Free games are primarily ideal for a quick fix, but a truly great game is well worth paying for. The 10 featured within are the finest we encountered on Android in 2015. It’s a diverse game spanning various genres, visual styles, and price points. From an interactive comic book fugitive tale to an organized, Zen-like game about snipping bonsai tree branches. All of them are united in excellence. Not to mention that the core play experience is available for a single price point. Whether upfront or as an in-app purchase following a free demo. If you’re looking for some awesome Android games to savor as the year winds down. And 2016 starts heating up, these are the ones to buy first. Enjoy!
Lara Croft Go
The Tomb Raider heroine found her ideal mobile showcase. Lara Croft Go swapped the third-person action of the console favorites for an isometric environmental puzzler. It’s an unexpected turn but one that works remarkably well. It was very much said about the previous year’s Hitman Go, also from Square Enix. Still, Lara’s quest is even more engaging. Each of the 100+ stages tasks you with reaching the goal by moving one space at a time. While working out puzzles, avoiding, or defeating enemies, and using new techniques to traverse the terrain. It’s well-paced and introduces its concepts gradually. The visual design is terrific, using some Monument Valley inspiration as a springboard to deliver its eye-catching sights.
Lara Croft Go ($6)
Fotonica
Fotonica doesn’t translate well to still images, much like the also-great Impossible Road. But play it for a few seconds, and you’ll understand why it’s so amazing. With its incredible speed. This first-person runner needs only austere wireframe environments to pull you in, pushing you to leap into the vast darkness. What separates the slim platforms. The visual simplicity extends into the game design, as well. It’s a one-input game; you’ll hold down anywhere to run and release to leap, making accurate timing your only focus. Even with the wireframe graphics, Fotonica delivers astounding sights and pairs them with pulsing, perfectly suited electronic music. You’ll want headphones for this exciting, one-of-a-kind experience.
Fotonica ($3)
Horizon Chase – Arcade Racing
Horizon Chase might feel like a comforting embrace from a long-lost friend. If you grew up on the arcade racing games of the late ‘80s or early ‘90s. And even if you didn’t, this throwback racer is a delight on Android. Pairing the simplicity and speed of old-school racers with a retro-meets-modern visual style that is vivid and stunning. Horizon Chase keeps things approachable on the road. Where lane choice and picking up gas icons are your most important tasks. But it’s fast fun; the short races are ideal for phone play. The campaign packs in several dozen tracks. The presentation is vital to the appeal. Tapping into the color palette perspective of classics without the need for chunky pixels.
Horizon Chase – Arcade Racing (Free; $3 full unlock)
LIMBO
You might have played Limbo elsewhere as long as five years ago. Playdead’s atmospheric puzzle platformer took its sweet time coming to Android. Even arriving two years after the iOS port. But this is one game worth playing half a decade after its debut. Delivering a tense, uncertain, and absolutely memorable side-scrolling experience. As a young boy in a shadowy, black-and-white world, you’ll explore the unknown terrain. Using your wits to overcome the environmental challenges ahead. There’s no tutorial, explanation, or overt narrative, but the ambiance is fabulous. The stakes feel real, especially with the boy’s horrible death animations. Limbo is short but very sweet, an essential Android play.
LIMBO ($1)
Prune
Shrub management might not seem like the most compelling game idea, yet here we are with the alluring Prune. It’s tough to classify: while something of a puzzle game, Prune is played in short, frantic bursts. You’ll draw up a root from the earth below, spawning the rapidly-growing bonsai tree. Which you must trim as quickly as possible to maximize its growth. Getting the tree to bloom flowers in the daylight is your primary goal. Snipping lower branches help push it further skyward. However, there are obstacles: red-black orbs that can poison or disintegrate the tree upon contact. Figuring out the best place to snip tends to require some failure. But the beautiful artwork’s soothing tone makes frustration rare.
Prune ($4)
HoPiKo
Meanwhile, suppose you’re looking for the tonal polar opposite of Prune. In that case, you’ll find it in HoPiKo, an absolutely chaotic pull-and-fling platformer. It’s set inside the video game console world, where you’re fighting off a virus by leaping from platform to platform. You only have a couple seconds to find a new destination bounce. Otherwise, it’s game over. This is a game of rapid-fire reactions on bite-sized levels. You’ll hop from here to there to another place, reach the goal within a few seconds. And charge right into the next stage. Die in five levels; you’ll start back from the top in each set. It’s a bit punishing. HoPiKo is one of the top twitch challenges in the Play Store and has a great retro look.
HoPiKo ($2)
FRAMED
Framed is undoubtedly one of the most inventive games to appear on Android all that year. It builds its mechanics around the framework of comic book panels. As a shadowy figure evades capture by pursuing police officers. It would be best if you rearranged the panels on each new screen. To generate the chain of events that keeps them free and on the run. Often, it turns into a logic puzzle, where one thing must lead into the other to keep the runner safe. But sometimes you’re just plotting out a route through doors or maze-like turns. It’s all about trial and error; enough botched attempts will eventually produce a winning outcome. Still, Framed is one of the most distinctive games you can play on any platform.
Framed ($3)
Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions
Suppose HoPiKo raised your interest, then perhaps the frenetic arcade shooting thrills of Geometry Wars 3. In that case, Dimensions will seem plenty appealing as well. It’s a dual-analog shooter without the physical sticks. Still, Dimensions does well with its touch equivalents. Letting you blast little neon shapes by firing in all directions evading contact all the while. Dimensions will entertain you with its blasting but also sticks around due to the absolute mass of content. It has 100+ levels in the campaign, flat 3D stages, and the fantastic classic modes from earlier console entries. Which amped up the tension by taking away your weapons.
Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions (Free)
You Must Build a Boat
Seriously, you must build a boat Like its oddly-titled predecessor, 10000000. Build a Boat that provides a compelling blend of match-three puzzling role-playing action. And yet manages to feel very distinct from earlier genre mash-ups. That’s because you need to act on the fly to link up tiles that help you perform the right action. As your little pixel character encounters enemies and treasure chests while running across the top of the screen. For example, you must connect three or more attacks, shields, or keys. The faster you are at fulfilling the hero’s needs, the longer each quest goes on. Whatever the result, you’ll earn resources to further the overall adventure and expand your vessel. It’s fascinating stuff.
Implosion: Never Lose Hope
Implosion is the closest we’ve seen to an excellent hack-and-slash console game done right on a smartphone or tablet. It’s a heated affair, one that sees you guiding a War-mech suit through tight corridors. Dicing up scads of gruesome beasts and blasting them with your machine gun. Massive, flashy combos are the focus here; they are plentiful. It looks and plays like a big-budget console game; the graphics are outstanding. Stellar anime cutscenes set the scene, and the single-button design for both blade and firearm attacks is ingenious. While $10 might seem like a lot to pay for a mobile game, it’s cheaper than an Xbox or PlayStation. Implosion does warrant the comparison. It’s that impressive.
Implosion: Never se Hope (Free; $10 full unlock)
