Posted by Jordan Magnuson
Wed, 14 May 2008 20:54:00 GMT
I know, I know, we’re all mature independent gamers here, and we know The Indie Canon like the back of our collective hand; and yes, Open Liero was mentioned here a scare half year ago. Well I’m sorry, but here’s the thing: is there any one here who is really going to stand up and say that Liero doesn’t deserved to be mentioned at least every few months on any self-respecting indie site? If there is one person out there who reads this post, and has not yet played Liero, and plays Liero as a consequence, then this post was not in vain.
So many clones, but there’s only one original; and here’s dos box, for sound.
If I had a million dollars for every time I had fun playing this game, well, I would be richer than Bill Gates—and that’s a lot of millions.
Edit: despite my [snobbish?] loyalty towards the original, it’s true that OpenLieroX is perhaps the definitive version of this game. Download it here.
Penny Arcade Adventures: On The Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness is hitting online stores on May 21st, and to juice you up for the release the PA guys are doing a countdown, and releasing a page of a comic each day. If you’re interested, take a look at this very positive hands-on preview by Chris Kohler at Game|Life. The game’s also gotten some very mixed reviews by the mainstream press, according to Gabe.
Precipice will be the first game released via Penny Arcade/Hothead Studios’ new indie game website, Greenhouse. It will be released for Windows, Mac, and Linux simultaneously.
In Caveman Craig you’re charged with leading a tribe of cavemen as they try to survive the harsh realities of everyday life as a friggin’ prehistoric caveman! Namely, dinosaurs. And evil cavemen dressed in black.
The interesting thing about CC is how you train each individual caveman to do his job (which he will then perform automatically). Cavemen come in three flavors (hunter, gatherer, and preparer), which each have two skills. To teach them these skills you simply perform the action a number of times while they are following you. New cavemen arrive when enough food has been prepared.
Along the way, you’re blessed with small gifts that make things easier for you (e.g. a fire and spit that prepares carcasses). These are fun rewards, and they alleviate the repetitiveness of training somewhat, but more skills, more dinosaurs, and more variety would have been very welcome. Raids on other tribes, perhaps?
Erik Hermansen at Caravel Games wrote to let me know that they’ve released a trailer for Deadly Rooms of Death: The City Beneath. True, this game is about a year old, but it’s never too late to try out this rather brilliant, and overlooked, series of turn-based puzzle games. And DROD fans consider The City Beneath to be the best of the lot (and suitable for beginners).
I love the game’s really odd visual design and sense of humor. Definitely very unique!
Joyous day! Everyday Shooter has finally made its way to the PC, via Steam. I’ll be honest, I had only gotten a taste of this game before, on the IGF show floor in 2007. It was fun then, but I gotta say, it really deserves to be played in one’s own room, with headphones on. Challenging and beautiful – one of few games where graphics, sound, and gameplay are completely harmonious with one another.
Try it! It’s definitely worth the $8.99 you’ll be paying for it (discounted from $9.99 for this week).
Droid Assault is a new action game from Puppygames. Just as Titan Attacks was a “Puppified” version of Space Invaders, and Ultratron a Puppified Robotron, Droid Assault is Paradroid given the Puppy treatment.
In Paradroid, players controlled an “Influence Device,” an otherwise weak droid with a very special ability – it could control and command droids after beating them in a logic-based circuit game. Droid Assault eschews this mini-game and lets you “transfer” to a droid so long as you have enough transfer points (obtained per 1000 score points). Also, once a droid has been transferred, it joins your team and can be controlled at any time (or when your current droid is blown up).
Longtime Paradroid fans may find this a bit off-putting, since the circuit mini-game was a big part of Paradroid (and allowed skilled players to take over even the mighty level 999 droid with a lowly Influence Device). However, Droid Assault is clearly built for speed and action, and as such it’s a highly enjoyable game with frantic action. The graphics and music are also ace, as we should come to expect from Caspian Prince and his team.
If I had any complaint, its that it’s occasionally difficult to discern blocks, pits, walls, and floors. Other than that, I’d highly recommend this very affordable ($10) little game. (And give Freedroid a try if you’d like to play the original!)
Pixeljam, the creators of Gamma Bros. and the Ratmaze games, have released Dino Run, the latest in their series of low-resolution Flash titles! The basic premise is that you are a little dinosaur escaping extinction! Run, run (and jump), as fast as you can to the end of each level before the “Wall of Doom” engulfs you.
This game’s a real charmer. Each of the 7 levels is meticulously rendered in beautiful lo-fi, with lots of little details that you will probably be too busy running past to notice. Along the way you’ll get to snack on birds, lizards, and fish, grab rides with pterodactyls, and discover lots of alternate passageways and secret nooks. Other dinosaurs that are fleeing the destruction will hinder you, help you, or just plain die at the hands of crashing meteors and other dangers – the entire atmosphere is kind of dreadful, in a really cute way.
There are quite a few extra features, like dino DNA upgrades, unlockable speedrun levels, various difficulty settings, and even a multiplayer online mode that lets you race against other dinos. A small donation will get you a Dino Run Bonus Package which lets you customize your dino’s look, among other things. Do eet – this game is really cool!
In Missile Matador you have to trick homing missiles into hitting each other… without hitting you. If you fall off the bottom of the screen, you also lose! It’s a fun concept, and it’s unnerving to see all those missiles trained at you in the brief breathing period before each level starts!
Missile Matador II extends the concept by adding timed missiles and a way to make your own levels (by editing text files). The rules of the game have also changed slightly – in order to win, you must reach a goal somewhere on the screen.
As an aside, “Missile Matador” is an awesome name. It sounds like something the VGNG would have come up with.
Jeff and I spent another day and a half hacking away at the The Indie Game Database. A lot of smallish changes, but they are significant:
Tags. Users can now add tags to games (e.g. abstract, music, dinosaurs, stealth, co-op). It’s mostly a novelty right now, but once filters are in place it will be a great way to search the database.
Note: tagging is still slightly buggy.
Site Layout. The site has been widened, which makes screenshots look much better, and also gives us more room to play with. A number of small cosmetic tweaks have been made to the layout as well.
Basic Browsing. Jeff has added support for browsing. Right now you can either flip through the pages of the master list of games, or flip through the same list sorted by rank.
The major additions to the site will come in another few weeks or so, when we add user reviews (yep!) and also filters, which, when added to what we’ve done this weekend, will let you browse games in a fairly advanced way.
In the meantime, I entreat you to rate games, add tags, and have fun perusing the site! Comments and suggestions are still very welcome.
