RPGs have one of the most loyal followings of any gaming genre. Whether it’s Final Fantasy or World of Warcraft, people spend dozens (sometimes hundreds, or even thousands) of hours crafting characters, playing stories, and enjoying themselves. RPGs were also one of the first genres to really hit it off on Android, and there are a ton of them to choose from. Here are the best RPGs for Android. Please note that we’ll be tackling jRPGs and “standard” action RPGs. We link to a variety of RPG subgenres just below.
We’d also like to give honorable mentions to Beamdog (Google Play), a developer with some great old-school RPGs like Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, and others. We also want to give an honorable mention to Star Wars KOTOR (Google Play) and KOTOR II (Google Play). Both games have some glitches, but they’re otherwise pretty good.
The best RPGs for Android
Doom & Destiny Advanced
Price: Free / $4.99
Doom and Destiny Advanced is the sequel, prequel, and reboot for the original Doom and Destiny. Its predecessor was on our list of the best RPGs for a couple of years. The game features a lot of the same characters and premise as the original but in a completely different storyline (and even dimension), according to the developers. It boasts 15 hours of content with free content being added, plenty of dungeons and secrets to find, tons of monsters, and even online co-op mode. It’s a lot of game to play, and it’s perfect for retro JRPG fans.
Eternium
Price: Free to play
Eternium is a free-to-play action RPG and one of the better ones on mobile for sure. It has some rare features like the ability to play offline. It’s a feature few action RPGs have these days. Additionally, it has a reasonably long story, easy controls, plenty of character customization options, and a relatively light touch on the free-to-play aspects of the game. It hits almost all of the proper boxes, and we think that contributes greatly to its longevity. This is one of the good ones.
Exiled Kingdoms
Price: Free / $4.99
Exiled Kingdoms is a single-player action RPG. It’s one of the few in this genre that isn’t also a freemium game. It features a storyline where you have to save the world from horrors that were leftover from a previous cataclysm. The graphics aren’t the best part of the game. However, they do get the point across, and the menu system is easy enough to understand. It looks and plays a lot like older games like Diablo II or Baldur’s Gate. Like most RPGs, you’ll have to upgrade your character, complete the story, and explore the world around you to find all of the secrets. The free version gives you a fairly large trial with two character types of play. The full version unlocks everything.
Evoland 1 and 2
Price: $2.99 and $8.49
Evoland and Evoland 2 are two very interesting games. They feature a variety of mechanics. That includes RPG, platformer, hack-and-slash, puzzle, and even some fun stuff like 3D fighter and trading card mechanics. Players traverse through the game world that frequently changes along with the game mechanics. However, its core genre is RPG. The games boast roughly 20 hours of play, offline support, hardware controller support, and more. The controls for the mini-games are a little rough around the edges, and users reported some bugs. Aside from that, these games are quite good. Additionally, neither of them has in-app purchases. Both games are also available on Google Play Pass for free.
Fire Emblem Heroes and Dragalia Lost
Price: Free to play (each)
Fire Emblem Heroes and Dragalia Lost are two RPGs from Nintendo. Fire Emblem Heroes is a surprisingly good (and smooth) strategy RPG. Players move characters around a checkerboard-style map and attack bad guys. There is a story, gacha elements, and some social elements as well. Dragalia Lost is an action RPG with 60 voiced characters, a decent storyline and soundtrack, and a colorful game world. Dragalia Lost had a rough release, but it seems to have ironed all of those out. Nintendo makes some rock-solid mobile games, and these two RPGs definitely deserve to be here.
Genshin Impact
Price: Free to play
Genshin Impact is the newest RPG on the list. It plays a lot like Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Players get access to a massive open world, and you can climb and explore basically all of it. There is even a glider to cover longer distances instead of walking and climbing everywhere. The game has some minor gacha elements, but it doesn’t cause a lot of problems. The gameplay, story, graphics, music, and mechanics are all rock solid with phenomenal execution. There is the occasional bug, but otherwise, it’s easily among the best RPGs on mobile.
Guardian Tales
Price: Free to play
Guardian Tales is one of those games that you don’t take seriously at first because the art style is so cutesy. However, it’s actually one of the deeper and more enjoyable RPGs on mobile in recent memory. You get the usual joy of RPG progression mixed with puzzle solving, action RPG combat, dungeons, bosses, a PvP mode, social guilds, and you can even build your own floating castle. A lot of mobile games mash a bunch of mechanics together just to stand out from the crowd, but Guardian Tales actually blends its various mechanics well and that makes it enjoyable to play. It’s free-to-play, but it’s not aggressive with its micro-transactions.
