Last updated on June 11th, 2023 at 01:45 pm
Elder Sign: Omens for iPhone
Elder Sign: Omens for iPhone is one of the best $0.99 to play game in the App Store.
Developed by Fantasy Flight Publishing, Inc, Elder Sign: Omens for iPhone is a Board game with a content rating of 12+.
It was released on 1st November 2011 with the latest update 12th June 2017
Whether you are a fan of Board, Strategy, games, you will find this game interesting and will absolutely like it.
Rating
57 people have rated 1.5.0
You can download the game Elder Sign: Omens for iPhone from APP STORE.
Description
Elder Sign: Omens for iPad is sold separately and is only compatible on iPads.
“GAME OF THE WEEK” – G4TV.com
TOUCH ARCADE – 4.5 out of 5
148APPS.COM – 4.5 out of 5
GAMEZEBO- 4.5 out of 5
BOARD GAME GEEK – 3 out of 4
The tense excitement of Elder Sign is now available on your mobile device! Elder Sign: Omens places you in control of up to four intrepid investigators, as they fight to keep all-powerful Ancient Ones from invading our world through a museum’s arcane exhibits!
Build a team of unique investigators
Explore an ever-changing museum
Face challenging arcane tasks
Save the world from absolute destruction
Expand the horror with exciting in-app purchases
Can you stand against the impending arrival of a malevolent Ancient One?
While Elder Sign: Omens brilliantly conveys the spirit of the Elder Sign dice game, a few noteworthy differences were adopted to optimize the mobile play experience:
-A limited number of available Ancient Ones streamlines the game play experience while offering adjustable levels of difficulty. Face Yig in normal mode, Azathoth in difficult mode, or Cthulhu in very hard mode (in-app purchase required to face Cthulhu).
-A number of subtle changes increase the peril of defending humanity. For example, the random negative effects drawn every midnight are more challenging, and the frequency of “no effect” results has been decreased. Monsters have likewise been altered to make them more difficult.
-Finally, there are no Ally cards in Elder Sign: Omens, which further streamlines play while increasing the overall challenge.
Updated on 12th June 2017
This app has been updated by Apple to display the Apple Watch app icon.
Updated to support 64-bit iOS devices!
Optimizations to reduce overall file size.
Elder Sign: Omens for iPhone Reviews
We have played omens for a few years and still enjoy it. We have one suggestion, make difficulty a selection in the pre museum screen and not have a difficulty bond to a old one.
Like the title says, this is probably the best or one of the best board game ports we’ve ever played. Its a little annoying that the expansions are all priced so high, but its hard to complain when the physical game is 10x more expensive. Super fun, this could easily be played in a group on a tablet as well, the only thing that you are missing by not playing the physical copy is the dice chucking but again thats okay! Dont understand why it is ranked so low as of when Im writing this review.
This game is wonderful. At first glance, one might think luck is the only requirement to win the game, but actually technic is also important. Basically you need to choose the CORRECT characters for the mission and to use resources efficiently. But certain adventures (one or two) in the game can be too luck dependent and this is a little bit annoying. DLC contains newly designed adventures and they definitely worse the price. But nevertheless this is the game that you wont play twice after you succeed, so it is reasonable to make it difficult. LOL. P.S. Hint: This game can be soloed with only one investigator and its interesting (and perhaps helpful) to do so, especially when against SOME monster.
So many boardgames that make it onto iOS just don’t capture our imagination, but this one’s different. Maybe it’s the fact that it’s cooperative rather than competitive. Maybe it’s because winning is so rare that you can enjoy a good game even if you lose. Whatever it is, this one’s our favorite, and we’re glad they took the time to update it to 64-bit.
This game runs smooth and is true to the table top game. Very few things like spells work a bit different but once you get the rules down super solid. The only bummer is if you turn off your phone screen during a movie scene it completely freezes and you lose progress. Exiting by flipping it up out of the way does it too but only during movies. Usually everything loads back in just fine if it is in between turns. We defeated Nyarlathotep(no spoilers but SUPER tough fight) our break ended during the movie so we had to shut off our screen and when we came back to it, it was stuck and we lost our entire game. We have screenshots of the win and the movies that play but our unlockable character is still locked. We will try to win again but that felt like a once in a while good luck streak to win. P.S. If anyone from Famtasy Flight sees this, is there a way to restore or get our investigator unlocked? If not no biggie but we are curious.
We need iPhone X full screen support! Great game though its a perfect example of how to take a board game and make it a video game. Now if they only made an iOS version of Arkham Horror card game, Arkham Horror & Eldritch Horror.
