake baby, aw hellz yeah!
You can't even get games like that on smartphones nowadays. Sure you can find Tetris and Snake, but they'll be overcomplicated, filled with ads, loaded with micro-transactions, and covered in other bull poopy.
When the monotozation wizards took over and from one year to another gdc turned from fun Indy game previews to marketers talking how to extract more money from you. 😅
I disagree with this. There are still a lot of really good free or pay once and get the whole game options out there. You have to sift through to find them but they’re there. And there are way better options than I remember having ten years ago.
You played Fruit Ninja because you already played all three other decent games 5 times that day.
You don't play anything now because of algorithmic doom scrolling.
You can still play all the old games today and hundreds of better mobile games you never heard of.
You just... won't. You can't scroll Reddit with Stardew Valley taking up the entire screen now can you.
> You can still play all the old games today and hundreds of better mobile games you never heard of.
Many old games are not compatible on newer mobile hardware.
I'm playing Brawl Stars and it's my favourite mobile game. No ads, lots of different characters and game modes, and you can play matches with one or two people. The graphics are very smooth on my phone.
This is the same as people saying "music was better 10 years ago". All of that music/games still exist. You van access it at any time. You don't have to play the crappy modern games/listen to crappy modern music. There's literally no rule and no one is forcing you to.
I would like to try one of those mob shooters where you walk away from a hoard while shooting. But I won't because I'm sure they are only ad infested bloatware. Most likely stealing all your data too.
yes, they were really awesome too.
Now people willingly pick gacha stuff over the exact same game that is for free (like vampire survivors)
smartphone games have become an enormous cancer on the gaming industry.
Back when you got the whole game and didn’t have to fork out for extra micro transactions
Wanted to see if any good mobile games had come out recently. Thought I’d start with last year’s “mobile game of the year,” seemed a good place to start. But even that turns out to be… a gacha game with micro-transactions. Even the _mobile game of the year!_ Where are the games like Monument Valley? Or the old Geodefense, way back on the original iPod Touch.
Yeah, I feel you on that. The best one I’ve found recently is Baba Is You.
Well, Baba Is You was just a normal console/PC game that wasn't ported to mobile. It's no more a mobile game than XCOM or Dragon Quest VIII are.
True, Baba is You is great! I played it, on Xbox I think. And that might be part of what’s going on. Mobile chipsets are so powerful these days that the best games on mobile are… many of the same games that are best on PC and other platforms! There’s no longer any reason for a good game to be exclusive to mobile, or to exclude mobile. But to win mobile game of the year, they probably need to be mobile exclusive, otherwise they’d just win for another platform.
Theres a good reason for some games to exclude mobile: complexity of command inputs.
Immediate counterpoint are DS games
Ports of PC games to mobile are generally pretty good!
The best phone games are the ones that weren’t made to be phone games. Stardew Valley, Terraria, Minecraft, etc.
Slay the Spire, Dicey Dungeons, Into the Breach, Vampire Survivors. Can’t wait until the Balatro port.
It's so difficult though, I get stuck and infuriated
Definitely requires several degrees of thinking outside the box!
Infinity Blade series is peak mobile gaming for me. Mobile-first controls, cool setting and atmosphere, great gameplay with a decent difficulty curve, stunning graphics??!! Truly felt like the mobile equivalent of a AAA game. Afaik, most decent mobile games (that aren't cashgrabs) live on Apple Arcade right now. At least they did a few years ago when I last checked it.
And sadly you can’t even redownload the old infinity blades on ios
I play old GBA games etc. on my phone. Even a few OG Nintendo JRPGs. Great to poke at while only half paying attention.
I feel like the worst is the best games are barely playable ports of old ps2 era games
That isn't a reason to overlook the game entirely though. Sure, the gacha system is a scourge on gaming, but if you just ignore that part, games like Genshin Impact and Honkai Star Rail are also free open world RPGs with solid gameplay, fantastic music, and compelling story.
