Ask Lemmy

In my experience the play store is awful to use if you're looking for anything that's not full of ads and/or extremely monetized. I recommend only using it when you know exactly which app you're looking for.

Generally I find games through itch.io and recommendations from others. Also there are foss game emulators on GitHub and similar sites.

Netflix recently started offering mobile games as well.

Ages ago humble bundle did android games but that's all in the past now.

I've been enjoying worldbox and lichess. I used to have a bunch more but the latest Android version made most of my collection stop working.

There were, back in the day.

Tap tap revenge and Paper toss were great.

Now everything is just shit for morons.

Balatro. Be warned though, it’s digital crack. One time payment though, no mtx

I mean... not sure if it counts as mobile but the entire history of console gaming up to few years ago works on emulators, so that's a VAST choice. Sure you might dislike 99.99% but if there is even 0.01% you enjoy, that's hundreds of games if not more!

Check https://search.f-droid.org/?q=emulator and consider a BT controller.

Slay the Spire: it's the same game as on PC or any other medium. Fantastic game. Obviously costs the same as other places (about $10), but well worth it!

Pokemon TCG Pocket. I started early with this, so I have had no problem with being F2P, but I'm sure that late adopters would need to pay some amount to become competitive. Still should be playable F2P, though. Anyways, it's amazingly unintrusive when it comes to real money transactions. No interrupting ads and you basically have to search for the in-game shop to find the microtransactions.

Roller Coaster Tycoon Classic. This one might have changed since I got it ~8 years ago. It's a pretty good mobile version of the original game. I've spent a lot of time with this game.

Shattered Pixel Dungeon is quite a timekiller on the phone

Balatro, all the other rougelites, monster train, slay the spire, etc.

I really like the polybridge series of games. Bridge puzzle game worh great mechanics.

Lots of good PC ports. The Kotor series and Baldurs gate 1 and 2 and icewind dale ports are good.

Autochess is fun. Lots of opportunities to spend money but none are important, just cosmetic.

Balatro is good (if you like that game as i do)

And also a series of games called "doors" are fun to pass the time. Like a puzzle box where solving one element opens another until the door is opened.

It is 99% crap on the stores though. I tend to get ports and emulators for most of my mobile gaming.

I've been playing old electron engine game like icewind Dale & Baldur's gate. Even Neverwinter nights runs & plays great.

Slay the spire, balatro, Ascension, melvor, plague inc, terraforming Mars, unciv, shapez...

Slice and dice, infinitnode

Unciv

Free, ad-free, open source phone games

Unciv: Civilization V clone that runs on a potato; a grand 4x strategy game. It seems pretty mechanically complete and has a lot of content. Easily modded. (Graphics may not be to everyone's taste)

Simon Tatham's portable puzzle collection: Mathematically inspired Puzzle games with a lot of customization and reasonable interface. This includes classics like untangle (graph planarity) and solo (sudoku, but generalized). I personally really enjoy Tower, and hadn't seen it elsewhere (and like 15 more games besides).

Chip defense: computer science themed tower defense. By the power of Turing, Noether, and Knuth you can strike down malicious packets attempting to corrupt your CPU. Good content, fun towers and educational bonus material, and I think it looks rather good. (Minor gripe/warning: early levels are optimally played with a lot of tapping that is not very ergonomic; this drops off after the first few levels.)

Honorable mentions (not FOSS, but still free, MTX free, and no ads beyond fishing for a rating). Higgster's game compendium: collection of games in a consistent and pleasing artstyle. Includes things like solitaire, wordle, binaro, and mastermind (20+ games total, several more have been added in the last year). This is really very well done, give it a look!

Flocks: Sliding puzzle game with excellent graphics and animations. Lots of levels, introduces new mechanics regularly, and easy to pickup or put down. I quite enjoy everything Robert has made, recommended!

Uhhhh BALATRO!!!!!

