Indie Links today has freeware before commercial, personal instead of professional and hot Monaco on Monaco action.

Four perspectives on personal games (Gamasutra)
“The personal games movement is providing an important, exciting new avenue for expression and a new understanding of design, many believe. At the Different Games conference in New York this weekend, four panelists presented on the theme of personal game-making and why it matters to them.”

Review: Starseed Pilgrim – A Game of Discovery by Droqen (IndieGameReviewer)
“You could be forgiven for initially dismissing Starseed Pilgrim as little more than a curiosity. Droqen’s latest endeavor is a strange, abstract title that does little to endear itself to new players; spending ten minutes with the game might leave you with the vague impression that something is missing. Spend an hour with it and you may come to the conclusion that it was designed with the specific purpose to bewilder and confuse its audience. If you stay a little longer though, you’ll begin to see something compelling and altogether worthy of your time emerge from the blankness.”

Analog Investigations in Arkham (Gnome’s Lair)
“Deduction, despite what Sherlock Holmes would have you believe, is not a science. It’s a method. A method that could arguably make the life of all fictional investigators much easier and can definitely be applied to board-games as the classic Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective so effortlessly proved over 30 years ago. What’s more, deduction is what you’ll be using when playing the freshly released and rather excellent Arkham Investigator.”

Why Vlambeer won’t stop making freeware first, products second (Polygon)
“Earlier this week, Vlambeer — an independent developer who receives as much ink for their critically acclaimed titles as they do for unscrupulous developers’ tendency to copy them — got hit once again. SkyFar, an iOS game from Bangalore’s Rubiq Lab, was criticized for nearly duplicating Luftrausers, a browser-based Flash game Vlambeer released in 2011, which the studio later planned to turn into a full retail release.”

Live Free, Play Hard: The Week’s Finest Free Indie Games (RPS)
“Heterosexual narc. More than a few games about the demise of balls. CANDY ANT PRINCESS.”

Two Game Developers Travel The World, Playing Games And Helping People (Kotaku)
“Earlier this year, Battlefield producer Daniel Matros and former colleague Tim Kjell set up something called Charitystream. The idea was simple: stream games online, raise money for charity. It’s a noble goal, yeah, but it’s also something countless others are engaged in.”

Monaco made good on Indie Fund $100K before launch, what it means (Joystiq)
“Since 2010, Indie Fund has helped launch high-profile games such as Dear Esther, QUBE and Antichamber, each one recouping investment within days or even hours. The first game in which Indie Fund ever put its faith (and money), Monaco, launched last week and made back its $100,000 investment in negative time, before the game went live on April 24.”

Monaco: What’s Yours Is Mine offers the thrill of the heist (Shacknews)
“Andy Schatz’s IGF award-winning Monaco: What’s Yours Is Mine is all about staying in the shadows and avoiding detection. In fact, it’s succeeded almost too well, remaining out of the spotlight since it first took the Seumas McNally Grand Prize at IGF 2010. After years of tireless work and dedication, Monaco has finally been released and like a fine French wine, it was worth the wait.”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie Links Round-Up: New Heights

Today’s Indie Links include a Boston Festival of Indie Games Kickstarter, a Javier Cabrera interview and what indie means to Thomas Was Alone dev Mike Bithell.

Tha Javier Cabrera Interview (IndieGames.com)
“Javier Cabrera, 50% of the Cabrera Borthers and one of the staunchest supporters of indie gaming I have ever met speaks about the indie community, developing games, The Free Bundle, Cypher and much more. Oh, and he does also mention some interesting plans on the future while never forgetting the past. So, set aside 30 minutes, make yourself a nice cup of tea and read on.”

Boston Festival of Indie Games seeks Kickstarter funds for expanded 2013 event (Polygon)
“Organizers of the 2013 Boston Festival of Indie Games have taken to Kickstarter to raise funds to cover the costs of the expanding celebration of independent studios in the Boston area, according to the event’s Kickstarter page.”

Today I Played: Monaco (Polygon)
“There’s no honor among bumbling fools. Here’s the thing about Monaco: If you’re not an expert, you’re going to have a lot of trouble understanding what the hell is going on in the above video. The stylistic, minimalist HUD and graphics are not exactly friendly to newcomers. That’s a bit of an issue when you’re playing the game, and even more of an issue when you’re watching four zany minutes of goofballs attempting to master its complexities.”

Thomas Was Alone Dev: Indie Means ‘I Get to Do Exactly What I Want’ (Kotaku)
“Mike Bithell’s had a crazy year. He went from being one of a few dozen developers at U.K.-based Bossa Studios to becoming a solo indie creator supporting a game on multiple platformers. What prompted the drastic lifestyle change? The steady climb of acclaim around his minimalist platformer Thomas Was Alone.”