Honkai Star Rail, that was the one that won mobile game of the year. I couldn’t remember the name
I will definitely overlook the game if gameplay elements are compromised by the design decision to make you spend money
As someone who despises mobile games, Genshin and HSR are actually legit. Admittedly I play the PC versions like 90% of the time but they are nothing like a typical mobile game. You don't need to spend a dime to fully enjoy the game, you end up doing it because the game is fun, and frankly spending money on these two games gives you very little advantage. Also there are no annoying ads popping up every 5 minutes (in fact there are no ads at all).
... Did you actually play to confirm that tho? Hoyo games are compromised by being live service resulting in limited daily progress, not by money. Funnily enough money barely gets you anywhere in their games.
The limited daily progress IS the core mechanic to make you pay...
I wouldn't say they are. Genshin in particular (which I play) has barely any incentive to spend money other than clearing a monthly dungeon called the Abyss. The maximum possible monthly rewards give you 600 of the premium currency. For reference, just doing the daily missions will get you that much in 10 days. In fact a common complaint among high spenders is that the game isn't hard enough. Neither does the game advertise premium currency deals to you. You could play the entire story so far and never see a dollar price on screen. I guess as a point of reference - I used to also play an actually bad mobile game where monetization was definitely the key factor. Genshin is not that.
I don't play star rail anymore, but i do play genshin. I am f2p (not counting an impulse spend but that was once) and I'm doing great. Hoyo doesn't make games that force you to spend. The story is fun, the gameplay is easy to learn, and the difficulty goes up when the player is ready ie, a test. The only reason you would spend money is cuz *you* want too. I spent on Navia, a then new character that I wanted. I didn't have enough time left to grind for primogems, so instead of waiting for a rerun, i spent a few bucks and got her. Completely my choice, nothing about her is necessary to the game.
Based Navia main, good choice
> That isn't a reason to overlook the game entirely though. If it's pay to win I don't play it. I don't know if either of the games you mentioned is pay to win, but if paying even gives the player a significant advantage it's worth overlooking.
I mean it's kind of pay to win? But not really. Let me explain. In Genshin, the only endgame is a hard PvE dungeon called the Abyss. To get the best rewards, you have to clear in three minutes. This is achievable while not paying anything, with sufficient game knowledge and careful spending of resources. Big spenders can clear the Abyss in about 10 seconds, but that's way overachieving for no additional benefit. There isn't even an official leaderboard to brag about. I'm aware that most mobile games put monetising first and the experience second, but with Genshin it really is the other way around. If monetisation is the only thing holding you back, I'd say you're depriving yourself of something pretty special. (Don't join the community though. We're a bunch of unfunny morons and losers)
> I'm aware that most mobile games put monetising first and the experience second, but with Genshin it really is the other way around. It sounds like an actually ok game then. I don't have a problem with devs making money, the way Riot did it with League of legends with cosmetic skins being a good example. 2007 Runescape as well. Might give geshin a try in this case, especially since there isnt like a leaderboard thats just a comparison of who spends the most like most mobile games.
Geodefense was so rad
Lol, I wasn’t sure if others would remember it! Didn’t know if it was actually popular at the time, or if I was one of only a few who played it. The sequel, GeoDefense Swarm, was also good
Genshin and Star Rail aren't really games riddled with micro transactions. That's the best part about them.
Shoutout to polytopia. A great free game with no ads or need for network access.
Looking forward to Path of exile mobile, hopefully it's good.
Try 'Youtube Playables'. No ads, no downloads, no microtranactions, just YouTube trying to keep you on their site for as long as possible by having decent mobile games.
You my friend need orna in your life, amazing geo Game with an amazing dev who started as a solo, and eas able to grow into a small company himself ! best part ? No micro transactions besides asteics!
The best ones from these last few years are mostly PC ports really. * Slay the Spire * Slice & Dice * Peglin * Loop Hero * Balatro (unofficial fan port) * Cultist Simulator * Don't Starve * Dead Cells * Stardew Valley * Terraria * Vampire Survivors * Super Auto Pets * Bloons TD6 or 5 * Any emulator with some good roms (prefer turn based games if I'm playing on touch) These are all on Android BTW
More games exist like that now than ever. It's just there's a disproportionately even larger number of predatory crap games.
