Touch Arcade

Like its spiritual predecessor, I suspect mobile gaming fans will be playing and replaying this one for years to come. I’m a little surprised to see such effort behind a paid original title on mobile in 2018, particularly without even a hint of added purchases to be found in it. I hope it works out for the developers, because I’d love to see more feasts like this come across my mobile plate now and then.

If you’ve been looking for something vaguely reminiscent of The Blocks Cometh to fill the gap it left, I think you’ll find Pandoraid does the job with aplomb.

I may have my nits to pick with Monster Hunter Stories, but the game is certainly quite a good JRPG all-around. It ranks fairly high even among the impressive JRPG library of the Nintendo 3DS, so in the increasingly dry traditional JRPG landscape that is today’s mobile gaming market, it’s a real blessing. It’s not as good as a mainline Pokemon release, nor will it keep you playing as long as a mainline Monster Hunter game, but I suspect fans of either looking for something to play on their phones or tablets won’t be unhappy with Monster Hunter Stories.

I am immensely enjoying Dragalia Lost. Just like Super Mario Run did for the time honored runner genre, so does Dragalia Lost do for social RPGs. It follows the formula and makes key improvements along the way. After hours of playinng I have yet to come close to running out of energy yet. The gameplaay, graphics and story all shine out above competition within the social RPG genre. If you can wrap your head around the departure from usual Nintendo fare, you’ll be rewarded with a gem of a game.

All in all, it’s a more solid version of SEGA’s classic brawler than I had expected we’d see on mobile, and certainly worth grabbing and spending some time with. Is it perfect? No, but let’s not make perfect the enemy of good here. Its visuals, audio, and gameplay put it at the head of the pack when it comes to mobile beat-em-ups, and even if a few hiccups here and there stop it from being exactly the way you might remember it, I think it’s nevertheless something you should have on your mobile device if you enjoy action games.

It’s unfortunate because Where Shadows Slumber gets a lot of things right. The pace is pretty good, the game looks and sounds great, and on an individual level some of the puzzles are fun to untangle. The games shines with potential, and that does take it a good distance. As such, I’d probably still recommend the game, even if I can’t do so as enthusiastically as I would have liked to. It’s buggy, the design feels inconsistent, and the story keels over at the last minute, but you may want to put up with all of that if only to get at the bits that work.

It’s also refreshing to play a game these days with no in-app purchases to speak of. Gamers hand over their $1.99 and get one fresh copy of Troisix in return. With support for English and French localization and iPhone and iPad screen sizes, this is a game that was originally intended to take around six months to develop, only for that to stretch to three years. If you want to recognize the hard work that went into creating a game as charming and as fun as Troisix, I heartily suggest you check this out.

I’d suggest there’s enough here to warrant the $4.99 expenditure here, and it’s clear a third game is likely to follow. If you are able to discern the story and timeline, and enjoyed Returner 77, that alone makes this a must-buy. Otherwise, I’d still say it’s worth your time and importantly, your money.

Needless to say, I’m quite excited by SHI•RO, both as it is and as it can be after the following two parts are launched. Saturated in Japanese style, text, and history/mythology, the game makes me feel close to the country despite it being across the world. It has renewed my appreciation in early written documents, as they tend to reflect prior histories that had only been communicated orally until then. It’s as close as we can get to actually speaking with those ancestors it references. The puzzles are difficult but simple to navigate and enjoyable to solve.

The Company Game arguably treads that tightrope just so, though at times I did wonder whether the puzzles were too obscure or if I was just not as smart as I thought I was! The Company Game will not be for everyone, of that there is absolutely no doubt, but if you’re a fan of smartphone puzzle games, want something a little bit different to the usual fare, and don’t mind having your blood pressure increase further than it really probably should, The Company Game should at the very least be on your radar.