Wot I Think: Don’t Starve (RPS)
“I starved. I feel as bad about disobeying the order as I do about losing my character. A negative imperative – ‘don’t starve’ – is so much more affecting than a positive one ‘orcs must die’. There’s a sense of threat in it, far more of an ‘or else’ than any form of Go Ahead And Do This. Don’t Starve really is about trying not to starve too: not eating is simply not an option. The cold fingers of personal famine are forever on one’s shoulder, and it’s crucial to remember that even as another kind of hunger, the familiar craving for better loot and gear, tries to seize control . When my own imperative was not ‘don’t starve’, and was instead ‘get stuff’, I last significantly less time. All I had to do was not starve: how could I lose sight of that?”

Kickstarter Katchup – April 28th 2013 (RPS)
“Jagged Alliance: Flashback arrives in the Katchup this week. I’ve expected (and hoped for) a Jagged Alliance crowdfunding attempt for some time now. As soon as it became obvious that Kickstarter was a place where old franchises could revive themselves, every week that the mercenaries didn’t appear was slightly more unsettling than the last.”

Magnetic By Nature (Indie Gamer Chick)
“Magnetic By Nature is the latest game from students attending the University of Utah. I know what you’re thinking. “Hey, wait a second. What do people from Utah know about having fun? Didn’t they ban their only form of that in the 40s?” Actually, inappropriate polygamy jokes aside, they know plenty about fun. Atari founder Nolan Bushnell discovered the medium of games as a student at the University of Utah. So in essence, we owe the gaming industry as it exists today to their beautiful, boring, Pac-10 devaluing institution. It makes me happy that the science of creating games is taught there to this day. It would be wrong otherwise, like if Harvard stopped teaching law, or Fresno State stopped teaching binge drinking.”

Recommended Game: Electro Bobble (Independent Gaming)
“Unbeknownst to humans, the insides of thunderclouds harbor entire ecosystems. Small beings called bobbles live off the electricity and leap around as if the clouds were composed of a series of platforms. Sometimes, an invasive species, known as meanies, takes over and sets up house, forcing the native bobbles to find another thundercloud. But one day, one bobble decided that it wasn’t going to be thrown out. This is its story.”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie Links Round-Up: Cruel Summer

Games based on depression, an award winning game we’ll never get to play, and other interesting titles in today’s Indie Links.

How Jason Rohrer Won The Game Design Challenge (RPS)
“A real high-point of every GDC is the Game Design Challenge. Well, was. Sadly the tenth year of this annual treat was the last, with organiser Eric Zimmerman bringing proceedings to an end. And wow, did it go out in style. With the apposite topic, “Humanity’s Last Game”, some of the biggest names in the industry put forth their pitches for the last game we’d ever need. And one man entirely stole the show. For a second year, that man was Jason Rohrer.”

Voiceless and forgotten: facing depression through play (VG247)
“Depression Quest and Actual Sunlight are two games based on depression. Dave Owen speaks with their creators to find out how they can help.”

The Cat that Got the Milk sequel revealed, leaps from freeware to commercial (IndieGames.com)
“The Button Affair super stylish developers, now called Modern Dream, have announced The Cat that Got the Milk will receive a sequel. Titled Abstract No.3, it will expand on the series’ twitchy, path-weaving gameplay and will be the team’s first commercial release.”

Mobile review: Ridiculous Fishing (Shacknews)
“Fishing is a tough endeavor, one that isn’t as easy as it looks on TV or in the movies. Homer Simpson once had an idea to dump a plugged-in bug zapper into a lake and it resulted in a whole lot of easy-to-catch (if somewhat high voltage) fish. That’s a ridiculous idea. Yet it’s not as ridiculous as some of the heavy artillery that’s used in Ridiculous Fishing, the latest iOS title from Vlambeer (Super Crate Box), Greg Wohlwend (Puzzlejuice), and Zach Gage (Halcyon).”

Storyteller preview: In the eye of the beholder (Joystiq)
“”Wait, save that. No one’s done it that way before. You made it more complicated.” Daniel Benmergui reached out to grab the mouse and save a screenshot of my panels in his comic-book narrative game, Storyteller, where I had just concocted a tale of love and loss based on the page’s prompt, using a trio of static characters. One click and Benmergui let me regain control – he resumed his place over my shoulder in a quiet room off of the main GDC concourse, paper and pen in hand, taking notes on my visible thought processes as they played out on-screen.”