It takes so much effort to find them though.
I agree. Something like angry birds was .99 and that was the full game. I am not a mobile gamer but probably had 4 games on my phone back then, now I have zero games installed.
Angry birds became full of micro transactions games too.
Try "single player games"or "2 player games" by jindoblu Amazing app. No Micro transactions. Loads of games.
[Iris](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.Maboey.IRIS) is a game i developped the old way no ads, no microtransactions just fun
It’s not so much the micro transactions as it is the ads for me
Mario Run did it perfectly. Release a fun demo with enough content to get you hooked, and then make the entire game a purchase. See what you're buying, and then buy it, and then you have it. Perfect business model. Flopped HORRIBLY. And now all of Nintendo's mobile games are the same shit everyone else is doing, and they're making tons of money. They tried. They genuinely tried. Mobile gamers do not want a good deal. Somehow.
Yeah but it's our own fault because we were too cheap to hand out two bucks for a game if we could get others for free. "I dOnT pAy FoR mObIlE gAmEs"
I didn't contribute to that, I paid for a ton of good mobile games, PlantsvsZombies1, WorldOfGoo,MonumentValley1&2, CutTheRope, FruitNinja, CatPhysics, the list goes on. Old games were the shit and were one purchase. It's the youngsters that didn't know any better, and made mobile marker what it is today.
What's the deal with the misery porn ads where there's a mom and her daughter and sometimes a dumpster baby, and they're dying of exposure and it looks like the game is about saving them? But then the actual game is a fucking candy crush clone? But also, the games are called like gossip town or some weird shit? And you never actually get to the part where you're saving them from the tough shit but rather just rebuilding their restaurant. The world of mobile games is crazy in a bad way.
My kid was playing a game and this ad came up where the dad was beating the mom and kid and they had to move out and it was a candy crush game. I remember my kid asking “why is the daddy hitting the baby?” I was pissed. No more mobile games for the kid. They have a switch now.
I'd rather let my kid play GTA instead of mobile games. It's actually less violent than most ads, and actually teaches them something. Or if the kid's younger than 8-9 there are plenty of games on PC, I'd rather give them a laptop than watch them do this.
Joke's on you, I used to murder my customers with death rides on Roller Coaster Tycoon as a kid, and now I'm on death row. /s (the death row part. I really used to murder my virtual customers)
Haha I remember when I was seven I was playing soldier of fortune (ultra violent shooter). Anyway I was shooting a dead dudes individual fingers off and working the face when my dad walked by and decided I needed a break from violent games. Week later I'm banned from shooters and playing rollercoaster tycoon instead, doing the old classic gap in the track and kill everyone, or leaving individual guests stranded on small islands for the rest of time. My dad, not knowing what I was doing comments "see you don't need violence in games to have fun".
Yeah! I actually downloaded one in which the ad was the dad getting a new girlfriend and kicking the mother and daughter out to the streets. Then the game itself was "oh no, I got divorced and by restaurant was damaged by a storm, gotta rebuild it", and the money making mechanic was a candy crush alike. Also you had to learn gossip about townsfolk. At no point did I get to save anyone from a Victorian orphan's death.
don't forget the ones where the woman masterbates on a washing machine, and then the sequel where she gets a bunch of friends together to all to it at the same time.
Wait what? I've never seen those!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7Gd6zm1DSw
Holy shit
look up all the commercials for that game, if the game was actually like those commercials, Id pay a full game price for that batshit story, but no, cant be like that in the real game
The most annoying thing about these IMO is you can only really make progress in the game for a few days before it becomes so “expensive” to keep progressing that you’re either gonna have to play like 500 more rounds to clean/repair/unlock the next thing or you can pay a few bucks to get the coins for it. They’re decently entertaining at first and then they _all_ plateau to the point you gotta either spend hundreds to keep continuing at a normal rate for the rest of the game or sell your soul to the game and play nonstop for weeks on end. Such trash.
Hey, the kids gotta learn about the hard truths of life somehow. I’d rather flappy bird teach him about dumpster babies than me.
