As if the previous blog article I wrote that mentioned something like Fl***y Bird somewhere in it wasn't enough due to the discovery of one of the recent news articles from Neowin about popular mobile games on Android, I may as well mention those past mobile games that article mentioned here. At the time, certain popular mobile games mentioned on that article had microtransactions as in-app purchases of premium virtual currency or additional default virtual currency using real money so you can use that feature for buying in-game items or upgrades and such. When I say additional default virtual currency, it means the only virtual currency in the game gets additional currency points. There are multiple ways the default virtual currency can be increased provided that it's the only kind of virtual currency in the game. Sometime in the early 2010s, there were eventually mobile games that introduced loot box feature but I won't include them in this blog post here as this is quite a different story.
So here are the past mobile games listed below:
Angry Birds
The classic Angry Birds games came out on mobile without any charge although they seem to have tons of levels with further levels being quite difficult. Having endless amounts of levels along with microtransaction for purchasing items as an easy way to proceed is what threw me off the most, more on that later, but with multiple Angry Birds games with tons of levels, it's going to seem like you would need tons of free time to attempt those levels if you could.
Temple Run, Subway Surfers, Jetpack Joyride & Fruit Ninja
They may seem simple concept-wise but the item-upgrade is what increases the replay value. The same may go for other games that are not endless runner games. Fruit Ninja has tons of sequels and versions with Kinect and VR being the good gaming experimental ways to play with full motion controls and usage of in-game slicer weapons to slice down fruits in the VR world using VR controllers. Even Angry Birds franchise has the VR spinoff as well but I don't know if there will be a VR endless runner game as well as if the only way to slide or jump will be through a press of a button while bashing away whatever obstacles coming your way or even avoiding whatever you're not supposed to run into.
Candy Crush & other similar freemium match-3 puzzle games
This is the kind of game you'll probably love or hate. Further levels will be TOUGH and that wasted tons of my time until I cleared some further levels by luck without even buying the in-game items or some sort through microtransactions. Maybe I'm better off with NOT spending money on microtransaction stuff as it may seem like a dangerous and addictive act in gaming. I could have used the money on something more important.
Hell, there's a good alternative to Candy Crush series that existed and that is Sugar Shock, from the same man who made the Bejeweled series of games and that follows the classic Bejeweled Blitz which relies on skills and luck for score. At least, that is a better time to spend on instead of Candy Crush which I couldn't tolerate anymore. It's a shame that EA had to follow suit with Bejeweled Stars for the sake of gaining additional money.
Flappy Bird and other games similar to it
This is one game I pretty much despised and avoided due to unoriginality of assets and garbage gameplay although its clones might have different look while retaining the same gameplay. The pipes looked like something from the Mario franchise and people including me eventually bashed the hell out of the game due to plagiarism and such.
Speaking of plagiarism of Nintendo IP stuff, there was some game like Giana Sisters on C64. One real fact is that, the lawsuit NEVER happened at all when it comes to the original Giana Sisters game on C64. Rather, Nintendo asked that the original Giana Sisters game be booted off the retail stores. Later games in the Giana Sisters series distanced themselves from the original Giana Sisters game.
The original Flappy Bird game was taken down due to bad influence such as addicting nature coming from it according to the sole developer. However, the damage was already done even if that game was taken down and with endless amounts of clones, the power of plagiarism has been running amok in the world of mobile games. At least, I had seen a paid professional indie game that took that power and its indie developer got away with it without being called out until the upcoming console/PC release that will take place next year. The power is real starting with stolen sound effects and the graphical assets are still similar to whatever the developer took even with various differences made.
Another stupid thing was the sales of IOS devices bundled with the original Flappy Bird app inside them after the game was booted off the app store.