Preview: Hiversaires (TIGSource)
“After years of releasing engaging short-form games, prolific digital artist Aliceffekt is nearing completion of his first independent commercial project, Hiversaires, for iOS. Committing himself to full time development at the beginning of February, Aliceffekt has worked solo on the game, handling design, code, art, and music.”

Little Inferno scores big sales (Destructoid)
“Little Inferno didn’t have a lot to help it become a financial success. A fireplace simulator made to parody and critique current trends in videogames isn’t exactly what the big publishers would call “a surefire hit with a huge pre-installed fan base.” Thankfully, word of mouth, positive reviews, and the reputation of the game’s all-star development team seemed to have made up for any lack of marketability.”

Second Thoughts with the Chick – Terraria (Indie Gamer Chick)
“I reviewed Terraria for PlayStation Network/Xbox Live Arcade. I said that I did have fun playing the title, but I didn’t recommend it because it was too glitchy and unfinished. I also said that I had lost interest in the game. Since then, there hasn’t been a review up at my blog. Why? Because I’ve been busy playing Terraria. So allow me to eat some crow and do a 180 here. Terraria IS worth your time, glitches and all.”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie Links Round-Up: Intangibles

Dark times come in today’s Indie Links, with games set in shadowy worlds, a game where the lights actually go out, and a game that portrays the nightmares of a toddler…

Top 10 Free Platformer Games of 2012 (IndieGames)
“The indie universe continued to offer up in 2012 platformers of all types: auto-running, puzzle, exploratory, narrative-driven, and subversive. And even in this age where developers can easily charge money for their creations, some choose to release them for free.”

Behind The Sounds: Hotline Miami And FTL (Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“Music man David Valjalo follows-up his exploration of the big-budget orchestral soundtracks in the mainstream games industry with a look at the other end of the scale – the super-low-budget, ultra-catchy, sometimes kitschy scores of indie darlings. He rounds up the men behind Hotline Miami, Sweden-based Dennis Wedin and Jonatan Soderstrom, two of the soundtrack artists they hand-picked, US artists M.O.O.N. and Scattle, and FTL composer Ben Prunty, to get the scoop on making music for small games and, quite often, small change.”

The Horror Game Where You Play As A Toddler Still Looks Eerie Despite Some Public Outcry (Kotaku)
“Remember Among The Sleep? It’s that game by Krillbrite studio where you play as a two year old who has yet to ‘develop a full sense of reality, making you weak and susceptible to the horrifying creatures inhabiting your nightmares.’ If you’ve forgotten, this is your reminder that This Cool Game Still Exists.”

New Xbox Live Indie Games For Week Ending January 18, 2013 (indiePub)
“Best bets this week include: Little Acorns Deluxe, a pixel platformer game where you take on the role of Mr. Nibbles; Dynasty of Dusk, a role-playing game where you must stand up to an emperor trying to gain immortality; Grid Space Shooter, a shooter game where you try to survives massive swarms of enemy ships; and finally Ultimate Dodgeball where you create a Dodgeball team and perform amazing acrobatic tricks while attacking the other team.”

The Joystiq Indie Pitch: A Walk In The Dark (Joystiq)
“Indie developers are the starving artists of the video-game world, often brilliant and innovative, but also misunderstood, underfunded and more prone to writing free-form poetry on their LiveJournals. We believe they deserve a wider audience with the Joystiq Indie Pitch: This week, the Flying Turtle team in Portugal talks barebones marketing and Steam Greenlight with its stylistic indie platformer, A Walk in the Dark.”

2013 Global Game Jam Expected To Break Previous Attendance Records (Polygon)
“Global Game Jam, a 48-hour game design event, is expected to break its participant record during the fifth annual event taking place this weekend, organizers announced. During the Global Game Jam, teams of professional and amateur developers gather to create games based on an announced theme. The event will take place in more than 300 worldwide locations in 60 countries. Game design professional Erin Robinson and Breat Victor will deliver this year’s keynote speech.”

Interview: Kentucky Route Zero’s Mountain of Meanings (Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“Kentucky Route Zero is a joyously original, heartfelt thing. If you haven’t already played it, go do that. If you have, then step on down to the RPS porch, pull up a slightly weather-worn deck chair, and let some soulful bluegrass overwhelm your senses. Easy, easy. The interview will begin soon, but for now, there’s certainly no rush. Oh, fair warning: it’s pretty SPOILERY. Co-creator Jake Elliott and I discuss Kentucky Route Zero’s unique approaches to storytelling, theater’s heavy influence on the game, the negative general perception of the American South, talking to animals, ghost stories, economic hardship, and a number of specific in-game scenes. So then, stroll on inside RPS’ quaintly rustic hilltop abode whenever you’re ready. Or don’t. There’s always time.”

