The games industry is colossal. By 2024, it’s expected to generate revenues of over $218 billion worldwide, with over half of that coming from spending on mobile app games. There are tens of thousands of games available to play right now on smartphones, mobile browsers, consoles, computers, and web browsers, so it can be hard to find decent games that you’ll enjoy. While it’s quite easy to find tools that will help you to manage Steam Workshop add-ons and content on your platforms, libraries and stores are rarely designed to point you towards the gems that will suit you.
So here, we’ve got some tips for how you can get the games that you want to play, from finding out useful tools to knowing how to get the games with the best elements.
Using AI to get games that are worth your time
It can take a very long time to find a mobile game that’s worth playing, particularly because so many of them are designed to have you play several hours before the grind, paywalls, or timewalls pop up. Even those who are dedicated to finding top games end up trying to hide apps on their Androids. For the most part, you’d be advised to go for premium apps – those that cost $0.99, $1.99, or even $2.99 – as they’re mostly ad-free, paywall-free, and timewall-free, allowing you to play the whole game at your leisure. Even the original Angry Birds rose to fame as a premium game, but of course, is now a freemium game. Regardless, there are newly optimised ways for you to home in on mobile games that are worth trying.
GameTree is an app platform that helps gamers discover games that they actually want to play, as well as link people so that you’ve always got a “player two” at the ready. You can find out more on the website, but for discovering new games, you’ll be able to make use of its rather accurate artificial intelligence. Its AI is said to have been able to predict new favourite titles with 93 per cent accuracy, with new ones sent your way each day. Plus, it offers its own reviews from the platform, curated by those with your same interests. Of course, if you don’t mind paying for premium games, you tend to have more luck. To make sure that you’re not paying for poor games, though, check out this list of good mobile games: it has some great picks, including the superb Pocket City.
Knowing the mechanics that really matter
In most forms of gaming, it’s very easy to get distracted by an eye-catching bit of cover art, but where this is at its peak is in online casino gaming. From the top of any given games library, you scroll to read more titles, from slots to table games, but the ones that tend to stand out are the licensed slots. While the franchise has been popular for decades, there’s a new peak of interest in Tomb Raider at the minute, especially among those looking to go to the live experience in London, with details here. Still, to make a good slot, it needs more than a great theme. This is where developers Triple Edge Studios got it right, fuelling Lara Croft: Temples and Tombs with a 96.05 RTP percentage and high volatility.
When it comes to online casino slots, it’s best to stick to ones with RTP (return to player) percentages of at least 92 per cent as this has essentially become the informal industry standard. The volatility rating gives you a better idea of how the game will play. High volatility means that the slot will, on average, pay out less frequently but in larger sums, with low volatility being the opposite. So, those with larger payrolls will likely get more enjoyment from high volatility games, while smaller bankrolls would be better used on low volatility slots. High volatility games are fairly common now, with the tenth-highest grossing film franchise, Jurassic Park, having a few high volatility slots online.
Getting the games that you can actually play
While it’s invariably hailed as the ultimate way to play, PC gaming can be absurdly complicated. Essentially, being a PC gamer doesn’t mean that you can play any computer game. In fact, if you don’t have a particularly high-end build, you likely won’t be able to play the latest releases. Maximising speed and performance by cache clearing does help, but at some point, new hardware is needed. So, even before you download one of the regular free releases from the Epic Games Store, it’s best to check if your PC can run a game of interest. Still, how do you go about knowing if your build and particular specs are good enough to run the game?
This is where System Requirements Lab or “Can You Run It” comes into play. Use the search engine to draw from its database of game specs and then use its run simulation to see if your computer is up to the task. At the time of writing, the page’s stats showed that nearly 170,000 people checked to see if they could run the February 2022 release of Elden Ring. Only 24 per cent of users passed the check. With the game still costing more than $50 some two months after its launch, it’s clear that checking first with this useful tool is the wise move.
No one wants to feel the disappointment of getting a game that they can’t run smoothly, or to spend hours searching and playing only to still not have found the right game. Luckily, you can use the information above to streamline your search.