If reddit mobile gaming communities are anything to go by then you probably think that mobile gaming and PC gaming are totally different. The truth is that there’s a lot of crossover happening lately. With smartphones becoming more and more powerful with each passing quarter developers have taken to porting their PC and Console games to mobile. This is our list of 5 PC Games ported to Mobile and it includes titles available on both iOS and Android.
Our Top 5 PC Games Ported to Mobile:
- Alien Isolation
- GRID™ Autosport
- XCOM Series
- Sid Meier’s Civilization VI
- Door Kickers
Bonus games not available on all platforms
- FTL: Faster Than Light
- Divinity Original Sin 2
- Grand Theft Auto Series
In this article we’ll take a look at our Top 5 PC games ported to mobile and talk a bit about why we chose and love them to bits! And as a bonus, we’ll cover a few more games that, due to one or more reasons, are not available on both platforms. But we think those games are worth it – if you can play them.
Alien Isolation
Alien Isolation is one of the best PC to mobile ports we’ve witnessed so far and this is why it’s so high on our list. The team from Feral Interactive did such an amazing job with the port that it has cemented them in mobile gaming history for years to come.
Graphically, the game looks impressive and can rival and even beat the the original Xbox 360 release. After I installed it I had to do a double take and check I wasn’t actually streaming the game from my office upstairs. Check out this visual comparison between the PC version and mobile version:
The gameplay is tight and it’s still just as scary as I remember it to be. The controls feel great and the game has full controller support. I highly recommend the game especially if you own a tablet and a Bluetooth controller.
On the other hand, don’t expect to be able to play this game on a bus or in a crowded location. It’s quite a tense game and distractions are going to impact the things that make it a great game.
What are those things? Tense moments. Incredibly emergent enemy AI. Tight tactical gameplay and amazing sound design. Great graphics. Hiding in lockers while holding your breath in real life.
GRID™ Autosport
GRID™ Autosport is another Feral Interactive masterpiece and a great port that really features what modern smartphones can do. It’s gorgeous to look at thanks to a lot of detail, high resolution textures and post processing effects.
The game is huge and a worthy AAA tile to shove into people’s faces when they say “But There Aren’t Any Good Mobile Games”. It’s pretty big in size as it requires around 6 GB of space but in exchange it offers ~100 cars, ~100 circuits, AAA graphics, amazing sound effects and one of the best simulation racing experience out there!
The game also as a free version with IAPs available for those who don’t want to spring for the full game at full price and it’s okay though if you’re looking for the premium experience I recommend throwing down the cash for it. Else, you’re going to spend more on the free version if you end up liking it (and there is a ton to like about the game).
The bottom-line is this: It looks gorgeous, it handles incredibly well and it’s a fully featured PC title on your favorite smartphone.
XCOM Series
We’re calling this the XCOM Series because we’re not just talking about a single XCOM game here. Both XCOM: Enemy Within and XCOM 2 are available on iOS and Android but published under different developers. One’s Feral Interactive (get used to seeing them throughout this list) who were in charge of the XCOM 2 port while the second publisher is 2K Games.
XCOM 2 – Feral Interactive
XCOM 2 has been optimized to run extremely well on modern smartphone devices. iOS users won’t have any problems running the game on their iPhones or iPads (although I do recommend playing the game on an iPad just because of the increased screen real-estate).
On Android things are also pretty good with the mention that you need to make sure you have at least a mid tier phone. Older devices are not supported but, as a general rule, if the play store allows you to install the game your phone can probably handle it.
In terms of graphical fidelity, XCOM 2 is a looker and I have to search very hard to find many of the visual differences between XCOM 2 on my computer vs my iPad. Lower graphical textures can be spotted in zoomed in sequences but, overall, especially when looking at a phone screen the game looks petty great.
Most concessions and changes don’t come from the graphics department but, instead, are due to adapting the game to mobile input and I feel like Feral did the best they could do with such a game. You’ll still missclick, especially on smaller screens, however that’s pretty common when playing with a mouse so I can’t fault Feral for this.
The only problem I have with the port? The lack of gamepad/controller support.
XCOM – Enemy Within
XCOM – Enemy Within is comprised of the fantastic 2012 XCOM franchise reboot + the expansion Enemy Within that builds upon the base game’s success. How much? It expands the base game and offers thousands of hours of entertainment to the game. I’m not joking on this.
I have personally sunken thousands of hours in the base game playing various Ironman challenges where once a character dies, that character is gone for good and in its place I have to use rookies. Ironman mode is available in this port and let me tell you: there’s nothing like seeing your favorite sniper missing a 97% chance shot.
The game is hard, brutal and requires you to hunker down and take meaningful tactical decisions. You get to name your characters and care for them and, if they die, you’ll actually feel like you lost a comrade and a friend.
It’s a tactical masterpiece of a game with mechanics designed to surface the feeling of actually being in a world-ending scenario. And, as dreadful and difficult the game is in some situations, it can also be extremely fun and hilarious at times.
Besides highly recommending the game to anyone with a tablet around, I also recommend the series that got me into XCOM and the Ironman challenges: XCOM: Ironman Impossible by Beaglerush. The series is 10 years old at this point but it represents the game perfectly.
