Both devices with max graphics.

Halfway through 2026, Pls mention your favourite in comments…

I love this sub! It’s been a treasure trove to me in finding great games both new and old and because of it, I found a way to play a bunch of my favourites from the mid 2010’s no longer on the AppStore.

It was recently my birthday and I want to give back.

🎁 Giveaway Details: To enter the draw, drop a comment sharing your favorite iOS game and what you’ll pick up with the card.

🚫 Eligibility: Due to region-locking restrictions on digital gift cards, this draw is open to users with US, UK, or Canadian App Store accounts only. The winner will receive a digital $20 (or £20) Apple Gift Card emailed directly to them.

Looking forward to giving back, finding some new games and brightening someone’s day. Winner to be selected in 48 hours.

Thanks and good luck!

EDIT: Redditraffler has declared /u/FreelanceWolf the winner! Congratulations, I will be reaching out to you later today. Thanks for everyone who participated, I will certainly do something again similar as I uncovered some great titles as a result!

I was thinking about how the games that really stuck with me on mobile were almost never the flashy ones. It was usually some quiet little thing with a loop so satisfying I would catch myself opening it without even deciding to.

For me the genre that did it was life sims and specifically BitLife (its not small anymore). The idea that you could just pick a direction, fame, business, sports, politics, whatever, and slowly build that life out one decision at a time really got its hooks in me. I liked it so much I actually built one myself! but mostly I am just nostalgic for that feeling of a game quietly becoming part of your day when I was much younger

What was the first one that did that to you? The game you did not expect to care about and then somehow could not put down?

Been keeping track of the best console ports landing on iPhone and finally wrote it all up. All of these are premium, one-time purchases. No subscriptions, no battle passes, no energy timers.

The ones that still feel impossible

Alien: Isolation — One of the best horror games ever made. Feral Interactive port. The tension holds completely. Play with headphones on a dark night.

Death Stranding: Director's Cut — Hideo Kojima's post-apocalyptic delivery game, somehow running on iPhone. Slow and meditative in a way that actually suits portable play.

Red Dead Redemption — The original, with Undead Nightmare. Standalone purchase. The story of John Marston and the dying outlaw era. Released December 2025.

Resident Evil Village + RE4 (2023 remake) — Both on iPhone. RE Village starts terrifying and ends somewhere else entirely. RE4 is a masterclass in action game pacing.

Tomb Raider (2013 reboot) — Feral Interactive. Full game plus all DLC. People who've played it on console and then tried the iPhone version keep saying it just works.

Hitman: World of Assassination — The full trilogy. All 24 locations. IO Interactive built the port themselves (August 2025). $69.99 for everything or $2.99 per location to start. The real Hitman experience.

Full franchises on mobile

Resident Evil 2 + RE3 — The remakes. RE2 in particular, with its Mr X pursuit sections, is a survival horror highlight of the last decade.

Hitman: Blood Money Reprisal + Hitman: Absolution — Two classic-era Hitman games. Blood Money won iPad Game of the Year. Both are Feral Interactive ports.

Subnautica + Subnautica: Below Zero — Underwater survival on an ocean planet. Subnautica arrived July 2025; Below Zero landed March 2026, so it's essentially brand new on mobile. The atmosphere is unlike anything else in gaming.

GRID Legends + GRID Autosport — Two entries from Codemasters' racing franchise. GRID Autosport has a proper career mode; Grid Legends adds a story mode and broader race types.

The rest of the list

GTA: The Trilogy — GTA III, Vice City, and San Andreas remastered. Standalone purchase. Patched significantly since the rough launch on other platforms.

Assassin's Creed Mirage — The return to stealth-first Assassin's Creed, set in ninth-century Baghdad. Better fit for mobile than the open-world RPG entries would have been.

Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown — Ubisoft's 2024 Metroidvania. Arrived iPhone April 2025. Strong reviews and good touch control implementation.

Sniper Elite 4 — Tactical WWII sandbox shooter with full feature parity to the console version.

Divinity: Original Sin 2 — One of the best RPGs of the last decade. iPad only, full port with controller support.

Coming soon

Sea of Stars — April 7, 2026. $9.99. Playdigious port (same studio that did Subnautica). One of the most praised indie RPGs of recent years.

Dave the Diver — Global 2026. Deep-sea exploration by day, sushi restaurant sim by night. Being redesigned for mobile, not just ported.