Audio Files: Aivi Tran And RPG Craymore (IndieGames)
“Two weeks ago I had the pleasure of rockin’ out with extremely talented pianist Aivi Tran at Magfest XI. Not only is she a beast at piano improvisation, she also composes music for indie games. Her recently released track “Climb, Lest I Fall” (above) was written for the upcoming RPG Cryamore, which looks to be reminiscent of Legend of Mana style gameplay. If my analysis of the gameplay is anywhere near the mark, Aivi’s music will do an excellent job at complementing Cryamore.”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie Links Round-Up: Purple Worm

Try something new with today’s Indie Links, which include last year’s top 10 (or 25) experimental games of 2012 – or if that doesn’t appeal to you, there are plenty of games of established genres you may not have played much, too.

Top 10 (Free) Experimental Games of 2012 (IndieGames)
“Ten games and another fifteen honorable mentions and we still can’t feel 100% happy with our Top 10 free experimental games of 2012 list. If there is one thing indie developers simply excel at, you see, is not just coming up with, but actually trying out and releasing games based on wild and at times radical ideas. Games so different, so innovative and so unique we can’t help but describe as experimental.”

A Common Thread: Rami Ismail (Quote Unquote)
“My name is Rami Ismail, age 24, and I’m the business & developer guy at Vlambeer, a two-man independent studio in the Netherlands best known for Super Crate Box, Radical Fishing, GUN GODZ and our upcoming game LUFTRAUSERS.”

Review: Medal Wars – Keisers Revenge (Indie Game Reviewer)
“Though Medal Wars provides a decent amount of action and plenty to keep players busy, it feels unpolished in places and suffers from clunky controls.”

Jumping The Kickstarter-Gun (Indie Gamer Chick)
“Kickstarter is not venture capital.  It’s not angel investing.  Pledgers are not looking for a monetary return on their investment.  I do understand this.  And yet, I’m still not a supporter of Kickstarter, because I think it sends the wrong message to potential developers: money is easy to come by.  I believe it’s irresponsible to teach young entrepreneurs that money should be given to them based on a concept and raw enthusiasm.  Funding should only be given on the grounds of actual ability, a proven track record of completed, competent projects, and the willingness to personally sacrifice for the benefit of your project.  It’s shocking to me how people fund games from people who meet none of that criteria.  I’m even more shocked when a developer reaches their Kickstarter goal, gets the money, and within weeks has another ask posted for even more funding.. and gets it.”

Road To The IGF: Blendo Games’ Thirty Flights of Loving (Gamasutra)
“Brendon Chung of Blendo Games has produced some of the most exciting and unique video game experiences of recent years, from the delightful Gravity Bone to IGF 2012 finalist Atom Zombie Smasher. Now the indie dev has yet another game as an IGF finalist. This time around it’s Gravity Bonesequel Thirty Flights of Loving, and it’s just as intriguing as its predecessor.”

Blind Eye Games – Interview With George Sawyer (Independent Gaming)
“I was lucky enough to contact George Sawyer at Blind Eye Games to talk about his upcoming zombie game, Safe Zone, a game where you’re tasked with travelling across the U.S. to get away from the zombie horde.”

‘Indie’ Means Nothing, And It’s Everyone’s Fault (Indie Statik)
“Man, oh man. The big question: What is ‘Indie’? You’d think a publication that has the word ‘Indie’ in its title and is staffed by primarily ‘Indie’ fans, all of whom write exclusively and exhaustively about anything and everything ‘Indie’ under the sun, would sorta know what the bloody word actually meansby now. Well, turns out we don’t. Turns out no one does. Turns out not a week goes by where I don’t hear someone meekly ask their fellow gaming compatriots whether or not GAME X is ‘Indie’ or not, only to be subsequently thrown aback by the crashing waves of wildly conflicting opinions on the matter until they find themselves gasping for air as they plunge deeper into an ocean of bickering, twisted logic and malice. Turns out this is a problem. So I’ve decided that for the good of all the game lovin’ peeps everywhere that I’m gonna figure this shit out right here, right now!”

Live Free, Play Hard: The Week’s Finest Free Indie Games (Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“Multiplayer god poem. HUNT FOR THE GAY PLANET. Super Hallucinogon. Color domming.”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie Links Round-Up: Violet Vortex

Today’s Indie Links include six top ten lists, and nine top five lists. So… I guess you can pick your top five or ten top ten/five lists, if you really want to.