It looks very dumb from the outside, but I actually think these games expertly tuned to pique interest and capture a certain demographic. And when I said "expertly" I literally mean I think they're employing experts who advise them on how to use psychological tricks to gain and retain their audience. The actual quality of the game is honestly not super relevant. A ton of games with super high numbers are just braindead dopamine stimulators.
It's the video game version of clickbait, though it functions slightly different. One could make 10 versions of the same basic game. One is "save your family", another is "see this anime girl naked", another is "become a super hero". It's all about demographics, maximizing exposure. They're already getting the weebs with "anime girl". So now they're shooting for some other demographic with the "new" game. Once you get past a few simple things like sex and superheros and graphical eye candy, all the classic video game things, you have to get creative to reach untapped audiences. You already have the game, now you just need the thin veil of a 'story' and some art. There's someone out there who would play a candy crush clone if, for example, you surrounded it with a theme about carpentry(say, making classy furniture), or hunting, or fancy coffees, or pimple popping, or a hundred thousand other things. Hosting is basically free, so the only question is, are there enough of potential customers to 'pay' for the work you sink into coming up with a new theme. 'Pay' in marks because maybe you aren't after money directly, but a portfolio of total downloads, or high ratings with people over X play time, or whatever analytics help you get into a different platform or market, or the whole project is a learning experience, or can be a learning experience for A.I. development. Speaking of A.I. - Expect shovel-ware phone games to only get more prolific as A.I. advances. I mean, when all you need to do is create themes, you can automate a lot.
This was a thing with Evony (PC) back in 2009! They were famous for their ads which featured women that were nowhere to be found in the game itself (basically a Civ knockoff). They started out inviting you to "save" a terrified woman being held at swordpoint and the like (again, Civ clone), then moved onto the famous very scantily-clad women and taglines like "Play now, My Lord!" "Play discreetly, My Lord!" on the ads.
Find out more at r/ShittyMobileGameAds
For whatever reason, algorithms are saying that's how you make money. It's like YouTube thumbnails, it makes no sense to have these excessively samey thumbnails but it works for some reason. It's all how these algorithms feed you ads and content.
thats is official google/apple stores for you promoting this crap. imagine if you had a choice where you could select store withbetter ad rules.
There is or was a mobile game that showed game play from a PC game in their ads. I think the PC game was Cossacks but I don't remember the name of the mobile game.
I keep getting ads for this game where you run backwards along a highway shooting zombies. Looked really fun, so I downloaded it and it was nothing like that. Like they must have gone through the effort to animate a totally made up game just to make their ad better. Bonkers.
There’s one I always see for this mobile add that has these little soldiers getting drip fed saliva from an ahego faced giant, fails to get it and falls down to fight enemies. I’m like why
Mobile game: wait 24 hours for this to upgrade, or pay $5
Rise of Kingdom unironically is asking for more than 2 months for one upgrade… it’s not even close to the final upgrade too. I uninstalled a long time ago, but I wonder if I kept grinding that they’ll just make me wait 1 year for +1% unit hp or smthing
I actually still enjoy RoK as a free player. By the time the server gets to KvK I realize it's up to the whales now and then I re-roll on another server. I just frame my goal as helping the whales get set up, still enjoyable to play. YMMV.
Nothing better than "We've gone out of our way to render this gameplay so unplayable that you will have no choice but to continuously give us money in order to make it playable."
I think mobile games were peak when they were uncomplicated. Games like flappy bird, potty racer, etc. easy to pick up and you don’t have think too much to play.
Now mobile chipsets are powerful enough that the best mobile games are simply… ports of good console games, lol. Indie games work well for this. Baba is You, Journey, etc.
Baba is you is the only game I've happily bought on mobile, but it doesn't count because it's just a port of the original pc game. I was however, and sadly, pleasantly surprised there wasn't a single ad once I bought it.
New games take this philosophy and ruin it Choose between an obviously correct green doorway or an obviously incorrect red doorway. Incredibly short identical levels where there is no downside to losing and no reward for a high score.
The one with the kid skiing down the endless mountain catching llamas
Alto's Adventure? There's also one called Alto's Odyssey that starts off on a desert.