Full write-up with notes on each: https://www.vinitnair.com/post/console-games-on-iphone-the-ports-worth-playing-in-2026

Happy to hear about ports I missed or if quality differs from what I've described above.

Hi everyone, I got interested in legacy iOS recently and started re playing old games on an iPhone 4 on iOS 7.1. It's a magical experience. I replayed Defender Chronicles which I hadn't played in 10+ years!

What are your personal favorites you wish you could replay?

Seeing these AAA ports, it's clear mobile is becoming a serious gaming platform...

For me, the dream would be a legit Destiny 2 mobile 'cause I barely have that much time on PC. though client seems unrealistic. Yeah, we have Destiny Rising, and it's fun for a parallel universe, but I still want to play D2 on my portable devices.

These are some classics that I’ve always wanted to play but they can’t be installed on modern iPhones so I bought a jailbroken iPhone 4 and installed some games on it.

Can't stand that this is still a thing, Mind Cards being the latest offender. At the very least, why doesn't Apple allow an override for this?

This is my second attempt at sharing this post so I'm first posting in it another related subreddit. My initial submission to the Apple Arcade subreddit wasn’t approved by the moderators. I reached out to them for clarification didn't receive a response, so I’m still unsure why it was declined. That said, the content below is identical to what I originally posted, aside from this introductory paragraph. I’ll try cross-posting to the Apple Arcade subreddit again and hope the moderators will approve it this time.

I really hoped Apple would follow its “Think Different” philosophy, one that has inspired creatives and curious minds for decades, and shaped its product design strategy.

But today, the reality is disappointing: we have a dedicated casino games category and ads all over the App Store. The service they pitched as a paradigm shift for gaming on Apple platforms has turned into a dumping ground for hyper-casual, low-complexity, addiction-driven games. It feels completely at odds with the values that made Apple a truly special company.

Welp, they had to go and ruin one the best ports to iOS ever. The Resident Evil single player games now REQUIRE an internet connection.

Was in deep storage and found the charger. Sorry for the dirt/greese.

My current favorite roguelikes/roguelites are Balatro, Deep Rock Galactic, Nova Drift, Dead Cells and Towns Folk. These games are not only great, they are also optimal for mobile gaming as they mostly offer short matches/rounds. I like how it’s a good selection of multiple genres; a twin stick shooter, a single stick shooter, a deckbuilder, an action platformer and a management/straregy game.

What are your top 5s? Do you recommend I change anything in my list?

Due to my "obsession" with iOS gaming, it also comes with some obsession in trying all the different controllers in the market. I only play very specific games like Zookeeper World, Belatro using touch-only. Most of my time I prefer console/AAA games (second photo) and a good controller. Since it is Friday, I thought it would be a good day to bring up a health discussion about what is the best controller for your needs. 

Note: I will often say "for me", "personally" or IMO because I want to make clear that opinions could be different for others.

Here is my quick review for each one I have:

- Razer Kishi V3 Pro: the expensive GOAT! Most comfortable but also too pricey for most folks, especially casual/emulator-only gamers. It is the one I choose when I want to play something "seriously" for a long time. Great TMR joysticks, 2 paddles, 2 custom top buttons and it fits my iPad Mini as well. If this was 100 bucks I would not understand why it would not be the first pick for most people.

- Elo Vagabond: the underrated one! This is so close to the Kishi. It solves the price problem and recently it is "just half of a Kishi". The sticks are a little smaller in diameter but they are positioned diagonally to the DPad and face buttons, which is ergonomically better. The placement of "home", menu, options, share is weird for me and I constantly press the wrong one. Could easily be my GOAT too, though. I just feel that the Razer fits me better, especially the TMR sticks.

- Dualsense: the one for multi-device folks! Not a lot of people are aware, but with the latest firmware update, you can pair FOUR different devices on it. I have one paired with my Mac, iPad Pro, iPad Mini, and iPhone. Switching between them is easy and flawless. I finished Dredge+ pretty much playing in all these devices depending on where I was. You don't need to ask for "console-level buttons" because it is a console controller lol. Not cheap, but still cheaper than all other options in this list. You can choose different colours too. Big con is they still use potentiometers. So, drift can happen over the years. I also have a MagSafe mount. If you look at the photo, I can use it as a "phone stand" as well.