The Joystiq Indie Pitch: Ravaged (Joystiq)
“Indie developers are the starving artists of the video-game world, often brilliant and innovative, but also misunderstood, underfunded and more prone to writing free-form poetry on their LiveJournals. We believe they deserve a wider audience with the Joystiq Indie Pitch: This week, 2 Dawn Games’ Carsten Boserup talks crowdfunding and indie publishing with his Steam game (now on sale!), Ravaged.”

Little Inferno (Indie Gamer Chick)
“Tis the season of gifts.  Or, if you want to be a killjoy, the season to burn toys in a fireplace.  That’s the idea behind Little Inferno, an independent game for the Wii U.  It’s by the guys behind World of Goo, which was probably the best digital-download game on the original Wii.  But World of Goo got by on being a quirky, addictive physics-puzzler.  Little Inferno, on the other hand, feels like the type of time-sink you would find on the iPhone market.  In fact, there are lots mechanical issues with Little Inferno that make me think it started life as a micro transaction-oriented mobile game, like Doodle God for arsonists.  Only such games typically cost $1 or less and make their money by nickle-and-diming you to speed up the gameplay.  Little Inferno charges you $15 upfront, and keeps the action nice-and-slow.”

Top 10 Best Indie Games of 2012, Honorable Mentions and IGR’s Most Anticipated Games of 2013 (Indie Game Reviewer)
“At IndieGameReviewer.com, we began compiling our Top Ten indie Games 2012 edition sometime around June. This is because we wanted to remember the impact of the games that came out in the first half of the year, and from that point forward, we looked at every game that crossed our path with the same consideration, regardless of its size…”

Music of the Spheres – Mathematical Beauty in Action (Independent Gaming)
“What kind of person are you, that you hunt angels?! Er, sorry. Music of the Spheres is certainly a simple concept at first glance, and is always interesting. But it gets more complicated. The theme certainly isn’t angel genocide, but something much more beautiful.”

Live Free, Play Hard: The Week’s Finest Free Indie Games (Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“First off, lists are bullshit. But these are indie games, not some Triple A Shooter that everyone knows about already, so we threw together our top 5 in the following categories to entice you to take a second look at some of the best games of the year.”

Top 10 Indie Horror Games of 2012 (IndieGames)
“Horror, just like humor, is an ancient, fickle and hard to tame beast. Going beyond mere jump-scares and evoking the feeling of proper fear can be particularly tough, but more than a few indie developers seem ready to tackle such tasks. This particular roundup hopes to cover the best and, well, most scary horror releases of 2012 and is featuring both freeware and commercial titles for a variety of platforms.”

The Sequel To The Best Reverse-Tower-Defense Game Is Superb, If Barely A Sequel (Kotaku)
“Anomaly Korea is actually very, very much like 2011′s Anomaly: Warzone Earth, the reverse tower-defense game. You still command a slow-rolling column of tanks and transports through a maze of evil enemy towers. You can still map out your route through the city streets using your fingers. You can still tap special power-ups into existence to briefly buff your vehicles or baffle your foes. You can still kill towers, collect money and upgrade your vehicles. You still need to get to a goal point with some vehicles. The game still checkpoints, makes you think, plan and re-plan, getting tough nice and quickly.”

Skulls of the Shogun Devs Interested in Cross-Platform Purchase Promotion, But Microsoft Can’t Yet Do It (Polygon)
“Buy one version of Skulls of the Shogun, get another for free? Developer 17-Bit would like to make that happen, but CEO Jake Kazdal told Polygon that the indie studio is hamstrung by Microsoft — the company doesn’t have anything like Sony’s PlayStation 3/PlayStation Vita Cross Buy promotion set up across Windows 8, Windows Phone, Windows RT or Xbox Live Arcade titles.”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie Links Round-Up: Spin The Wheel

We’re on fire with today’s Indie Links! There’s a game about burning things in a fireplace, a game about Santa Claus lighting houses on fire… and a game where you have to treat a customer right or you’re fired.

Recommended Game: I Get This Call Every Day (Independent Gaming)
“I Get This Call Every Day is a Gordian knot that resists being cut. It’s an intractable situation that some people, such as the game’s author, have to deal with on a daily basis without getting fired. David S. Gallant’s latest game (and the first one that’s being sold and not freely distributed) is an autobiographical tale of workplace absurdity.”

Free Picks: Happy Little Murder Friends, Fistful of Gun (Farmergnome) (IndieGames)
“Under the Garden and Under the Ocean developer Farmergnome (Paul Greasley) sure makes pretty games, no matter the size. He just released substantially updated, free builds for his recent Ludum Dare game for Windows, Happy Little Murder Friends, and another side project called Fistful of Gun.”

