The nice thing about mobile games is that they don’t usually require a lot of time and attention. The bad thing is that they can cease to exist at a whim.
I had the first Droid phone that released in 2009, and I loaded it up with these mysterious new things called “apps,” many of which were games, but some were things like “Hot Giggity: A Glenn Quagmire Soundboard” and “Best Street Fighter 2 Soundboard.” A lot of soundboards in the early App Store days.
Since then, mobile gaming has exploded and become a multi-billion-dollar industry. Sure, most of the top games are generic match-3s, condensed versions of other games, or idle battlers, but there were some gems in the rough that have sine been lost to the sands of time.
Here are five mobile games I still think about to this day.
Dragon Coins
“Dragon Coins” was the first mobile game I really played a bunch on my little Google Nexus tablet back in May 2014. It’s basically “Puzzle and Dragons” style of game progression but rather than matching colored orbs, you try to push coins and other objects into the hole. If you’ve ever been to a boardwalk or a Dave & Buster’s, you’ll know what I’m talking about:
Gameplay was simple but fun. Depositing regular coins into a character’s slot made them attack, colored coins had different effects depending on the character, like attack buffs, and the other various items would have effects like speeding up the pusher, making it push farther on the board, dropping coins and items from above, and more.
I recall there being some semblance of team building but generally I just picked the highest rarity units I had and played with them. I tried to have one of each color to make sure I got any on-field benefits from each color. I’m not sure if that was the right method or not, but that’s a recurring theme with a lot of these games.
This is back before anyone really knew how to make a good mobile game, so features like guaranteed high-rarity units or pity systems weren’t around. You can see how dire the pulls are here:
After just 15 months, in August 2015, both the Japanese and Global versions of “Dragon Coins” were sunsetted by Sega. A representative posted a farewell message on the Sega forums, saying,
…the game never found an audience large enough to support ongoing development and, as a result, we have to shut things down.
Sadly, this would be the first of many times I’d lose a mobile game to corporate meddling.
Sega Heroes
I know I bemoaned Match-3 games earlier, but “Sega Heroes” was a fun and creative Match-3 that, again, borrowed elements from “Puzzle & Dragons” and had a bunch of Sega characters, both old and new. The game launched globally in November 2018, something mobile games didn’t really do until fairly recently.
Here’s how mobile games based in Japan used to work. Usually, games would release in Japan or the greater East Asian region first. Then, if the game was popular enough, it would get a global release. Usually, the global version had a short time to turn a profit before getting sunset. We saw it with “Dragon Coins” and a myriad of other games, and we’ll continue to see it moving forward if the developers decided to do the Japan/Global split.
In “Sega Heroes, your job was to match colored icons to deal damage to your opponents. Each character had different abilities that you could trigger by completing certain conditions, like comboing multiple sets of icons. I’m pretty sure there were also active skills, abilities you could trigger when you wanted by tapping the character’s portrait in-game, but I could be wrong.
There were a ton of Sega characters represented here. There’s more than just all the “Sonic the Hedgehog” characters with one or two characters from other franchises represented. There are characters from all corners of Sega’s history, from popular choices like “Yakuza” and “Super Monkey Ball” to legacy titles like “Street of Rage,” “Altered Beast,” and “Shinobi.”
I remember being so upset that I couldn’t get Shadow when he released, nor did I manage to pull any of the “House of the Dead” characters. But I managed to almost fully max out Death Adder!
“Sega Heroes” shut down in May 2020, not because of poor reception, but because the app’s developer Demiurge split from Sega to go independent. Demiurge called their shot and hit it out of the park, to say the least. Since leaving and joining Embracer Group (did anyone else hear lightning strike?) they’ve worked on “Hearthstone,” “Marvel Snap,” and “2XKO,” among other games. Not bad.
Yu-Gi-Oh! Cross Duel
I have been critical of anime games for not trying new things with their IPs, but when it goes the way “Yu-Gi-Oh! Cross Duel” went, I understand why more companies don’t take risks.
“Cross Duel” released on September 6, 2022 and flipped the “Yu-Gi-Oh!” format on its head. Rather than a one-on-one TCG simulator, “Cross Duel” was a four-player game that was part auto-chess, part card battler. Players had a deck leader, similar to games like “Duelists of the Roses,” with a 20-card deck of monsters, spells, and traps that would hit the battlefield.
PvP battles were a little chaotic but seemed to have some genuine strategy behind it as the game aged. Each player had 4000 life points, like “Duel Links.” The playing field was three across, one for each lane, with monster zones and spell and trap zones in each. Players could set a spell or trap to activate when conditions were met, just like the original card game.
Turns had two phases: Main Phase and Battle Phase. In the Main Phase, players would draw cards and place their cards into different lanes. There were three lanes — left, middle, and right — that players had to manage. The Main Phase is when abilities would kick in, letting cards boost their teammates or do other effects.
