Ready, steady, glow: Nitronic Rush

As hangover cures go, having my senses battered by a symphony of light and a fair few pounding beats is the last thing I would expect to help. Problem is, once I saw Nitronic Rush this morning I couldn’t keep my clicking finger from that download link. And then it seemed unjust not to play it right away. Advertised as an ‘experimental, survival driving game’ by the game’s student devs, I’m certainly expanding on its experimental uses.

Nitronic Rush was created by a group of students at the DigiPen Institute of Technology. It’s Tron for the Trackmania generation. It also evokes some strong memories of 90s racers like WipeOut, Rollcage and Extreme-G. In fact, it’s only in playing this game that you realise how much we’ve lost that lust for blistering stunt racing that used to be such a strong part of the genre mix, even on the PC platform.


So it’s an arcade racer, which gives you the power to fly and flip for points around a number of absurd neon tracks. You also have a nitro button which affords you a limited amount of rechargable fuel before your car shakes itself to pieces.

You’ll be happy to hear that Nitronic Rush plays as good as it looks. And it really does look incredible. Your car, equipped for flying and teeth shattering speed boosts, is incredibly responsive when winding itself around these roads, flipping from wall to floor and generally driving like a total bad ass. That’s ignoring all the crashing you’ll definitely do, but that’s fine. Like Trackmania, you’ll have fun playing this game to perfection.

I’m not mentally equipped this morning to understand quite how the scoring is calculated from the various stunts, but points are tallied up alongside your finish time for the high score board. Personally, I just like the colours and the way this game makes me smile as I zoom across mind-melting landscapes. It’s relentlessly noisy, visually and aurally, and contains enough little features and set pieces to keep you wowed throughout.


There’s a short and knowingly daft story mode which sends you off to destroy a virus core in order to protect the cyber city. You drive into it or something. I don’t really know, but it was cool and that’s all you really need to know. If you’re after something to liven up a particularly dreary afternoon, this game will more than do the trick. There are several game modes and a multitude of pretty diverse tracks. Online access allows you to pit your skills against ghost racers across the globe and there’s always your previous best to have a go at if you’re happy endlessly bettering your past self.

Best of all, Nitronic Rush is completely free. So why are you still reading this?


Nitonic Rush can be downloaded right here.

Running down a dream: Fragmentation

From wall bricks to floor bricks. From moving upwards to moving forwards. Let’s keep this fun theme going! Must give credit to IndieGames.com for this find.

Fragmentation is a nifty piece of freeware gaming created in forty eight hours by Riley Adams for the Ludlum Dare 21 compo back in August. Racing down a straight corridor is the easy bit. Moving fast enough to avoid the crumbling floor behind you is where things get tricky. Pillars are placed in your way to keep you thinking and you also have the ability rotate the room and duck and jump to ease your passage through the world. Play well and you’ll speed up. Play badly and you’ll fall into the abyss beyond. Just like in real life.

It won’t keep your attention for long, but it’s a thrill whilst it lasts and manages to place you in that zone of awesomeness that allows you to act on instinct to survive. Plus, such a colourful time-sapper it’s not to be knocked when you consider the time constraints on its creation.


Download Fragmentation from Ludlum Dare, here.

The only way is up: Against the Wall

Not enough games make enough use of the vertical plane. Remember the first Call of Juarez? I don't think anyone in the world agrees with me on this point, but I still think it the highlight of the entire series - clambering to the submit of that weathered mountain to retrieve a single eagle feather for some mystical trial. Some said it was a misstep. I thought it was an unexpectedly inventive change of pace. There's not enough tranquillity in video games. Or scaling of awesome heights.

I guess Against the Wall is here to correct that. Here we have an early alpha build - not much more than a concept at this point - of a game which requires you to climb. Where to? And for how long? Your village and I'm not sure. Although I'm hoping you might reach the top to find David Gilmour there, banging out some aged guitar riff before the whole thing comes crashing down. And the kids stop singing that bloody chorus.

Speculation aside, developer Michael Consoli has released his project into the wilds of the web to interest gamer folk and inspire others to lend a hand.


Despite being so much of a blank canvas at the moment, playing through this early build there's no escaping the sense of scale that the game already provides. Your goal is to travel upwards across the side of an infinite brick-lined barrier, pulling out bricks with your magic sceptre and skipping from one to the other to gain height. It's a neat idea, strained slightly by the vastness of the world and the repetition required to climb, but it's easy to see how this manner of play can be built upon and enhanced by a few more oddball environments and development of the basic mechanic.

It's promising then and there are already a few surprises even at this early stage in development. Here, in Consoli's own words, is how the game works and what he needs to happen:-


You can download the alpha of Against the Wall here or play it in your browser on the very same page.

Gamer's block or: How I braved the Abyss of Uninstalled Games and saved my soul

I'm definitely riding a To the Moon come down. Recently I've been struggling to find anything to play. I've no review codes to game at, no desire to explore something epic. Gemini Rue is waiting for me, Bastion has bored me. I'm an addict with so many drugs to choose from that I can only sit back with my arms folded and wish I was high.

When a game like To the Moon comes along it's a funny thing to figure out. Afterwards, when the credits roll, you're left with thoughts that will continue to pester you for days. And I don't want any old run-of-the-mill run-and-gun hit-and-run action to destroy that feeling. I want love and sorrow and laughter and tragedy to continue onwards. Where do I get that? How do I safeguard its destruction? It's almost as if I'm scared to embark on a new adventure in case it ruins something I've already experienced, clouds my memory.

