{"id":105929,"date":"2019-12-20T15:35:54","date_gmt":"2019-12-20T15:35:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pockettactics.com\/articles\/best-new-iphone-android-games-december-20th-2019\/"},"modified":"2019-12-20T15:35:54","modified_gmt":"2019-12-20T15:35:54","slug":"the-weekender-last-of-2019-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2019\/12\/20\/the-weekender-last-of-2019-edition\/","title":{"rendered":"The Weekender: Last of 2019 Edition"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

This\u2019ll be the last Weekender update of the year so enjoy it – the next one will land January 3rd, 2020. This week has been a little bit mixed simply because I\u2019ve been travelling a bit for various company stuff, but I\u2019m glad we got a few updates out. It\u2019s a little sad to think this will be my last GOTY session as Editor, but thankfully there\u2019s still plenty of time until the new people come on board that I don\u2019t have to worry too much about \u2018handing over\u2019 just yet.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve got content planned for the Christmas break – got a few op-eds reflecting on the year coming through, and of course the official GOTY post at the end of the month, but other than that, don’t expect a lot of news or reviews from now until we\u2019re back.<\/p>\n

Out Now<\/h2>\n

There\u2019s not actually much I feel warrants special attention this week, but I also don\u2019t want to leave you completely in the lurch so here\u2019s a few games that caught our interest:<\/p>\n

Firstly, we have another new board game release, huzzah! This one is called King Tactics – War of the Roses<\/em>, which despite sounding like F2P trash is actually the digital adaptation of The Rose King<\/em>, or \u2018Rosenk\u00f6nig<\/em>\u2019, which is a KOSMOS game created by Dirk Henn. It\u2019s a minimalist strategy game for one or two players, with a couple of game modes and online multiplayer. It\u2019s out on both iOS<\/a> and Android<\/a> and isn\u2019t that expensive, although beyond that I\u2019m not really sure how else to describe it. Maybe you\u2019ll get more from the trailer than I did:<\/p>\n

[youtube https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=ZfyMrd4CJbE?controls=0]<\/p>\n

The next game is Hoop League Tactics<\/em>. It\u2019s a turn-based strategy game that mainly revolves around making smart choices as to the placement of your players, focusing on their ability to make shots. Each player on your team can either move, pass or take a shot, and there\u2019s a timer of sorts that acts as your stamina so knowing when to make the shot and when to keep pushing is key. Really, it comes down to positioning so that the right player is in the right place, at the right time.<\/p>\n

[youtube https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=kml3aSJnqDE?controls=0]<\/p>\n

This game is available on both iOS<\/a> and Android<\/a>, and as a free-to-download trial with a full-game unlock that\u2019s currently $2.99 – 40% off the full price during December.<\/p>\n

The final one is AI Dungeon<\/em> – this is a free text-adventure game. There\u2019s nothing much to it, but it boats and AI-driven text engine that\u2019ll allow you essentially play forever? It says it\u2019s a \u201climitless text adventure\u201d<\/em> thanks to the AI that powers it. Might be worth checking out just for the concept, although it\u2019s only on iOS<\/a>.<\/p>\n

App Updates & News<\/h2>\n

The Mario Kart Tour<\/em> multiplayer beta has finally rolled out, although only Gold Pass subscribers can access it for now. It\u2019ll be running from now until December 26th, and will let people play against each other in actual head-to-head matches, as opposed to whatever it is that happens currently.<\/p>\n

Hearthstone Battlegrounds<\/em> has also received a new update (as well as Hearthstone<\/em> itself), which removes Nightmare Amalgam from the card pool. This is pretty huge, as Nightmare was pretty key to the meta at large, and one of the most sought after cards in the game. Brann Bronzebeard has also been removed from the pool of minions, and plenty of other minions have had their tiers changed as well.<\/p>\n

Apple Arcade has also introduced an Annual Subscription option to their new subscription service. It costs $49.99 ($59.99 in Canada) and \u00a349.99 in the UK, which essentially gets you 12 months for the price of ten and saves you around $10.<\/p>\n

Also, if any of you have been missing the Eclipse<\/em> digital board game app, one of our readers made the bold move to ask the table-top game\u2019s creators about a mobile adaptation, now that the boardgame\u2019s second edition is in the works. You can see an image of the reply here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But essentially the original version is due to return Q1 2020, with news regarding a digital implementation of the Second edition due sometime in Q2.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve also noticed a slew of other updates, including Minecraft Earth<\/em>, DOTA Underlords<\/em>, Santorini<\/em> and more.<\/p>\n

App Sales<\/h2>\n

I wasn\u2019t expecting so big a sales event so soon after Black Friday, but here we are. It\u2019s Christmas in exactly five days, and everyone is jumping on the bandwagon to offer up some holiday app sales. There\u2019s honestly a bit too many to list out properly as several publishers have just gone all-out, but here\u2019s a hap-hazard summary of games to look out for that are going cheap:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • Seemingly anything currently published by Asmodee Digital. They\u2019re discounts are as high as 75% and this is across iOS and Android.<\/li>\n
  • ACRAM Digital\u2019s Istanbul<\/em>, Eight-Minute Empire<\/em> and Steam: Rails to Riches<\/em>.<\/li>\n
  • Battle Chasers: Nightwar<\/em><\/li>\n
  • Star Traders: Frontiers<\/em> & other Trese Brothers games<\/li>\n
  • All of the Kingdom Rush<\/em> games + other Ironhide titles<\/li>\n
  • The Banner Saga 1 <\/em>& 2<\/em><\/li>\n
  • One Deck Dungeon<\/em> & other Handelabra games<\/li>\n
  • Reigns: Game of Thrones<\/em><\/li>\n
  • FTL<\/em><\/li>\n
  • Holy Potatoes! A Spy Story|?<\/em><\/li>\n
  • Holy Potatoes! We\u2019re in Space!?<\/em> & the other Holy Potatoes games<\/li>\n
  • Motorsport Manager Mobile 3<\/em> (Free!?)<\/li>\n
  • Solitairica<\/em><\/li>\n
  • Peninsular War Battles<\/em><\/li>\n
  • Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions<\/em><\/li>\n
  • Galaxy Trucker<\/em><\/li>\n
  • Raiders of the North Sea<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    There\u2019s probably more, but the tool I use is listing so much from the past 24 hours alone, I’m trying to just skim through for the highlights. I\u2019ve also checked a couple of games that are on both iOS and Android and the majority of sales seem to be on both platforms where applicable, but obviously double-check before you buy.<\/p>\n

    That\u2019s all for this week\u2019s update, Merry Christmas if you don\u2019t come back to the site much next week, otherwise see the rest of you on Monday!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    This\u2019ll be the last Weekender update of the year so enjoy it – the next one will land January 3rd, 2020. This week has been a little bit mixed simply because I\u2019ve been travelling a bit for various company stuff, but I\u2019m glad we got a few updates out. It\u2019s a little sad to think […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":105930,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[70],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-105929","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mobile-game-releases"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105929","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105929"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105929\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/105930"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}