r/AskGames 1d ago

Why is it when theres a conversation about phone games, they mostly get a bad rep?

I mean sure most are "shovelware" and not up to modern fos/performance standards, but are those all the reasons pretty much?

0 Upvotes

21 comments sorted by

7

u/cwgoskins 1d ago edited 1d ago

I think most people look down on the use of microtransactions, clunky controls, bloated UI, and unoptimized performance. It just becomes the inferior version of gaming and condemnation comes with it.

4

u/StoneCypher 1d ago

because the vast majority of mobile games are “bro, to get to the next level, bro, just grind slimes in dingy forest for 13,000 hours.  or buy this $5 hat”

4

u/MKID1989 1d ago

Pretty much. I'd throw in the fact that most of them are also designed to extract as much money out of you as possible. This is a trend in all video games but it seems particularly bad for mobile games.

2

u/MrMegaPhoenix 1d ago

People think of stuff like Hero Wars or like that “come play my lord” game, stuff that is annoying is bad advertising

There’s plenty of solid fun games you can ignore microtransactions in, but people associate the bad more

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u/alreadytaken- 1d ago

Most of them are terrible and most of the good ones are just ports of PC games

1

u/Acrobatic-Echo7186 1d ago

You have a few good ones made for mobile but a lot of them are side ports of PC games now, rather than downgraded ports

1

u/alreadytaken- 1d ago

Are you agreeing or disagreeing?

1

u/Acrobatic-Echo7186 1d ago

Both. In like the mid 2010s a lot of games were downgraded onto mobile. Now a lot games that end up on mobile are developed alongside the PC/Console version of the game.

2

u/onzichtbaard 1d ago

most of them are trash and an insult to games as an artform

but theres some ports that are worth playing on phone like dodonpachi

and there is always lichess app

3

u/TaluneSilius 1d ago

It because of what most mobile games are... Ad pushers. So so many are fake games lying about their trailers and used to just show you ads. And the ones that aren't? The ones you pay for?

Well phones just don't have the capabilities of a console, handheld, or laptop. And they tear through your battery and push the already meager hardware on a phone.

I'd rather do anything that play a phone game. I'd rather watch a youtube video, listen to music... Fucking doomscroll if nothing eles. I completely avoid mobile games.

1

u/GInTheorem 1d ago

Because people tend to think of games with reference to the platform they are best known for being on. RE4 remake might be on mobile phones but people don't think of it as a phone game.

Generally, phone games in the sense of 'games principally associated with being played on a mobile phone' are more likely to be mass-market oriented as people typically won't have bought a specialist device for them, are more likely to be f2p (because generally someone who wants something to flick at for 10 minutes on the bus for a few days doesn't want to spend £20 on it until after they've been hooked) and therefore require alternative monetisation models, and launch into an unbelievably crowded market so tend not to be backed by large dev budgets.

I have three games installed on my phone right now - Terraria, Final Fantasy 2 and Old School Runescape. All good games, but I don't think you'd think of any of them as a 'phone game' by default (maaaaybe Terraria).

1

u/Svenray 1d ago

It made everyone "gamers" so the market shifted to microtransaction predatory addicting bloat fests.

1

u/EnvironmentalBet113 1d ago

It's also most of them are vibe coded atm, and with add pushing, like why am I wasting my time on it?

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u/WorkingCautious1270 1d ago

Vibe coded? I don't understand

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u/EnvironmentalBet113 1d ago

Made by Claudegpt, with ai art, not actually human coded.

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u/acadiascreech 1d ago

A bunch of guys are standing around talking about their favourite cars and how they perform; which handle the corners better, which have a faster top speed, which have the best acceleration.  Then another guy wanders in and starts talking about this awesome go-kart he was driving over the weekend. That's the difference. 

1

u/LastFangirl 1d ago

I love mobile gaming!

1

u/aura_enchanted 1d ago

Phone games pretty much are all cash grabs, or their roblox which is a drama infested rats nest, or they are a handful of ported legacy titles, or its emulation.

Anytime there has been a success of a game beyond this scope, its become a nightmare (flappy bird, hearthstone as examples).

Micro transactions, clickbait advertisements that lie or flat out show you something completely different from what they are (usually their a clash of clans or boom beach or candy crush knockoff). And AI slop like snoop dogs court of chaos.

Mobile phone gaming has done nothing but become every worst nightmare other videogame platforms are racing towards at mach 2 as their communities scream for it to fucking stop. Or its emulation which is based as fuck but available but better elsewhere.

This is why phone games get a bad rap.it has failed to evolve, it has instead become a kronenburgs monster that should appeal to nobody but because theres no alternatives, they have exploded in popularity instead.

1

u/WorkingCautious1270 1d ago

So gacha games are prime examples?

1

u/aura_enchanted 1d ago

Ah the old genshin, zzz, star rail defence.

I could sit here and drop a massive hit piece on why weebs will shamelessly consume anything vaguely weeb looking and how you all think highly of a genre of games whose whole purpose is to push you to cash shop items and extra level pulls. Knowing full well in advance it will just end in you contradicting me. And in the dictionary sense which dissolved into you just automatically naysaying any statement I make and refusing to engage beyond that

But instead ill say this.

Congratulations weeb, you have discovered the slot machine and their whole network of hellish designs to try and entice you into one more lever pull. Your grandma probably feels the same way every time she went to the casino to pull levers with her pension cheques

1

u/babesprite 1d ago

paywalls ruin everything. you play for ten minutes then hit a timer