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From classic FPS titles like DOOM to platform fighting games like Brawhalla, there's a wide variety of action games available on your Android device. While you'll probably want to pair the online action games with an Android controller for that competitive edge, all these games are playable whether you're using an Android phone or tablet.
Tomb Raider Reloaded is a fun shooter buried under predatory microtransactions
The satisfying and challenging levels are hard to enjoy in this soulless game
I have to hand it to Tomb Raider Reloaded's developers. They took it upon themselves to step back from the gritty survival tone taken by recent Tomb Raider games and answer the question that's been burning since the first Tomb Raider game came out in 1996. What if Tomb Raider was not about a gunslinging adventurer but about how to design a confusing microtransaction system to empty wallets?
I just tried one of the best skateboarding games on Android, and you should too
It's easy to pull off satisfying combos in this addicting title from Noodlecake
Perfect Grind is the latest game from the indie studio and developer Noodlecake, who is behind some of our the best Android games out there, like Alto's Odyssey and Really Bad Chess. Perfect Grind joins the fray as a quirky skating game where you'll use straightforward swipe controls to perform a variety of tricks and combos, and you can even design your own skate parks to pull off your favorite tricks in style.
AutoVoice Assistant Action is back for all supported languages
Google's infamously terrible developer support strikes twice in a year
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Google has taken down the Assistant-integrated AutoVoice Action again, for the second time in a year. This time, the company claims the action "promotes content that advocates hate or violence or promotes discrimination," apparently because someone in Germany stringed together a clearly custom command that made the Assistant spout off some hate speech.
Retro PC shooter Shadow Warrior has just been released by DevolverDigital onto the Play store under the title Shadow Warrior Classic Redux. This is a port of the remastered PC version that goes by the same name. With this release, you can expect cleaned up visuals, the original two episodes of the game, and its two expansion packs - Wanton Destruction and Twin Dragon. If you are any sort of first person shooter fan, this is undoubtedly the definitive version of a cult classic.
It's not often we see a new game exclusive to the Android TV platform. Mercenary Kings is a 2D action game funded in 2014 on Kickstarter and originally released for Windows. The game was later ported to the PlayStation 4 and PS Vita, and eventually released on Steam. Now Mercenary Kings has made its way over to Android TV.
It was just another day at the office, then bam. It's suddenly werewolf central up in here. What's a well-dressed executive to do? Kick some werewolf ass, that's what. The latest game from publisher Noodlecake has a boring name (The Executive), but the gameplay is anything but.
Remember that "Voice Access" talk that was supposed to happen at I/O but was removed from the schedule? It turns out that, while it wasn't the full-on in-app voice craziness we had hoped for, Google did have some news about voice interactions to share.
Months ago, we posted a rumor about "modular actions" set to come to Google's Search app (now just called Google) along with "Ok Google Everywhere" functionality that would allow users to activate search from anywhere on their device. The latter has already been implemented, but Google is still inching toward the former. With the technically unreleased Google app, the search interface can overlay apps from which it is called, but Google today announced another step forward - the ability to let apps hook into search by accepting voice queries from the user.
We've already cruised through Liberty City and significantly lowered property values in Vice City, now it's time for a west coast vacation in San Andreas. The third Grand Theft Auto game of the PlayStation 2 era just landed on the Play Store in its blocky, polygonal, sandbox glory, and you can pick it up for a cool $6.99. No in-app purchases, no time-outs, just good old-fashioned Rockstar madness.
Earlier today, we published a first look at what we believed to be a Yahoo!-made competitor to voice assistants like Google Now and Siri. The video, sent to us by an anonymous tipster along with screenshots showed what looked to be a very impressive app with an implementation similar to Facebook's Chat Heads, whereby a Y! icon would constantly float on the home screen waiting to be activated.
We have just a week to go before the sequel to 2011's Thor hits theaters, which makes this the perfect time to drop a movie tie-in game that cashes in on the hype. Gameloft's Thor: The Dark World places the god of thunder in a top-down dungeon crawler that looks not unlike the company's own Dungeon Hunter series, minus the multiplayer aspect. If you have an engine that works, why not use it, right?
In Dynamite Jack, you play the part of a space marine that has been captured by the enemy and forced to work in the Anathema Mines. You don't have time for that nonsense, so escape it is. It seems like your alien captors are not the brightest stars in the cosmos – they leave explosives, flashlights. and keycards laying around everywhere. Lucky for you.
I am going to show you a game. It costs about a buck on the Play Store and is very fun. However, once you begin playing it, you will have roughly five minutes until you either scream, demand a refund, or your head explodes. There are no other options. The game is called Puk. And it is insane.
Crumble Zone has all the ingredients for a great action arcade game. Aliens? Check. Guns? Check. Great artwork? Check. Best of all, it just came out on Android and it's free!
Do you like sword fighting giant spiders, expansive worlds to explore, pickpocketing items from strangers, avoiding jail time, riding horses, sneaking around, gathering loot, switching from first- to -third-person at the tap of a button, choice-based questing systems, ragdoll physics, and ancient lore? Then I can think of two games you might be really interested in! One of them is Ravensword: Shadowlands!
It wouldn't be a new month without a roundup of the previous month's best Play Store offerings. Of course, we've already taken a look at the best new apps from February 2013, but games – as usual – were also well-represented by new entries last month.
Chris Lacy, developer of the gorgeous, widely lauded Tweet Lanes, has finally brought his latest creation to the Play Store – Action Launcher.
Ong Bak is a fine series of Thai martial arts movies that received plenty of critical and commercial success both in Thailand and around the world. Naturally, when a film about people kicking things and stuff getting punched makes it big, a game must be sure to follow. That game, Ong Bak Tri, is being built on the Unity3D engine for PC, consoles, and Android. The newly released gameplay trailer looks pretty fantastic for a mobile game.
Gameloft has been releasing high-end games on Android for the last few years, and some of them have been quite good. However, just as many of them have had serious issues that rendered them unplayable for me. Wild Blood will cost you some serious cash up front, but it promises an epic action-adventure story with killer graphics. Does it deliver?