Looking for games for my friend. She’s mostly looking for a casual timewaster for a bit of enjoyable escapism. She historically liked some of the “merge games” where it’s about merging icons on a grid, and a couple of the more traditional idle games but its so hard to find any without summy practices like dark patterns and abusive monitization.
So, what are some good casual mobile games? Ideally, the sort of thing your grandma could enjoy, but without the scummy practices that are widespread.
Edit: I’m looking for more “pure” casual games, rather than ones that are primarily puzzle or arcade games. Something more akin to Cookie Clicker, those old shovelware hidden object games, or Bejeweled’s zen mode rather than Tetris or Brickbreaker.
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Infinite Minesweeper.
On Android, there’s a good collection called Offline Games that has a lot of decent ‘grandma friendly’ mini games inside it.
Good choice - I was going to suggest Simon Tatham’s Puzzle Collection.
Yes. Always Simon Tatham’s Puzzle Collection.
It’s freaking fantastic. Anyone sleeping on it needs to check it out.
It runs on just about anything, too, including some eReaders.
There’s so many free open source games that fit your need.
Check out this search on F-Droid: https://search.f-droid.org/?q=game
And
Unfortunately, I’m looking for more “pure” casual games, rather than ones that are primarily puzzle or arcade games. Something more akin to Cookie Clicker or Bejeweled’s zen mode rather than Tetris or Brickbreaker. F-Droid doesn’t seem to really have much like that.
Anuto tower defence?
There’s less, but still some great ones.
Since you asked for non-predatory games, I still recommend spending some time searching F-Droid. It’s the only place I find most non-predatory mobile games.
On f-droid, I would try out:
- Burger Party
- Breakout 71
- Duck Run
- Gurgle (Wordle)
- Gridle (Wordle variant)
- Luanti
- SuperTuxKart
And on Google Play or Aurora, check out (paid, but nice if they haven’t enshitified yet):
- Mini Motor X
- You Must Build A Boat
- Ridiculous Fishing
Ridiculous Fishing
“As of December 10, 2025, the Android version is no longer downloadable from the Google Play store.”
:(
Walkscape is a fun mobile analog to runescape where xp in a dozen skills is gained by real-world steps.
It’s still being built and expanded but its alpha stage is very playable and besides the skills has quests, challenges, items, apparel, pets and a lot of fun stuff going for it, all while being a casual, healthy game.
Looks like signups are open now.
Have they added support for any watches yet? I have had my eye in this for ages as I’d love to try it but haven’t checked in a while!
ios wearables are supported according to their roadmap
Seconding Balatro. I don’t think a mobile game can get better than this
Kards. It’s a WW2 card game that’s super easy to play and fun.
Umamusume
/s
Considering valves translation layer for arm we might be able to play all games on phones. Main issue would be controls, but I guess emulators exist.
When I played it, Hill Climb Racing is pretty decent.
That game got me through school. Great game, but last time I played it, was more than a decade ago.
Yeah, honestly, I can see why. The big issue is that there are two other games in the series, and they’re likely monetized like onion soup on a cake.
I like Meow Tower. It’s a nonogram puzzle game which was new to me, you get the hang of it pretty quick and it’s nice to have something other than a merge puzzle. Plus cute cats!
Unciv is a pretty cool game! It’s basically FOSS civ 5 that can be played on mobile. Huge timewaster haha
10,000,000 or You Must Build a Boat
I’m really enjoying 2048. I set the board to 7x7 and have been playing the same game for weeks. Current largest block is at 131072.
https://f-droid.org/packages/org.secuso.privacyfriendly2048/
It’s been many years since I used my phone for games, but I do remember suuuuper liking Kairosoft games! They were very cute, straightforward, and progression felt fun. They also didn’t have any micro transactions. They’re kind of simulation type games, but they are also very approachable for new players!
Zen Koi - You are a koi (fish). You eat, grow, breed, ascend to your final dragon form. Collect different combinations of fish colors and patterns. Very chill, soothing music.
