Best Android games?

Now that we have our own smartphone forum, I don't see why all Android topics need to be in one thread.

What Android games have really blown you away, in terms of gameplay, atmosphere, creativity, etc? What are you playing right now? I'll post some mini reviews with my own thoughts (probably starting with Leo's Fortune and Monument Valley), but I'm looking for some more games for my phone and I wondered what other people have liked the most.

 

I use only 3 apps for gaming on my Android.

FPse is a PlayStation simulator. I've got a bunch of my old games loaded up into the Sim. I can even use a PS3 controller with it instead of using an overlay controller on the touchscreen.

The 2nd is Final Fantasy 3. I got it on sale at AM and glad I did. I haven't even finished it after 2 years. Just play it a little bit whenever I'm out and about and bored.

3rd is Mahjong. I've played Mahjong since the days of the Mac LCII...

If I were to get another game, it would be a solitare or poker.

I don't believe in Candy Crush.

 

I don't believe in Candy Crush either, and if anyone here posts about it, may Odin strike him down.

Speaking of the All-Father (and of sagas), has anyone here tried the Android port of The Banner Saga? Really interested in it, but not all good PC games make good mobile games.

 

Candy Crush is amazing, maybe one of the best games all platforms combined. It was the best mobile game out there until Kim Kardashian released her game but I guess Kanye's game will blow that one out of the water. Can't wait!
Lol jk. I don't really game on mobile much but The Room was a pretty good game.

 

Assassin Creed Pirates is pretty fun. Deus Ex The Fall is good. Emulators are excellent. The GTAs released run great.

 

You will get yours when you are sleeping...

 

Just bought The Banner Saga. Only about a half-hour into it, but even that much is enough to get my blood boiling again over King's lawsuit to make them stop using "Saga" in its name because of Candy Crush Saga.

Only one of those games has:

The frozen northlands
Where the sun has gone out
And the Gods are dead
And Norsemen and giants wage war and make alliances to survive
While sailing around in longships
And killing each other in mead halls

...and it's not Candy Crush Saga.

 

King sued people over use of the word "Saga"? Like they were the first... Not hardly... Romancing SaGa anyone? 1992 SNES...

I am pretty hooked on Heroes Charge myself... you just need to make sure you don't IAP yourself into bankruptcy lmao. Nowhere near as bad as Pocket Knights or Brave Frontier on IAP though, that's for sure.

 

I was thinking more about prior art from 700 years ago, not 20 years ago, but that works too...

http://sagadb.org/

 

I wish there were more fun games on android that weren't based completely around In-App-Purchases. I eventually quit playing 99% of them due to it. No DLC, no IAP, just games like they were back in the old days.

/rant-broken-record

 

I seriously considered getting Game of War.

But then I found out you don't get Kate Upton as the prize for finishing.

._.

...So disappointing...

 

Well I was just trying to stay in the video game name realm lol.

Yeah it really sucks buying a game just to find out that you have to make additional purchases... its a plague that has spread to all gaming platforms though unfortunately.

You did yourself a huge favor not getting GoW. Just reading a few of the reviews about how much you actually have to spend to get anywhere was enough to keep me from even trying it out. The game has no balance whatsoever - whoever pays the most absolutely destroys everyone else. Most games offer special perks with IAP but you have limits on how often you can buy something or whatever. That game is a lot like the Mobage games where big spenders can just spend and spend and spend to get ahead.

 

I'm now several hours into The Banner Saga and I have to endorse it as one of the best games on Google Play.

Trailer:



Basically, it's one part tactical RPG, one part choose-your-own adventure book.

TACTICAL RPG: Battles are well-thought-out and surprisingly complex. There are a number of tactical considerations which actually translate to real-life combat so they don't ruin the atmosphere. With each attack, you have to choose between attacking armor or attacking strength (in real life, trying to shatter their shield or trying to hit them). Damaging armor makes subsequent attacks to strength do more damage. And then there's this whole point of "attacking strength"--your strength for attack purposes and your remaining hit points are one in the same; injuries weaken you in addition to bringing you closer to death. This makes so much logical sense you wonder why more games don't do this. And then there's a number of different classes, combat styles, special abilities, items that grant buffs, etc. It's a lot to keep track of at first but there's a rewarding sense of depth to it all, and it never feels artificial or complex for complexity's sake (the way some of the more esoteric combat-and-leveling systems of, say, Final Fantasy can be).