I have so many unplayed games to pick and choose from it's pathetic. The various sales and bundles over the last couple of weeks have levelled my bank balance as well as my ability to become enthused by video gaming. Where do I start? How do I end this?

Well... by trial and error. By staring at the screen, hovering my mouse pointer over shortcuts on my desktop and trying to imagine what it might feel like to hit that main menu and drop right into that game. Most of the time I'll turn my nose up, or I'll be repulsed by the very thought of giving up all my good staring time to something that certainly is not To the Moon.

Argh... get over it. Get over it. Get over... hey. What's this? Oh. Something on Steam I bought but dropped right into the Abyss of Uninstalled Games. Should I click? Aye, go on then...

Bam.

Let me tell you about Painkiller.


Painkiller isn't incredible. It's a game I've tried to love over again and over again, but found to be of little substance. It’s creaky and uninspiring. Even on initial release I disliked how it presented the devolution of video gaming, taking it back to the primal stage as if the developers, People Can Fly, had crawled right back into the ocean because they found the trees to be dizzying.

So I loaded it up out of desperation, hoping that something I knew I couldn’t love could lift me from this hole. A shot of stupid to cure my ills, waxing my boredom and obliterating any other emotion I might care to feel. And somehow I'm thirteen again, stalking through the most stripped down form of our favourite entertainment: Point and shoot, point and shoot, pick up ammo, lay down hell. It's not great, but it could be frenzied enough to flush this feeling of malaise from my mind. It’s overkill. I’m using acid for mouthwash. I’m amputating limbs to kill itches I never had. I don’t know what’s going.

But do you know what? It’s working. It’s my medicine. I’m self-prescribing and kicking ass. Shoot this demon, shoot that witch. I don’t care what I’m shooting, I’m just fighting back until I’m ready to climb up to whatever pinnacle of entertainment it was that knocked me down here in the first place.

My love for this hobby rolls in cycles and it’s a funny thing, but I’m a total sucker for this kind of punishment.

First Look: GTA V

Saturdays are for sitting at home after a slow and sorry week at work and wondering what to play next. Whilst I'm at it, you should check out the new trailer for this game by Rockstar which flopped its terrifying e-penis onto the internet this week:


How often does one and a half minutes of very little convert into a billion words of over-analysis and absolute presumption worldwide? Every three or four years when this happens, of course. It clouds minds. It renders common sense redundant.

Well, step by step, I'll offer my own thoughts on what we can expect from the game after watching this trailer for the very first time. Straight from my mind and onto the screen. When you're done reading, watch it again and admit that I AM RIGHT ON EACH AND EVERY POINT. AND IT IS EXCITING:

0:07 Man and lady walking dog! This is new. This is BIG. Do they kiss? Do they cuddle? Is Rockstar's next goal to portray true loving relationships in place of seedy fucks and lady lust? Maybe.

0:10 Ladies looking at men's bottoms! Perhaps the game will cast you as a woman who... no, that's ridiculous.

0:15 Palm trees! You play a tree who lives with other trees and grants wishes to the ghosts of dead truck drivers who wander the streets below.

0:17 Golf! You play a golfer who hates homosexuals and air travel. Kills things with razor blades.

0:19 Jet skis! I've pre-ordered at this point. By which I mean I've written 'buy GTA V' in big letters on my forehead because it's not yet possible to state my claim on Amazon or will myself into the future. How do they top jet skis?! Clearly you'll be playing as a porn star with a violent past and a penchant for travelling places and doing things. My excitement levels have hit the roof!

0:20 Hiking. Hiking? Hiking! You play a malcontent with a violent past and a fetish for bivouacking and jazz mags.

0:25 Fast cars! You play a car thief with a violent past and a fetish for porn stars' hairpieces. You live in a subterranean crack den with a cat named Doug.

0:30 Wind farm! You play an eco warrior with a violent past who lives up in the hills smoking twigs and leaves with his wife and three small children who ONLY EXIST INSIDE HIS HEAD.

0:45 Crop-dusting marijuana! You play a drug lord with a violent past, who likes porn and cars and Harry Potter fan fic. Also, is a vampire.

1:00 Homeless man! You play an angry bum with a violent past, who likes patio furniture, video arcades and eating beetles. Massive racist.

1:05 Police chase! You play a police officer with rickets and a learning disorder. Cop buddies always laugh at him when he fails to spell 'pomegranate' correctly. Also, has violent past.

1:10 Hollywood sign, but not Hollywood sign! You play as a failed porn star turned actor. Crack habit, six fingers on each hand and hilarious stutter. Says things like, 'B-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-but... I don't wanna.' Always wears burgundy clothing and cries at CSI reruns.

Wow. Well, I don't know about you but I'm tuckered out after that. I'll have another look at it tomorrow and expand on each of the points noted above. What we mustn't assume is that Rockstar will simply release a GTA sequel that is a bit different, but largely the same as its predecessor.

