This is the time of year when we all begin to look back on the previous year. We assess everything—the highs, the lows, and the in-betweens. At SmartRead, we don't tend to brood on the negative aspects of things. Instead, we're going to concentrate on the greatest mobile gaming experiences available with our inaugural SmartRead Awards.
We'll be showcasing the biggest and finest Switch and mobile games that came out in 2020 in this double feature. There is something for everyone among the many alternatives we have included, including cross-platform treats, exclusives, and ports. The fact that every game on this list is of the greatest level, however, never changes.
If you like very fantastic games, we suggest you to check out our lists of the top iOS and Android games, as well as ourbest mobile games 2020 section, which is jam-packed with reviews of the newest games for the Switch and mobile devices. We really like the games we play on SmartRead.
Honours SmartRead 2020's best mobile games
Impact of Genshin
There are some parallels between the game and Breath of the Wild, as we mentioned in our Genshin Impact review, but there are many more differences. Genshin Impact offers an amazing anime-themed environment to explore, along with a cast of characters to meet and collect. In some ways, this has entirely revived how many of us think about mobile games and the gacha genre. There's always plenty to do in the game because to Mihoyo's constant supply of character and content updates.Shin Impact is so fantastic, in our opinion, that it ought to have won mobile game of the year at the Game Awards. Sadly, however, we can still celebrate it here at least.
Eve Reverberates
It's no small task to condense the fundamental Eve Online experience for mobile devices. It is well known to be a very complex experience that takes a great deal of playtime, study, and community collaboration to comprehend, much less flourish in the universe.Nevertheless, NetEase has succeeded.
Eve Reverberates is a stunning reimagining of the traditional MMORPG, and it has grown to be one of the top mobile titles in the category. We go into further detail in our
Eve Echoes review, and our
Eve Echoes guide offers some great starting point advice.
Runeterra's Legends
Riot released a number of titles this year, including League of Legends: Wild Rift and Teamfight Tactics, an auto-chess-inspired game. However, we were most pleased with Legends of Runeterra. This card-battling interpretation of the League world revolves on assembling champions and their corresponding realms to build combo decks that are both unexpected and effective.Runeterra feels different from other games because of the enormous range of champion combinations that may be made, in addition to the stunning artwork, audio, and excellent production qualities. As we said in our
Legends of Runeterrareview, it almost seems as if that power is equivalent to the fact that so many decks feel so fantastic.We're interested to see where Runeterra's expansions go.Pascal's Wager
Dark Souls could never run on a mobile device, is there? We were all mistaken, as
Pascal's Wager has shown. Its cast of characters, eerie setting, and sheer difficulty more than make up for its lack of the elegance seen in From Software's trilogy.Because Pascal's Wager is a challenging but fair game. Furthermore, the touch controls are really well-implemented, which is the largest obstacle that a precision action role-playing game on mobile has to overcome. Find out more in our
Pascal's Wager review on why we like it.
Tales of Guardians
One of the biggest releases of the year for mobile gacha games was
Guardian Tales. It offers an engrossing action fighting system reminiscent of Zelda, gorgeous pixelated graphics, and a multitude of characters to unlock, each with their own unique playstyle.Guardian Tales addresses the question of how little time is really required to play gachas, which is a typical criticism. It's not only really enjoyable, but you also have to lead your heroes in combat (see which ones are the greatest by reading our
Guardian Tales tier list).
Krumit's Tale: Meteorfall
Every year, a good number of new roguelike deck builders are released, since the genre is rather popular on mobile devices. In 2020,
Slay the Spire was released for mobile devices, but we really want to draw attention to another roguelike card game. The game is a clever spin on the card-crawling genre, as we pointed out in our
Meteorfall: Krumit’s Tale review. You may play as a warrior, wizard, thief, necromancer, or cleric, and use your special abilities to battle your way through each dungeon-box of surprises.Whether it's the peculiar graphic style reminiscent of Adventure Time, the unconventional narrator, or the way the game's several classes entirely alter gameplay, Krumit's Tale is plenty of personality. Above all, however, is the ease of picking up, playing, and finishing a few dungeons.South of the Circle
This year's offerings on Apple Arcade were so good that we could do a whole SmartRead Awards just for them. To be fair to the other mobile users, we had to choose only one, and that had to be
South of the Circle.You take on the role of Peter, a failing professor who becomes stuck in Antarctica, in this inventive and heartwarming adventure. As we discover what caused Peter's current situation, the narrative alternates between the past and the present. Find out more in our
South of the Circle review about why we thought it was so great.Randonautica
Randonautica: What is it?That was the question everyone was asking in the spring, when most of us were looking for a new pastime due to national lockdowns (we addressed it in our
Randonautica explained guide). The Randonautica was perfect. You were just given a random set of coordinates and, with an open mind, you travelled in that direction, discovering anything you came across.That naturally led to a lot of extremely bizarre
Randonautica stories when people learned about the amazing, weird, and sometimes even frightening things that were occurring in their neighbourhood.
Lunar Spooner
I can honestly say that I have never played a game quite like this one before. We described Moonlighter as "what Stardew Valley would be like as a dungeon crawler" in our
Moonlighter review, and that description is still rather true. Moonlighter is a bizarre mash-up of dungeon crawling and domestic shopkeeping, where you battle adversaries to get merchandise for your grandfather's store. Though it's an unexpected pairing, the two gameplay facets flawlessly complement one another.The iOS version of Moonlighter is also very well-suited for mobile use, with an auto-battle difficulty level that gives the game a platform-specific feel.The XCOM 2 Collection is available here.Feral's adaptation of the tactics game was described as a "perfect introduction to what makes the series special" in our
XCOM 2 Collection iOS review. The XCOM 2 Collection is a superb game, even though it may be challenging at times. This version enhances the action and clever tactics of the game for mobile devices and adds a fantastic UI and control mechanism. This is a fantastic way to play XCOM for the first time. You'll be up against the odds while attempting to start an uprising and drive out the planet's cunning alien rulers.