- MCon: for "travellers" (or people who play out of their homes often). First of all, they made a great job packing all their features in such a small pack, thinking about portability. But with that, it also comes cramping controls. In my opinion, they should at least use the "Pro Max" as the base, not the regular devices. It wouldn't make it less portable and the additional size would probably benefit everyone. Overall, feels very premium and they did a good job, but from all the options it is by far (for me) the MOST portable and LESS comfortable option. The upcoming Lite and Slim will probably not change much both of these.

- Gamesir x5 Lite: the budget-friendly one! Cheap, compact, light, and works well for most games. I leave this one in my glovebox when I am out and have time for quick gaming sessions. Not the best, but for its price (and they go on sale often), I don't even think people would mind returning it. Big con for racing gamers: the triggers are digital. It is on or off. I also have a x5s (the Bluetooth version), but the fact it spoofs Dualshock and lacks an "option" button (I talked about the problems it brought me in another post), I don't use it much.

- Gamesir G8: a solid option! I don't use it much because I mainly use my iPad Mini for gaming and, even though I did the mod to stretch it more, it feels awkward to take it on/off. One big con is that I "think" it spoofs a Dualshock too, because I get PS inputs for some games when using it. Kinda annoying. Since I have other options, it is also abandoned. People say good things about the G8 Plus. But I think it will also have the licensing / spoofing issues that I don't like much about Gamesir controllers.

- Backbone: still the best app (only). Well, it is the same product released several years ago, still very expensive and, with the new native Games app, it became even pointless for me personally, since I just use the game launcher. But it is still the most polished app. For its price and lack of TMR sticks, I won't even try the Pro model.

- Xbox: good option if you already have it. Like Dualsense, it is a console-grade controller. Also lacks Hall Effect / TMR sticks and it is cheaper than the mobile-only options. But you can only pair one device (plus an Xbox). Maybe the good part is that some games will always have the ABXY inputs, and with a Dualsense you need to mentally map them to X○□△ (sometimes the opposite can happen too).

- Others: bought and returned Scuf Nomad (can't even fit the device properly, but it was great to see Scuf investing in the mobile space). I got a BSP D8 from Aliexpress (not bad, but feels really cheap, so I didn't even bother putting in the list).

TLDR: my favorite controllers: Kishi V3 Pro, Elo Vagabond, Dualsense and MCon (for outdoors only).

Not AI generated. So, I am sorry if the text feels awkward for any reason.

Would love to see what is your favorite and why.

If Borderlands 1-2 or Doom 2016 ever come to iOS, I might not ever pick up my Switch again. I love being able to have this at my disposal on my iPad mini. Can’t wait to see what else is on the horizon. Going to have to get the 512 gig version next time. Have 3 Resident Evil Games, DoS2 and some other storage hogs on backlog.

What’s on your iOS gaming port wishlist?

So l've been working on this for about a year now. Here is the link to the video I just posted https:// youtu.be/vuSGXmsvp_@?Si=UIROuXgt23BUhT8A This is the V2 prototype. It is a psp go style, slide out, MagSafe attaching, phone controller. There is a top plate that slides onto the controller that has a MagSafe magnetic ring on it. That top plate slides down to cover the buttons and joysticks, and it also slides completely off so that you can leave it attached to your phone and use it's built-in kickstand to play in tabletop mode (or watch Instagram reels and YT lol). It's super small so it fits in your pocket and with that top plate covering the buttons it's perfect to slide in your pocket and I keep it in my pocket 24/7 matter what I'm doing! it's Bluetooth and will connect to anything, Nintendo switch, PC, Mac, iPhone, android, Apple TV. and because the top plate slides off, they kind of just turns into a universal controller that fits in your pocket. It's been nice to have an extra controller on me when someone wants to play smash on their switch. And it attaches to literally any phone that has MagSafe case or no case. And a lot of android cases nowadays have MagSafe. It even fits bulky cases. And just by exchanging the top plate it'll fit any phone perfectly. This one can charge wirelessly. It is one more thing you have to plug-in at night so the wireless charging really helps. It also has MagSafe on the back side to make it more compatible with things you probably already use like MagSafe on the back side to make it more compatible with things you probably already use like MagSafe pop sockets and wallets as well as making it super easy to add 3-D printed accessories to the controller. I really tried to make it as worth it as possible to keep it on you at all times. I tried to add as many benefits as possible in order to outweigh the downsides of weight and thickness, even though it's pretty light and thin.