Scrolled the entire page. Just to not see hill climb racing, and slither.io

Puzzles by Simon whatshisface
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=name.boyle.chris.sgtpuzzles

Bunch of puzzle games, no monetisation

Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp went paid about a year ago and there are no MTX or ads anymore. You can also take a look at Epic, they offer a mobile app with giveaways of paid games just like they do on PC.

For games currently out and available:

• Slay The Spire ( a bit more than just something to pass the time with IMO, but again, it's a direct port from PC )

• SuperTuxKart ( I personally don't like the mobile version over control issues I have, but it's still real fun IMO, if you like good kart racers )

• Feudal Tactics ( definitely a time passer on smaller maps )

• HyperRogue ( trippy non-Euclidean game )

• Shattered Pixel Dungeon ( I suck at it, but it's a fun enough dungeon crawler )

• Mindustry ( PC port is more my style, but fun base defense resource extraction game overall )

For games to come out hopefully soon:

• Maze Mice ( I'm addicted to that game and am half tempted to buy it on mobile when it drops if the dev provides a way to buy an APK for the game instead of going through g••gle play. Think Superhot meets Pac-Man meets roguelite ( rougelike? ) )

I really like Robotek by Hexage. It's free and you can play offline.

Shattered Pixel Dungeon.

Infinitely replayable procedurally generated roguelike that is hard but fun to master, and a blast to play. It’s been on my phone for five years now and I still go back to it.

Totally offline, totally ad free, and still receiving active updates from the single developer.

It’s also got a pretty robust community.

The Battle of Polytopia is a fantastic turn based strategy that I've spent way too much time playing.

Beholder is also great on mobile. Similar authoritarian setting to Paper's Please, lot's of decisions, consequences and replayability.

I Love Hue is a super relaxing colour puzzle game.

You could check out https://www.darkpattern.games/

It's a website that ranks games based on how awful or not awful they are.

Stardew Valley, Shattered Pixel Dungeon, Luanti with VoxelLibre, Mojo Launcher, Unciv, Lemuroid to play console games like Crash Bandicoot or Super Mario Bros, Geometry Dash (not the Lite version, that has ads), 2048, Vector Pinball, 1010! Klooni

baba is you is pretty good.

If you're into deck building give "Dominion" a go. The base game is free (which is absolutely playable) and a good way to get into the swing of the game. The AI is a cheating bastard through, so either play it on "easy" or play with some friends. It's SERIOUSLY addictive.

Yeah game-enjoyment is subjective. Mobile games don't require a 2-hour tutorial before full game starts so people play them. I seen people play the "ad-spam" games on bus without being bothered by the ads.

The mobile version of Papers Please is exquisite. I highly recommend reading the developer's documentary of it: https://dukope.com/devlogs/papers-please/mobile/

Balatro and peglin

Shattered Pixel Dungeon

WorldBox

Mindustry

Unciv

Stardew valley.

The Room by fireproof games. Probably one of the first actual proper mobile games. Its spawned clones no IAP, no crap. Just fun, hard af puzzles.

Hoplite. Fun little iso turn based roguelike. Vampire Survivors. Reverse bullet-hell roguelike. Has spawned so, so, so many clones.. GTA:Chinatown Wars Have not played this is a very very long time, but i'm sure it still holds up (if its available). Old school (2d birds eye view) gta style.

These are games that work well without a controller, The Room actually would play worse with one. If at all.

Then of course theres emulators and roms and stuff.

A dream of mine is to make good mobile games, no ads, just a single low purchase. Realistically it just wouldn't be economically viable at all unless there is a free version with ads. But also realistically most mobile gamers aren't using a controller and touchscreens suck.

Breakout 71. I could play for 30 seconds or 15 minutes. No ads, lots to unlock. Really like this one.

https://f-droid.org/packages/me.lecaro.breakout

Others have Mentioned Shattered Pixel Dungeon. Love that one too.

Snake

A while ago, I came across a curated list of no-BS games for Android and iOS.

BS consists of ads or barriers to progress that can't be removed with a one-time payment. It has user ratings, and the highly-rated games are nearly certain to be good examples of their category.

Monument valley