Must-Try Free 3D Games and Demos to Download for Motorola Droid and other Android phones, Tank Recon and More

The first Android phones are a bit slow and the OS is not mature enough to provide the optimum gaming experience. However, with the introduction of Motorola Droid, and later, the HTC Droid Incredible, and HTC Evo 4G, with 600 MHz and now 1 GHz processors in the phone, and excellent screens, the Android phones are now capable of delivering console quality graphics and gameplay in a portable package

To demonstrate that fact, several game demos are now available for the high-end Android phones to demonstrate their capabilities. They are all 3D simulations, with excellent graphics, and would be great to show off your phone to others.

Speed Forge 3D is a demo from an outfit in Eastern Europe that is more of a technology demo than a full game, but it is a very impressive one, in the vein of Star Wars "Racer", where you take a hovercraft around the track in the shortest time possible, with a bit of physics involved, as the vehicles don't exactly turn on a dime, but has a bit of momentum, and you need to "side-slip" a bit to make it through some corners.

Tank Recon 3D (lite) is the free / demo version of Tank Recon 3D where you are dropped into this simulated battlefield where you fight an infinite number of enemies simply to see how long can you survive. The graphics are very good, though the tanks are a bit small, and the controls need a lot of work. Still it is an impressive test. The full game promises a campaign with different missions. So it is more than just a Battlezone (tm) clone, but more like... Stellar 7 (tm).

Winds of Steel (demo) is a 3D "behind" arcade flight sim where you take a WW2 plane into the sky and perform various missions, including dogfight and bombings. The demo version has just one mission: survival training, where you try to last as long as possible against infinite number of enemies (3 at a time). You can choose either the Japanese bi-plane, or the Japanese "Zero". Full version promises bomb attacks, dogfights, and various combinations, on both sides of the Pacific Theater of Operations.

Asphalt 5 Free is the "demo / teaser" edition of Gameloft's Asphalt series, now available on Android phones! It comes with a hefty footprint (about 17 MB), and needs to download another 100 MB (yes, 100 MB) of data to your SD card to run, but it is a VERY impressive 3D car racing game. There is one course, one game mode (quick race) and two low-end cars available in the free version. The full version promised over a dozen cars, a dozen courses, and several different race modes, including police chase.

The mechanics are very simple: throttle is automatic. There is the tilt sensor for steering, and two onscreen controls: braking and boost. Braking is just that, but it also initiates drifting, if you do it while turning. Boost is, of course, the normal 'turbo boost'. The car has a 3-stage boost, meaning you can use up to 3 shots of boost together and go REALLY REALLY fast. You can pick up additional boost on the course, or do special moves like drifting to get more.

The controls are a bit twitchy but tuneable. Watch the iPhone version video to get a sense how the Android version plays.

Hope you have enjoyed these demos worth trying out on your high-end Android phone, such as Motorola Droid, HTC Droid Incredible, or HTC Evo 4G. Give each a spin. It should convince you that the Android phones are no slouch when it comes to gaming.

Stay tuned for more Android game reviews and highlights.