Yep, there's a grass touching simulator. I mostly play Bus Simulator: Ultimate, though it gets my battery temperature to 55°C. Enough to hurt on fingers.
How is Endless Sky on Android?
I've been playing Escape Velocity/Override/Nova for as long as they've been a thing, and have done like 3 laps on Endless Sky on Linux as they've added content, the most recent one firmly placing it as the best execution of the genre for me, but I'm not sure how it would translate to a little touchscreen device.
I play on both Linux and Android, so I can directly compare. The UI buttons are a little small and the combat is a little different because you're poking the screen where you want to go instead of using arrow keys, but it's equally fun on either platform.
For me, it's using emulation. I'm currently playing Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door from the GameCube, and there are very few android games that can match the quality of older AAA titles.
I usually play on and off. My wife saw me playing and got it, now she's addicted. Our son saw that I had it on the switch too and started to play it this weekend. Now they are Stardew crackheads.
Orna RPG! It's a GPS game like Pokemon Go with a classic RPG style, no pay to win options, a great community, and Devs who listen to feedback with regular updates.
Genuinely the best GPS game I've played by a long shot.
Open Sudoku and Endless Sky. ES saves the game as a text file. If you play it on PC and save a file the last line of the text file is the only difference. You can play the game on both and save back and forth. I only have FOSS apps. I don't have any google stuff at all. Both of these are from F-Droid.
I just play it differently on Andy vs PC. On PC I'm aggressive with a smaller force and take a lot more risks. On mobile, I "talk softly and bring a big stick." I usually use a large force around me and use the grouping feature to control my own security and fire power. I don't worry about firing at stuff myself and all of my weapons are turrets on my own ship. This is how I deal with the resolution difference in practice.
There is a resizing setting for the screen resolution. The main thing to be aware of when swapping between mobile and PC is that last line I mentioned. Save a new game on both platforms and you'll see the last line is the over all layout setting for mobile versus PC. They use a completely different interface. If you use the PC version on mobile bc you didn't change the last line on the save file, it can be impossible to play.
My favorite Android game has always been, and still is, OSMOS. It used to be in the play store. You can still get it on Android from Hemisphere. There's also iOS, Ipad, Steam (for Linux), OS X and Windows versions. I love this game so much I keep an ancient 7" pad with Marshmallow 6 offline just for it (Because I had the original on it - You don't need an ancient device).
And you pay once and that's it! It's got frequent updates, and I've never felt pressured to spend in their store. Was actually happy to buy some heroes after a while, considering how much mileage I've gotten out of it.
The only commercial Android game I regularly play is Wordscapes. It's an almost embarrassing level of enduring basic bitch addiction, I don't engage with any microtransaction bait, I have a systemwide ad blocker... and I love it.
Otherwise it's all Emulators and Open Source (covered well elsewhere in this thread).
Puzzle game where you push blocks around. Blocks with words can be pushed together to change game behavior. For example on a level with Baba, Is, and You blocks together let you control your character (your character is named Baba). But if you push a block that says Door in front of the Is and You blocks you will suddenly control the doors instead of Baba. It's a really cool concept and the levels get extremely imaginative. And also difficult
It's been on PC for years. It's a puzzle game where you push tiles around to form simple statements, and those statements affect the rules of the level you're on.
Translated:
Lichess - Because chess is so good
Mindustry - Because the game is very well done and resource management is cool and relaxing
Slice & Dice - I like how the game uses dice for attacks and how the characters improve
Rhythm games, especially Phigros and COXETA. I also like the mobile port of Portal Knights, even if it is inferior compared to the other versions, and the developers have dropped this port.
I do really like that so far paying is completely optional. I found so many of the android F2P are good for a couple weeks (or only days) before you realize you need to spend money to really play the game.
Been really enjoying Night of the Full Moon. Slay the Spire like but the opponents have decks and play like players.
