Free to pay: 40 awesome iOS and Android games without in-app purchases
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In-app purchases are everywhere on mobile. It feels like you can't move for people trying to sell you a new hat or some extra ammo or a pair of pants that are impervious to fire.
Whether it's a free-to-play game that makes its money from microtransactions or a cheeky paid game that wants even more cash once you're inside, IAPs are endless, and they're here to stay.
But some game developers defiantly refuse to fill their games with money making opportunities. If you look hard enough it's still possible to find an app that you buy - and buy once.
To help you find these rare and endangered species, we've put together a list of 40 games on iOS and Android that have an upfront cost and contain no IAPs.
They also happen to be top notch games.
Rymdkapsel
iOS, Android - £2.49 / $3.99
A soothing space strategy game. Collect resources, build rooms out of tetrominoes, and prepare to beat back your shapely invaders.
Ridiculous Fishing
iOS, Android - £1.99 / $2.99
Fishing is boring. That's why Ridiculous Fishing has shotguns. And toasters. It's a game about wiggling your device to dodge and catch fish, and then blasting them to bits with a gun. There's a subtle story to follow, too.
Super Crate Box
iOS - £1.49 / $1.99
Vlambeer first showed us its mastery of action games and ballistics with Super Crate Box. Collect crates to score points and swap your weapon while shooting cuboid creatures. Just don't kill yourself with the dreaded disc gun.
Super Hexagon
iOS, Android - £1.99 / $2.99
Bringing to the fore our love for dizzying dodge 'em ups, Super Hexagon is a tough lover, which is why we keep coming back to it. It might be the ultimate game for challenging your reflexes.
Pivvot
iOS, Android - £1.99 / $2.99
Another dodge 'em up, Pivvot will have you spinning a pivoting point through a gauntlet to electro beats. Don't get dizzy.
Slow, surreal, and spooky. Year Walk is a unique first person adventure in which you discover the haunts of Swedish folklore in a creepy forest.
A surreal thriller set within literature. DEVICE 6 turns the written word into puzzles, geography, as well as narration. A compelling mystery through neuroscience and other oddities.
Beat Sneak Bandit
iOS - £1.99 / $2.99
Tap to the beat to sneak past security and steal back the clocks of the world to restore it from chaos. Smart, stylish, and will keep your brain ticking.
Knightmare Tower
iOS, Android - £1.99 / $2.99
Stab monsters to bounce your way up a huge tower to rescue princesses and take on the baddie at the end. Slicing through flesh shouldn't feel this good.
Black-and-white visuals fit neatly with the grim tone of sidescrolling puzzle platformer, Limbo. You play a young boy travelling across a hostile world where everything is out to kill you.
XCOM: Enemy Unknown
iOS -£13.99 / $19.99
A classic turn-based sci-fi RPG re-imagined with brilliant form. Employ clever strategies in order to overcome the invading aliens. Make a mistake and say goodbye to your beloved soldiers forever.
Gemini Rue
iOS, Android - £2.99 / $4.99
Who doesn't love a bit of sci-fi noir? Gemini Rue is an adventure game for those who love mysteries involving corrupt corporations, rain-drenched cities, and seedy criminals.
Little Inferno
iOS, Android - £1.99 / $2.99
Burn it all! It's getting cold outside, so you better chuck all of your possessions in the fire, and play with them to keep warm, too. Plus, there's a surprising little satire of F2P to be found inside this fireplace.
Mikey Shorts
iOS - 69p / 99c
One of the better platformers on iOS, Mikey Shorts has you jumping, running, and sliding as fast as you can across its levels. Make sure to collect coins and rescue the people you see along the way.
The Room
iOS, Android - 69p / 99c
A delight for the fingers, The Room is brain teaser that involves fiddling with puzzle-boxes. It's a lot better than that makes it sound. Mostly because there's a mystery to pursue, too.
Waking Mars
iOS, Android - £2.99 / $4.99
As you jetpack through subterranean Mars, you'll reawaken the strange flora inside. As beautiful as it may be, not everything is friendly underground, you know?
Game Dev Story
iOS, Android - 69p / 99c
While we spend most of our time playing games, let's try putting the boot on the other foot and make a game instead, yeah? Game Dev Story is actually a management sim that has you controlling your own game development studio.
You'll have to blow a gale as Enril the Wind Spirit in platform-adventure LostWinds. Your mission is to ensure that the young boy, Toku, is able to carry out his mission of releasing the curse hanging over the world of Mistralis.
As usual, it's The Corporation that's to blame for causing all the Suns to go out. Use jetpacks, teleports, and gravity beams as you help Inco and Helios on their galaxy-spanning quest to restore light.