Alto! That game is so good for turning your brain off for a bit and having some fun.
Try "single player games" or "2 player games" by jindoblu
I thought this post was referring to the java mobile games of good ole' Nokia days until I realised it's 2024 now
Can't believe we're at the point where people are nostalgic for Flappy Bird
NOW those were good games. Not the Java, the symbian ones.
Fruit ninja, jetpack joyride, angry birds 👌
IMO Fruit Ninja is basically peak mobile game. You understand how to play within 2 seconds of opening the app, but there's skill involved so it's worth playing to try and get better, and it also makes use of the (somewhat) unique touch interface on your phone as a core gameplay mechanic. It's also something that's easy to pick up for 2 minutes and put back down if needed, so perfect to have in your pocket all the time. I haven't played in a while so maybe nowadays it's full of garbage. But back in the day it was a masterclass of game design.
Every app I use was better 10 years ago. So many picture/video and music apps that don’t even exist anymore. Now what’s left look like it’s all from the same terrible company and they’re all filled with ads. It’s amazing to me that anyone still uses them.
I needed a PDF editor. Every single fucking app was a subscription. I remember back in the days apps you would buy once and kept it.
Dont get that sweet SaaS multiple otherwise
https://tinywow.com/
Did you end up finding one?
Try Xodo PDF, it's decent
Thats what I ended up using at the end coincidentally
I still remember the first time i used it. I used to depend on word for everything. PDF editor felt like a paradise!
> Every app I use was better 10 years ago. Couldn't agree more. They recently "updated" my banking app, and made it around 100x worse than it originally was. It's been a buggy mess for over a year. Fuck Truist.
This is capitalism in a nutshell. It drains the soul from anything it touches and reduces it to a machine trying to grab as much money as possible. Sad.
I downloaded Jetpack Joyride I don't like it anymore. The game is essentially the same but it hounds me to spend money
I downloaded World of Goo and now I need a Netflix subscription to play the game.
Mobile games back in the day were about making something fun that made good use of the unique inputs touchscreen had to offer. Mobile games now are about mega companies making shitty but addicting game loops designed to milk you of your money, and never be beatable. There are still fun games, but most devs (myself included) just don’t bother with mobile anymore because you’ll never even be found on the store u less you have insane amounts of money to advertise, and to get that money you typically need to ruin your game with said shitty micro transaction game loops
Yeah remember that iPad like orbital game or something about making orbits to clean up objects?
I had an app that made a few bucks, someone made a crappy free clone, pumped it full of ads and microtransactions, and it became the top grossing app on the app store for a long time, probably made millions. After that I was like fuck it, made all my apps free, went back to my day job.
Oh my fuck, that is fucking horrible. This, this is why all mobile games suck now. Even if you manage to break through you still get screwed, I’m so sorry that happened to you.
Ah it's fine, I just did it for fun I never was interested in the business side of things
You’re a better person than I lol. That woulda made me just reconsider making games at all
Haha I did stop making games actually, but it led to better things so I'm not mad
Well I’m glad to hear it :)
Ouch. My condolences.
It’s subjective. There’s just lots of bloatware, lootbox/gacha and bad mobile games in general right now. But currently there are still good phone games out there. You just have to wade through all the front page headiners. Some older games are also more refined now.
Like almost everything on smartphones these days, games are hardly games, they are vehicles for ads and data mining.
Tons of great smartphone games these days, just fork over 5-10 bucks for a paid one. Slice and Dice, Dicey Dungeon, Slay the Spire, Game Dev Tycoon, Vampire Survivors, Unciv etc
Graveyard keeper is one of my favourites
Oooh I'm gonna play this!
Slay the spire is on android? Ohhhh, that's worth a check out.
Horrendously addicting. It's a true destroyer of good sleep.
Totally don’t have 360 hours on it
Yeah, it's a great way to kill a few minutes. Or 600 hours. Same thing really
Unciv is great
Saving
There's a game called Balatro that's coming to mobile this winter I believe. Keep an eye out for that one too, it's amazing
Balatro on mobile is going to get me fired….
Not to forget 20 Minutes till Dawn, Symphony of the Night, Loop Hero, Magic Survival, Pocket Rogues,...
