GAMES OF THE WEEK - The 5 best new mobile games for iOS and Android - November 13th 2020
It's that time again! Time for another entry into our long-running GAMES OF THE WEEK series.
If you're looking for the best 5 games which have hit the iPhone, iPad or Android stores this week then you've landed yourself at the exact right place at just the right time. Lucky, lucky you.
With this article, we skirt around the droves of subscription services (Apple Arcade, Google Play Pass, GameClub, Hatch, and all of their friends) which have launched onto mobile platforms over the years. We also don't factor in things like Steam Link or Google Stadia which allow streaming to handheld devices - and would open up this list to almost every game under the sun.
What that means is that our list is a finely curated list of brilliant, fresh titles which you can download and play without subscribing to, or installing, any third-party initiative. Of course, there are some great games on those services, but, let's focus on the stuff that you can grab right now.
From saving the planet from extraterrestrial occupiers through to fighting sheep-to-sheep in physics-based, turn-based combat there's plenty to see this week, and that's just two of the games from the five - there's also a brutal 2.5D fighter, a detective point and click adventure and a tactical, top-down shooter.
Remember, if you're looking to check through some of our previous selections then you can always do that at our Games of The Week Hub, it's a great way to find games to fill out that empty storage space on your phone. Or, if you like your news in bitesize chunks, delivered straight to your palm then maybe follow us on Twitter or join our Discord.
Anyway, without any further delay, click on the big, blue button below to find out more about what we believe to be the top five of the games which released on mobile over the last week.
1
A3: Still Alive
It's only been a couple of months since A3: Still Alive was first announced, and so we still hadn't managed to get a proper look at the game in action. It's available now, we've managed to give it a quick go, and it's pretty good. For those not in the know, it's an open-world RPG based on the South Korean PC title, A3. The developers sought to bring the feeling of a large living world to the tension of a battle royale - and from what we've played, they've managed it.
2
Forager
I've been playing Forager extensively since it launched on the Xbox earlier in the year. It's great. If I had to describe it quickly then I'd describe it as Link to the Past meets idle/factory game, and by that I mean that you'll go on adventures, level up your character, gain super powerful artifacts, but you'll also be building a production line style system.
At hour one you'll be bashing trees and rocks to get wood and stone, but by hour twenty you'll have mining rods carving up ore which is spawned by your mine, those ores will be automatically sucked into storage where they'll then be refined into second-stage materials. After that you might even be refining them again, creating even more valuable items. In this time you'll go from fighting with a wooden sword to creating robot drones which you can assign to protect your factories and oil drills -- it's pretty great.
3
Fruit Ninja 2
Fruit Ninja 2 is extremely similar to Fruit Ninja, however, there are more modes and playstyles as well as the chance to show off how good you are against other players. There're also more power-ups and, in general, concepts within the game, all of which really build upon the core of the ten-year old classic, Fruit Ninja (1).
4
Gnomitaire
Digital Board/Card game powerhouse Tinytouchtales is back again, and this time with Gnomitaire.
I don't know about you, but I'm seeing more and more games based off solitaire appearing as time goes on. It might be tied to it being, by definition, a very solitary game within solitary times, but - regardless of the reason - I'm not complaining. It's such a simple core-loop that it lets itself perfectly to the 'random' nature of games, and Gnomitaire is a brilliant example of that. You'll arrange 16 random cards into four columns through matching up card types, and it feels great. It's also marketed as "A tiny Solitaire for clever Gnomes", and it's great to finally have a game targetted specifically at me... wait.
5
MO: Astray
Side-scrolling, action-puzzler MO: Astray is now available, and it's a doozy. Visually stunning and with a beautiful, otherworldly soundtrack. You play as a creature which awakens in a lab where parasitic plants have taken over, killing all of the scientists who had been working within. You'll carefully explore the ruins, discovering pieces of the story through viewing the final moments of the fallen humans. It's all incredibly well made and hard to tear yourself away from.