DoDonPachi Resurrection
iOS, Android - £9.99 / $13.99
Pink bullets. Purple bullets. Blue bullets. DoDonPachi Resurrection has all of the bullets you'll ever need. Oh, except you'll have to dodge them. Yeah, good luck with that.
Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP
iOS, Android - £2.99 / $4.99
Explore a mythic realm, meet timid characters, and master the art of sworcery. Sword & Sworcery is a unique game with superb audiovisual style.
Minecraft: Pocket Edition
iOS, Android - £4.99 / $6.99
An open world at your fingertips waits for you to dig, battle, and craft within it. Join with friends to co-operate in survival, or maybe take it easy and create something huge out of the resources you've collected.
As Naija, you'll have to swim, sing, and fight your way through Aquaria's beautiful underwater world. You'll learn about both the history of the terrain as well as Naija's past.
Spelltower
iOS, Android - £1.49 / $1.99
Find words among the rabble of letters slowly rising from the bottom of the screen. SpellTower remains one of the best word-based puzzle games on mobiles.
Canabalt
iOS, Android - £1.99 / $2.99
This side-scrolling endless runner is elegant. As your tip-tapping feet pelt you across rooftops, you'll send birds into the air, and witness a city being crushed by robotic invaders in the background.
Wonderputt
iOS - 69p / 99c
Golf may be boring to some, but that's only because they haven't explored Wonderputt's weird and wacky adventure golf. You'll see cows, submarines, ski slopes, and alien abductions as you hit the ball across this ever-changing course.
Splice
iOS, Android - £2.49 / $3.99
An artistic and relaxing puzzler, Splice has you create life from nothingness. Quite the feat. You re-sequence, mutate, and splice cells with your fingers.
Hiversaires
iOS, Android - 69p / 99c
You find yourself inside a mysterious black-and-white machine. You should probably try to escape, but the only way to do that is to study Hiversaire's cryptic clues and figure out its elusive structure. Fascinating exploration is to be had.
You're a naughty hacker, trying to exploit your way through the guarded inner workings of a hostile system. Plan your moves carefully in this engaging cyberspace roguelike.
Your hotel is about to be bombarded by an army of seagulls, rats, and yetis. To stop them, you'll need to build out your hotel with musical weaponry. This is a wonderful and unique tower defense challenge.
Nihilumbra
iOS - £1.99 / $2.99
You have to help Born on his adventure through this beautiful world to eradicate his curse. Use the colours around Born to grant him powers to transform the world, for better or for worse...
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
iOS, Android - £4.99 / $6.99
This masterfully ported GTA classic follows CJ as he climbs the ranks of San Andreas. Work out, steal cars, find love, perform drive-bys, rob stores, and skydive in the open world game's many missions.
Create sumptuous electronic music and save your friends by guiding a geometric astronaut across the beautiful levels. You can even create your own custom music and levels.
Have all of your actions narrated as you take on the role of the Kid. This isometric action-RPG's colourful world forms in front of you as you run. You'll need to use a mix of blunts, blades, and firearms to overcome the hordes of enemies within.
World of Goo
iOS, Android - £2.99 / $4.99
Create large structures from balls of goo in this action-puzzle game. Bridges and towers must be constructed to defeat gravity and get the goo across chasms, over spikes, and up hills.
Frozen Synapse
iOS, Android - £1.99 / $2.99
This top-down turn-based strategy has you commanding squadrons of soldiers around a small level. Simultaneous play with your opponent means you'll have to guess their moves and prepare for the worst. Like a rocket to the face.
1000000
iOS, Android - £1.49 / $2.99
Fight through dangerous dungeons by mixing and matching tiles. Think smart, upgrade your skills, and find new gear to survive.
Autumn Dynasty
iOS, Android - £4.99 / $6.99
Here's an RTS that turns what looks like traditional Chinese paintings into action-packed battlefields. Brush strokes are used to guide your armies, but the main form of art you'll need to conquer is that of warfare.
Dynamite Jack
iOS, Android - £2.99 / $4.99
Escape from an underground prison on an alien planet using stealth and bombs. A weird mix of tactics there. This is a top-down action game with enemies that can be dealt with by dynamite, torchlight, or evasion. Challenge yourself.
McPixel
iOS, Android - £1.99 / $2.99
With more kicks to the groin than, well, anything else ever, McPixel is a quickfire puzzle game with an absurd amount of harebrained humour throughout.
Badland
iOS, Android - £2.49 / $3.99
Guide a vulnerable, chubby bird through striking but treacherous environments. Multiplication, shrinking, and even using mechs form your repertoire of tools and techniques to get through these crazy gauntlets.