I mustve poured several hundred hours into Slice and Dice and still haven't unlocked everything. So much variety in gameplay.
When everyone played and shared on Facebook.
Maybe, but let's not ignore the awesome ports now possible due to better hardware. Try some games on this list: * Papers, Please * Stardew Valley * This War of Mine * Minecraft * Terraria * Don't Starve: Pocket Edition * Muse Dash * Poly bridge * Unciv * Mini Metro * Castlevania: SotN * Dead Cells Yes, you have to pay an IMO perfectly reasonable price for most of them, and that's fine.
Let me add to this list: - XCOM 2 - Total War: Rome, Medieval 2 - Baldur's Gate 1, 2 - Icewind Dale - KOTOR - Neverwinter Nights - The Bard's Tale - Northgard - Shadowrun (all three games)
Ports: Wreckfest, Life is Strange 1 & Before The Storm, Battle for Bikini Bottom, Grid Autosport, Brotato & VampireSurvivors, Bridge Constructor (most of them, for example Portal, yes Valve Portal) Expensive ports: Squeenix Final Fantasy Mobile: Rush Rally 3, Rocket League Sideswipe (EOL but servers are still up)
Because in the early days of iOS and Android developers tried to bring full fledged games to mobile. Now it's just shitty cheap cash grabs
You should check out stone story rpg! It’s a bit grindy but a very creative concept and story in my opinion. Amazing art as well
Plants versus zombies is just as fun as it was 10 years ago
Except that it’s absolutely littered with ads now
Dude the best mobile game I’ve ever played was Galaxy on fire 2. That shit was heat, and I still have it downloaded and play it every once in a while. It has a decent story, great gameplay, and a ton of customization. Hell, it even has its own in game economy. As well, it has not 1 but 2 great DLCs that add new ships, weapons, gear, star systems, and story!
Holy fuck GoF was the shit, afaik there was a 3 planned butvit didn't happen
It did happen but it’s really bad, I think it’s called like GoF Manticore or something
Fishlabs, huh? 2 was obviously a huge improvement, but I still have nostalgic memories playing the first GoF as a kid on like a sony ericsson phone or something. I actually thought Deep 3D was the better of the two. I loved the deep sea theme more, and the depth limits + fish catching was pretty immersive for the time.
I tried downloading two games today that looked fun and they were just pay to win ads.
They still exist, they just cost money now, and were originally made for pc.
True. But it’s so damn hard to find games like Downwell and Alto’s Odyssey. Used to be a whole lot easier to do that.
Back then, we were happily slicing fruits and flinging birds, not stressing about loot boxes and in-app purchases draining our wallets faster than a speeding bullet!
Gameloft was a banger. Also, why the hell did they remove dead space ios from the apple store? Why can't I play it when I already purchased it?
I think that covers ALL games as a rule. I also miss flash/html5 games.
Line rider man
No way. Games are definitely getting better, to say the least. But there will always be gems left behind.
Lots of games are getting better, but it's easy to feel like they're getting worse because of the ways the industry is evolving, in particular online multiplayer games. Whenever one comes out that's *not* a huge scam, people get so excited. Plus couch co-op is surprisingly sparse these days, usually reserved for side-scrollers and the odd shooter. Single player games are for sure better now though.
Weirdly, the YouTube app has Flash games built in now. They're generic versions of old popular ones. A Farm thing, some Tower Defense, that one with launching bombs in an arc. https://youtube.com/playables/UgkxMYb8szzWt5VeS7WoQoXGi1NE6p3GWsYM?si=AJF8JqlFD6y3LKg_
I think gaming peaked in the 1990s.
Life was way more fun 10 years ago
Angry Birds was better without the ads.
Infinity Blade was the best mobile game to ever exist, and now its gone.
Enshittification. Players opting in for ads and paying for win. Gives platforms the ammo they need to double down on ad tech. You're now seeing playables on youtube as well. It's gonna get so much worse. Just check the paid games section, it's almost like a haunted house. People want ads and enshittification? That's what they'll get.
