Drova Mobile Closed Beta
The last three weeks I had the fortune in participating in the second closed beta test for the upcoming mobile version of Drova. If you've read my article about the games I've played in 2025 (see here: https://daydreamingmoose.bearblog.dev/the-games-ive-played-in-2025-and-what-i-want-to-play-in-2026/) you know that I'm a huge fan of the game and that it was one of my absolute highlights of 2025 (though it is older, but I’ve only played it in 2025). All screenshots included are taken by me with the touch controls of the mobile version (and kept as spoiler free as possible); the banner above is part of the official Press Kit by the developers Just2D.
Before I start talking about the mobile version specifically, I'll give you some info about the game itself. Drova is a German developed indie videogame RPG, that has taken more than just one inspiration from the original Gothic games. If you've never played those (and you should), that means that the map is relatively small and dense, quests don't have any helpful quest markers, just people roughly telling you where to go and combat is extremely deadly at the beginning but your character gets noticably stronger with each level and you'll be able to steamroll all early level enemies later on. In terms of setting and story, Drova is inspired by Germanic and Celtic themes as well as Roman in the form of the many Ruins strewn throughout the game. But it doesn't simply copy those themes, it is only inspired by them in looks and its setting. The story will see your character travel to the world of Drova and join one of the two factions, either the city of Nemeton who wants to turn Drova into a flourishing world the legends made it out to be (because it certainly is not - it's a deadly hellhole, more or less), or join the Remnants that want to escape from Drova. Joining a faction won't change the overarching storyline too much, but will flavour it decidedly, so that finishing it twice is definitely worth it (I've finished it three times now). There's also a large number of skills to use during the satisfying and challenging combat as well as spells and four different types of melee weapons (Swords, Spears, Daggers and Axes) and two ranged weapons (Slings and Bows). Combat is definitely melee focused, even after unlocking spellcasting later in the game. Swords and Spears are one handed weapons and you can equip either Shields in the other hand, keep it free for a different type of attack, or use a sling. There are also three levels of difficulty, so nobody has to be afraid of not being able to finish the game, and an ironman mode that'll end if you die, but you'll be able to continue play in normal save mode.
Now, let's talk about the mobile version specifically. First of all, if you've looked at the screens and thought to yourself 'That button placement is dumb as hell!', good news! It's only me who's dumb, because the game is VERY customisable on mobile and you can move each and every element in the UI as well as change the size nearly to your hearts content. The customisation goes further, though. You can also enable a left handed mode that pretty much mirrors the UI except for the top row (health bar and menu buttons). You can also scale the UI elements, change Dialogue buttons and more. So, if you're worried about the controls, don't be. You can make them fit your tastes and they're very well done. I've never played a large game like this on mobile, and especially not with touch controls, and I didn't have any noticeable problems playing through the game on the standard difficulty. There's also a helpful option for auto aim during combat, which makes it much easier. And if everything fails, you can always connect a controller to your mobile device and play that way. I've only tried that for a short time because I wanted to really test the touch controls, but they worked very well as well, which is no surprise since the game is also out on all current and last gen consoles and you can use a controller on PC.
Performance is also quite good. I've been playing it on my Tab S10 lite and after several patches I was getting smooth gameplay at an average of 50 FPS. Earlier version saw some noticeable micro stutters at certain more cluttered points in the game as well as large differences in FPS ranging from 30-60 FPS. With the latest build at the end of the beta, all that was gone with very stable FPS at about 48-52 and no more micro stutters. I also tried out the game on my phone, a Samsung A26, so a budget phone as well. I only played for a very short time at the beginning of the beta, but performance was even better on that. Other beta testers reported similar that the performance was oaky at the beginning and got better and better with subsequent patches. Personally, I preferred my tablet still simply for the larger screen, but the game plays fine on phone as well, especially when you connect a controller to get parts of the UI out of the way.
Other than that, the game ran very smoothly in terms of gameplay. The touch controls nearly never got into my way, except for one optional fight near the end in the moor (no spoilers here, if you've played the game, you probably know what I'm talking about) where the autoaim wasn't a lot of help and didn't aim at what I wanted it to. It's a similar problem with the non-aggressive animals in the game, like rats, that you can kill for a very small amount of XP. But since those aren't aggressive (like the optional encounter mentioned above) the reason for Just2D doing it like that is obvious. I've done everything I can in the game and except for one quest that was bugged and subsequently fixed, there was nothing that didn't work as intended.
So, all in all, the closed beta experienced was a really good one, with responsive devs and very little bugs. The only one that remains is the constant reapplication of achievements that you've earned, but that one is linked to the game being a test, and not a full release apparently. The bug will grant you your earned achievements again and again, which would make it impossible to use the buttons in the top row while the achievements were getting displayed, which can take a few seconds if you're near the end of the game and have earned a lot of achievements. Other than that, the only thing that can still be improved and is being worked on as far as I am aware, is performance. Again, it's already very fluent and works great, but the devs think they can do even better, so they're working on that. There might still be a few small language and translation problems from the PC/console versions to the touch controls, and I personally caught a number that got fixed very quickly, so let's hope the other testers caught the rest and the game will be in tip-top shape once it releases officially on mobile.
And if you're now interested in getting a PROPER game for your mobile device for once, instead of the usual BS the mobile gaming market is getting flooded with, Drova Mobile will release on 23rd April 2026 for iOs and Android worldwide, with a large number of languages available. Currently, English, German, French, Korean and Simplified Chinese are implemented and with the release of the Mobile Version, the translations for Polish, Spanish and Traditional Chinese will go live. All of the translations were done by real translators, not AI.
If you can't or don't want to wait for the mobile release, as mentioned above, it's already out on PC, Switch 1 (works very well on 2 as well as far as I am aware), PS 4 and 5, XBox One and Series S and X.
And if you're interested in seeing more of the game, you can check it out here: https://just2d.com/