Best free android games you can play on a touch screen using emulation
Let’s face it, most free Android games are a bit shit. Actually, that’s unfair – there are some good ones, but by and large, most free to play stuff is awash with microtransations and all that fremium ad-based nonsense. What I’m going to talking about here are the best free android games you can playvia emulation.
The best free android games that are actually console games. because, you know, you download the correct emulator from Google Play, find the ROMS through the browser on your phone and hey presto, you’re totally (or probably) breaking the law, because you don’t own the original cartridge.*
But hey, I’m not here to judge you, you morally repugnant criminals. It’s absolutely your choice to bringing down the entire games industry one ROM at a time – all I’m doing is provising a service whereby you download the right games, not some garbage like Sonic 3 – yeah, you heard me.
S-O-N-I-C-3
Now, I hear that the problem with playing emulated games on your android phone or tablet is that you have to use the touch screen. What should be bonifide retro classics and undoubtedly the Best Free Android Games Ever, turn out to be thoroughly unplayable and a bit depressing.
I imagine you could puke a kidney trying to play Thunderforce IV on a Samsung S3 with any degree of competence.
So, to officially qualify as the best free android games – these titles need to be perfectly playable. Action is out, turn based strategy and JRPGs without real-time battle systems are absolutely in. Lastly, I’m not giong to suggest you download for free – something that’s already available on Google Play, because that would be bad.
LETS DO THIS, YOU FILTHY THIEVING SCUMBAGS!
Phantasy Star IV
Yeah, you knew this was coming, right? Phantasy Star this, Phantasy Star that – I’m a massive massive fan of the original 8bit and 16bit RPGs. They’re pretty old now and haven’t aged amazingly well mind. Phantasy Star I & II are really tough and obtuse by todays standards and it’s unlikely many people will sit through them in their entirety.
I’m going to pretend that Phantasy Star III never happened so that I don’t spontaneously bust into tears.
Phantasy Star IV on the other hand is still hanging on in there. It’s a nice looking game, with a cracking story – and enough charm in it’s 16bit 90’s stylings to keep it a perfectly relevant play in 2015. It remains, to this day, in my top 5 favourite games of all time.
Advance Wars
So this is a weird one for me because, well, while I like Advance Wars, I actually prefer the Fire Emblem series. That said – there is no disputing just how excellent these games are.
In fact, I think it’s fair to say they are the pinnacle of the turn based strategy genre – charming sprites, wiggle room in your strategy (there’s not ‘right’ way of going about things) and a huge range of units and tricks to flex your war-commanding muscle.
The use of CO’s (who’s presence bestow strengths and weaknesses to the overall battle) further layering the strategy into an already exceptional strategy experience that is, frankly, frighteningly addictie in ways that even the best compariative titles tend not to be – Fire Emblem included. Kudos also has to go to lovely anime aesthetic – there’s a vitality and energy to the overall presentation that is absolutely brilliant.
I wrote a piece a while back about ‘Perfect Games‘. Honestly, this one slipped my mind at the time – but if I’d remembered, I’d definitely have included it.
Shining Force 1&2
Start with the first (despite the hero-centric AI) so that you can ‘do’ the whole Shining story from the beginning. While strategically, the first game is not great – I’ve always loved this series’ look and feel, and by the time you reach the second game, it really comes together.
In the early 90’s, while most of the western world were oblivious to the fact they werent getting Fire Emblem, Camelot delivered a fairly similar experience of fantasy, grid-based battles – only between skirmishes you had the chance to explore different towns and villages for chests, and to flesh out the gameworld with conversations with townsfolk.
You also got to recruit a huge amount of characters to your cause, many of which, you grow rather emotionally attached to through their explots on the battlefield, especially as, through promotion, they changed apearance, so there was a little feeling of growth.
As a kid, I remember loving the art for your attacks during battle – and that love hasn’t diminished over the last 20 years. While the overworld has aged, the characer art itself is just as charming.
The series is definitely one of the important milestones in the JRPG / SRPG genre and should not be missed.
Final Fantasy Tactics Advance
I thought I’d add this one because it’s a game I’ve come back to since rediscovering my GBA Micro. I’ll confess I originally didnt put much time into it, becasue it has a few really irritating quirks and foibles – like not being able to tell, at a glance, the benefits and downsides to equipment, for example. Or its really weird map-making system that, even now, I stuggle to fathom the point of.