It's free to play with expansions and an ad free experience you can pay for. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ztgame.yyzy
It has quickly become one of my favourite games when I started playing a few months back. I mainly play on PC with a few QoL mods, but I think it works great on a smart phone as well! Great game to have in your pocket! The only bad thing I've encountered on Android, is that the cursor in the menu does not become visible when you've a controller connected. It's there, but you can´t see it. Kinda annoying, but I could fix this by forcing it with a mod (I forgot which one, but I can look it up if you want).
It's one of my favourite games to play when I just want to chill without thinking too much.
Idle games, good ones at least, are about developing a strategy and watching it play out. Complexity comes in how wide a variety of strategies you can play around with and how much they impact how things go.
Dead cells, out there omega edition, 20 minutes till dawn, vampire survivors, titan quest, hollow knight, 9th dawn rpg 3, starrows, scourgebringer, undead horde
I like time waster games for when I need to actually burn time or I'm waiting for something to go through, so an old but gold choice for me is Flow Free. I actually play it on an iPhone 4s but it is available for Android so I think it counts
I DO NOT SUPPORT CANDYWRITER. Play the original Instlife, the game the company Candywriter bought and deleted to destroy the competition. You being on Android you can grab an .apk file of it.
Instlife was developed by InstCoffee, a group of two indie game developers. Candywriter was at the time a 10 people company.
Instlife began development in 2016, and started gaining raising traction in 2017.
BitLife was released for iOS only during the Instlife massive boom in popularity in 2018, while Instlife still had no iOS version. Bitlife gained steam thanks to a few dirty tactics (Instlife ran no ad campaigns and completely free, while Bitlife constantly spent on video ads on other games and websites and had a in-game barrier forcing people to share the game on Twitter if they wanted to have all features) and being the only game on iOS of its type it during the boom of course started doing numbers.
For every Instlife update, Bitlife would come 1 week later with the exact same feature as a carbon copy. (With Instlife gone, Bitlife actually diverged heavily from the original concept).
When Instlife began making and distributing its iOS version, Bitlife started losing players moving to the original and at the time much more complete and polished game.
Not too long after the iOS release, Candywriter bought full rights to Instlife (the amount of money was never disclosured, but the acquisition was confirmed by both parties). It lasted a week under the new ownership, where it then got silently removed from both Play Store and Apple App Store and followed tweet from Candywriter announcing the acquisition and the imminent release of the Android port of Bitlife.
Been playing Golf Blitz for a couple of years and still absolutely love it. Also recently enjoyed revisiting World of Goo (although it now only seems to work if you have Netflix - I do, but it's a shame it's not available for everyone)
Does it have to be Android exclusive? I still play Duet infrequently. Simple but beautiful, pay once, and engaging gameplay. Besides that, I don't game much nowadays.
Friends and Dragons. I can't really explain it, but it's a little like chess plus an RPG. You don't need to pay, and it's enjoyable. I've been on it almost two years now.
Here's my games folder:
Finding mobile games that aren't live service garbage is tough but at least a lot of good PC games just port to android.
Here's mine. Ignore the background.
Yep, there's a grass touching simulator. I mostly play Bus Simulator: Ultimate, though it gets my battery temperature to 55°C. Enough to hurt on fingers.
.... --- .-- / - ..-. / .- .-. . / .-- . / ... ..- .--. .--. --- ... . -.. / - --- / .. --. -. --- .-. . / - .... . / -... .- -.-. -.- --. .-. --- ..- -. -.. / ..--..
In addition to being good games, neither has any microtransactions, ads, or any of that BS, was happy to give the devs some money.
... RetroArch.
Do you use any sort of controller, or just use the on screen buttons?
Can't stand the on screen buttons. I use this thing with the clip.
Ohhhh that is awesome, thanks!
In my case I have a retroid pocket 2+
Such a great little android handheld.
Hah Not a android game directly but opens up multiple worlds of games for you... so truely a not bad contender
Shattered Pixel Dungeon, Endless Sky, and Mindustry (especially that last one, which I haven't seen anybody else mention yet).
I get all my games from F-Droid, not any commercial app store.
