Comparison

Celestile vs Mateforge

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Celestile

Engage in turn-based space conquest with deterministic combat. Expand your empire, research technologies, and outmaneuver rivals to achieve victory through domination or ascendancy. Features unique factions, strategic combat, and a deep tech web.

Highlights
  • Deterministic combat with no luck
  • Expand, build, research, and out-think rivals
  • Two win conditions: Domination and Ascendancy
  • Eight unique factions with strengths and weaknesses
  • Strategic tech web across five disciplines
  • Fog of war that hides fleets, not geography
  • Portrait mode for one-handed play
Features
Read full description

A turn-based 4X strategy game with no dice. Every attack shows its exact result before you commit, and that number is what happens. No luck. Just the plan you made. Claim a cluster of space one tile at a time — expand, build, research, and out-think up to fourteen rival empires. TWO WAYS TO WIN Domination — hold every planet on the map. Ascendancy — finish ahead of every rival inside 40 rounds. DETERMINISTIC COMBAT The forecast above your units is the outcome. Attack, defence, terrain and tech resolve to one number, and you see it before you commit. A fight you lose is a fight you misread, not one the dice took from you. EIGHT FACTIONS, EACH WITH A COST Every faction has one real strength and one real weakness. Hive Mind builds mines for 1 energy and pulls 50% more out of them. Swarm fields cheaper units and one extra per planet, but defends 10% weaker. Nothing here is a straight upgrade, so choosing is an actual decision. TERRITORY YOU HAVE TO EARN Every planet projects a zone of control, and you can only build inside your own. Put three Moon Lasers in a planet's zone and that zone widens. Growth is a build order, not a land grab. A TECH WEB THAT FITS ON ONE SCREEN Five disciplines — Warfare, Doctrine, Aeronautics, Stellar and Lunar — three tiers each. Fifteen technologies on a radial web you read at a glance instead of scrolling. FOG THAT HIDES FLEETS, NOT GEOGRAPHY You see your own zones plus a tile, and a tile around every unit. Ground you have already explored stays on the map, dimmed. An enemy fleet standing on it does not. AN ECONOMY YOU CAN LEVERAGE Deposit energy in the bank and draw interest. Or borrow against the future and settle a balloon payment five rounds later. Miss it and the Galactic Bank sends dreadnoughts to collect. EIGHT UNIT CLASSES Scout, Marine, Rover, Fighter, Bomber, Mech, Artillery, Dreadnought. Build a military university for a class and every unit of that class attacks 10% harder for the rest of the game, anywhere on the map. BUILT FOR A PHONE, NOT PORTED TO ONE Portrait, one-handed, low-poly worlds on deep space navy. The board scales with the field — a tight 12x12 grid against a single opponent, up to 24x24 against fourteen. Four difficulty levels. WHAT IT DOES NOT DO No account. No login. No internet connection. No chat. There is one interstitial ad, and only from your third match of the day. Buy any faction and it never appears again. Players in the EEA, UK and Switzerland never see it at all. WHAT IS FREE Two factions — Hive Mind and Swarm — and the whole game around them: every map size, every unit, every technology, both win conditions, all 63 achievements. Six further factions are a one-time purchase each. No subscription. 63 achievements, a five-star rating for every faction, and a career record that persists between games. Nine languages: English, Spanish, Russian, German, French, Portuguese, Hindi, Korean, Japanese. Frosty Robot Studio.

About

Mateforge

Features
Read full description

Mateforge is a single-player chess roguelike deckbuilder. Command an army of chess pieces, cast powerful spell cards, and survive an ever-collapsing board across an endless run of battles. Each round the board crumbles beneath you — capture every enemy before it does. Between fights, draft upgrades, recruit and merge pieces, forge your deck, and grow stronger for the boss waiting ahead. FEATURES - Chess meets roguelike — pieces move by real chess rules, but the board falls apart every turn - Build your deck — craft custom decks from 29 spell cards: lightning, meteors, freezes, teleports and more - Evolve your pieces — defeat bosses to permanently evolve your army through 3 tiers of power - Merge & recruit — fuse pieces into stronger ones and expand your squad - Boss battles — face bosses with shields, swift moves and spawning, scaling in difficulty - Daily challenge — a new rule-bending mutator every day - Meta progression — earn shards and unlock permanent perks that carry across runs - Endless runs — no two are ever the same - 6 languages — English, Türkçe, Deutsch, Français, Español, Italiano How far can you get before the board swallows you?

Screenshots

Celestile4 screens
Mateforge4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Mateforge at none against Celestile's 6. On price, update cadence, ads and device support 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Celestile sells 6 one-off in-app purchases. Mateforge asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Celestile ships an update every 11 days, Mateforge every 5 days. The most recent releases landed on October 31, 2026 and November 13, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard1 real difference · 9 level
Celestile versus Mateforge: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterCelestileMateforge
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.8 (5 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews—
Number of ratings5 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 11 daysEvery 5 days — better
AdsYesYes
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS15.015.0
Further details — not scored
Size17 MB9 MB
Age rating9+4+
DeveloperFrosty Robot Studio, LLCSalih Eksioglu

In-app purchases

6 purchases

Celestile

One-time6
  • Collective Faction$1.99
  • Nomad$1.99
  • Wardens$1.99
Show 3 more
  • Ascendant$1.99
  • Warbound$1.99
  • Forge$1.99
None

Mateforge

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Celestile free?
Celestile is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Mateforge free?
Mateforge is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Celestile or Mateforge have ads?
Both Celestile and Mateforge show ads.
Which is updated more often, Celestile or Mateforge?
Celestile ships an update every 11 days, and Mateforge every 5 days. Most recently, Celestile was updated on October 31, 2026 and Mateforge on November 13, 2026.

Other comparisons