That aside though – it’s a pretty magnificent FF Tactics experience. The shadow of War of the Lions looms large over this – being much more serious in tone. However, Tactics Advance’s ‘younger’ slant on the action (you play a bunch of kids sucked into Fantasy world and have to get home) betrays a strategy game that’s very smart and, at times, brutal.
What really made me appreciate it more, so long after it’s release, is the Judge system. In battles there are laws that must not be broken – like not using certain weapons. Disobey and the penalty is harsh. All of a sudden you have to REALLY think about what you’re doing – and that makes Final Fantasy Tactics Advance uniquely rewarding.
Earthbound
For me, Earthbound was the Persona 4 of it’s day. A reminder that just because you’re an RPG doesn’t mean you have to be set in some generic fantasy land – populated by all the usual Swordsmen, Knights, Mages and Healer archetypes.
Standard weapons are replaced with everyday objects – standard JRPG storylines, characters, enemies and locations are replaced with a mix of the everyday and the surreal, from hippies to monkeys and arcades to diners. Crucially though, it’s the way the game yo-yos from moments of brutally tough difficulty and dark undertones – to moments of weirdness, whimsy and light-heartedness.
Perhaps the Earthbound’s greatest achievement is that it was even made in the first place as, conceptually, its themes are so bizarre that Publishers and Developers, both then and now, would usually run a mile. The fact that this game even exists warms my very soul.
Fire Emblem
I have to include this one because the ‘original’ on GBA was my first taste of Emblem, and the game that started the love affair. Actually, tell a lie – it was Lyn’s sword attack animation in the battle sequences which really did it for me.
The way she sheathed her sword after attacking? Impudent – but outrageously sexy for a 35 pixel tall (I counted!) sprite.
Anyway, I digress. Fire Emblem! It’s brilliant for all the reasons you already know. Masterful strategy design that is at once super-simple to understand (taking into account weapon bonuses aand terrain) wrapped into an engaging story, told though increasingly tough chapters and great dialogue between characters you genuinely care about.
At the time it was a revelation for me. While I missed the exploration offered by the Shining series, I loved just how tight an experience Fire Emblem was – no fluff, no filler – just chapter after chapter of ball-breaking strategy. Where people actually DIED. Forvever.
Seriously, I don’t want to tell you how many times I had to reluctantly turn my GBA off after a favourite got lanced at the end of a near-perfectly executed chapter. Soul destroying stuff – because it was always down a strategic error or my own childish impatience.
What a game.
Golden Sun
Is there anyone out there that played the original who didn’t immediately fall in love with it? Actually, ‘immediately’ would be a lie – because it took FOREVER for this game to really get going, such was it’s insistence on excellent characterisation for it’s brilliant cast. But we can forgive a JRPG for taking its time to bed in, right?
I remember being so hyped for this game – mainly because it was from Camelot, the guys behind the Shining series, and because it was the first proper JRPG for the system. The developers didn’t disappoint, because the production values and sprite work in this game were simply phenomental for its time. Even now, this is an absolutely GORGEOUS looking game – with dynamic angles for the battles and some really lovely effects to liven things up.
Stucturally there isn’t anything particularly mould-breaking for the traditional JRPG and Random Battle template (outside the elemental Djinn) – but I’m totally okay with that, even now, as it’s so exquisitely presented.
Fortunately, there are two Golden Suns on GBA (if you’ve not played either, why not play both?) and while the sequel, so I’m told,(as I’ve not played it) is not as good as the original – both combined will offer well over 80 hours of solid JRPG action.
* Please don’t steal stuff because that would be bad. It would make you a bad person. I should probably have called this feature ‘My 16bit or sprite based turn-based JRPGs and strategy games’ or something. Only that wasn’t anywhere near as snappy or antagonistic sounding. Also, really bad for SEO, you know? Apparently SEO is something I ‘need to do’ now. I originally thought SEO was something only assholes on twitter do, in between being ‘Social Media gurus’ and posting inane sentiments like ‘You’ll never have a best friend like a sister’ (along with a picture of a puppy) to drive up their retweets – but actually, this is something that I’M doing as well! Only, I’m not 100% sure it’s what Rice Digital had in mind…
Sue me.
Anyway, like I said – play these game on their HOST SYSTEMS (or where they’re available for download) you fucking degenerates.
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ILJG runs the I Love Japanese Games Facebook Page and can be found on twitter here @japan_game_love
His views are definitely not those held by Rice Digital or its partners.
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