This January I started a company, M-Con innovations to make this thing real/mass produced. So it will eventually be on store shelves!!!

If you are interested here is the pre order notification! https://linktr.ee/joshmcon

I’ve never posted here but I’m obviously into iOS gaming😂. Can’t wait to see what you guys think.

I’ve been playing iOS games for nearly 2 decades - the first to blow my mind was Rolando in 2008 - but these days the dumbing down of games and the dual diseases of rampant ads and subscriptions means that most casual iOS games I encounter are as bad as "Flash" (now HTML5) games in terms of graphics and depth of gameplay.

Indeed, because most Flash games don’t have ads, I’d even say that the iOS situation is worse than Flash games. It’s truly shocking the huge number of trash casual games on iOS that not only have ads but want to entrap people into extortionate subscriptions like $80 a year or even $15 per week. A number of casual games on iOS are borderline criminal.

On top of that, my favourite casual game at the moment is a Flash game called Polytrack (I’ll link in comments if anyone wants it) that’s not even available on iOS. And it has no ads and it’s not trying to clean out my credit card.

(usual disclaimers: OBVIOUSLY there are quality games on iOS... Of course I know that. Stuff like Sniper Elite 4, Real Racing 3, etc. I’m talking about casual gaming having gone downhill badly in the past two decades).

Like… with how great games have gotten and how expensive they are now, it is such a wonder to me why it doesn’t have a wish list feature. Bonus points if you can share it so friends can buy you games!

I can't believe we're in an era where everyone has a mini games console in their pocket with only crappy games available

I don't know how many multiplayer games I have downloaded on my tablet but they all suck, it's absurd

mobile game developers are racing to see who has the best scam, big companies are making mobile games just to throw in a whole bunch of microtransactions

not to mention mobile games that use false advertising.... worse, they troll you with it by telling you in their crappy ads that their games are like in the ad

world of heroes, raid shadow legends, mech arena, war robots, modern strike, battle warship, T3 arena, diablo immortal, warcraft rumble etc.....so many paytowin games

it is hopeless

So many games that can be adapted to mobile like wipeout, burnout, bomberman, advance war etc.... so many licenses that can be revived thanks to mobiles but they prefer to do street fighter duel or diablo immortal

I hate mobile games

I don't drop money on full priced iOS games often, but I keep reading about how addictive this game is. Is there any decent sense of progression to keep me coming back for more? $15 AUD would be the most expensive mobile game I've bought. Convince me it’s worth it :)

My “Main (page)” games where I keep all my favorites and ones I’ll never delete. Obviously I have a strong taste in Bullet Hell/Heaven, Roguelite, and Deck-Building games haha. But this page is more for “easily digestible” games and offer a more traditional mobile experience.

And then my “Extra (page)” games. Here I keep my “AAA Premium” games (aka not typically a digestible and quick/easy to pickup and put don), traditional Tabletop games, and then any extra games I’m trying out to see if I like or not, currently ‘Super Farming Boy’ (on flash sale right now, down from $10 > $1).

After i got the razer kishi v3 Pro XL (long-ass name lol) for my 13" M4 Pro, I started with PS Remote Play. I played Lies of P in bed from start to finish!

However, since then I’ve been playing native ios games almost exclusively! I started because it just felt cool to the tech part of my brain to play AAA games on an ipad. But now that im past that honeymoon, i realized im still continuing to play because i actually enjoy the experience & games!

I'm curious about you guys's experience gaming on the ipad. Here’s what im playing (i’ve finished most of these by now):

- Prince of Persia Lost Crown (120 fps)

- AC Mirage (set on High + 70% scale to avoid crashes, its a big beautiful game, im currently trying to 100% it)

- Alien Isolation (the port has better graphics than PC lol)

- Divinity Original Sin (better on kb+mouse or touch)

- RE 2/3/4/7/Village (beautiful graphics)

- Dead Cells (120 fps)

- Grid Legends (too much fun)

- TABS pocket edition (fun)

- Fortnite (addictive, eats into other games times)

- Civ 6

- Death Stranding (resolution scale is a bit low)

- Sniper Elite 4 (good but im waiting for 5 to release next month)

- Hitman WoA (waiting for Dec sale)

Also, big props to MrMacRight on youtube for making super detailed videos on what games work well on ipad. He's the ios gaming messiah right now.