REVIEW: To the Moon

There's something to be said for how quickly To the Moon captured my attention. The setup is brief but perfectly executed: Two scientists arrive at a house in the woods with a box of tricks which allows them to alter the memories of whomever happens to have paid for their service. The catch? The grim reaper is breathing down the client’s neck. It's an excellent hook that instantly throws up a ton of questions as to the possibilities and limitations of such a device.

Our subject is Johnny, an old man on his death bed. He has one wish: to have visited the moon. Why does he want this? He doesn't know, so it's up to the game's leads, Drs Rosalene and Watts, to find the answer and make his dream (or rather, memory) come true.


To the Moon does not present a challenge. Essentially, it's an interactive story in the guise of a 16-bit adventure game. What control the player does have is heavily restricted by the precise experience that the developer, Freebird Games, intends them to have. There are a couple of choices they can make along the way, but the player won't be reloading through death or be required to bloat their inventory in order to progress through the chapters. They simply guide the characters and watch as the plot unravels.

This could be an issue for anyone seeking a test of intelligence or skill, or some kind of thrill ride, but for those after an interesting story told well, To the Moon rarely falls flat. It makes use of common traits of the medium to absorb the player, keeping their hands busy and their eyes locked on the screen.

For the first act of the game, you'll be tasked with tripping back through Johnny's memories one at a time. In each version of the subject's past reality you'll need to discover more about him, but also seek mementos - little keepsakes - that can be used to form gateways into earlier memories. Searching for these items is as close to a typical adventure game as To the Moon gets. It's item hunting with a dash of puzzle solving required to activate the next area.


The boredom that this sort of repetition might usually provoke is offset by the constant progression of the plot as your insight into the minds and motivations of each character develops to a point at which you genuinely care about what may - or might previously - have happened to them. Snapshots of half-recalled conversations play out in these instances, building a picture of why it was that memory reconstruction was requested in the first place.

To the Moon could easily have become a succession of saccharine moments designed to melt hearts which instead only inspired the urge to vomit. By its very nature - dying man, lost love, sentimental desires - Johnny's story is, without question, a nose-blowing sob story. But what thankfully turns this on its head is the detached viewpoint that a couple of scientists going about their day jobs provides.

Following these characters in performing what they perceive to be quite mundane work is endlessly interesting and frequently amusing. They are the ones who provide the smirks and the flippant remarks so that the player doesn’t have to. The banter between the two doctors, who are completely at odds with each other in terms of personality, provides just enough comic value to allow the main plot to breathe and to ensure that the player never feels overwhelmed with a barrage of emotionally loaded codswallop.

It also means that those moments which are truly heartbreaking are far more effective when allowed a quiet moment to play out.


Outside of the realms of fabricated memories is a reality that was never far from my mind throughout my time with To the Moon: There can only be one ending. Johnny will inevitably die and he will never have truly visited the moon. It’s a sobering thought and being reminded of this fact every now and again grounds a tale that could easily have floated away into fairyland.

But it’s not depressing. It is enlightening, charming and funny. The balance between comedy and tragedy is well trod and I commend Freebird Games on creating such a memorable and tightly written story that works so well in this medium. As I’ve said, making your way through To the Moon does not require skill. It is a work of interactive fiction, but for the four hours that it took me to complete it never struck me as lacking anything that a great gaming experience should have.

It's a brave thing for a developer to do, to expect the buyer of their game to act as a bystander to their own creation. After all, if we as gamers were after such an experience, wouldn't we just watch a movie or pick up a book? To the Moon, by it's very existence, would like to argue that point and I can confidently say that it is one of the finest games I’ve played all year.

To the Moon was released 1st November and is currently available for trial and purchase here. (£7.99)

Back in Block: Voxatron

It wasn’t too long ago that I gazed upon Voxatron with the eyes of a small child, taking in the lights and colours and musical beats and wondering what it would be like to sample such retro delight. Thankfully, fate stepped up to the plate, the Humble Voxatron Debut was announced and I purchased the alpha version (and thus all subsequent updates) for a snip of the future RRP.

Besides the price plummet there are two advantages here. Firstly, I don’t need to remember to purchase Voxatron once it hits the netwaves. Secondly, I get to see and feel it in action right now.


After a full playthrough of this twenty level version of the game, I find myself in two minds about the experience. It’s beautiful and bold in its presentation and there is a certain old school charm; the way enemies flock to you like vultures on carrion, the bip-bip-bip of your pea shooting limbs as minotaurs and hippo-things crumble to voxels. However, that may be why it hasn’t instantly grabbed me. Voxatron is pretty much as I expected it to be. There have been few surprises.

Having said that, it’s thoroughly pleasing to play. The environments are varied and there are a couple of trickier boss fights that give a taste of how the game may expand on the traditions of arcade shootering given half a chance. There’s also the destructability which, if not a surprise, is certainly an interesting little hook. Everything in the world deteriorates with blaster fire, collapsing trees and pillars if you knock out the supports. You’ll even explode on death, taking revenge on those who ended you and severely pockmarking the world - this provides no advantage, but has a tendency to look fantastic.


Certainly, I have no right to judge it having only played the demonstration and there is a part of me which suspects that Voxatron reserves a couple of tricks up its sleeve. It also comes with a level editor which immediately extends its appeal and is bound to result in a wave of community-generated madness in wake of the game’s release.

As mentioned, Voxatron is pay what you want via the Humble Bundle for the next two weeks. You get the alpha now, full game on release.