The auto-chess component would kick in during the Battle Phase, as cards would move to different points on the path. If two cards met in the path, they would battle. If a card had more attack than their opponent, it would move on, but lose ATK equal to its vanquished foe’s.
If a monster made it to an opposing player’s zone, the opponent would lose Life Points equal to the monster’s remaining attack. The last player standing would win the game.
There were competitive PvP modes but the modes I played the most were Raid Battles. I remember the Monarchs all getting one with a few others, but I stopped playing regularly by the time the other raid bosses started.
Raid bosses had special abilities that impacted the field and had tons of attack. As we can see, Raiza the Storm Monarch had 17,000 ATK in Stage 1, and 23,000 ATK in stage 2. The goal was for all four players to deal as much damage to the boss as possible to stun them, then go in for the kill.
Rather than dealing damage to your opponents, monsters who made it through the battle zone unimpeded would heal you for their ATK values. It made working together with your teammates crucial as to not block paths necessary to keep your teammates alive.
I thought the raids were more fun than the PvP games but not enough to play them consistently. It also didn’t help that I was trying to balance multiple mobile games, including multiple “Yu-Gi-Oh!” games, at the time, plus the other actual console and PC games I was playing.
I’m crushed that I missed this Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon event. Look at this model! It’s gorgeous.
And that is what I think people mostly remember “Cross Duel” for more than anything else — the artwork. The character renders got a clear upgrade from “Duel Links” and came to life while in combat. Each card in the game got a brand-new, 3D model that looked rather impressive for a mobile game. It’s a shame none of these assets were ever reused.
Cross Duel shut down just under a year into its life, but fortunately, not all is lost for “Cross Duel!” About three months ago, a passionate group of players from the Willow Grotto Discord server rebooted the game’s servers for PvP matches. You can learn more about the project at the Cross Duel subreddit.
Crash Fever
Now, if you’re reading this from a South Asian country, first off, thank you, but also you may be wondering what I’m talking about. “Crash Fever” recently celebrated its 11th anniversary, what do you mean it’s dead? I am, of course, referring to the global version of the game, which shuttered after seven years on December 21, 2023.
The game originally launched on October 26, 2016, and caught my eye as something a little different. The gameplay was a unique take on what is essentially color matching, the character designs were great, and the soundtrack was full of really well-made songs that matched the intensity of the combat on screen. I mean just look at what the endgame segments looked like:
Granted, I never really knew exactly what was happening most of the time, but that’s more of a me issue than the game’s issue. However, I don’t think it did a stellar job of explaining just what the hell you’re supposed to do.
Between the story mode, events, whatever the hell “Wizard” quests were supposed to be, Special events, all the events to grind out currency and awakening materials, and everything else the game threw at you, it became daunting, especially when I’d leave for a while then revisit intermittently throughout the years. I wish I found this video beginner’s guide and the 55-page PDF guide before the game closed.
I know my beloved “Dokkan Battle” doesn’t do a great job of guiding new players, either, but “Crash Fever” felt like a fever dream every time I’d open up the game. What are bugs? What are Ghost Points? Who knows!
Also it was expensive. Getting polygons, the premium currency, from the devs was like pulling teeth, and it felt like there were never sales outside of major celebrations. RIP to “Crash Fever,” you were always third or lower in my heart at a given time.
Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Blazing
Last, but certainly not least, was “Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Blazing.” This strategy game based in the “Naruto” universe originally released in Japan on July 14, 2016, and globally on August 23, 2016.
No color matching here — gameplay took place on an open battlefield, where players would move their characters into range of their opponents to deal damage. Teams were made of six: four player units in two pairs, and a friend pair. You could swap between the units in your pairs to change up your strategy or give your starters a chance to recharge.
Units also had active skills that were basically the big flashy attacks to keep you engaged. The animations improved over time, including lifting animations straight out of the “Ultimate Ninja Storm” games.
I recall the game being slightly less confusing than “Crash Fever” but not as confusing as “Dokkan Battle.” There was a lot to do with a lot of currencies and materials to keep track of, but it felt less daunting than the others. There were PvP events, raid battles, Ninja Road, and more.
I had a bunch of good pulls during whichever big celebration gave you Six Paths Madara and decided to start taking the game seriously. He was crazy. I miss him.
I also had a few busted Minato units, I recall.The thing I liked about “Ninja Blazing” is that the canon powerful characters felt powerful in the game. I was absolutely carried by them and I liked that.
“Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Blazing” shut down both servers on February 9, 2021, mostly due to the lack of new, original content. “Naruto” the series was over and the game couldn’t utilize the “Boruto” license.
The whales took their cash elsewhere, and amidst a sea of new “Naruto” and even “Boruto” mobile games releasing with improved graphics and gameplay, there was no room left for “Ultimate Ninja Blazing.”
But again, there is hope. A group of dedicated “Ultimate Ninja Blazing” players are working to revive the game and bring it back. It remains to be seen just how far they’ll get, but the fact that the game is playable again is a sight to see.
What deceased mobile games are you still stuck on? Let me know in the comments!
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