Use a APK for a open-source app - for testing this I tried using the x86 APK for VLC Media PLayer, which resulted in a error screen - I then tried the armv7 arc version and that worked at first and then crashed.
Most closed source devlopers don't want their stuff freely distributed, so for most apps on Google Play at least you either need to use: Get a APK of the application you want to use - no, it does not seem like you can install from Google Play, you need a APK file of the app, so this is the tricky bit. I also had issues with Ubuntu 14.04's build of Chromium 41, so I installed Google Chrome :( and that worked. on my Fedora 21 build of Chromium 40 I got the error 'Manifest file is invalid' when trying install the extension, even after clearing data and reloading the extension. This will take a while as it seems to download a crx installer weighing in at 113Mb, and another one at around 9Mb, so be patient: Install from here - click 'Add to Chrome' Here are some steps I did to get it to work You can now under Chrome run APKs, using this extension (bearing in mind it is in development for use by developers for testing apps).