Post titles are a natural breeding ground for misguided metaphors, I’ll admit. Simply put: Pyrodactyl Games have recently made available a downloadable demo of their latest project, Will Fight For Food. This is being provided through the Desura marketplace in advance of its upcoming release on Feb 29th. Described as a ‘Role Playing Brawler’, you’ll be cast as an ex-wrestler fallen on hard times on a quest for revenge and, one assumes, some stable accommodation. This is street life, people, only with less Randy Crawford and little more Randy Savage.

We often talk about what game tropes are being used too much, but I think we forget to mention the ones that we’re not seeing enough of. In this regard, one thing I’m seeing a definite lack of is pirates. I think we can all agree that we need more pirate games. (I really hope the SOPA people don’t read that out of context and shut us down). Fortunately, Subvert Games is all too happy to oblige with the formidable Blackreef Pirates.

Good news tower defense fans! One of the most lauded in-development TD games has finally seen a release. Defender’s Quest is now available to the masses of indie gamers who want something a little more advanced than their basic TD or RPG game. Even better if you input the code “DIY” when buying the game you’ll get $1 off through January.

Old news? Perhaps, but these two projects are one of the better kept secrets of the modding world. The Ultima series are classics for a reason – a long-running franchise of very forward-thinking roleplaying games that ran all the way through the 80s up until the end of the 90s, sadly ending on a sour note due to extensive publisher meddling. The one key weakness of the games is their age. While the combat engines are solid and the settings and stories excellent, the technology lets them down, which is why these two full-length remakes are worthy of your attention.

Happy news incoming from Lunar Giant Studios as they announce the release of new Delve Deeper DLC, available now automatically to download on Steam. The add-on is packed full of player-created content and comes at no cost for those who own the title.

[Guest review by Ken Ellis.]

Trapped in a world of music and battles! Do your fingers have the rhythm to dance the dance of DEATH!?

For the past few years, The Battle For Wesnoth has been one of the grand pillars of PC freeware/open-source gaming, but a quick poke through our archives here shows that we’ve not said anything of note about it – clearly an egregious oversight to be rectified. What better time for it, too? A major new release is looming and a release candidate is available now for the public to pick over, so put on your robe and your wizard hat; it’s time for some hex-based strategy RPG’ing.

So here’s something I think we can all get on board with, and I promise you that it’s not just another Minecraft clone, although that’s not to say it doesn’t borrow some ideas. In essense, 3079 is very much like the Minecraft we all know and love in aesthetics. The blocks are everywhere and theya re full destructible after all. However, it doesn’t take too long for the differences to show.

It would seem that the bad times are firmly behind The Indie Stone now. In a major development blog update, they’ve confirmed a content-lock on a variety of significant upgrades to the game. They’ve just got some balancing, bug-fixing and tuning to do before delivering the next playable build – the first in months – into the hands of would-be zombiepocalyptic survivalists worldwide.

After the impressive success of Recettear and Chantelise, it was clear that indie localization team Carpe Fulgur were on to a good thing. Now, they’ve unveiled their third translated Japanese indie title – Fortune Summoners: Secret of The Elemental Stone, due for release on January 17th for $25. A steep price, even compared to their previous two releases – it’s going to be a hard sell.