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The 5 Best Mobile RPGs

Posted by Campbell Bird on February 8th, 2025

There's no shortage of role-playing games you can find on the App Store, but the most common recommendations you might see or come across tend to almost exclusively select free-to-play titles or ports of age-old classics. Those are fine (or not, depending on who you are), but I'm venturing to do something a little different.

Below is a list of RPGs that are great in their own right and have zero in-app purchases. They are also games that I recommend you play specifically on mobile given their design (or--in some cases--availability).

Top Mobile Game Discounts

Posted by Campbell Bird on February 6th, 2025



Every day, we pick out a curated list of the best mobile discounts on the App Store and post them here. This list won't be comprehensive, but it every game on it is recommended. Feel free to check out the coverage we did on them in the links below to further vet these discounted games before you decide to buy:

Games marked with an asterisk(*) denote that the entire developer/publisher’s catalog is discounted, despite the fact that all of their games may not be listed here.


The Westport Independent (Free)

Click here to read our The Westport Independent review


The Bug Butcher (Free)

Click here to read our The Bug Butcher review


Holy Potatoes! A Weapon Shop?! ($0.99)*

Click here to read our Holy Potatoes! A Weapon Shop?! review


Cultist Simulator ($1.99)

Click here to read our Cultist Simulator review

Games I've Been Playing - January 2025

Posted by Campbell Bird on February 1st, 2025

Each month, I want to share some less formal thoughts about the games I've been playing and my impressions of them. These might be game's that got reviewed for the site or not. As an individual person covering a storefront that is shoveling titles onto its store each day, I have time to dip my toes into a lot of it, but I can't always spend the time needed for a review. With recaps like this, I can give some games their due, even if I can't get a full review of them. I can also add additional thoughts to things I did decide to write about or even honor older games I just decided to back to for some reason or another. See below for what I played this past January.

148Apps Game of the Year 2024 - Unsung Games Edition

Posted by Campbell Bird on January 5th, 2025


For a few years now, I have done some traditional Game of the Year honorifics where I've given props to titles via various categories and finished with the silly exercise of trying to rank the top ten games of the year in an ordered list to declare a "winner."

There's still value in this, I think, but I have nevertheless decided to do something a bit different. Mobile is a strange landscape that feels like it gets stranger every year, and it causes a lot of people to overlook the entire landscape unless some splashy PC or console phenom gets ported. I get the logic here in entirely, and I also think that it would make for a list of games where I say Balatro is a really great game not entirely useful.

So instead I am just going to highlight some mobile titles from this year that I think folks should give a fair shake, even if they haven't heard of them or generally don't play mobile games in any dedicated sense. Here they are below:

Games to play while you’re home for the holidays

Posted by Campbell Bird on December 20th, 2024

The holidays are about being with family, but that doesn’t mean you can’t play games while you’re home with them. Mobile games are the perfect things to take with you as you travel to wherever you’re going, as they’re experiences you can always have with you and bust out at a moment’s notice.

In honor of the upcoming break, I’ve put together a list of the top four games I plan on bringing with me on my travels. All of these picks have their particular use cases, but all can be played in just about any situation, even if you are going somewhere that doesn’t have a good data or wifi connection.


Out of the Loop

Out of the Loop is a great little party game for 3-9 players with a really simple concept. Everyone playing is clued into a particular keyword based on a category (e.g. animal, household item, etc.), except for one player who is left quite literally out of the loop. Then, players are prompted to ask each other specific questions and the person who doesn’t know what the word is has to hope they aren’t found out.

This game is a great pick for holiday gaming if you want to get your whole family involved. The instructions for every step of the game are clearly written out on every screen, and the concept is so simple that everyone immediately gets how to play. As a bonus, the game just released more category packs, so even if this is an old favorite, there's some good reason to bust it out again.

148Apps Game of the Year 2023

Posted by Campbell Bird on December 28th, 2023

It's that time of year again! Join us as we highlight some of the best mobile games of this past year.

Before diving into picks and talking about games, I just need to say that 2023 felt like a real turning point for gaming on iOS, and not in a good way. This year, I played what feels like fewer mobile games than ever, and I chalk quite a bit up to what the reality of mobile gaming is now, which--with a few exceptions--looks a lot like "run with a subscription model or die."

More than ever, the App Store looks like the nightmare marketplace everyone previously (and somewhat prematurely) made it out to be. There's a small sliver of games that are actually worth your time and attention, and many of those are now just solid but unexciting safe bets, many of which you are asked to pay for on a recurring basis to have access to.

This is the headspace I'm in heading in to these awards, so it feels less like the celebration of mobile gaming that it should be. Still, though, there are things I played that I think other people should also check out. So, with that, the awards will roll in piecemeal across this week and wrap up just before we turn over to 2024. See below for the honorifics:


The Categories

For each of these categories, I'll choose a winner and mention some notable runner-ups. Any game nominated or chosen for any of these cateories is then eligible for the final category, Best Game, which is the culminating category where I will construct a ranked list of my favorite games from this year.

The best iOS games to get you in the Halloween spirit

Posted by Campbell Bird on September 29th, 2023

We’re getting closer and closer to Halloween every day, which means everyone’s gearing up to watch their favorite horror movies, make weekend trips out to pumpkin patches, and do all kinds of other, fun seasonal stuff before this month ends and everyone looks toward Thanksgiving.