The game is addictive and the expansions (small extra cost) really create some interesting variants. With the recent update however, the sound no longer works quite right and lost the ability to skip through the opening story and other story elements (which takes awhile – really dont enjoy sitting through that every time).
Been playing since it came out, but now it crashes on launch.
We’ve played this a ton and enjoy it. Just wish they would update the app to fit modern phones. IPhone 12 just launched and this app is still designed for screens from 5 years ago. Full screen please.
This game can be awesome and very much captures the atmosphere of H. P. Lovecrafts works. It can be a little fickle in that sometimes you get dealt a losing selection of events but even that helps you learn how to prioritize which event youll attack first. As with the tabletop version, choosing the right character for the right event is CRITICAL! The expansion adds more challenging encounters some of which are insanely difficult (seriously, Ithaqua difficulty level is actually labelled Insane!). Great game though occasionally frustrating. Worth purchasing!
The sound no longer works for this game. Please fix.
This game is great! Really well ported to iOS. The problem is there is no skip button for the intro video!!!!!! Having watched it around a hundred times now Im fed up!!!!
Go read the blogs before you buy, people. We sure didnt, and everyone agrees that this game is nearly impossible to win, even on the so-called easy levels. Everything is trying to make you lose the game, and the one time we actually got enough elder signs, the doom track advanced and we STILL LOST. We want our $3.99 back.
This game would be a lot more fun if it were more possible to win. The main issue is that the game itself doesnt scale and its too luck-heavy. The game sometimes (and usually) starts you off against tasks that require far more preparation and items than you start with, making it near impossible to get the ball rolling. Even if you do manage to beat an early task, the game can easily spiral out of control. As with most games involving dice, this game is a little too dependent on luck. Even if youre fully stocked and armed to the teeth, you can still scrub out and fail the task, potentially getting killed off right off the bat. Theres very little strategy involved. However, this app is probably better than buying the actual board game and getting frustrated at how much money you spent on that, so we would recommend the app over the board game if you NEED to play it. All in all, though, save your money and buy something like Ascension instead.
Long unakippable cinemaatics at the start and end of every match. It’s not that the game is too random, it’s that the randomness is poorly planned and feels even more punishing and demoralizing than it is. Rally questionable game design.
The dice mechanic is broken. Pretty much impossible to achieve anything. Encounter win ratio is 3/10 which is ridiculous.
Edit: 3 years and counting since an update. :( we used to play this almost every day; we have all the DLC. One of the best games of its time on the app store. Except now, it’s been seemingly abandoned; nearly 2.5 years sinxe the last update. We check back in periodically to see if anything new is up, but am consistently disappointed.
The variability of playing anything above easy feels like the rolls are absolutely against you, giving you everything but the results you need. Makes the game feel frustrating and not at all like you have a chance. We’ve had to start over on just the second level so many times, we may just delete the game out of pure frustration.
Just bought the game and theres no sound on the iPad or iPhone.
We bought this game years ago, but the lack of support has brought it to its knees literally. We cant even get through a game at this point without it freezing up. Do not buy unless they fix.
Literally just bought this game and it keeps telling unable to download.
Waste of money. Game relies on the roll of the dice. We played one game where we never achieved a roll to complete the task. Recommend Catan instead.
Hasnt been updated in five years. Lots of bugs on the iPhone. 13 freezes doesnt respond to input and so on. Skip it.
Dont get or spend any money on it. Even on easy you cant win. If you like losing EVERY SINGLE TIME then get it. We like FF board games this is nothing like that, almost unbeatable.
First off, the game does not cheat. You have to find the right mix of investigators for the adventures and be careful about playing spells, clues and red and yellow dice rolls. If you come out swinging as soon as the game starts, you will be devoured! You can win this game! Though it might be by a very close call!! It is brutal and challenging!
This is a great game. We were happy to finally come across a game that wasn’t super easy and required some forethought and planning in order to have a chance at winning. The low reviews aren’t due to the game being low quality, they were simply because you aren’t going to win every time you play and certainly not your first time. We like games that provide a challenge, if you want a challenge instead of mindless tapping at a timed interval, this could be the game for you.
This game is better then the boardgame version. Challenging but fair. We have beat all the ancient ones but ithaqua but we came close. Few more tries; the catch is to get at least 18 supplies before you launch the expedition. Great game. Great graphics. Great story line. Great sound effects.