If you’re on the fence about getting the game, start with the video bellow:
XCOM – Enemy Within is probably one of my favorite games to play on my tablet. I frequently play it by streaming the game from said tablet to my $6000 iMac Pro (I wrote about that setup here). Why? So I can enjoy more screen real estate on the Mac. And then when I have to leave for a meeting or go somewhere else I can just pick up the tablet and continue where I left off.
If you’re going to purchase any game from this list based on my recommendation alone, go for XCOM – Enemy Within.
My only gripe is that Feral Interactive did not handle this port and I want to throw more money at them.
It’s amazing how much love developers can put behind their ports while others outright refuse to port their games to mobile (a topic which we covered previously in our article titled “Why Don’t Developers Port Their Games To Mobile?”).
Sid Meier’s Civilization VI
I remember the first time I heard about Civ 6 coming to mobile. It was a video from PocketGamer and within the first 3 minutes this line was said:
“ came to mobile and it’s the FULL FULL FULL FULL FULL game I should point out . It’s not a half baked companion up ”.
Pocket Gamer’s youtube video on Civ VI for iOS.
Technically the game is a premium game but it’s offered as a Free(mium) with a limit of 60 turns. We wrote about why developers release FREE games in our article titled “How Do Free Mobile Games Earn Money” and I can see the reasoning behind this choice but it really hurt the game’s ratings on the Play Store (and the App Store contains quite a few mentions of this practice).
The game’s price is a hefty one (according to mobile game standards) if you take Rise And Fall into account. You can get the base game for $9.99 but you’ll have to factor in the price for the expansion. In total, expect to pay ~ $40 for the full experience.
As a Civilization fan? I think it’s worth purchasing it in order to have the game available on the go. I’ve spent many flights with the iPad on my lap annoying Saladin at every step of the way.
Door Kickers –
I’m a bit biased with this one so don’t consider it to be a proper review. Why? Because I’ve drank on more than one occasion with Dan and Mihai from KillHouse Games – the developers behind Door Kickers and I find myself fanboying over their work quite often.
I initially purchased the game on release in order to support them but I’ve fell in love with the game over the years. I’m by no means in their target audience but seeing the game run on a tablet? It really makes you feel like a Tactical Master in charge of a breach and clear situation.
It’s like one of those Sci-Fi movies from the 80’s and 90’s where you’d see a commander holding a futuristic slab with a big screen poking at it in order to mark where the troops should go and how to behave.
It makes me feel like an armchair commander that’s sitting safely in the HQ. And it’s not just me that see it that way, as some police departments in the US are using Door Kickers for trainings and simulations tactics. Check out this reddit post by /u/MaverickF14
Other PC Games ported to mobile
Games in this section are those that we would have wanted to add to the main list but we couldn’t. Some of them aren’t available on both platforms while others are temporarily removed.
FTL: Faster than Light
If I can describe FTL in any way that description would be: There’s no turn that can be wasted as any single, simple turn has a hard decision living in it’s shadow.
FTL, as many other games in the list, isn’t a new release but it’s one of the best experiences out there. The only reason why it’s not in the TOP 5 games is due to it’s availability only on iPads.
Divinity: Original Sin 2
Let’s get this out of the way – I think Divinity: Original Sin 2 is one of the best games to grace iOS. It has a premium price, a premium look and Larian Studios knocked it out of the park.
Everything about this game screams Baldur’s Gate with amazing modern graphics and a tiny bit of a Dragon Age: Origins sprinkled in for a good measure.
But those modern graphics come at a cost and the game requires the latest iPad Air (4) as the minimum specs to run it. And it’s not available on Android or any other iOS devices outside of the Air 4 and iPad Pro. Else, this would have been a contender for the number 1 spot on our list, going head-to-head with Alien Isolation.
The game is the very definition of a PREMIUM RPG for mobile devices so if you have any hardware that can run it, waste no more time and go get it.
And then get the Baldur’s Gate series and ports from Overhaul Games.
Grand Theft Auto for mobile
The GTA series is a mixed bag with their Android support at this point but we think you’ll want to check them out if you’re under the right circumstances hardware wise.
In short, the games are not reported as being able to run on Android 11 and 12. I have the games on my iPad Air 4 and they run pretty well but on Android? Good luck.
And it’s not looking like future GTA titles are going to be any better. We covered Take Two’s Zynga acquisition and we went into great detail about what that means for the future. You can read all about it in our article titled “The Future Of Grand Theft Auto On Mobile Doesn’t Look Good“.
The TL;DR of that article is: “Expect more GTA Online casino style things and less premium ports to mobile“. Heck the CEO’s talk more about recurrent consumer spending than anything else.
Where To Next?
That our recommendation for great PC games ported to mobile. We have other recommendations and topics we think you might be interested in. For example, there’s quite a few games we rated high in our reviews like Merchant (another premium game that hides behind a free price tag) and Thumper, a fast-paced game with gorgeous graphics.
We also talk a lot about the mobile gaming industry and their shenanigans and we have a special category titled “Worst Of The Mobile Gaming Industry”. We cover subjects like “Why Do Mobile Games Have Fake Ads” and “Why Are All Mobile Games The Same”.
If you like our content and want to stay up-to-date, you can subscribe via the mailing list widget on this page! Or give us a follow on twitter. Is there something else you’d want covered on our Best Smartphone Games blog? Let us know in a comment below.