Physics side-scroller
BADLAND
One tap keeps you airborne, everything else is the world trying to crush you. Beautiful, cruel and still the best-looking thing on this list.
Frogmind · paid
Is there any indie game on a phone worth paying for up front?
There are several — and the four below all share one quality: once you have bought them, they never ask you for anything again.
Questions first
Eight things readers ask before installing
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01Why are all four paid games?
Because paid indie games are where the honest deals are. None of these four has an energy meter, a daily login or a shop, and none of them will ask you for anything after the download. That is unusual enough on a phone to be the organising idea of this site.
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02Do they work without a connection?
All four run offline once installed. Human Fall Flat needs a connection only for its online multiplayer; everything else, including its full single-player content, works in airplane mode.
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03How long is each one?
BADLAND has a campaign of a few hours plus a large set of extra levels. Machinarium runs four to six hours. Bridge Constructor Portal is around six. Human Fall Flat depends entirely on whether you play alone or with others — three hours solo, considerably more otherwise.
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04Which one works best on a small screen?
Machinarium and Bridge Constructor Portal, because neither needs fast input. BADLAND is fine because it uses one touch. Human Fall Flat is the awkward one: it wants two analogue sticks and a phone gives you two thumbs on glass.
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05Are they suitable for children?
This site is written for adults, and while none of these games are graphic, BADLAND in particular is bleak and Human Fall Flat involves a lot of falling. Ratings differ by country and are shown on each Google Play listing — check there rather than relying on the art style.
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06Do any of them have in-app purchases?
Machinarium and Bridge Constructor Portal have none. BADLAND and Human Fall Flat have optional extras of varying kinds. The definitive list for any game is on its store page, and prices are only shown at checkout.
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07Do they run on an older phone?
Yes, all four. Human Fall Flat is the heaviest and shows occasional slowdown on our four-year-old test handset; the other three run without noticeable trouble.
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08Are you paid to write these?
No. Every game here was bought with our own money and there are no agreements with publishers. See the Legal Notice.
The four
Physics, paint and a portal gun
Point and click
Machinarium
A hand-painted adventure with no dialogue and no hand-holding. The puzzles are fair, the world is worth staring at, and the built-in hint system is honest about how it works.
Amanita Design · paid
Construction puzzle
Bridge Constructor Portal
Structural engineering plus portals, which is a far better combination than it sounds. Every level is a small experiment with an unambiguous pass or fail.
Headup · paid
Physics platformer
Human Fall Flat
A deliberately clumsy body in a world of solvable problems. The controls are the joke and the challenge at once, which works better with friends than alone.
505 Games · paid
Table
Side by side
| Game | Type | Length | Offline | Extra purchases |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BADLAND | Physics side-scroller | 4–6 h plus extras | Yes | Optional |
| Machinarium | Point and click | 4–6 h | Yes | None |
| Bridge Constructor Portal | Construction puzzle | about 6 h | Yes | None |
| Human Fall Flat | Physics platformer | 3 h solo, more together | Single-player only | Optional |
Lengths are our own completion times, not figures published by the developers.
Method
How these four were chosen
The rule is simple and it does most of the work: a game gets covered here only if buying it ends the transaction. No energy meters, no currencies, no daily rewards, no shop tab. That excludes a great deal of what tops the charts and leaves a small field of games designed to be finished rather than maintained.
After that, each one is played to the end on two handsets — a current mid-range phone and one about four years old — and the review records where the touch controls fight the design, how long the whole thing took, and whether it is still worth returning to. Nothing is written about a game we have not finished.
We do not score games out of ten. A number implies a precision that four hours with a physics puzzler does not produce.
Know a game that fits the rule?
One payment, no shop, and something interesting happening mechanically. If you know one on Android that meets that description, send it over — it will be bought, finished and written up.
Send a suggestionContact
Dublin Indie Gaming is written and published by Conor Murphy, 8 Shop Street, Galway, H91 V241, Ireland. Email [email protected], or use the form on the contact page.