Mindustry is such a gem. It's cross platform too, You can find it here
Merely a gateway drug to Factorio
I love factorio!
How is Endless Sky on Android?
I've been playing Escape Velocity/Override/Nova for as long as they've been a thing, and have done like 3 laps on Endless Sky on Linux as they've added content, the most recent one firmly placing it as the best execution of the genre for me, but I'm not sure how it would translate to a little touchscreen device.
I play on both Linux and Android, so I can directly compare. The UI buttons are a little small and the combat is a little different because you're poking the screen where you want to go instead of using arrow keys, but it's equally fun on either platform.
Wow. EV is a name I haven't thought about in a long time. What a classic that was.
I've started to play endless sky today, really enjoying it so far! Although I'm playing it on my mac but still
For me, it's using emulation. I'm currently playing Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door from the GameCube, and there are very few android games that can match the quality of older AAA titles.
Plus, no microtransactions!
I like to play Lichess puzzles and chess.com puzzles.
Li-chess? Is that a new form of chess?
Chess 2 just dropped
Holy Hell etc.
new response just dropped
It's one of the most popular online chess-playing websites/communities, and they've put out a chess puzzle app for your phone.
Nah it's just a chess app
Stardew valley. Such a good game that plays great, especially on tablet.
I usually play on and off. My wife saw me playing and got it, now she's addicted. Our son saw that I had it on the switch too and started to play it this weekend. Now they are Stardew crackheads.
https://github.com/00-Evan/shattered-pixel-dungeon
Yes! I'm playing special surprise pixel dungeon as my preferred variant right now.
Probably shattered pixel dungeon
This and slay the spire are basically the only two games I play on my phone these days
Orna RPG! It's a GPS game like Pokemon Go with a classic RPG style, no pay to win options, a great community, and Devs who listen to feedback with regular updates.
Genuinely the best GPS game I've played by a long shot.
Vampire Survivors. It makes my phone catch fire but it is fire
Open Sudoku and Endless Sky. ES saves the game as a text file. If you play it on PC and save a file the last line of the text file is the only difference. You can play the game on both and save back and forth. I only have FOSS apps. I don't have any google stuff at all. Both of these are from F-Droid.
I love this game but the ui is frustratingly small. Do you know of anyway to make it bigger? Or at least increasing the font size or something?
I just play it differently on Andy vs PC. On PC I'm aggressive with a smaller force and take a lot more risks. On mobile, I "talk softly and bring a big stick." I usually use a large force around me and use the grouping feature to control my own security and fire power. I don't worry about firing at stuff myself and all of my weapons are turrets on my own ship. This is how I deal with the resolution difference in practice.
There is a resizing setting for the screen resolution. The main thing to be aware of when swapping between mobile and PC is that last line I mentioned. Save a new game on both platforms and you'll see the last line is the over all layout setting for mobile versus PC. They use a completely different interface. If you use the PC version on mobile bc you didn't change the last line on the save file, it can be impossible to play.
Mine are bloons td 6, league of legends, and rocket league.
My favorite Android game has always been, and still is, OSMOS. It used to be in the play store. You can still get it on Android from Hemisphere. There's also iOS, Ipad, Steam (for Linux), OS X and Windows versions. I love this game so much I keep an ancient 7" pad with Marshmallow 6 offline just for it (Because I had the original on it - You don't need an ancient device).
Lots of good memories of Android humble bundles, playing Osmos and Eufloria. Too bad that program petered out
It's a good while I don't hear about Osmos, it's a fun game.
Bloons TD 6. Only game I've had installed for years, the pop pop pop makes my brain happy in a way I can't explain.
Exactly its a mix of everything its a great TD , with nice graphics and the sounds are simple yet so worth it.
And you pay once and that's it! It's got frequent updates, and I've never felt pressured to spend in their store. Was actually happy to buy some heroes after a while, considering how much mileage I've gotten out of it.
Yes exactly , Monetization seems to be done good its "optional" there but isnt needed at all. you actually get tons for free.