Because technology isn't that advanced yet compared today where people are no longer appreciative to the little things.
Or if you go back about 15 years ago you hit the true pinnacle of mobile gaming. Before smartphones and touch screens. I'm talking about Tetris and Snake baby, aw hellz yeah! You can't even get games like that on smartphones nowadays. Sure you can find Tetris and Snake, but they'll be overcomplicated, filled with ads, loaded with micro-transactions, and covered in other bull poopy.
Man, I can't even play a simple game of Scrabble with my mom anymore. Now it's Scrabble GO! which is just cancer.
When the monotozation wizards took over and from one year to another gdc turned from fun Indy game previews to marketers talking how to extract more money from you. 😅
Download an emulator and your favorite ROMs and play some old school goodies. Retroarch works great.
This is an absolute fact
Clearly yall haven’t tried Arena Breakout
Agreed, I miss PvZ 1 and Fruit Ninja.
We are now in the shareware phase we had on pcs in the 90ties
I Genshin Impact disagree.
Disagree. The problem is that there are too many games, making it harder to find the good ones.
~~Smartphone~~ Everything was more fun ~~10~~ ~~years~~ ~~ago~~ when we were younger
True legends remember Doodle Jump
I used to be a mobile dev, I left the space because it was so shitty and I couldn't bring myself to do the shitty things necessary to compete.
I disagree with this. There are still a lot of really good free or pay once and get the whole game options out there. You have to sift through to find them but they’re there. And there are way better options than I remember having ten years ago.
Hard disagree. You are just playing bad phone games.
You played Fruit Ninja because you already played all three other decent games 5 times that day. You don't play anything now because of algorithmic doom scrolling. You can still play all the old games today and hundreds of better mobile games you never heard of. You just... won't. You can't scroll Reddit with Stardew Valley taking up the entire screen now can you.
> You can still play all the old games today and hundreds of better mobile games you never heard of. Many old games are not compatible on newer mobile hardware.
I'm playing Brawl Stars and it's my favourite mobile game. No ads, lots of different characters and game modes, and you can play matches with one or two people. The graphics are very smooth on my phone.
Most of the other "players" are bots. Fun game but that part was annoying because most matches weren't balanced at all.
This is the same as people saying "music was better 10 years ago". All of that music/games still exist. You van access it at any time. You don't have to play the crappy modern games/listen to crappy modern music. There's literally no rule and no one is forcing you to.
>All of that music/games still exist. You van access it at any time. That's true for music, but for games a lot of them actually are gone forever.
Youre playing the wrong games
I think you're trying the wrong mobile games. There are a few amazing games today.
nah, your phone can emulate rom now
Agreed. They weren't trying to squeeze every single penny out of you
Now it’s : 1. Download our game it’s free 2.insert card details for “fULl eXpERIeNCe”
Ahhh infinity blade and zenonia
Not sure if you have an iPhone, but if you have, subscribe to Apple Arcade. It has zero micro transactions or ads and the games are top notch.
i barely remembered Fun Run and completely forgot about FTS Soccer until seeing this
I don’t think I’ve played a game on my phone since middle school, so about 8 years ago. None of them interest me anymore.
The good ones are certainly harder to find these days. It’s a real task to winnow down what’s on offer.
Download a gomeboy or PSP emulator and you're set.
That's why I downloaded the modded version. Not spending shit on Last day on earth (good game but too grindy)
At the moment even games for what I assumed was a one-off payment to play are full of micro-transactions that bombard you constantly.
I would like to try one of those mob shooters where you walk away from a hoard while shooting. But I won't because I'm sure they are only ad infested bloatware. Most likely stealing all your data too.
Fuck me, here I was thinking the Motorola wasn’t a smart phone. It isn’t but shit mate.
More like 15 years ago
Infinity Blade is still the best mobile game I've played and that came out late 2010, 2 and 3 were also good.
Try the "I became a dog" series! It's a bit grindy at first, but with a good mystery element and several different endings in each game.
yes, they were really awesome too. Now people willingly pick gacha stuff over the exact same game that is for free (like vampire survivors) smartphone games have become an enormous cancer on the gaming industry.