Feedtank’s Pangolin: Anteaters FTW (Independent Gaming)
“Sounds like a platformer? You’d be surprised. This vivid, surreal indie ios game by the 2-man devteam at Feedtank, is …NOT a platformer.  In fact, it’s the very antithesis of a platformer. You don’t control this loveable anteater who looks like a bowling ball. Rather, he is entirely at your mercy as you bounce him around the world with trampolines.”

Little Inferno Is A Delightfully Grim Tale, But Its Best Story Is A Hidden One (Kotaku)
“Maybe it’s because Little Inferno doesn’t present the side of Armageddon that we’re used to seeing in games, but you might not even pick up on its apocalyptic storyline. Yet as I burned prize after prize in my Little Inferno Entertainment Fireplace, a thought tugged at the back of my mind: why am I doing this?”

Mew-Genics Is Multi-Platform, One of Which Is iOS (Joystiq)
“Mew-Genics will be available on iOS devices, but that’s not all. Well, actually, that is all for today. The weekly Mew-Genics teaser simply says that the game will launch on multiple platforms, one of which is iOS, as demonstrated by the accompanying iPad mock-up. Considering the mobile angle and Edmund McMillen’s recent involvement with Sony, we’re personally hoping for a Vita release as well.”

Indies Met Challenges, Learned Lessons In 2012 (Gamasutra)
“Recently, I spoke to a number of well-known independent game developers to find out if they too shared the sense that this has been an extraordinary year for indie games. Part of that conversation focused on the lessons other small teams might learn, as indie games move from niche to mass-market, via digital distribution hubs on consoles, mobile and PC. What have they learned this year as they strove to get their games noticed? How have they been able to find success?”

Holly Jolly Pyromaniac: A Christmas Game With Villainous Spirit (Polygon)
“Indie developer Underground Pixel is no stranger to gamemaking.Holiday Havoc and Pastry Panic, known for their retro, arcade play-style are proof of that. Fresh off its second Ludum Dare jam, the developer is proud to present its latest title: Holly Jolly Pyromaniac, a holiday-themed title brainstormed and built in just 72 hours.”

Review: La Mulana (Re-Release) (Indie Game Reviewer)
“La-Mulana is a room-based side-scrolling Metroidvania adventure game released in 2012 by EnjoyUp for the Wii. This Indiana Jones-inspired action title is a remake of the 2005 game of the same name by the same developers: GR3 project with updated graphics and ‘decreased difficulty,’ as the original was notoriously unforgiving. While at first this seems like another cash grab by a developer doing the whole ‘HD’ remake thing that was so popular in 2012, they actually bring some improved and interesting new features to the title, one of which is support for XBOX 360 controllers (PC). It doesn’t sound like much, but the feature adds a lot to the game’s playability and shifts it from a keyboard-mashing platformer to a smoother experience, though unfortunately it inherits all of the original’s control issues.”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie Game Round-Up: Log Jam

Among the games covered in today’s Indie Links are a platformer inspired by the classic Ghosts n’ Goblins, a strategy game starring an undead samurai, a parking simulator that a reviewer apparently finds to be almost as much fun as actually parking a car, and not one but two player-run sandbox RPGs where players can create their own highly customized worlds (is that an upcoming new genre or something?)

Maldita Castilla (TIGSource)
“Like Hydorah before it, Locomalito’s Maldita Castilla stays very close to its inspirations, in this case the venerated platformer series Ghosts n’ Goblins. From the overall look to the invariable jump, you’ll feel very much like you’ve stepped into the greaves of Arthur’s Spanish cousin.”

60 Seconds To Park (Indie Gamer Chick)
“…And I’m sorry to my readers who were looking for a game review and read that nonsense above.  But what else can I do with a game like 60 Seconds to Park?  There’s almost no actual game here, so I have to fill the space with something.  The game is exactly what it sounds like: find an empty parking space within 60 seconds.  Every stage, the parking lot gets larger, but there’s only one space that is randomly selected to be empty.  Find it, put your car in it.  It’s that simple.”

Feeding on Undead Armies in Skulls of the Shogun (Joystiq)
“Here’s your high-concept, catch-all elevator pitch for Skulls of the Shogun: samurai zombies meets turn-based strategy, and a dash of Words With Friends thrown in for flavor. 17-BIT’s charming top-down strategy title captures the action-flavored flow of the Advance Wars series, though it ditches the grid-based world in favor of more natural radial movement. The whole package comes together around an ambitious multi-platform release that features asynchronous multiplayer match-ups and a meaty, multi-hour campaign.”

TIGSource Devlog: Dom2D’s Visual Showcase of Awesome New Games, Issue #11 (Venus Patrol)
“Would you look at all the colors in this week’s issue? In it, we explore the dark corridors of spaceships filled with evil robots in Steam Marines, jump around Another Castle in our brand new jetpack, swim in the crazy seas ofGeisha Novia, and skulk creepily in a foggy forest in Stealth Vampire.”

