What better way to spend a gloomy January weekend than indoors, in the warm, playing games that won't cost you a penny? This week: a good old-fashioned scary story, a world of wireframe and darkness, a game of multiple, endlessly unfolding Russian dolls, a hunky dude sucking a lolly and potions, potions most delectable and foul. Enjoy!
Beneath Floes by Kevin Snow, Patrick Bonaduce, Priscilla White, Mike LeMieux, Pinnguaq
Kevin Snow wrote the extraordinary The Domovoi, a lyrical hypertext story supported by exquisite artwork from Patrick Bonaduce. They're joined for Beneath Floes, among others, by Priscilla White, who creates an immersive, haunting soundscape here that will transport you bodily to the frozen North. It's a story of stories, of old folklore tales passed down between generations, and how they warp and shift on each retelling. True to that you get to shift the game a little yourself, putting your own spin on a cold, sad story that feels perfectly at home in these Winter months.
If you'd rather download Beneath Floes and play it offline, you can do so here.
Im Null by Devin Horsman, Robin Arnott, Zak Ayles
A fascinating MMO of sorts that plonks you in a wireframe world with a bunch of other players, each represented by a number and a vertical line. Its stark environment is a vast-seeming, purgatorial void where if you wander far enough you'll bump into something interesting or upsetting, be it the sound of a sad and desperate woman on the phone next to a model house, a fly sitting on an iPhone, a spooky forest or an equally spooky graveyard. Follow the power lines, your instincts or other players to each installation—this is a world that demands to be explored.
Entire Screen of One Game by Tom Murphy
I missed this Ludum Dare 'Entire Game on One Screen' game back in December, but it's been messing with my mind today courtesy of Paradise creator Devine Lu Linvega's Twitter account. As it says at the side of the screen, you can't win this game, but you can run and jump and admire the developer as the perspective is pulled out endlessly before you. Every few seconds, the block you're controlling, really the entire game transforms into another block in another platformy environment, and then another, and then another, until you can barely move for transparent Russian dolls. An impressive, and fun, technical feat.
Succulent by Robert Yang
“It's a guy in his underwear, standing in an abstract featureless void, sucking on some sort of long orange thing.” And yep, this is exactly as Robert Yang describes. Is that a thing you're interested in playing? It is quite suggestive, and a little creepy, but it's also funny and ridiculous, a bit like his previous Hurt Me Plenty.
Moderately hypnotizing video of the game in action below.
Cureator by Simon Weis and Zoltan Haller
An innovative take on Match-3 (there's also a bit of Diner Dash in there too, I feel) that asks you create potions for a bunch of warriors, mages and monsters, who bust into your lab asking for such. I mean, that is only fair, as it's your job. To create potions, you need to drag and mix certain coloured liquids together, before dropping the resulting bottle onto your client, to exchange it with them for a pile of sweet, sweet gold. There are a couple of rubs, so to speak: the fact that you only have four bottles to play around with, and that you require gold to add ingredients in the first place. With only a certain amount of plate-spinning allowed as you multitask orders, it's often only a matter of time before you run out of space or gold.
The random number generator that seems to determine the next colour stitched me up a few times, but this is a smart and charming take on familiar puzzle territory.
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