Kemco RPGs
Price: Free / Varies / Free to play
Before Square Enix began launching ports of its classic jRPGs, there was only one really good jRPG developer on Android, and that was Kemco. The studio specializes in RPGs, and they currently have dozens of games in their repertoire. Some of their more popular options include Symphony or Origin, Machine Knight, Covenant of Solitude, the Alphadia saga, and many more. Most of the games cost under $5. There are even a few that are free. None of them are bad, but you may or may not like them based on your preferences. You can click the button below to view their entire collection. It’s quite large so prepare for some scrolling and some surfing. There are literally dozens of options available, and most of them are pretty good.
Monster Hunter Stories
Price: Free trial / $19.99
Monster Hunter Stories was one of the best RPGs from 2018. The game is a port from the Nintendo 3DS game from 2016-17. It features turn-based mechanics, decent graphics, and a decent storyline to play through. Of course, you do still hunt, capture, and battle monsters as well. It is a port, but it actually plays pretty well for a mobile port. In addition, the game has one of the best demos we’ve ever seen. You basically play the prologue in the demo and then port the save to the main game in the premium version. The premium version is quite pricey at $19.99. However, it is a single purchase with no in-app purchases or ads.
Postknight 2
Price: Free to play
Postknight 2 is the latest game in the popular series. The game has a unique premise. You are basically a mailman and your adventure takes you all over the game’s world to deliver people’s packages. The travel takes you to a bunch of places where you level up and become more powerful. There are also various characters to hang out with, a simple but effective battle system, and more. The ultimate goal is to become an S-Rank Postknight. It’s not as traditional as your standard RPG or JRPG, but we still think the game is pretty fun and there is enough RPG there to add it to this list.
Princess Connect! Re:Dive
Price: Free to play
Princess Connect! Re:Dive is a mobile gacha RPG and one of the best currently on mobile. The game boasts a cast of over 50 heroines for the player to collect and play with. You can also spend time with your heroines to improve their bonds which, in turn, makes them more powerful. Combat is a pretty standard 2D, turn-based style. In terms of pure mechanics, there isn’t much to separate it. However, the pull rates are decent, it’s fairly free-to-play friendly, and people still praise this game even after a year or more of playing.
Square Enix titles
Price: Free / Varies / Free to play
Square Enix has been working hand-over-fist to release its collection of RPGs on Android over the last few years. Fortunately, most of them are fantastic RPGs. Some of the stuff you can find includes Final Fantasy I-VII (and IX), Dragon Quest I-VI (and VIII), Secret of Mana, Adventures of Mana, Final Fantasy XV: Pocket Edition, Chrono Trigger, and many others. They also have mobile RPG games like Final Fantasy Brave Exvius, NieR Re[in]carnation, and Dissidia Final Fantasy Opera Omnia. You can even pick up strategy RPGs like Heavenstrike Rivals and Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lion.
Square Enix’s collection of RPGs is rather extensive and gets larger every year. The button below takes you to the developer page so you can browse them at your leisure. Square did a Pixel Remaster version of Final Fantasy games I through VI, and those are available in the Play Store as of February 2022.
Summoners War
Price: Free to play
Summoners War is one of the original mobile gacha RPGs. You start with a relatively small team and work your way up to more powerful characters. The game boasts over 1,000 characters, an absolute ton of things to do, temporary events to keep things fresh in the endgame, and smooth gameplay. Combat is fairly standard turn-based, with up to six of your characters fighting the bad guys. The game has its ups and downs, mostly due to it being so old. However, the game is on an upswing at the time of this writing, and it’s easily one of the best when it’s on an upswing.
Titan Quest: Legendary Edition
Price: $19.99
Titan Quest: Legendary Edition is an older RPG from 2006 that was remastered and put on mobile. The developers released this version of the game last year with good success. Titan Quest is an action RPG similar in feel to games like Baldur’s Gate or Diablo II. You roam the open world, beat up bad guys, slay bosses, play through the main story quests, and find better gear.
This version of the game includes all of the Titan Quest DLCs, including Immortal Throne, Ragnarok, and Atlantis. That helps justify its higher-than-average price tag. We had the first version of this game on our list for a while. Here’s hoping the developers keep this one updated so we can keep this on here for a while as well.
WitchSpring 1-4
Price: $1.99-$4.99 each
WitchSpring is a bit of a hidden gem on mobile. There are four games in the franchise, and each of them is a competent RPG. The games vary from release to release. However, they are all generally decent RPGs with your typical RPG mechanics. The bigger draw here is the above-average storytelling, the various things to do, the above-average graphics, and simple controls. The first three games happen at the same time in the game’s universe, with the first two titles telling the same story from two different perspectives. Thus, you don’t have to play this series in order for the most part. We do recommend playing the first before the second, but you can play the third and fourth titles independently at any point.
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