REVIEW: Ignite

Please be aware: This review reflects only the single player portion of the game.

What I like most about Ignite is the boost button. I think it’s the one on the dashboard they labelled TEAR REALITY ASUNDER. That’s what it feels like. When you call for nitro in this game you’re essentially passing the steering wheel to the devil himself. The screen contorts and blurs and one errant twitch of the thumbstick will have you scraping the wall at 150mph. The thrill is immense, whilst it lasts.

Ignite is a funny old thing, really. In some ways it reminds me of the original FlatOut, which held a similar wild enthusiasm for speed and destruction, but it doesn't really break any rules when trying to present the same brand of unhinged arcade racing. In fact, it doesn't even feel that unhinged when you don’t have the capacity to TEAR REALITY ASUNDER.


To start with you'll be offered some straightforward races against a few stupider-than-thou AI opponents. If you lose to these guys, I'm assuming the game just quits and uninstalls itself from your system, because to do so would mean that you’d likely never seen a gamepad before, probably never heard of ‘the internet’ and certainly shouldn't be left alone with a computer.

After this the learning curve climbs, but not all that much. You’ll whizz through it without too much hassle, unlocking cars and tracks with your successes. Within the three main car types - muscle, street and race - you'll gain access to new paint jobs that come hand in hand with bonus attributes to help you gain the lead in races.

The twist? You can lose a race and still win it. That is to say, race wins are determined on points gained from smashing, speeding and drifting your way around each track, not simply by your finishing position. Leading the pack helps, but it's not the be all and end all if you finish in second place with five thousand points in hand, whilst the guy in front has only made a couple of hundred. Points count as deductibles of your time and these are tallied up at the end of each race.


The reason for this? Presumably it gives more aggressive, slower drivers the opportunity to win big by bothering all the other cars and smashing up the scenery. But unless you're talking tricks and spins and big air, which this game explicitly isn't, then where's the fun to be had in not taking pole position? I'm unsure on this point.

After experimentation, I found it rather simple to lead each race on both points and time by picking a roadster with a destruction bonus and knocking down every piece of signage I could find. No other style or car type earned me a fraction of the points that this method did and - because points convert to nitro - I maintained the thrill of being at Beelzebub’s side the whole time. Good for me, bad for Ignite, because something’s clearly awry when your toolset consists of one sledgehammer and a bunch of inflatable mallets.


The point scoring does get in the way of the actual racing. Keeping track of it and trying to understand why you might be behind when everyone else isn’t means your mind is kept from enjoying the thrill of the chase. And because you’re given two variables by which to judge your lead, you’ll often have little idea of whether you should be threatened if you’re either lagging behind or lacking in points. It’s an odd experience and means you can never accurately gauge the competition.

For all its colour and noise there's unfortunately very little here to get excited about. It’s a pretty game and there are moments of genuine spine-tingling speed, but all too often the game seems to be holding you back, tying you to its EXCITING! NEW! CONCEPT! which, on closer inspection, isn’t that exciting. It’s still good old fashioned fun if you’re willing to accept the flaws, just don't go into it expecting the next Burnout.

Ignite is released on 28th October and will be available to purchase on Steam. (€14.99/$19.99/£12.99)

Mechanical wonder: The Iconoclasts

Another day and another piece of indie magic in which to lose myself. IGF entrant The Iconoclasts sparked my interest, not only because I happened to be in the mood for checking out some pure and gleeful platform gaming, but because an alpha version of the game is already available to play and I just couldn't pass it up.

I was expecting a short snippet of action in demonstration of the basic game mechanics, or a rough prototype with the art assets in place prior to the actual gameplay being fleshed out, but I was amazed to discover just how polished this long unfinished gem actually is.


The project has been on and off since its previous incarnation as Ivory Springs back in 2009 and, on the game's website, designer Joakim Sandberg has stated that the latest version makes this playable preview copy seem "quite inferior". If this is a reference to how The Iconoclasts actually plays in the alpha then I don't know what to think; it's hard to see how this experience could be honed to a finer point. But we do know, at least, that the cartoon graphics have been upgraded to HD which should lend the whole thing a slightly more commercial fronting.

The game is set in a colourful fantasy world and the visual stylings are distinctly animé. You take control of a young lady named Robin, recently orphaned after her father died. She now lives alone in a beautiful, bright - but restrictive - rural settlement. Technology here is controlled by the government, tinkering is outlawed and this puts Robin, daughter of a famed mechanic under quite a bit of scrutiny.


After a brief explore and an early boss fight you'll be confronted by the black-suited antagonists and the plot thickens from then on as you set about blasting the wildlife and using a contraband wrench to wreak all kinds of havoc.

The dialogue is fast, funny and enhanced by some expressive character animation. The music is toe-tappingly upbeat. To be honest, it's just nice to see a fun, light-hearted platform game joining the rest of the IGF entries when so often it can appear to be a dry, artsy contest.

Obviously the portion I played can't be said to be representative of the final product, but as far as I can tell, things can only get better. I haven't been this enthused by a platformer for a long while.



The Iconoclasts has not been set a release date, but you can pick up the preview copy here.

