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Indie Game Night (2013-02-11): Sports Night
Monday nights, 6PM, at Awesome Inc., we meet up to expose ourselves to indie games. C’mon out and look at how small game designers are pushing the medium, or bring something we can play!
This week, we looked at: Hokra, Get On Top, Bloodball, Caesar’s Day Off, 400 Years, Nick Bounty in: The Goat in the Grey Fedora, Enigma, PAKOON! 2, Velocity Raptor, Techno King, Luftrausers, and I Wanna Be the Guy: Gaiden.
Details after the jump.
Hokra
4p local, action/sports, ps3/win/mac/linux (unreleased), paid
Hokra is one of the Sportsfriends digital sports games for four players. It distills sports down to the minimum elements, as summarized by one of the devs at the table: “move a ball from one place to another, score points.” Players need to carry the ball to one of their two goals and keep it there to fill up the goal’s score bar. Players can boost and tackle opposing players, steal the ball, and shoot it across the field or pass to a teammate. Really engaging with four gamepads around a big screen.
Get On Top
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pzbih31w76U
2p local, action/sports, web (flash), free
Get On Top is a kinetic physics wrestling game for two players. Like a playground game, two androgynous figures join hands and feet, then lean back as if to spin. Players kick and lean to move their opponent and whoever’s head hits the pavement first, loses.
Bloodball
4p, action/sports, windows, free
Bloodball is a dodgeball game for up to four players. It placed third in the TIGSource Sports Compo (all entries here). It’s a fast-paced pixelated take on the classic game with charged-up throws, catches, and life bars that are never long enough.
Caesar’s Day Off
1p, comedy, web (flash), free
WARNING: Don’t watch the video, just go play Caesar’s Day Off. It’s short, easy to pick up, and has a great sense of humor. We planned Caesar’s day by roundtable vote, and it was splendid. You decide if each of the activities pleases or displeases the emperor.
400 Years http://www.kongregate.com/games/scriptwelder/400-years
Nick Bounty in: The Goat in the Grey Fedora
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpvvN32ur90
1p, adventure, web (flash), free
The Goat in the Grey Fedora is a comic noir detective adventure game, the second in the Nick Bounty series from Pinhead Games. You star as the titular crayon-faced detective on a job to recover a mysterious goat statue for a dame. It makes exceptional use of off-camera action in the second act.
Enigma
1p, puzzle, win/mac/linux, free
Enigma is a modern open source remake of the old Dongleware game, Oxyd. Your mouse directly controls the acceleration of a marble. You bounce around levels trying to open up colored boxes. If you open two of the same color box, they stay open, and you can move on to the next level once all the boxes are open. Terrain and block types vary wildly across dozens of levels, introducing switches, gates, lasers, dynamite, and all manner of sticky/slippery surfaces.
PAKOON! 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdYz0Ze_d-A
1-4p network, racing, windows, free
PAKOON! 2 is downhill skiing. In cars. Play solo in Race, Slalom, and Airtime modes with 7 vehicles across 7 world ski destinations. Originally published in 2003, it still plays very well with nice-looking vehicles, a great soundtrack, and a number of camera modes.
Velocity Raptor
1p, puzzle, web (flash), free
Velocity Raptor is a puzzle game that teaches players about the effects of the theory of relativity. It provides a novel visualization of the effects of traveling at near the speed of light as you use relativistic effects to get through each screen.
Techno King
1p, action, win/mac, free
Techno King casts you as the sole defender of a future Tokyo under attack from giant mechs. Your enemies wreak havoc on entire city blocks, setting them afire. You have powerful weapons at your disposal, but is it worth the collateral damage to take down the terrorists?
Luftrausers
1p, dogfighting, web (flash), free
Luftrauser is a low-fi 2D dogfighter. Its plane physics behave more like a guy with a jetpack than an airplane, which means you really get to play with mid-air stalls as a mechanic. Water buoys you back into the air rather than killing you, letting you perform flips below enemy aircraft.
I Wanna Be the Guy: Gaiden
1p, platformer, windows, free
I Wanna Be the Guy: Gaiden is a Nintendo-hard retro platformer. Its art and gameplay borrow heavily from classic console games, but its core theme is frustration by surprise. You can’t anticipate your death, you can only learn to accept it. Fortunately, the game saves your progress frequently.
. . .See you next week, devvers.
