Junk Jack Retro vs Pocket ZONE
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Junk Jack Retro
Explore, build, and survive in procedurally generated 2D worlds. This prequel offers retro pixel art, a dynamic day/night cycle, and a vast array of crafting and building options. Discover hidden secrets, fight monsters, and create unique homes.
- Retro style pixel art
- Procedurally generated worlds
- Dynamic day/night cycle
- Advanced farming system
- Extensive crafting recipes
- Underground biomes
- Combat with diverse mobs
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*If you don't have Junk Jack we suggest you to first purchase it and then consider Junk Jack Retro to enjoy where all started!* Junk Jack is now called Junk Jack Retro, with widescreen support! Junk Jack Retro is the prequel of Junk Jack, a 2D sandbox game where you can explore, build your home and survive in random procedurally generated worlds full of monsters, treasures and hidden secrets! --------- What the press says: "A Wonderful Free-Roam Game with an Irresistible Pixel Aesthetic" -Iphonealley.com, 4.5/5 "It has charm in spades. While it isn't the first 2D sandbox building game out there, it is a particularly attractive one, sporting crisp pixel art and gorgeous lighting effects. " " -Toucharcade, 4/5 "Junk Jack is a hands-down, no questions asked must-own for any and all iOS users who love sandbox crafting games." -148apps, 4.5/5 "Junk Jack isn't Minecraft, nor does it feel like it needs to be as its 2D world provides the same level of novel exploration fun while presenting challenges of its own to overcome; a tightly balanced free form experience that's only going to get better with time." -Appspy, 5/5 --------- Join our forum (http://forum.pixbits.com) and help us to improve our game, and share your creations! Features: * retro style pixel art! * beautiful sound tracks from Bright Primate * intuitive controls: swipe to move and tap to interact with everything! * dynamic day/night cycle * never get lost with customizable signs * advanced farming system with more than 30 different plant types * 135+ recipes for cookable foods! * tint cloth blocks with 15 color dyes * underground biomes with unique graphic style and monsters. * placeable and throwable explosives that can destroy buildings, landscapes and monsters! * critters and enemies to fight (more than 60 different mobs!) * a fully featured lighting system together with many different sources of light and global lighting * 3 slots for infinite worlds that you can generate and explore, every world is different from any other! * procedural generation which creates beautiful worlds with plants, caves, different biomes all around the world * a double layered world which allows to customize background and foreground of your creations * many ores and shiny gems to help your adventure * many hidden containers full of treasures * more than 1000 treasures! * more than 600 crafts! * more than 380 block types * many elements to decorate your houses (like sofas, tables, wardrobes, paintings, statues and many others) * an in-game discoverable book to teach you how to play and the recipes available * shelfs to place items around just to make your buildings shine * minimap (with a really zoomed out feature to allow you to share your creations) * runs fine on older gen hardware We would like to thank Notch! He developed our bigger indie brother Minecraft, without which this game would not exist. If you need help, please contact us!
Pocket ZONE
Embark on a co-op survival adventure in a post-apocalyptic Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. This text quest and RPG hybrid features character customization, a detailed map, and a hardcore survival system. Trade with players and uncover the Zone's secrets.
- Co-op survival gameplay
- Text quest and RPG mechanics
- Character customization
- Detailed Zone map
- Player trading
- Hardcore survival simulation
- Random events and loot system
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New co-op survival game from the developers of Pocket Survivor, Pocket Survivor 2, Pocket Survivor: Expansion has reached an unprecedented level of nuclear addicting mix in the direction of text quest and RPG, event visualization and hundreds of different character animations! A burning cocktail of unusual gameplay from the symbiosis of the Unique survival setting of the stalkers of the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone and the Role-playing System, a classic RPG in the spirit of the world of Fallout and the Wasteland! Artifacts and mutants, adventurers and bandits, endless generated events in the game with a well-thought-out role-playing system of classes and skills, as well as an indescribable atmosphere of loner survival in the brutal world of the Zone! - The zone challenges you! Can you survive in her strong embrace even for a day? - Your goal is to survive and become fabulously rich! - See the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and achieve your innermost dream with the help of the legendary Wishmaster. Or maybe you just want to get away from the gray and boring life of megalopolises and just wander through the wastelands of the earth, where a person is again left alone with an aggressive environment that dreams of devouring him? Features of the game: Create your own Hero from hundreds of visual body parts and high-quality RPG - role-playing system of character classes and their skills and abilities Large detailed map of the