First look: Manastorm - Lust for Guts

I was going to write about something fairly low key today, like a knitting simulation or a platformer involving a sleepy field mouse, but then, whilst perusing IndieGames.com for news stuff, I happened upon this:


Manastorm - Lust for Guts is an excellent example of why wizards should never cohabitate. It's also how I imagine every Magic Circle christmas party eventually turns out, after they're all hammered and arguing over which of them could kick Derren Brown's head in the best.

I like it a lot. It looks loud and fast, which is something that deathmatch gaming hasn't really maintained since Quake III kicked the door down in 1999 and demanded that we should all worship it, and only it, as the pinnacle of multiplayer murdering in the first person format.

What caught my eye in particular was:-

- The blood
- The fire
- The rock summoning
- The more blood
- The aerobatics
- The exploding people
- The lava balls

It's as if God returned to Earth to smite us all but gave up after everyone started to dick about with his awesome spells.

It's a bit rough around the edges, animation-wise, but this is a game still very much in development and besides, how are you going to notice any graphical discrepencies when you're bouncing around the map like a rubber ball? A rubber ball filled with blood.

An early alpha version of Manastorm - Lust for Guts by Team Rock IT is available for download here on the developer's site, but it's LAN only so there isn't a hope in hell of me being able to give it a whirl.

Rockin' Stroll: Proteus EP

"I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
And felt compelled to frag them all;"
The immortal words of Wiliam Wordsworth there, quoted from an early revision of his landmark poem, Daffodils (working title, UDM1), which provides a fascinating insight into the mind and desires of this great man. It was altered before final publication, of course, in a decision that many felt was telling of his disillusionment at the evolution of deathmatch gaming and the changing attitudes within the surrounding community. So, in his twilight years, he took to filling his mind with aspects of virtuality that didn't involve shooting things in the face. Like pretty flowers.

For this reason, Wordsworth would have bloody loved Proteus. The work of Twisted Tree Games (designed by Ed Key, soundtracked by David Kanaga), it is a game of "pure exploration and discovery" as noted on their website. This is absolutely the most effective way of describing it.


Proteus features no weaponry, no hostile creatures; the intention is for the player to wander and watch and listen. When you arrive in this world, your eyelids will gently part and you are encouraged by the absence of any instruction whatsoever to make your way to the shore of a distant land. It's boldly ambiguous.

It's also delightfully retro, but doesn't play the token nostalgia card in the same way that many indie developments do. It really looks the part. The water glistens invitingly and the clouds which cover the top of the highest mountain billow and swell as they threaten to engulf you. It looks as if it was thrown out of the early nineties, but there is something hidden behind its pixellated make-up that speaks of reality.

This is where the desire to explore comes from; the awareness that there is more to this experience than can be assumed from its simplistic initial appearance.


Primarily it's a musical experience with a soundtrack that reacts to your movements. There are no goals to reach, no puzzles to solve, but as you walk you'll hear the alterations in your physical environment, where ambient rhythms mix with the flora and fauna of the world. It's subtly compelling in the way it manages to maintain the thrill of discovery without any kind of virtual back-patting.

Once the initial version of Proteus is released it's going to be hard to pinpoint an audience to recommend it to because it simply doesn't fall into any standard category. Simply saying “if you like having a bit of a stroll then you’ll love this" probably doesn't cut it. Regardless, I think Proteus will be a game that a good deal of people will find instantly refreshing and the lucky ones will completely lose themselves to.

The Proteus EP is planned for release before the end of the year, with a more expansive 'LP' version to follow at some point thereafter. The price has not yet been confirmed. For updates check the website, here.

Orgy of delight: 2012 IGF Pirate Kart

It's that time of year again. The deadline for submissions to this year's IGF main competition has come and gone and the Pirate Kart is one entry that stands proudly clear of the standard crowd of sensible, innovative and artistically viable pieces of entertainment software.

Put simply, the Pirate Kart is a selection of over 300 games by over 100 separate indie devlopers. Each title was either unsuitable for an independent submission or lacked the polish to go it alone, so here they are, available for all to take a chance and dive into a swathe of nutty half-ideas and creative abominations.

There's a lot of shit there - naturally. This is to be expected of a collection open to submissions from any Tom, Dick or Harry with something to prove. There's also a lot of toilet humour, which is lovely, but very NSFW. I advise you wait until you get home to sample delights such as Hoody Attack, or Space Phallus, or Wee - which has you playing God's own Eve as she attempts to remonstrate Adam for pissing on her every morning.


Aside from this sort of stuff you'll see the standard clones (of which Snake and Asteroids feature heavily) and a few odd non-games that don't quite fulfill the standard expectations of interactive entertainment.

Regardless of the quality of each individual game, as a collection it's an exciting thing to be able to explore. The list is set out concisely in the main program window and you can sort as you please; by title, by author or entirely at random. There's even a 'Play Random Game' button which performs as expected and lends the sense of mystery to proceedings as you shuffle through the productions at your leisure, usually only spending two or three minutes with each one.

Of course, every now and again there's an idea or a look that sticks and it's hard not to become involved. For my money, here are a few that I would recommend you try out if you fancy a bit of direction prior to getting your hands/brain dirty with the rest of it:-

FuhFuhFire by Robert Yang
"Fire! Fire! We're all going to die!"


The inimitable Robert Yang gives us a game which draws equal measure of mirth and terror as players are tasked with rescuing seven elipsoid victims from a raging fire in a building of some sorts.

