Fran Bow . It's a psychological terror click adventure, available on both Mobile and PC. On mobile I think it has 5 different chapters, and 0 transactions other than the buying price. Really recommend it!
Old school RuneScape
There is a f2p that you can get hundreds of hours out of, but the full game has a monthly membership. It’s possible to sustain the membership with the in-game money you make just skilling/pvm drops.
SW: Knights of the Old Republic and SW: Knights of the Old Republic II are available for Android and iOS. These are complete ports of the original games, not knock-offs, and Aspyr did a pretty good job retooling the UI for mobile screens. I think they're totally worth the price.
Cookie clicker paid, stardew valley, Terraria, freedoom (gzdoom + open source IWAD packaged on fdroid store), mindustry, original peggle you can find apk on internet archive, opensurge, minetest engine with voxelibre game for open source minecraft.
Endless Sky is a solid space trader and combat game, free on f-droid
Frozen Bubble is a pretty fun ~~bubble bobble~~ Puzzle Bobble clone, also on f-droid
Arx Libertatis allows you to play the full version of Arx Fatalis, a super in depth underground RPG inspired by Ultima Underworld. You need the PC game files to transfer to your phone though.
Well, backgammon is the best gambling game ever invented. Knowing how to play marks you as a person of distinction the world over. Computers can almost beat the best players in the world.
Lots of backgammon Android apps, the best is Backgammon NJ
as a Rhythm Game Enjoyer I always gotta recommend Cytus. There are paid songs but the base game has over 100, each with at least three difficulties :3
tho even if you like rhythm games I definitely recommend looking up the game first because I have yet to ever properly convince my other rhythm game-loving friends to genuinely play cytus. Still it is one of my all time favorite games
As a rhythm game enjoyer, i must also chip in with Geometry Dash🤩. You could install the free version, but i highly recommend you get the full version as that includes not only the game's levels, but also the levels of other users. It's only $4 and that's it. No other microtransactions.
I am a rhythm game enjoyer, I've genuinely played Cytus. At this point I'd consider the best mobile rhythm game, but I don't play it often as I'm not stuck playing only on a phone that often. Like, only play it on airplanes sometimes. I did fiend it for a bit when I first discovered it (10 years ago already?). Much easier to master than any other rhythm game I've played, might be part of why I don't play it more.
iPhone or android?
There are a decent number of indie games, at least on iPhone. I play Balatro, monster train, binding of Isaac, stardew valley, slay the spire, dead cells, dicey dungeons, alto's odyssey on iPhone (some with a controller).
Oh Android, but those are all great suggestions and appear to be on android as well! I haven't played all of those, but I've heard wonderful things about all of those on PC. Didn't realize all of those have pc.
Yeah, discoverability kind of sucks (on both OSes) because they get flooded out by microtransaction slop. I have Apple Arcade (because I use the other Apple one stuff and it's cheaper just to package it), and filtering by that makes life easier. Several of those are included.
The other option that excels on Android is emulation. You might kind of need a controller for real time games, but there are a lot of substantial turn based games on older platforms that hold up well and are tolerable with on screen controller for menu navigation.
If you enjoy puzzle games then Baba is You, Snake Bird and Railbound will keep you busy for quite a while.
The Lifeline series from 3 minute games is excellent if you like a twist on choose your own adventure games.
Kairosoft titles are typically $5 to $7 dollars. Tons of Dev and Tycoon style business builder titles. Most are fantastic.
Old school Runescape
I have the following games on my iPhone:
Yellow and the subsequent games are pretty interesting puzzle games
mindustry is free on Android, it's a tower defense/factory building game (it's also open source)
I got bloons td 6 for like 7 bucks, for some reason it also has microtransactions but they are not required or pushed onto you. I think btd6 is the best tower defense game, it just has so much content and is still getting regular updates.
I haven’t seen DATA WING by Dan Vogt mentioned! It’s a short top down “racing” game with really fun space drifting physics that’s 100% free to play with no ads and no micro transactions. Each level is only a minute or two long so it’s great for on the go
Luck be a Landlord is fantastic! I just got it and spent way too much time playing it.
Ascension if you like deck builders. It has full expansion packs like getting the physical card game, but it’s fun without them and the expansions are cheap as hell. There’s a pack where you get tons of them that goes on sale sometimes. It doesn’t have dark patterns, but the packs could be classified as DLC I think. They’re just a couple dollars USD instead of 20-30 like the physical cards.
Full disclosure: I own the physical cards and fucking love this game.
I'm enjoying NecroMerger. It has optional ads (no forced short ads either) and the micro transactions are either some general buffs, ad-free version or gems. The gems are dished out royally imo, where I've purchased most of the premium currency content by just playing.
Something you can't play right now but can sign up to play for later: WalkScape. It's an RPG game in a similar style to RuneScape, but you actually have to walk to craft, skill and walk around the map.
The team has often said that they are against microtransactions and other monetization schemes that currently plague the industry, so they have plans to release a freemium version and a paid version.
I Love Hue is really peaceful
Halls of Torment released recently and seems to be a direct port of the PC version. I've been enjoying it quite a bit
I used a 3 month trial for Play Pass and have found quite a few games through it. It strips out ads and microtransactions and gives you all the content for free, at least in my experience so far. Some of the games in this thread are included. I'm debating keeping it after the trial
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