Strategy games that don't punish you for putting the phone down

Old-school RTS demands your full focus, and that's a hard sell on a device you use in fifteen-second bursts. Lately, though, more strategy games are building around interruption instead of against it.

Iron Tide Command is a good example. Its supply-line system means the smart play is often to stop, reposition, and wait — which happens to line up perfectly with real life pulling you away mid-match.

What I look for now is a clean pause and a save that trusts you to leave. If a strategy game respects the fact that I'm playing on a bus, it earns a lot of goodwill.

The genre used to feel out of place on phones. These days some of my favorite tactical thinking happens there.