Twankility - Forced Meditation by Andrew Gray
"You are a fluffy cloud. You slowly fly through the sky."


It's an experience that will last approximately two minutes and, after that, you won't want to play it again, but it did make me laugh at least twice when so many other games in this collection try so hard and fail. If you like inanity, you might like this.

Operation Lodestone by Leon Arnott
"To think - we have reached a point in military history where our weapons must become dumber to penetrate our enemy's defenses."


It's not the most original concept, but it kept me playing long enough to be worth recommending. There's a story, but I paid little attention. A super missile powerful enough to obliterate entire cities is at your disposal. To guide it, you'll need to place some magnetic towers along its route. It's a puzzle game and I got some kicks from it. That is all.

IGF Pirate Kart 2012 is a whopping 1.5GB but downloads speedily enough via BitTorrent. Find a link, here.

Beats of Rage: Keyboard Drumset Fucking Werewolf

After a day or so of seeing Gaddafi's big, dead face plastered over every news source and being exposed to the tedious righteous yammering of the gutter press in relation to this fact, let's have something a little more pleasant, a little calmer...

Here's a nice new bit of freeware courtesy of Cactus that sees you, The Eskimo, climbing a mountain via a series of crumbling platforms reminiscent of Super Mario's soggy donuts. (That's what they were called, right? Only, I just Google checked the name and only the obvious explicit results were returned.)

Anyway, its rather pleasant actually and there's a catchy pop song playing in the background for you to jump along to and...


Oh dear, I've turned into a FUCKING WEREWOLF and the band are shouting at me in a politically contentious manner and now I have to kill people.

I guess the name should have given it away. Keyboard Drumset Fucking Werewolf is a short sharp jab in the cortex. The screaming soundtrack (courtesy of Fucking Werewolf Asso themselves) is essentially your game timer, the levels starting and stopping with every verse/chorus that passes in this snotty electro-punk charmer. And each level is a new format with different goals (as disclosed by the download's accompanying documentation). It's a feast of genres, all involving the struggle of one - probably quite misunderstood - psychotic werewolf eskimo man.

It works completely, of course. It's mental, but it's engaging off the bat. The experience is as much about noise and lights and fucking people's senses as it is about having a jolly good time. And I had just that.


Keyboard Drumset Fucking Werewolf is available for free, from here.

First look: Overgrowth

If you were thinking that the madder half of crime fighting duo Sam and Max was the only hyperkinetic-bunny-thing to grace gaming, then you would be wrong. Just plain wrong.

Overgrowth is the latest project from Wolfire Games. It's been in development for around three years now and I seem to drift across further coverage of it every couple of months. Each time I see it, I can't help but feel the need to kick some rabbits to death. Ha! I was playing on that whole 'games affecting perceptions of reality' thing that is so incredibly current affairs...

Anyway, look here - fighting lagomorphs!


Wolfire claim it to be the spiritual sequel to Lugaru, released in 2005, which was in the same vain but happened to be rather difficult to control from what I can remember. Regardless, with Overgrowth, the developer is promising 'better graphics, better physics, more characters, more moves, great mod support, and co-operative multiplay' in comparison to their previous offering.

I'll vouch for the graphics at least. The above video and every other piece of footage showing ongoing additions to the alpha build just look staggeringly good. The impact of fat feet upon fur seems to have been nicely realised and the dynamic reanimation every time an animal receives a solid kick in the head is strangely satisfying to watch.

I'm going to try to get my hand on the alpha build as soon as I'm able.

Worth noting: As with many other indie developments at the moment, those who pre-purchase receive updated playable previews until the game receives full release. If you don't want to foot the $29.95 to do so then the least you can do is check out - and salivate over - Wolfire's YouTube channel which details the individual updates of each weekly release.

Overgrowth has no solid release date yet.

Computer games make children ‘mental’ warns elderly person with qualifications

Children who play computer games are far more likely to grow up ‘bonkers’ than those who enjoy less modern forms of entertainment, a woman almost twice the age of the ZX Spectrum has warned. Dr Cynthia Langley is the author of a new report which provides further evidence in support of her theory that computer games are to be feared by pretty much everyone, not just the over 50s.

Utilising her education to have a look at things and make decisions, Dr Langley has concluded that the imaginations of young people are easily corrupted by interactive video images - images that their parents are often unable to prevent them from seeing without having to get up and turn the television off.

One subject observed by her research team, Yvonne Presley, described a time when her parental instinct was unable to respond to a frightening encounter with the imagination of her 10 year old son.

"He was playing something or other on the TV with all them lights and colours when he suddenly said, 'F***, I’m dead!'. When I asked him where he had learned the 'F' word, he pointed at me and said, 'You', which is worrying because I’m pretty sure I’ve never been in a computer game before.

“And, after all that fuss, I discovered that he wasn’t actually dead."

Langley also thinks this sort of occurrence to be conclusive proof that children above and below the age of 10 are finding it increasingly difficult to resist simulated genocide.

"Our studies have shown that if you lock a small child in a cargo container with only an XBox 360 console machine, a copy of Saints Row and a packet of crisps, they'll inevitably pick up the game controller and embark on a sickening odyssey of violence in order to entertain themselves - sometimes before they’ve even had a go at the crisps.”

These results seem to support a recent discovery that crisps are a bit salty, but do in turn suggest that video games make you both fat and stupid.

