April is shaping up to be a banner month for mobile gaming, with two of the best indie games of recent years making the jump to phones and tablets. Sea of Stars hits iOS and Android on April 7th, while DREDGE+ arrives on Apple Arcade the same day — and both are worth your attention.
Sea of Stars, Sabotage Studio's stunning retro RPG that drew widespread acclaim when it launched on consoles and PC in 2023, is getting a full mobile port with cross-progression support. This isn't a stripped-down mobile version — it's the complete game, priced at $9.99 with no in-app purchases or microtransactions. The turn-based combat system translates naturally to touch controls, and the game's gorgeous pixel art looks phenomenal on modern phone displays.
For those unfamiliar, Sea of Stars follows two Children of the Solstice who combine sun and moon powers to fight the alchemist known as The Fleshmancer. The combat system rewards timing and positioning, the world design channels the best of classic Chrono Trigger-era RPGs, and the soundtrack by Yasunori Mitsuda is predictably excellent. It's a 25-30 hour experience that's perfectly suited to portable play.
DREDGE+ takes a different approach to the mobile transition. Black Salt Games' Lovecraftian fishing RPG joins Apple Arcade as a complete, zero-IAP edition with all DLC included. The game's loop of fishing by day and fleeing cosmic horrors by night works surprisingly well in short sessions, making it ideal for commute gaming. The touchscreen controls have been reworked specifically for mobile, and the atmospheric lighting — critical to DREDGE's oppressive tone — holds up beautifully on OLED displays.
Both titles represent the growing trend of premium indie games finding new audiences on mobile without compromising on quality. If you missed either of these on their initial release, April 7th is your chance to fix that.
