When it comes to racing games without an up-front price tag, Gameloft has real winenrs with Asphalt Xtreme and Asphalt 8: Airborne. The former is an offroad style racer with a variety of tracks, online multiplayer, and various vehicles that you can unlock. Asphalt 8: Airborne is an older game, but has a metric ton of content for you to play through. It also has online multiplayer and other activities to play. These are both very solid racing games considering their free price tag, but their in-app purchase strategy is a little aggressive. They’re great experiences. They're both excellent free Android games.
Critical Ops is among the newer generation of first person shooters and it’s one of the best. In this title, you’ll battle terrorists in a variety of urban-oriented levels or you can play as the terrorists if you want to. It has a strong online multiplayer community where you can play with your friends as well. It’s still a work in progress, but it seems to hit all the right marks and it’s updated frequently. If you’d like a first person shooter that’s completely free, NOVA 3: Freedom Edition is quite good as well. They're both free Android games worth checking out.
Clash Royale is the latest game out of Supercell. They also made Clash of Clans, a former entrant on this list. In Clash Royale, you’ll collect cards, build decks, and then square off in one-on-one duels with online opponents. You'll earn trophies when you win. Similarly, you'll lose trophies when you lose. You’ll also get to form clans to share cards, challenge clanmates to combat, and you’ll have a variety of chances to unlock new cards. It’s a solid card game and a great alternative if you just can’t get into Hearthstone. If Clash Royale just isn't your thing, Supercell also makes the highly popular Boom Beach and Clash of Clans games. Either of those are good enough to make this list too.
Fallout Shelter made huge waves in 2015 and was one of the best free Android games released that year. In Fallout Shelter, you must build a shelter, take in survivors (called Dwellers), and create a thriving ecosystem. You’ll have obstacles such as fires, raids by AI bad guys, and the like but otherwise it’s a pretty standard builder simulation game. The in-app purchases take almost a blatant backseat in this title and the developers have been good (so far) on releasing new and updated content.
Final Fantasy Brave Exvius is perhaps the best Final Fantasy-themed freemium game out there. It features tons of elements from the original games, including actual town and dungeon explorations, hidden treasures, secret dungeons, and tons of lore. The game play is simple to learn but you’ll need to think critically in order to beat bosses and hard opponents. You’re frequently rewarded for logging in daily and additional missions, quests, and activities helps keep the game fresh. This is about as good as it gets for freemium titles. If this one isn’t doing it for you, but you love Final Fantasy, you can also try out Mobius Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy Record Keeper.. They round out a very positive group of freemium games from the Final Fantasy franchise.
Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft is a card dueling game where you unlock cards, build decks, and then duel other players using the deck you built. You can build multiple decks and Blizzard has been pretty good with putting out regular updates to add more cards and content. You can also log into your account on mobile or on PC which is a really nice touch. If you don’t want to face real players in real-time PvP combat, you can always beat down on some bots for practice. It’s free to play which makes it easy and accessible for everyone to try out. It's definitely one of the best free Android games out there.
HQ Trivia is a hit new trivia game. It's a live game show where all players compete at the same time. There's a host that asks questions and people answer in real time. There are 12 questions per round with a ten second timer for each question. The people left standing after 12 questions split the winnings. Did we mention that it's real money? It's definitely something unique in the mobile gaming space. Games take place at 9PM EST every day with 3PM EST games on weekdays. That means there are 12 games per week. That makes it hard to burn out on the game too quickly. It's free to download with no in-app purchases.
NOVA was one of the first successful first person shooters on Android. NOVA Legacy is the latest installment and it's already one of the best free Android games. It comes pack with better than average graphics and controls. There is also a story line, online multiplayer mode, and a rudimentary crafting system. The game has a sc-fi story line. Thus it brings something a little different than most mobile shooters. It's not the best shooter available, but the price tag should be just right for a few dozen hours of fun before the freemium stuff gets annoying. We also recommend ignoring any claims that this game is small. It absolutely is not.
Pokemon Go was the biggest mobile game of 2016. Actually, it was the biggest ever. Even though its popularity has tapered off a bit, the game is still a very solid free option. Players can explore the real world around them all while catching Pokemon, taking down gyms, and finding Pokestops. New additions include legendary Pokemon, raid battles, and more. The game continues to evolve beyond what many remember it to be. It’s one of the great free Android games.
Smash Hit and PinOut are two of the most solid infinite runners out there and they’re from the same developer. Smash Hit gives you a first person perspective as you throw metal balls at glass panels to avoid certain death. It’s calm, fun, and it looks fantastic. PinOut is an infinite pinball game where you must launch the ball through various levels and obstacles forever. Both free Android games look great, play well, and have unique mechanics for this genre. Both titles have an optional pro version that unlocks checkpoints so you can continue from a saved game. Otherwise, there are no ads, no in-app purchases, and nothing getting between you and the game.
Sky Force Reloaded is the latest in the Sky Force franchise (which are all pretty good free Android games). Like its predecessors, Sky Force Reloaded is a top-down, scrolling shooter where you fly a plane and your goal is to defeat bad guys, avoid bullets, and perform all kinds of various quests. It’s an ode to the old school top-down shooters. Despite its highly improved graphics, the game stays true to those old shooters. The difference being that this one has better graphics. It’s a good overall experience just like the previous iterations were.
Plague, Inc is a strategy game where you must mutate diseases and use them to destroy the world. The goal is to infect as many people as possible. There are multiple diseases in the game, each with their own outbreak strategy and the game is realistic enough that the developers were once invited to speak at the CDC. The developers have added plenty of expansions over time. The game also comes with save and load game functionality for multiple files so you can play many times at once. It’s one challenging game, but one that’s also worth checking out.
UNKILLED was one of the best free Android games of 2015. This is a zombie shooter where your job is to accept missions and then dive into the various scenarios and slaughter all of the zombies. There are over 300 missions and many of them include boss fights. You’ll also find over 50 weapons, some of the best mobile graphics we’ve seen so far, and there are some online multiplayer aspects to the game as well. It comes from the same developers who did Dead Trigger 2 (Madfinger Games) which was a mainstay on previous versions of this very list for years. You can pick this up for free but there are in-app purchases so do beware of those.
Vainglory is perhaps the best MOBA currently available on Android. It boasts high frame rates, unlimited free play, and solid connections. You’ll be able to team up with people and go head to head against other teams much like you see in all MOBAs. There are also decent graphics, more than 25 heroes to unlock and play with, and you can play with (or against) bots if you so choose. There is also a beta version that can use the Vulkan API if you want to check that out. It's one of the better free Android games.
Yodo1 Games is a game developer that has a bunch of very enjoyable and very engaging freemium games. Most have probably heard of their hit titles such as Crossy Road, Rodeo Stampede, Pac-Man 265, and Looty Dungeon. There are also a few others including Rooms of Doom. Most of these games are infinite runners where you must continue moving forward or you lose. The graphics are charming and the game play mechanics are simple to learn and understand. They’re also extremely kid friendly which makes them great overall family games. Their main developer page is linked above. However, some games like Pac-Man 265, Crossy Road, and others are published under different developer names. You may need to search from them in Google Play. Their new game Jellynauts should be another surefire success as well.
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