The only commercial Android game I regularly play is Wordscapes. It's an almost embarrassing level of enduring basic bitch addiction, I don't engage with any microtransaction bait, I have a systemwide ad blocker... and I love it.
Otherwise it's all Emulators and Open Source (covered well elsewhere in this thread).
Baba is You
What's this one about?
Puzzle game where you push blocks around. Blocks with words can be pushed together to change game behavior. For example on a level with Baba, Is, and You blocks together let you control your character (your character is named Baba). But if you push a block that says Door in front of the Is and You blocks you will suddenly control the doors instead of Baba. It's a really cool concept and the levels get extremely imaginative. And also difficult
It's been on PC for years. It's a puzzle game where you push tiles around to form simple statements, and those statements affect the rules of the level you're on.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ca5BYKRVXHM
Vampire Survivor. I love games that i can play offline.
Slay the spire and Downwell (PC ports I guess), it's amazing how much the quality of mobile games is for games that are more than one dollar.
Translated: Lichess - Because chess is so good Mindustry - Because the game is very well done and resource management is cool and relaxing Slice & Dice - I like how the game uses dice for attacks and how the characters improve
Rhythm games, especially Phigros and COXETA. I also like the mobile port of Portal Knights, even if it is inferior compared to the other versions, and the developers have dropped this port.
Bloons TD 6
oh! is there a BTD6 community on lemmy yet?
the discussions, memes, and strats were interesting on the r/.
Lichess and Worldbox
John gba lite with pokemon unbound rom.
Marvel Snap is cool. You can have a fun time paying 0
Came here to say this. Not only can you have fun F2P, the games are quick, so you can play one in a few minutes.
I do really like that so far paying is completely optional. I found so many of the android F2P are good for a couple weeks (or only days) before you realize you need to spend money to really play the game.
Been really enjoying Night of the Full Moon. Slay the Spire like but the opponents have decks and play like players. It's free to play with expansions and an ad free experience you can pay for. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ztgame.yyzy
Stardew Valley, Xenowerk and Don't Starve Pocket Edition.
I keep coming back to Stardew. Such a fun game.
It has quickly become one of my favourite games when I started playing a few months back. I mainly play on PC with a few QoL mods, but I think it works great on a smart phone as well! Great game to have in your pocket! The only bad thing I've encountered on Android, is that the cursor in the menu does not become visible when you've a controller connected. It's there, but you can´t see it. Kinda annoying, but I could fix this by forcing it with a mod (I forgot which one, but I can look it up if you want). It's one of my favourite games to play when I just want to chill without thinking too much.
Among us and started valley
I love starred valley
Hill Climb Racing 2. I don't really play much on my smartphone.
super auto pets is so cute and very fun
Melvor! Favorite idle game that has kept my attention for months (I usually lose interest in games in a few weeks).
The video on the app mentions fiendish complexity below the surface. Is that real? How can an idle game have any complexity at all?
Idle games, good ones at least, are about developing a strategy and watching it play out. Complexity comes in how wide a variety of strategies you can play around with and how much they impact how things go.
Hero of Aethric
super hexagon. i like the pretty colors and noises and it makes my brain quiet.
Dead cells, out there omega edition, 20 minutes till dawn, vampire survivors, titan quest, hollow knight, 9th dawn rpg 3, starrows, scourgebringer, undead horde
Hollow Knight is on Android? Wow! I never knew.
I meant the unofficial port. It's not officially available on android
Still surprised there's an unofficial port. What an undertaking! Props to them.
Lichess and Kairosoft Games (BonBon Cakery, High Sea Saga)
I like time waster games for when I need to actually burn time or I'm waiting for something to go through, so an old but gold choice for me is Flow Free. I actually play it on an iPhone 4s but it is available for Android so I think it counts
Bit Life is pretty good.
I DO NOT SUPPORT CANDYWRITER. Play the original Instlife, the game the company Candywriter bought and deleted to destroy the competition. You being on Android you can grab an .apk file of it.