"Apparently one of these so called 'games' offers children candy for murdering mad hobos, but steals their cake if they don't surrender their bodies to a local crime kingpin,” says Dr Langley.

“I don’t know where I heard that, but it's true”.

In response to these findings, one person who has played a video game said: “I never thought about it before, but if sunshine can melt a kid's ice lolly then what’s to keep computer games from melting their brain?

"Or their face?”

More stupidity, here.

And some sense, here.

REVIEW: Alien Zombie Megadeath

I recently commented on how often developers feel obliged to force uninspired storylines upon their games in an attempt to give some sort of substance to proceedings. Most of the time it doesn't add anything at all, which was my point, particularly when the focus of play is purely on the destruction you can wreak between cutscenes. It's hard to give a crap about individual character relationships when you spend most of your time massacring entire species. Which is why I applaud the approach PomPom Games took in introducing the player to this finely realised game world:

'You are a lone Spaceman doing something or other. Driving around in your spacecraft, visiting random planets.

They are the Alien Zombies. Intent on the destruction of all Spacemen doing stuff... in space.'

Bravo. It's as if they wrote that intro simply to emphasise the fact that it wasn't needed at all. And I also appreciate the insinuation that, if the aliens weren't zombified, they might have been a decent bunch of guys.


Alien Zombie Megadeath is very much a game about wanton slaughter. It's also about earning points and madly shifting between numerous horizontal platforms to avoid contact with - and death by - an array of colourful foes.

This is trad arcade in many ways. You don’t need to have been playing games for most of your life to take one look at the screenshots here and realise exactly what it is you would have to do were you playing it yourself. Move and shoot, shoot and move, pick up those crystals, power up and blast the hell out of legions of space slime. Easy.

There are eighty levels of varying difficulty, most of which will have you clearing each screen of aliens. Variations that pop up from time to time consist of bomb disposal, space baby rescue (really) and good old fashioned survival, along with the odd boss fight. Further levels and designs for your spacesuit are unlocked as you earn medals from specific achievements within battles, but you’ll rarely find yourself having to replay to perfection in order to proceed through the game.

In this respect, AZM is accessible enough for a casual gamer to dip in and out of, but big and tough enough for the hardcore to spend a lifetime completing and unlocking everything that the game has to offer.


It would be easy to pass off AZM as a throwaway, nuts and bolts shoot ‘em up at first glance, but that’s not the case. A wealth of enemy types keep you thinking on your feet and there are enough entertaining additions (jet packs, anyone?) and game types to keep it from becoming a desperate space-slog. It may not be spectacularly pretty, but bright colours and distinctive creature designs mean it’s generally simple to keep track of all but the most frantic of shootouts. To compliment this, the controls are particularly responsive and work well enough on either keyboard or gamepad.

I'm not saying the game will rob you of your sleep, but if you're a fan of arcade shooters, AZM is robust and entertaining and there should be enough content here to keep you going for a very long time.

Alien Zombie Megadeath sees release on 18th October 2011 and will be available for purchase via Steam (£7.99)

REVIEW: The Bridge

The Bridge is a bit of a looker. That was my initial thought as I was prompted to play an active part in the introduction of our slumbering protagonist. The hand drawn visual style is an obvious look for an indie platformer, but it works beautifully here. On instruction, I shook the world around our unnamed hero, presumed to be M.C. Escher, and a piece of fruit soon fell from the tree bows above his head. It was a rude awakening, and an instant introduction to the game’s foremost mechanic - the perception and control of gravity.


Making references to previous titles as points of comparison can be both lazy and insulting, but I do feel it important in recommending this title. Braid, And Yet It Moves and Limbo are the most obvious direct links to how this game looks, plays and feels thematically. The artistic design and the smarts required to solve some of the obstacles you'll come across exhibit echoes of all of these games. And The Bridge’s world maintains the same dreamlike quality that hints at something sinister beneath the cutesy surface.

You might not know exactly what it is you're getting yourself into when you make your first foray into the highly illogical environments presented by the game, but I'm going to be intentionally light on the specifics of how puzzles are solved. A good deal of the thrill in beating The Bridge is learning its rules for yourself and then going about bending them to your own advantage.


An Xbox controller is recommended, but not essential. The game tempers its pacing enough that rash moves are rarely required and if you're losing repeatedly because of pixel perfect jumps or close encounters with grinning boulders then you're likely being too aggressive in your puzzle solving.

And let’s remind ourselves of the aforementioned influence here - the work of M. C. Escher. That needs little explanation and from the screenshots you’ll see on this page, I defy you not to be itching to involve yourself in this world, to experiment with its limitations. Here, up becomes down, left becomes right, down becomes both left and right and... well, you get the picture, but in spite of how confusing this could be to someone who just wants the ground to stay wherever the hell they left it, the game does a great job of not becoming a confusing mess of directional woes. It manages to avoid being obtuse to the point of frustration.

There's little narrative to speak of so there's no ultimate goal from the outset, but the world is fully realised in that it provides an evolving hub from which to visit the different levels of play and you’ll realise as you explore and increase your abilities just how to make the most out of your surroundings. You’re not out to rescue the princess here, you exist to progress.


That's not to say that there isn't an overriding theme. The character you play is inherently spectral; he is drawn into the lands he explores, and the periodic messages that drift onto the screen provide a kind of poetic justification of your actions within the world.