We’re a big fan of the Elder Sign board game, so we grabbed this game just for fun. It’s certainly more difficult than the board game, with a few of the mechanics being different, but we love it! You have to know the game. Know the characters and what each is capable of. It is not just luck. It is luck mixed with strategy and understanding of odds. Yes, sometimes you’ll get awful rolls, but that happens when playing with real dice, too. Be smart about your play, and you can get the upper hand. Seriously, we play a LOT of different tabletop game, including every one of FF’s Lovecraftian games, and they all have some element of luck to them. On this app, we win about 60% of the time, but it’s a challenge every time! Don’t buy it, or any Fantasy Flights game for that matter, if you don’t want to work hard for your wins! :)
A great game with varying levels of challenge. From easy to premeditatedly insane, you pick your own difficulty level (by choosing which god you fight). – Tip: If having trouble, choose to play with only two investigators. And make sure they are both good ones.
As the title says, the app isn’t hard or impossible. As with most ffg card/board games, it’s complex but that’s what we love so much about them. These sort of board games needs to be fully understood prior to judgement, learn the rules to the game, then play it. Why we’re so appreciative that ffg released this app is because we were hesitant of purchasing the board game due to how complex the gameplay might be. After playing (and learning the game) for a couple days and went right out and bought the hard copy. The gameplay on the hard copy is just as amazing, if not more. We recommend that as well! LEARN THE GAME, THEN PASS JUDGMENT.
We don’t ordinarily leave many reviews but when we saw how low-rated this app was, we had to sign in. We’ve spent dozens of hours with this game since we originally bought it. It’s very well designed and the game is intended to be challengingyou really have to play and lose a few times before you start to grasp the underlying strategies. Finally, understand that this is Lovecraft. The entire mythos is based on the concept that mankind is fighting a losing battle against overwhelming dark forces and victory does not come easy or cheap.
This is a great game and It convinced us to buy the board game and both expansions along with Eldritch Horror.
We’re so surprised to see how low this game is rated. It’s such a fantastic gameplay experience with great art and mood setting. It’s smart, challenging, complex but also immensely satisfying. We played the board game version two or three times with friends and enjoyed it, so we recently decided to pick up the video game version. First off, like the board game, the video game is not a gimme to win. It’s a combination of luck, skill, and understanding of the various gameplay tactics. (Backstory, Elder sign is a simplified version of Arkham Horror, which is a six hour marathon of a game). It took us a little while to learn the mechanics of the video game version, like how to focus the glyphs on a roll (basically, save the glyph you want). And it took even longer to get really good at learning how to select teams, how to manage resources like your spell and unique item cards, and how to send the right investigator in for a particular challenge. Sometimes luck isn’t on your side and you get bad rolls, or you get loaded up on hard adventures. But sometimes it all comes together and it’s much more satisfying for not always being easy. We’ve gotten to the point where we can usually beat the basic games. We liked the game so much that we purchased all three expansions and we have yet to beat any of those, but we’re getting close. The expansions also give you new investigators. The Cthulhu expansion gives awesome investigators, the Alaska one has some good ones, but we wasn’t excited about the investigators from the Egypt expansion (although Egypt has our favorite actual gameplay from any expansion). In short, get this if you want to sink your teeth into a game and spend some time building your skills in it. If you want a fast game that you can play a few times, win and move on, it’s probably not the right pick.
Love this game – challenging, but once you get used to the mechanics, quite fun and definitely winnable. Awesome that the developers just updated it to be 64bit!
We had a lot of fun playing this game. We liked building our team, and choosing which encounter to go after next. Our first win came with one remaining investigator and a nearly full doom track, leading to an exciting conclusion. Looks like there will be more maps, monsters, and investigators in the next update. We look forward to it!
We brought this app before playing the board game. We enjoyed this app very much. It has a lot of options, so each game feel new. It is a hard game, but with every game, the more you play the more you learn the better you get.
An evil little slot machine that will repeatedly bite you in the butt in sometimes downright unfair ways (I’m looking at you, midnight effect right before midnight). But it’s pretty, and given that it has us coming back for more again and again and again, it would hardly make sense for us to rate the game low. We’re obviously entertained, and the pleasure quite outweighs the frequent frustration. If you like your games challenging–REALLY challenging–you can consider this a recommendation.
Nice port of the board game. For the haters, read a strategy guide. Our only complaint is the In-App-Purchases; the extended game play is overpriced for a $4 game, they should be included.