Also, the game runs off auto-saves. None of this "save before the battle and try to do it perfectly, and if not, load and try again" stuff. It adds some real weight to the experience.

CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE: Between battles, gameplay pans out in a series of branching dialogue trees or action trees. Something happens or someone says something, and you have 3-4 ways to respond (it puts text up and you choose one of the options). This works well for two reasons. First, your decisions really matter; it's not like in certain games that have the illusion of choice, but basically the same result occurs regardless (the ending of Mass Effect 3 being the classic example). Characters live and die, join you or fight you, based on your decisions. Entire villages of women and children can live or die based on your decisions, and there's sometimes no one "morally right" answer, and unintended consequences are common. Second, this works off auto-saves too. No "gosh, that didn't turn out as I expected, lemme try this again." Every decision has weight because you can't change your mind and try the other options to see what is best.

ATMOSPHERE: The art style is hand-painted and fits great with the sad/stoic feel of the game overall. Characters are believable, morally complex, and have diverse personalities. I have two gripes. First, the music is good, but isn't playing the majority of the time; I'd like more of it. Second, the lore of the game is thick, and they kind of throw you in the middle of it without quite enough background explanation early on of who is who and what's going on. It's Old Norse-ish without being entirely based on Old Norse mythology, and some of the lore of the game had me confused for the first hour even though I have a bit of a background in Old Norse mythology, You catch up eventually, though, and after an hour or two you start to get really sucked in.

PERFORMANCE: I get occasional stutters with a Moto X (2014), but nothing too serious. Load times for battle or changing location are a few seconds of black screen with a progress bar. Nothing in the game requires twitch reflexes, so these minor issues are only annoyances and don't affect gameplay. Some control elements are small on a 5.2" screen, but nothing unmanageably small (and this isn't a game where reflexes matter at all).

PRICE: $4.99, and worth every penny. No in-app purchases or ads either.

 

Was playing Game Of War, but quit now and currently playing EndGods. Kind of strategic war game. All about summoning and fighting, bad thing is I don't have enough coins to buy new heroes due to using coins to buy unneeded stuffs. I find it hard to get through if you don't have coins to buy the heroes though. If anyone is playing, add me at juljul to PvP and find some points. Thanks!
http://bit.ly/1FULrkn

 

Final Freeway 2R. The only Android game I really enjoyed, FF 2R is great Outrun clone, very thoughtfully designed, featuring cute graphics, various controller options (including physical keyboard), and fantastic gameplay. Other than that, I prefer to launch some emulator.

Worth mentioning:
Heroes: A Grail Quest is a very nice KB clone, but lacks some features in comparison with original. Very good game, anyway, with decent controls for touchscreen devices of any size.
Banner Saga seems to be a good game, however I stopped playing after half-an-hour.
Heroes III HD are... well, Heroes III on Android.
GTA San Andreas is a good game itself, but after playing IV... seriously? What I always hated in GTA (& most clones) is ridiculous idiotic damage model with prefedined visual damage zones unrelated to actual collisions and no impact on perfrormance at all. Mafia I had proper damage model back in 2k2, by the way...

 

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.turner.asmajormayhem

Both ios and android versions and I've spent happily many hours without spending any money.

 

Yeah...I don't feel so bad passing over the "Updated Free" version of GoW what was offered by Google Play to me then.

 

These are my top 5

Galaxy on Fire 2

Shadow Fight 2

Modern Combat 5: Blackout

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

Shadowgun: Deadzone

 

I'm really getting into Terra Battle. And I haven't dropped a single dollar. Once they get 2 million downloads (they are at 1.8m right now), they start working on a console version of the game too.

It has a rather unique battle system. You have a grid and you have to pincer your enemies between two heroes to start the fight. It sounds easy but you very quickly start going against enemies that you only have one move to set them up to be killed and you have to use a single character to bump around the others into place and you get maybe 5 seconds to do it once you start your move.

