Apple Arcade Discussions

IMO, Exit the Gungeon is the only worthwhile game on that service.

But others seem to like Card of Darkness and whatever else.

A Monster’s Expedition is excellent–makes me glad I’ve kept the service.

I enjoyed Card of Darkness and Grindstone but finished neither.

Guildlings is a nice bite-sized RPG that fits well on mobile; what’s available is only the first chapter, though, and I’m not sure when the rest is coming out.

Overland is excellent, too, and I think it plays a little better on mobile than on PC.

I’ve downloaded a bunch of other Arcade games and haven’t tried them yet … there may be more worthwhile out there.

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I think Cosmic Express is made by the same people and it’s on sale for a buck right now.

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I’m not on Apple Arcade, but I expect mini motorways has continued to improve since launch

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Forgot that one–yeah, Mini Motorways is still very good.

I just got the one month Apple one free subscription, so I’m back into Apple Arcade for a month. Anything that I shouldn’t miss?

First stop is mini motorways, I didn’t even bother to delete it from first time round, I knew I’d be back

I enjoyed Manifold Garden. Kind of a trippy escher-esque environmental puzzler that uses shifting gravitational direction as it’s main mechanic to solve puzzles, explore new areas etc. I played it on my ipad. Not sure how well it would play on a smaller iphone screen.

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I only mean this politely but this thread already has quite a few “must have” mentions, some just a few above your post. Don’t think there’s been much worthwhile released since those either. AA is a rather “Arcade” service as it turns out.

But my suggestions, as before, would be Exit the Gungeon and Card of Darkness.

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Depends what you like. The Bradwell Conspiracy is a nice 3D adventure game with a satisfying narrative. My only complaint is some of the text that helps point where it’s going could be hard to read on a phone.

Guildlings is great, but not a good choice if your account will expire since the story is unfinished.

Assemble with Care is a low-stakes puzzle game with a narrative by the team from Monument Valley. It plays quick and I liked it, but it’s definitely not something that will appeal to everyone.

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The more I think about this change, the less I like it. I assume this now means I have to subscribe to Arcade to continue playing games like Threes that I’ve owned for years. If true, that’s some serious B.S. …

(edit) … although, the flip side of that is making some older games part of Arcade hopefully ensures continued support for newer devices, rather than watching them fall victim to another “appocalypse.” So, clearly, I’m not quite sure what to think.

(edit #2) So, good news after looking at the new Arcade setup—the rereleased apps have new names (Good Sudoku+, for example), so it doesn’t affect apps I already own. Those old apps probably won’t get much more support, but at least I have them still.

Oooo, a Star Trek game. Wonder if it is any good?

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Narrator: it wasn’t.

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My gut call from the screenshots says it’s a tactical rpg where the crew of the various enterprises murder their way through the galaxy. The stats and levels on the few roster suggest the cookie cutter freemium mechanic of opening packs to grossly inflate numbers, which you then grind against a series of other numbers in order to “win”.

Is anyone still subscribing? Do any of you think it is worth it? I really want to try the Clap Hanz golf game. I haven’t tried Arcade out yet.

I just resubbed in April when they launched like 50 new games on there. I still play Mini Motorways a lot, playing Reigns for the first time, Simon’s Cat and Taiko Pop Tap is a huge favorite of my daughter. There is a new Kingdom Rush coming to Apple Arcade soon also.

Kingdom Rush is a favorite in my house. I may have to try this out. I still with the games we’re offered at a premium in addition to “free” with the sub, but oh well.

I have it as part of the bundle, as I use more of those services than not, which makes the price of the full subscription worthwhile. Have downloaded a few games but not really found anything truly monumental…

FANTASIAN by Hironobi Sakaguchi (FF I-IX, Chrono Trigger, FF X and X-2, FF XI and XII, Super Mario RPG, FF Tactics, Xenogears, Vagrant Story, Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, The Last Story).

excerpt from Wiki: “On 27 March 2019, Sakaguchi announced Fantasian, a Japanese role-play-game, exclusively for Apple Arcade. The game will be released in two parts. The first part was released on 2 April 2021.
Fantasian’s soundtrack was composed entirely by Nobou Uematsu (best known for his work on the Final Fantasy series’ soundtracks, while some of the in-game dioramas were created by Dragon Ball series creator Akira Toriyama.
Sakaguchi has stated that he was inspired by playing Final Fantasy VI with some old colleagues, saying “It really reminded me how much I love this classic RPG game genre”.
The game’s graphics are distinctive for their extensive use of more than 150 handcrafted miniature dioramas which were 3D scanned in order to create the game’s environments.”

should appeal to everyone who liked the classic FF and LOST ODYSSEY on XBox, one of my favorite games.

I finally caved and bought in to Apple Arcade, mainly for my kids. There are a handful of games that I am interested in trying but every time I go to the Arcade tab I see Star Trek: Legends.

“Don’t do it!” screams the Angel on my left shoulder. “You hate those kinds of games and have sworn to never play one again in your life.”

“What harm can it do?” says the devil on my right. “There are no iaps so surely it is a bit different.”

Spoiler alert: the Devil lies.

Now, I will admit that without premium currencies bought for real money the game seems ever so very slightly different in that I’m not fearing the iap paywall and feel like I can play as much or as little as I want without feeling the need to cough up money.

Other than that, this is the exact same game as every other gatcha”RPG” in that there is barely a “story,” which is told through static text boxes that is only a vehicle to advance you from one fight to another. The fights are what you’ve seen a thousand times before where 4 characters in one side of the screen use basic abilities against 4 similar characters on the other side of the screen. You obtain more characters through story missions or through loot boxes, characters level up as they fight or can be boosted with an item. Gear levels up with another item, abilities with yet another.

What this game proves more than anything is that without the slot machine mechanics to drive these hatch’s games, there is barely any game there.

Characters look good, if cartoonish, but this is the EXACT same game as the Star Wars one. And the Marvel one.

Darn me if I don’t just want to play to get a Picard, though. I’ve got a Riker and he even has an ability called The Riker Maneuver!

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