Native game ports you can install on iPhone and iPad
Most native ports target Windows, Linux and Android first. A growing number also publish an iOS build. None are on the App Store, so installing them takes one extra step. Below: the games that have builds, and how the install works.
The games
- Bluewake: The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, recompiled from the GameCube version. Needs a dump of your own disc.
- Dusklight: Twilight Princess from its full decompilation, with HD rendering and high frame rates. Needs your own GameCube disc.
- Gen1Recomp: a recreation of Pokémon Red, Blue and Yellow, with documented iOS install steps. Needs your own ROM.
- DevilutionX: Diablo, with controller support. It uses the data file from your copy, and the free shareware data also works.
- Fallout Community Edition and Fallout 2 Community Edition: the original Fallouts, rebuilt. Need the data files from your own copy.
- VCMI: an engine for Heroes of Might and Magic III. Needs the data from your copy.
- Xash3D FWGS: runs Half-Life and many of its mods. Needs the game files.
- PokeMMO: plays the GBA and DS Pokémon games online, with an iOS version listed on its site.
The Steam and GOG versions of the PC games all work as data sources. For the console games, see our dumping guide.
Installing an .ipa
These projects publish their iOS builds as .ipa files, usually unsigned. Apple only runs apps signed
with an Apple account, so you sign them yourself with a sideloading tool:
- AltStore signs apps with your Apple ID and refreshes them through a companion app on your computer.
- SideStore does the same, but after a one-time setup on a computer it refreshes on the device itself.
The limits come from Apple, not the tools. With a free Apple ID, apps stop opening after seven days unless you refresh them, and only three sideloaded apps can be active at once, the store app included. A paid developer account stretches the signature to a year and raises the app limit.
Getting the game files in
Each app handles this a little differently. Many show up in the Files app under On My iPhone (or iPad), and you copy the game data into that folder. The project's README says exactly which files go where. For apps that support file sharing, you can also copy from a computer: Finder on a Mac, or the Apple Devices app on Windows.
On Android instead?
Android is simpler: download the .apk from the project's release page and allow the install. Far more ports
offer Android builds, including OpenCE (Halo: Combat Evolved),
Crash Bandicoot,
Open Nectar (Pikmin) and
Project Picori (The Minish Cap). Each game's page lists the
platforms it has builds for.