Indie Pleas: Indie Game Crowd Funding Roundup for December 14, 2012 (indiePub)
“This week’s Indie Pleas include: Galcon 2: Galactic Conquest, a strategy game where you have to conquer the galaxy and defeat the enemy planets; The Red Queen of Oz: Two Fates, an adventure game where you play as Alice and Dorothy through Wornderland and Oz as they try to stop the evil Queen of Heats; Full Bore, a puzzle-adventure game where you play the role of a bore; and finally Epica Rex, a multiplayer sandbox RPG game where players can explore land and even go to war with others.”

Acclaimed Games Festival IndieCade Adds an East Coast Option with IndieCade East (Kotaku)
“Video game gatherings come in a few different flavors. GDC, as the name implies, is mostly for game developers and exists most as a professional networking/workshop space. The medium’s biggest hype machine is E3, where developers, marketers, press and select fans spread the excitement about upcoming games. But IndieCade—which has happened for the last few years in Culver City, Calif.—is arguably my favorite games-centric gathering. So I’m really glad that there will be an East Coast version from February 15th to 17th of next year.”

Oh Godus… Molyneus Has a Kickstarter (Independent Gaming)
“For those of you who haven’t heard of this infamous madman, Molly is the creator ofPopulous, Black and White, and the Fable series. He has become pretty well-known known for being utterly crazy-bananas in terms of hyping games, continually surfing a tidal wave of his own ambition, making promises he cannot keep and just generally leaving a path of rubble in his wake.”

A Common Thread: azurenimbus (Quote Unquote)
“I’m André. I’m a 27 year old starving artist cliché, born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and I do not speak Spanish. For the past two years I’ve been living in New Jersey, Murika with my girlfriend. When I’m not making games or working on other similar starvation-inducing personal projects, I work as a reluctant graphic designer. My aim is to further starve by becoming a full-time independent developer soon.”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie Links Round-Up: Forest Pool

In today’s Indie Links: Making a video game out of paper, the end of a doomed journey, and why making your players suffer can be a good thing.

FTL: The Fatal Frontier – The Last Stand (Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“These were the voyages of the Starship Moggy. Its eight-sector mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new weapons and new system upgrades, to boldly go somewhere no-one has come back alive from before (apart from save-scummers).”

The Benefits Of Making Your Players Suffer (And Maybe Throw Up) (Gamasutra)
“Bennett Foddy, creator of QWOP, GIRP, and CLOPamong others, likes to play with his players, and he suggests that more of us should be doing the same. At the top of his talk at IndieCade on Friday, he asserted, ‘I’m going to try to convince you to put more suffering in your games.’”

Double Droids And The Wonder Of Game Development (Hookshot Inc.)
“This weekend I made an award-winning video game. I should probably clarify that.”

Video Game Origami: ‘Derrick The Deathfin’ Goes From Paper To Playstation (The Verge)
“There’s an incredible diversity in the kinds of graphics that video games have presented us with over the years, but developers are still managing to find ways to surprise us. Derrick the Deathfin is a new downloadable title launching today on the PlayStation Network that not only looks it was made out of paper, at one point it actually was. In order to make the art style as realistic as possible, the team at developer Different Tuna crafted papercraft models of each object before making them part of the game world. It’s a lengthy process but one that adds a sense of realism to a game about a cartoon shark. Or as Different Tuna’s Gordon Midwood says, it creates ‘something that’s kind of organic, that doesn’t look like every other video game.’”

TIGSource Devlog: Dom2D’s Visual Showcase Of Awesome New Games, Issue #1 (Venus Patrol)
“Since 2005, TIGSource has hosted the largest forum dedicated to independent game development. Its devlog section, in particular — where developers show their work-in-progress and get feedback from the community — has proven to be a goldmine for amazing design, gorgeous art and constructive criticism. As a game designer and an artist myself, I find these quite inspiring and feel these projects deserve more attention.”

iOS Hit Nihilumbra Coming to PC (IndieGames)
“Beautifun Games’ iOS puzzle platformer hit Nihilumbra is coming to Windows and Mac. Our own Cassandra Khaw appreciated the iOS version’s 10+ hours of gameplay. Additions to the PC versions include improved atmospheric and weather effects, new HD textures, an improved and fully remastered soundtrack with a new song, and minigames.”