Zone with ten unique locations. Ability to exchange and trade found items between real players and friends. A hardcore real-life mobile survival system with the best RPG component inspired by the Fallout and Stalker series Interesting random text events, the outcome of which depends only on your choice and on external factors that directly affect your chances of survival. A complex and well-thought-out loot system, and more than a hundred random events while searching for and confronting the aggressive environment of the anomalous world of the Zone. Over 100 different types of weapons, armor, helmets, backpacks and costumes, including legendary and mythical items! Artifacts and the ability to equip them will add variability to the gameplay. Real radio stalkers in the spirit of the previous parts will help raise morale and survive in this abnormal world! Real survival simulation. You need to eat, drink, rest, sleep, and heal injuries and illnesses. Lack of a direct, linear plot, and the ability to study the world of the Zone and stalkers by indirect events. If you are a fan of games such as STALKER Shadow of Chernobyl, Call of Pripyat, Clear Sky, Metro 2033, Fallout, Exodus, then this game is definitely for you! Play as a stalker - the Hero of the Chernobyl Zone, who found himself in harsh post-apocalyptic conditions and help him survive in a world unfit for existence! We use the standard Apple Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: Pocket ZONE at Free against Junk Jack Retro's $0.99. Pocket ZONE also leads on rating (4.7 vs 4.3) and ratings volume (3.8K vs 147). Junk Jack Retro's advantage is ads (none vs shown) and iOS requirement (7.1 vs 15.0). On review sentiment, update cadence, in-app purchases and monetization model there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Pocket ZONE is free to download; Junk Jack Retro costs $0.99 up front. Junk Jack Retro sells 10 one-off in-app purchases and Pocket ZONE sells 11 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per 7 days. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Pocket ZONE holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.3. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Pocket ZONE has 3.8K ratings behind it against 147, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 84% of Junk Jack Retro's written reviews are positive against 80% of Pocket ZONE's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
Junk Jack Retro ships an update every 5 weeks, Pocket ZONE every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on October 29, 2026 and October 27, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Junk Jack Retro | Pocket ZONE |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $0.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 4.3 (147 ratings) | 4.7 (3.8K ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 84.2% of reviews — better | 79.9% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 147 | 3.8K — better |
| Update frequency | Every 5 weeks — better | Every 2 months |
| Ads | No — better | Yes |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 7.1 — better | 15.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 32 MB | 228 MB |
| Age rating | 9+ | 9+ |
| Developer | Pixbits SRL | APPWILL COMPANY LTD |
Customer experience
Junk Jack Retro
Pocket ZONE
User reviews
Junk Jack Retro
From 147 App Store ratingsWhat we love
- ⭐ Long-time fan
- 💬 Multiplayer request
- 🎮 Retro feel
- 👍 Great game
- 🔍 Lots of content to explore
Room to improve
- 🐛 Crashes
- 🔒 Needs more security
- 🕹️ Clunky controls
- 💰 Not worth the money
- 🤔 Confusing
Pocket ZONE
From 3.8K App Store ratingsWhat we love
- 🚀 Great pocket version of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games
- 👍 Friendly community
- 🤝 Supports developers
- 🕹️ Unique and immersive gameplay
- 🌆 Atmospheric and well-designed
Room to improve
- 🔁 Repetitive and grindy progression
- 🐛 Bugs causing loss of items
- 🔍 Unclear tutorial and lack of guidance
- 🔫 Unbalanced difficulty scaling
- 💰 Premium currency tied to characters
Bugs and requests
Junk Jack Retro
Reported bugs
4 issues- Crashes on launch
- Inventory/crafting issues
- Compatibility problems
- Saving/loading issues
Requested features
9 requests- Multiplayer
- Creative mode
- More content updates
- Armor and weapons
- Customization options
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- Larger worlds
- Liquids and portals
- Bosses and mobs
- Quests and progression
Pocket ZONE
Reported bugs
5 issues- Disappearing items in storage
- Weapons getting deleted after repairs
- Anomaly damage being inconsistent
- Accuracy and hit chance issues
- Language translation problems
Requested features
5 requests- More quests and story content
- Ability to change character class
- Improved inventory management
- Multiplayer and co-op features
- Ability to save progress across devices
In-app purchases
Junk Jack Retro
- Complete CraftBook$0.99
- Slime Hat$0.99
- Botanist Hat$0.99
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- Chef Hat$0.99
- Robin Hood Hat$0.99
- Breeding Hat$0.99
- Jazon Hat$0.99
- Frost Ninja Hat$0.99
- Santa Hat$0.99
- Golden Logo$2.99
Pocket ZONE
- Premium (1 Week)$2.997 Days
- Buy 500 Neuro$0.99
- Buy 50000 Bruble$0.99
- Buy 1000 Neuro$1.99
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- Buy 2000 Neuro$3.99
- Buy 5000 Neuro$5.99
- Buy 10000 Neuro$8.99
- Buy 1000000 Bruble$8.99
- Buy 50000 Neuro$64.99
- Buy 100000 Neuro$99.99
- Buy 10000000 Bruble$99.99