Instlife was developed by InstCoffee, a group of two indie game developers. Candywriter was at the time a 10 people company.
Instlife began development in 2016, and started gaining raising traction in 2017. BitLife was released for iOS only during the Instlife massive boom in popularity in 2018, while Instlife still had no iOS version. Bitlife gained steam thanks to a few dirty tactics (Instlife ran no ad campaigns and completely free, while Bitlife constantly spent on video ads on other games and websites and had a in-game barrier forcing people to share the game on Twitter if they wanted to have all features) and being the only game on iOS of its type it during the boom of course started doing numbers.
For every Instlife update, Bitlife would come 1 week later with the exact same feature as a carbon copy. (With Instlife gone, Bitlife actually diverged heavily from the original concept).
When Instlife began making and distributing its iOS version, Bitlife started losing players moving to the original and at the time much more complete and polished game. Not too long after the iOS release, Candywriter bought full rights to Instlife (the amount of money was never disclosured, but the acquisition was confirmed by both parties). It lasted a week under the new ownership, where it then got silently removed from both Play Store and Apple App Store and followed tweet from Candywriter announcing the acquisition and the imminent release of the Android port of Bitlife.
Ha, interesting I'd never heard of any of this, I was quite late to the game. This sort of crap p*sses me off.
Will check out the original.
Lichess
Mighty Doom is a fun auto shooter, made by Bethesda and has minimal ads (opt to watch for rewards) and micro transactions are not required to win.
Honestly surprised with how good it was, and the minimal ads
My favourite Android game is Genshin Impact even though I only play it on PC... but hey it exists on Android 😬
Favorite game is Gwent, though I usually play it on desktop. The game I play most often on Android is either Cytus 2 or Dead Cells.
I really like Logic Wiz sudoku variants Basically sudoku variant puzzles, it's a lot of fun, and has really good puzzles.
Moonshades
Arcaea, Rotaeno, Phigros, Noisz Sl are my favs now.
I've been liking greenhouse atm, but I also play sunshine island and The Ants fallen kingdom
Cytus Chess Bonza
2112TD
Leap Day
I've been loving Call of Duty Mobile for the past 3 years.
I love hue, Tsuki Odyssey, Monopoly GO, Wild Rift.
I also like idle tycoon games but I switch between those after playing for some time.
sling kong and smashy city r pretty cool games
Been playing Golf Blitz for a couple of years and still absolutely love it. Also recently enjoyed revisiting World of Goo (although it now only seems to work if you have Netflix - I do, but it's a shame it's not available for everyone)
Isle of Arrows. It's a tower defense game but there are also elements from board games and puzzles. And the visuals are really nice.
I loved Defense Grid on PC, and the coop TD game Sanctum. But I haven't found a TD on android that I have played past a few levels on yet on Android.
Does it have to be Android exclusive? I still play Duet infrequently. Simple but beautiful, pay once, and engaging gameplay. Besides that, I don't game much nowadays.
Friends and Dragons. I can't really explain it, but it's a little like chess plus an RPG. You don't need to pay, and it's enjoyable. I've been on it almost two years now.
PewPew Live.
Age of History is a turn-based strategy war game. It's an addictive way to kill a few hours, and you can customize your game modes quite a lot.
Tap Ninja is pretty good as far as idle games go.
Donut County because not only is it fun, but my 3 year old can play it.
Nonogram Katana as my favorite short wait time-waster.
Final Fantasy V as my favorite game that I'm actually digging into right now. I'm doing the Fiesta challenge, FF5FJF.
Currently speedrunning the first Pocket City before dropping money on the second one.
Marvel Contest of Champions or emulators when I actually want to play something
Royal Match or Woody when I just want to kill a couple minutes
Sand:box premium
Trials Frontier. I love the atmosphere, I imagine myself riding off into the sunset with my crappy bikes and this game's fantastic soundtrack.
Krafteers: tomb defenders (the old version, from Deonn, before this shittty company bought it and turned it into an ad fest)