New release roundup: The best new mobile games from draconic dangers to pixelated platformers

Produced alongside our friends at PocketGamer.fun - THE place to discover your next favourite mobile games - here's our pick of the best fresh-this-week titles.

While the deals and the stats of the gaming world are important, nothing would happen without the research, funding and, of course, development that goes into making a great game. PocketGamer.fun brings you latest games, lets you see them in action and download right from the page.

So here are the most exciting new mobile games right now, the developers and publishers behind them, and why, exactly, they've made the cut.

Tarisland

Fantasy adventures, dragon hunting, raids, and a puzzle-filled realm await in Tarisland, Locojoy’s latest game and a Tencent-backed MMORPG. In classic RPG fashion, this mystical mobile title features character classes like mage, warrior and priest, with each having its own abilities and playstyles; it looks to make things more complex and flexible by combining these with a talent tree system, making each player’s build that much more unique.

And of course, building and investing in a character only has purpose if that heroic avatar has a seemingly unsurmountable threat to overcome… In Tarisland, that threat is the Blight Dragon, covered in impenetrable scales, and with a wingspan of almost 200 meters. It is said that the dragon was the first in the universe, and serves as a suitably imposing final boss for adventurers to prepare to face.

Tarisland has been published by Tencent subsidiary Level Infinite and launches on mobile and PC today, with cross-progression allowing players to explore the wilderness on the go and tackle bosses from the comfort of home, or visa versa, if they’re so inclined.

Kaiju Attack 2

Combining retro graphics with match-3 gameplay, Game Stew’s Kaiju Attack 2 gives iOS owners the chance to take down the most gigantic of monsters with the power of a device so small it fits in their pocket.

The puzzler acts as a sequel to the original Kaiju Attack and inserts plenty of moral ambiguity into the equation, tasking players with stopping the extraterrestrial monsters from saving fish, rescuing abandoned pets, and seeking a solution to the pollution problem. Does that make gamers the bad guys?

Some intergalactic beings do want to "make humans pay", so perhaps the extremities go both ways, but whether they’re heroes or villains, players can download Kaiju Attack 2 for a one-time fee and take on every challenge Game Stew throws at them.

Honor of Kings

Tencent’s mega-unicorn mobile MOBA Honor of Kings is well known in China as one of the most successful mobile titles of all time, and finally, almost nine years later, it’s seen a global launch. Out now in North America, Europe, Japan and elsewhere, this is really a second chance for Tencent’s flagship to make a global success.

Developed by Tencent subsidiary TiMi Studio, Honor of Kings released in 2015 with Tencent as its publisher. It’s released under myriad pseudonyms in various countries since, with its most successful variant being Arena of Valor - still operational today, but far from the revenue earner Honor of Kings is in its homeland.

Now with Honor of Kings out globally, also published by Level Infinite, both names are in use for two concurrent games. Perhaps this time around, Honor of Kings will succeed in conquering the world as it has China: filling its pot of gold with $15.6 billion to date from the Chinese App Store alone.

Skul: The Hero Slayer

Pixel-graphics platformer Skul: The Hero Slayer pairs hack-and-slash action with roguelite mechanics in fiendishly creative fashion, all while offering players on Apple, Android and Steam 100 playable characters.

This triple-digit sum comes courtesy of Skul’s, well, skulls. The player can pick up new heads and pop them on their titular Hero Slayer’s shoulders, unlocking the powers of a genie, mage, dual wielder, and more in the process. Whether that means carrying a huge greatsword or simply burning everything in sight is down to the skull a player chooses.

Developer SouthPAW Games expects players to use these skulls for more than just crazed chaos, though; priority number one is the taking back of the Demon King’s castle from those irritating humans…

Hearts

Netflix members can now play the classic card game Hearts on mobile through the power of their subscriptions. Created by MobilityWare, the new title simply called Hearts starts with a tutorial to catch newcomers up to speed, running through the rules and features.

Netflix hopes to land Hearts into many subscribers’ hands, after all, whether they’re a Hearts novice or a "card shark". It’s a streamlined version of the game with "smart features", and promises to sharpen players’ strategies while providing a level of challenge tailored to each person’s needs through the power of AI.

Accessibility is clearly the key in this Netflix exclusive, with an "undo" button rarely found in real life, meanwhile Relaxed Mode gives players the chance to learn without risking their ranking. Hearts does offer a competitive mode for those veterans of the game, though, and for confident upstarts looking to put their skills to the test.

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