It is a free to play game but the pay part us actually 100% optional. You get energy to summon more powerful heroes just by playing the game and your stamina regenerates on its own so it makes a nice little casual RPG. It has a lot of the minds behind Final Fantasy backing it too. It has a unique model where new features are added based on the number of downloads. When you play it, you'll notice the distinct music is reminiscent of Final Fantasy. The reason for this? Nobuo Uematsu made a lot of the music!

Www.terra-battle.com

 

I would love to see Sid Meier's Starships and Faster Than Light on Android. Both are perfect games for mobile platform (lacking for PC, at least the former).

 

I tried Terra Battle but it keeps freezing on my phone(LG G2 VS980). It seems like it would be fun enough if it would actually work, instead of taking more time restarting than actually playing it.

 

That sucks. It runs extremely well from my experience so far. Heck it doesn't even drain my battery unlike... Well basically every other game.

Do you have Lollipop, KitKat?

 

4.4.2.. Its some sort of sweet food.

 

I would try emailing the developer if you haven't already, sometimes they will be able to tell you an eta on a fix. Other than that, I was able to find another person running 4.4.2 in their forums that has the crash as well. It seems to be updated pretty often but I'd shoot them an email

http://terrabattleforum.com/threads/app-crashes-after-it-starts-up.7190/

 

Right. I agree entirely. I hate these "Free to play" really "Free to pay". I'd rather they give users the option to buy it outright and give in-game bonuses to earn powerups, etc, than nickel and dime you. It's horrible too. My kids have Android tablets and they want a certain game, it's free, I download it but then they can't keep playing because they need to buy crap. I'd rather spend $10 for each of them to not worry about it.

 

They make too many millions on IAP to stop. It is actually becoming a thing in the PC games too. Not that it is anything new but even Blizzard is doing it now, not just obscure free to play PC RPGs. Blizzard's Hearthstone card game is a money pit for example and if you want to get anywhere you have to buy card packs or you will just keep getting crushed in card duels.

 

EA did it too with Mass Effect 3. The grind to unlock multiplayer gear is absurd unless you spend money (on top of the $60 plus Day One DLC you already spent).

I generally avoid any game now that has microtransactions for anything more than cosmetic issues or expansion packs (Monument Valley on mobile, Rise of Flight on PC). Sooner or later the game will feel broken unless you put more money in, and it makes me feel like I'm at a casino. I'd much rather pay upfront. But nowadays people like us are just a vocal minority. We're not where the real money is. Pull up Play's "top grossing" list. It's depressing.

 

BINGO! "feel like I'm at a casino"...

I feel the same. It really is not a whole lot different than the digital slots in Vegas (or elsewhere). Same thing with arcades now. They have a lot of similar games to those in the casinos, except you win stuffed animals and cheap toys and candy. Seems like it should be illegal for minors because it's the same thing, seriously. You're still pumping in money for the hope of winning something. That's called gambling to me.

But I digress.

 

I am much better about controlling it now but I had a game where I literally gave them a couple grand in IAP. Luckily I got banned from that game after I got a refund from Google after getting fed up with the developers. I play Heroes Charge now and it is actually possible to get ahead in the game with small purchases or even no purchases. These developers are not greedy at all though. They even used to have a refund policy until people abused it. Other than that, I abstain from paying for free to play games.

At least if I was gambling there would be a chance to win some of the money back. IAP is literally throwing cash away and if the company one day takes the server offline for some reason, all that cash is gone. I now view IAP as part of a very small entertainment budget I have made for myself. As long as I don't go over that, I don't mind. Keeps me busy and most of all, helps me stay sober. It wasn't two weeks after I got banned last year before I threw over a year of sobriety out the window and started binge drinking again. I'm sober again but yeah, boredom + me = disaster.

 

I played Zenonia 3 a few years ago. It was pretty fun, but I could never beat the final boss.
EDIT: Just googled it, apparently there are 6 Zenonias now.

 

I have all 6 of them... I just have a really hard time with onscreen controls.

They crash a lot too and Gamevil never fixed them