Let's hear what (or if) the HN crowd plays!
Other than those two it's all mind numbing one button auto scrollers, crappy money extraction attempts, and boredom. The games that actually look good usually suffer from the inadequate input method that is a touch without tactility.
There's a boat racing game that's pretty good too from the people that made Beach Buggy Racing. So I guess there's three games worth playing.
Everything by clarus victoria (e.g. Marble Age): They got "incremental gaming" right, and fitted it to a civ theme. I wish there were more games like this which were turn based and not some weird idle time based format.
Slay the Spire: a bit too fun to the point it's addictive, but thankfully it gets repetitive after the first 40 hours
Kairosoft games: a little expensive, but top quality gameplay. The new ones have too many event pauses, but they're all fun. Ninja Village is probably my favorite.
Cultist Simulator: top tier game for Android. It fits your puzzley, stages and open ended request. And there's a fun unlock once you win the game the first time.
Hero Generations: also puzzley but not as casual
Scribblenauts Remix: casual, light, fun with kids too and good for a laugh. The base game is a few hours, but the single pay DLC goes further than I have interest in
Project Highrise: Nice and casual, but not too casual
Concrete Jungle: A city building puzzle. Great graphics and story, but harder than Project Highrise
Cook Serve Delicious: cooking sim x action game. Gets the sim part pretty well. But may suck up a 15 min block of time
Conquest of Elysium 3: A real 3X game for Android, but you'll have to squint on a phone. The controls are well suited for touchscreens though.
- Duet
- Osmos (Edit: ios only now, used to be on both)
-tsumego pro
These are all basically mobile-gaming-on-the-toilet perfection.
I wonder why those creators pulled from the google play store. I'm 100% sure I had them on android, my ipad is new and my first apple touch device.
Magic: The Gathering Arena
Lichess