First of all, in the last week we’ve played between 2 to 3 dozen rounds of this and have yet to beat the baddie once. Let us tell you why that is, and also why this game is a fantastic little horror gem. We have a deep seated love for the Lovecraft mythos and a general understanding of what a game emulating Lovecraft’s themes should include, and this game does it well. Anyone that says this game is "too hard" either 1) doesn’t understand the nature of the game or 2) the nature of Lovecraft’s works. Let us address these 2 points. First of all, the nature of the game: the foundation of this game is dice rolls. Your ultimate success is based on chance and is altogether subject to RNG. There are certain guidelines that the game abides by (for example, difficulty levels, investigator selections, tool use timing and risks taken) and there is little that you, as a player, can do to manipulate the random aspects of this game. That doesn’t mean you are powerless. As we listed above there are ways you can guide the general direction of the game, and influence ultimate goals, abilities and requirements. Second, subject matter. Lovecraft’s universe is a scary place and you as a member of the human race most often will end up succumbing to madness and ultimate failure, which you should expect from a cosmic horror game or piece of literature. Even when you "win", you’re still just a meaningless human that doesn’t hold a candle to the madness and chaos that is the eldritch existence and it’s implications. Our first game we had no idea what we were doing and was going on adventures left and right with no thought to what we could do to affect the outcome and often ended in very little success (that is, total failure). We estimate we’ve about 2 or 3 dozen plays or so. Our most recent game played we got to 9 elder signs (of 10 needed… So close!), and pulled an unfortunate combo of 2 doom tokens at the stroke of midnight which put us over the limit and ended the game. So we have gotten close to winning, once. It should also be noted that we’ve only played this game on easy, that is, against Yig, and have yet to beat him. There is plenty of replay value here as long as you expect not to "win". You should expect to lose, to fight tooth and nail, to claw your way out of insanity’s pit, to assess your last game and try to figure out what you could have done differently, or simply get back on the horse that tossed you for the 50th time.
Best translation from board to phone that we could ask for. We have a few nitpicks though. We would have liked a tutorial instead of videos, but after we poked around the menus, we’re extremely happy. This one we’re torn on. Expansions are cool and all, but the three expansions they offer here are actually the complete core game from the table top. Or at least two are. After seeing that, we felt like we paid for an incomplete game. HOWEVER: this game is a lot cheaper than most table top translation games (by half almost) so, we kind of like the idea that we’re buying a smaller version to see if we like it. Which we do. And we will buy the expansions. So, that’s our cons, our pros are that its every bit the experience you get from the table top playing solo. We highly recommend the game.
Elder Sign is one of our favorite board games, so of coarse we bought it on the App Store. It’s way harder than the board game. The dice rolls are close to impossible to get right. We’re up to a hard challenge but it’s so hard we can’t get our wife to even play it anymore. Love it cause it has sooo much potential but it’s mostly just disappointing.
We would first like to say that this game is definitely beatable. We have won 80% of the time. That’s out of about 10 games or so. Saying that, we would say it’s not worth the money. They give only 4 bosses to play, and you have to pay way to much to unlock more. Also they only have maybe half the characters available and the rest have to be purchased. We’re already getting bored with the bosses and will not be spending more money to unlock the rest. They should change it. Thanks for a fun, yet too expensive game.
We’ve played and played and played again. We have never gotten even close to winning. It’s impossible to win ever when you need ridiculous dice results, never get what you need, and advance the doom tokens by 2 for rah midnight strike on the clock. This game literally makes us insane!!! We like a challenge, but a win would be nice once in a while. Mechanics are great, love the simplicity of it, hate the fact that it’s unimaginably impossible to win. We forgot to mention, it’s impossible.
We can’t win and we can’t play with other people.
We like the idea behind this game, and we can imagine that I’d like the board game. But, as others have said, the glyph rolls just do not seem random. Example from our last game: our investigator deploys yellow and red glyphs, needs a Peril roll, does not get it in 4 or 5 rolls. Failed adventure. Next adventure, our investigator deploys a red glyph, needs a few Lore rolls, does not get it the entire time. These are easy adventures, impossible to complete because the dice do not ever show what you need. Yes, random dice based games result in this kind of behavior. But for us, this is consistent. Easy was easy, normal so far has been impossible. We don’t chalk this up to deliberate programming as some other reviewers have. We believe this is a bug that needs to be addressed. Particularly since it is obviously not happening to all players, based on the reviews.
The tasks become way too tough after the first "easy" level.
We heard great things about the board game, so we thought this would be a good primer. From what we understand the board game is difficult as well, but at the table, with friends, you can bond over the stress and take great pleasure in the rare win. That DOES NOT translate over to a mobile game where the majority of the games played will be solo. You can employ strategies to not loose as fast, but that’s it. You have NO control over the game results because the success or failure is determined by random glyph generation. So this game is nothing more than a glorified slot machine. Your good performance and smart game play WILL NOT BE REWARDED because you can’t stop the progress of the old ones. We like FFG, and play some of their games, but this game? UTTER GARBAGE.
The probability in this game is so rigged that it’s not worth playing unless this is fixed. We’ve played the actual board game, which is fun, but because the digital game tends towards giving you low chances of getting even one thing you need for any given adventure it makes the game so frustrating. Don’t buy unless the app is changed.