If you’re in the midst of all your Halloween activities and you want to take a break with some games that match the spirit, we’ve got good news for you. There’s a bunch of great games on the App Store that can get you in the mood for Halloween, and we’ve compiled a list of the best ones in a handy little list. We've also added a "spookiness rating" (1=not scary, 5=scariest) to each one so you can find the right game for you. Check out the picks below:

The 6 Best Mobile Games like Baldur's Gate 3

Posted by Campbell Bird on August 15th, 2023

Baldur’s Gate 3—the long-awaited sequel to one of the most celebrated CRPG series of all time—is finally here, and by most accounts it seems like a game lovingly made for those who like their video game rpgs to feel more like tabletop ones. If you commonly read this site, though, you may be looking for a way to play something like Baldur’s Gate 3, but on iOS. Now, it’s not exactly a secret that you can get very close to doing that by picking up several high-profile ports. The previous Baldur’s Gate games are available on iOS, as are Icewind Dale and Neverwinter Nights. You can even check out other Bioware RPGs like Knights of the Old Republic or even pick up Divinity - Original Sin 2, the last release from the Baldur’s Gate 3 developers (provided you have a device powerful enough to run it).

This list isn’t about those games, though. I decided to do some out-of-the-box thinking to gin up a list of games that can give you things you might want out of a Baldur’s Gate game while feeling a bit more tuned for mobile or short-burst play. See below for the picks:

Best mobile games like Settlement Survival

Posted by Campbell Bird on March 13th, 2023

Settlement Survival recently hit the App Store, and it seems fair to say that players are a little disappointed by it. There’s plenty of reasons to be less-than-thrilled with this city-building/management game, but luckily it isn’t the only option for getting this kind of experience on iOS.

See below for our top picks of games like Settlement Survival. They might not be as close to providing Banished-style gameplay as promised by Settlement Survival, but they’re also generally way more enjoyable.

The best mobile games for Valentine's Day

Posted by Campbell Bird on February 14th, 2023

Love—artificially manufactured and genuine—is in the air with Valentine’s Day coming up, but that’s no reason to stop gaming. Now you could just keep on logging in to your Genshin Impacts, Rocket Leagues, and posting your daily Wordle score, but you could also be playing some games that match this romantic time of year.

Luckily, there’s plenty of solid titles to let you do exactly that. Read on below for our top picks of fully vetted and endorsed mobile games that examine love, relationships, kissing, and more.

The best mobile games like Harry Potter that aren't Harry Potter

Posted by Campbell Bird on February 13th, 2023

Hi, in case you weren’t aware: JK Rowling is a bigot, and the latest game based on her Harry Potter series revolves around an antisemetic plot. Don’t play it. Don’t let you friends play it. It’s bad and supports a bad person!

With that out of the way, I did some thinking about what kinds of games might be good to play instead. Games that might have some similarities to certain aspects of Rowling’s wizarding world, but without the middling writing, racist undertones, and deplorable author. It wasn’t easy, but there are definitely some mobile titles that fit the bill. See below:

148Apps Game of the Year 2022

Posted by Campbell Bird on December 31st, 2022

2022 is almost over, and so now in the same fashion as last year, I wanted to model some Game of the Year awards through categories in addition to simply ranking my personal favorites. Between now and the dawn of 2023, I'll be updating this page regularly with new entries for each category, so make sure to check in and see what titles win which awards.


The Categories

For each of these categories, I'll choose a winner and mention some notable runner-ups. Any game nominated or chosen for any of these cateories is then eligible for the final category, Best Game, which is the culminating category where I will construct a ranked list of my favorite games from this year.

Apple Arcade: Ranked - Top 25 [Updated 7.6]

Posted by Campbell Bird on July 6th, 2022

In case you missed it, I am on a quest to rank every Apple Arcade game there is.

Over a year into the Apple Arcade experiment, I’m adjusting my approach to these rankings to make it a bit less cumbersome to update and read. For the most part, this means the number of updates on previously released games will decrease, and the text below each entry will be kept to a brief-yet-accurate justification for its positioning.

This has less to do with the pace of Apple Arcade releases and more to do with the fact that the general quality of games on the service simply isn’t what it should be. In the time that one release comes to the service, multiple high quality games hit the App Store that you don’t have to pay monthly upkeep for. Unless something drastic changes with the service, my opinion on it probably won’t change much. With the most recent update bringing older established titles to the service, Arcade is certainly the strongest it has ever been, but additional shakeups like this will need to keep happening to finally sell me on the service.

Anyway, on with the ranking updates:

Game ranking updates for 7/6:

The 5 Best Mobile Puzzle RPGs

Posted by Campbell Bird on June 24th, 2022

RPGs with puzzle mechanics feel like the perfect fit for mobile. There’s something about a game that moves at a gentile pace while having a somewhat predictable-yet-challenging set of mechanics that can morph as you progress through some kind of grand adventure that feels right at home in your pocket.

With the recent release of Hero Emblems II, I thought it’d be good to revisit some of the absolute best puzzle RPGs that iOS has to offer, just in case you missed out on some of these incredible titles.

The best mobile games like Diablo (but not Immortal)

Posted by Campbell Bird on June 17th, 2022

Diablo Immortal has now been out in the wild for some time now, and it’s basically more impressive as a game than I initially expected and more disappointing on the monetization front than anticipated. You can read a full review here, but the upshot is the game is a perfectly fine and highly polished way to do some Diablo-style grinding and the store—though shitty—can mostly be ignored.

If you don’t want to support or engage with free-to-play design and/or Activision Blizzard generally, first: I totally understand as there is no shortage of reasons for having these sentiments! And secondly: I have good news! There is a veritable bounty of games on the App Store that can deliver a very Diablo-like experience without a gross store or company attached to them. Check out our top picks below.