Kickstarter Katchup – 6th October 2012 (Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“It’s glum in the Katchup this week and I’ve been spending most of this fine Saturday morning wiping the tears from my eyes with a twenty pound note. If only I’d pledged it to the promise of a game instead of using it as a handkerchief for all these long months. If only! Two of my personal favourites have fallen by the wayside and there’s only one winner, although it is an interesting one by virtue of not being an obvious success story, powered to victory by the presence of a celebrity developer. There are a few projects on the verge of success and if I were writing this on Monday, the ‘Winners’ column would probably be much more satisfactorily populated.”

(Not) Getting Noticed On Steam Greenlight: Incredipede’s Story (Joystiq)
“In the indie world of secret handshakes and underground brunch meetings, there’s a specific phrase for the following complex process, as described by developer Colin Northway: ‘Apply to Steam, be rejected, release without it, get popular, be noticed by Valve, release on Steam.’ This is widely accepted as the ‘Offspring Fling’ submission process. It takes the name of Kyle Pulver’s retro platformer, which launched on Steam in May, months after not launching on Steam, despite Pulver’s attempts. Northway shares this rejection jargon with us in terms of his own puzzle game, Incredipede, and Steam Greenlight:”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie-Links Round Up: Construction Crustaceans

MaK.  Prevail.  Party of Sin.  Edgar Rice Frotteur.  These are all very strange names for video games.  So obviously you want to read today’s Indie Links to find out just what these titles are.

Underrated Indie Games II: Under The Radar (TIGSource)
“After months of effort, Underrated Indie Games II was wrapped up a little while ago. It is part of moshboy’s endeavor to bring attention to overlooked indie games. The videos in this new addition to his series cover a 100 games of a wide variety to give you a glimpse of what you might have missed.”

Size Five On Stealth, Story & Swearing In The Swindle (Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“A few days back, Time Gentlemen, Please and Privates dev, Dan Marshall of Size Five Games,revealed just why his ‘xciting upcoming cyberpunk crime caper The Swindle had gone eerily quiet for a few months. Fearful that the XNA language he’d been working with might not be supported by Windows 8, he started from scratch in Unity. In this second half of our chat, we cover the game itself – how important stealth and gags are to it, its ‘retrospective’ approach to storytelling and why it’s more Grim Fandango than Day of the Tentacle. Also Dishonored, because Dishonored. Also Hitler, because Hitler.”

The Joystiq Indie Pitch: Party of Sin (Joystiq)
“Indie developers are the starving artists of the video-game world, often brilliant and innovative, but also misunderstood, underfunded and more prone to writing free-form poetry on their LiveJournals. We believe they deserve a wider audience with the Joystiq Indie Pitch: This week, Crankshaft Games’ Daniel Menard talks about his PC co-op puzzle-platformer about breaking out of Hell and storming Heaven, Party of Sin.”

Off The Vine: A Closer Look At Grinding Game Edgar Rice Frotteur (Venus Patrol)
“Swedish designer & developer Adam Henriksson — last seen providingvideo documentation of the debut of Mega-GIRP — has just uploaded a beautifully shot longer look at the 48-hour game he helped create at the 2012 Nordic Game Jam with Thomas Perl, Johann Sebastian Joust creatorDoug Wilson, and Proteus musician David Kanaga.”

The Time You Killed Playing Super Hexagon Lives Again (Kotaku)
“This week I played Super Hexagon in the office of my insurance agent, financial advisor, and attorney, as I settled up matters relating to the sale of a house. That should establish the game’s cred as an outstanding time-killer.”

FTL: The Fatal Frontier, Sector 7 (Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“And so my FTL campaign, the flight of the starship Moggy, limps to the game’s penultimate sector. It seems impossible that we’re still alive at this point – let alone that we now have seven crew, three guns and NO-ONE IS DEAD. The looming question is whether or not we’re anything like equipped for the final showdown in Sector 8 – but then again it’s foolish to go asking that before we’ve survived Sector 7.”

MaK (PixelProspector)
“MaK is “a physics sandbox with tethers, rockets, explosives, teleportation, relative gravity and potentially unlimited room for creativity” that reminds of Super Mario Galaxy. RPs wrote a bit about the game and the developers explain the game in more detail in this 5 minute gameplay video.”

Petit Planets: Johnny Two Shoes Shows Off Their iPhone Adventure, Prevail (Venus Patrol)
“I spy a little bit of Glitch‘s free-wandering & subdued landscape, a little bit of GodFinger‘s deformable terrain, a healthy dose of predecessorPlunderland‘s highly physics-based platforming, and maybe just a touch ofSpore‘s explorable ecologies in this new gameplay video of Prevail, the latest from UK indies Johnny Two Shoes.”

Source: The Indie Game Magazine – Indie Links Round-Up: Out The Window