Playing through the main body of the game will likely not take you longer than a couple of hours, but there are a couple of additions to keep you coming back once you've hit the end screen. Firstly, there are achievements to be had, if you happen to like having your successes verified by pop-up text. Secondly, once completed, you'll gain access to beefier versions of the original mind-bending levels. Believe me when I say that these will keep you scratching your head for a good deal longer, although I felt they didn’t quite match the purity of the original experience.

The Bridge is good, solid indie fare. Having an eye for the abstract and a brain for the patently absurd is not essential, but you will need a modicum of patience if you're new to this kind of puzzler. That said, it's forgiving enough for those who just wish to relax into a game which does so many things right in portraying exactly what it is that makes Escher's work so incredibly absorbing.

The Bridge has not yet been given a solid release date, but is likely to hit the PC early next year. Pricing has also not yet been confirmed.

First Look: Voxatron

Do you remember when voxels were declared to be the next step in the rendering of expansive 3D environments? You do? And then do you remember, very shortly after, when they weren't? Me too. They looked terrible, didn't they? They made every game seem slightly out of focus, as if smudged by any number of artless, godless hands.

Video gaming nostalgia often denies games you once held dear from looking any good when viewed from a modern perspective (with the obvious exception of Deus Ex, which looked just as awful back in 2000 as it does now).

But look at this! Voxels weren't all that bad!


Voxatron by Lexaloffle Games brings voxel tech back into the limelight, sticking it through the retro filtration machine that all good indie games must go through on their way to becoming lovable cult hits.

Featuring both action and adventure combined with fully destructible environments it really does look very pretty in motion, if slightly dizzying with all those lights and colours.


As you see there, the alpha is to be released shortly and looks to be a nice little psychadelic romp. Plus, those tunes are BANGING. Is that right, how I said that? Well, never mind.

First Look: To the Moon

You might think it common for me to perform cartwheels at the merest mention of a prospective indie release, but this isn't true - I just like to write about whichever games excite me the most. By this measure it took me no time at all to decide on putting up a quick post about To the Moon, the soon to be released adventure game from Freebird Games.

They're a developer I've no previous experience of, but advise on their website that their "focus is to create familiar yet alternative [takes on] the classical RPG experience". That's fine by me, I figure the world has plenty of room for a few more Chrono Triggers before it finally boils away into space. If you feel the same way, To the Moon's charms will surely provoke all sorts of delightful feelings in your belly.

Many games cause me to make a brief note to follow their progress, but very few actually cause me to stop and stare and repeatedly watch promotional footage. To the Moon is one such game.

The premise is instantly arresting. The game will follow two doctors who have the power to alter the memories of a dying man in order that he may recall his most desired fantasies before his clogs are finally popped. I'm already hooked and the trailer below is almost all I've seen in demonstration of its substance:


Funny, attractive and designed to evoke all kinds of nostalgia - what's not to love? The above footage also poses plenty of questions about how the game will play out. There is to be no combat and Freebird clearly want to keep it from being so bluntly labelled as a 'game', but what seems clear to me is how well classic JRPG stylings fit the theme. And the writing appears to be spot on.

So, one to watch with peeled eyes, and I'll certainly be providing my thoughts on it once it sees release on 1st November this year.

REVIEW: Retention

Two ponderous indie adventures, both focusing on recovery from physical and mental trauma, in one month. Anyone would think this site had an agenda; a reflective, soul searching agenda.

Retention is a little hard for me to describe, primarily because it’s barely a game in the traditional sense of the word. It’s a sequence of events, a scattering of snapshots. You click through pictures - memories - laid before you and ten-and-a-half minutes later the experience ends. Did you do it in the correct way? Did you win, or perhaps save the world? The interpretation of any of the eight endings available is misty at best.

Ambiguous doesn’t even begin to describe this game. But let me have a go.

Before play begins you’re given a prologue that explains the protagonist’s position. Here is a man who lives his life without a moment to spend looking back at what he’s experienced. He never stops. As such, he has no memories, or at least he attributes very little value to his memories. After taking a tumble from his bicycle one day he loses everything and, in an effort to hold onto his past, it’s up to the player to help him correctly rediscover the events of his life.

This isn’t a simple case of storytelling through a linear set of prompts. From this point onwards you’re presented with hundreds of pictures, three at a time, often with no tangible relationship from one to the next. Well, apart from cats. There do seem to be a lot of cats.

You start at the end - or rather, you seem to work your way backwards from the time of the accident. However, you can choose to view the photos in any order you like and you don’t appear to be required to select them all, only those with significance in the particular story you’re trying to tell.

Something is definitely going over my head here. I’ve played it five times and only on my last turn did I succeed in grouping together a coherent set of memories. The rest of the time I failed in exactly the same way. ‘I can’t remember who I was...’ says the game and there’s little I can do to correct that. Even when I did succeed in recovering everything, I still had no idea how I arrived at victory.

Retention is a strange one then. It’s like nothing I’ve ever played before and I’m not entirely sure whether I’ve played it still, despite sinking about an hour of my time into its strange world. It’s both baffling and mesmerising, but I can’t say that I didn’t in some respect enjoy my time with it. Just leave your preconceptions at the door, along with your sense of logic, and you’ll probably be fine.