Premium games are having an unusually strong September on mobile

September is developing into one of the strongest recent months for premium-style mobile releases. Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris launched this week with a free opening level and one-time full-game purchase, Dragon Quest Heroes: Torneko's Mystery Dungeon Classic HD brought an important catalogue title to Japanese smartphones, Dave the Diver arrives September 17, and Kingdom Rush 6: Genesis follows on September 24.

This does not signal the end of free-to-play dominance, but it demonstrates that developers are once again treating modern phones as viable platforms for complete games. Faster processors, larger storage capacities, better cooling and increasingly common controller support make the technical case straightforward. The harder issue remains consumer psychology: many smartphone owners hesitate over a $10–$25 game even while spending considerably more through subscriptions or repeated microtransactions.

Try-before-you-buy models and cross-platform recognition may help change that behaviour.