YOU EVEN HAVE A HOOK FOR A HAND

You know what people should do more often? Have ADVENTURES. Seriously, there should be a surgeon general recommendation for one adventure per year. They keep you from being sedentary and getting fat, because you're too busy running away from rolling boulder traps and climbing up cliffs. Unfortunately most people either don't, or just can't get that adventure in, too busy with jobs or whatever to go spelunking or exploring. Today, I got a game that might fire up that ADVENTURE ENGINE everyone has inside them, and it's called Treasure Adventure Game.

They tell you everything the game has right in the title

At first, you take a look at Treasure Adventure Game and you think "Oh great, another 8-BIT INDIE PLATFORMER" and then you roll your eyes. But this isn't the case! TAG actually has quite a lot to it aside from platforms to jump on. Multiple dungeons to delve, treasures to find, islands to explore, and a whole ocean to sail. TAG has hours worth of content for you to play around with, an impressive feat for a studio (Robit Studios) that's basically one guy, Steven Orlando. It even won an award for "Best Indie Game" back in 2011.

Styx didn't do the soundtrack but they totally could have

Among TAG's neater features are a day night cycle, and NPCs that have their own schedules based around that cycle, a full soundtrack by a dude named Robert Ellis, an upgradeable boat, and boss fights! This game is a complete labor of love, and it shows. There have even been fan translations of it in Dutch, Polish, Brazlian Portuguese, Castilian Spanish, French, German, and Chinese.

Movie adaptation in the works

If any of this is drawing you in, or you just want something to play between ADVENTURES, then Treasure Adventure Game is for you, and you can snag it, and the translations here

Brush your teeth

Oh man, time to check your meds at the door, because we're diving right into some weird stuff today! I've you've read through previous posts you'll know I told you about Middens by John Clowder, well today I'm here to tell you that it's got a sequel, and its just as strange and twisted as the game that came before. Get ready to slip on that straight jacket and stair at ink blot cards because today I'm going to tell you about Gingiva!

Basically where you're going

Where in Middens you played a Nomad armed with a sentient revolver, in Gingiva you play as a woman with a wind up key for a head, and things only get stranger from there. Though Gingiva gives you a far more coherent path to work with in comparison to Middens, which dumped you in the game world and told you to go nuts, that doesnt detract from the strangeness at all, especially in the party member department.

"Sup"

Gingiva is more combat focused than Middens, and there are less people to talk to, though that doesn't detract from the game that much, as the environments are still just as strange, as is the music, the attacks (such as "French Taunting") and the enemy designs. You dont need to play Middens to appreciate Gingiva, or vise versa, but I think they're both worth playing.

Maybe not at the same time

If you like weird RPGs, then Gingiva is right up your alley. If you like weird stuff in general you should be happy with what Gingiva brings to the table.

You can get Gingiva here

Steam powered sword wielding robots on another planet

Know whats great? Robots (When they aren't rising up against us). Know what isn't all that great? Crazed wild life, rabid animals, demons, sentient plants, and violent elemental creatures (unless they're attacking someone you don't like, then its great!) So lets talk about a game that has all of that, and way more! That game is Spiral Knights

SPIRAL KNIGHTS

Spiral Knights is of those massively multiplayer RPGS. It's pretty action oriented, instead of having a large overworld to explore, the game play mostly takes place in the semi-randomly generated dungeons, full of treasure, traps, monsters, and boss fights. The gameplay feels like the Four Swords Zelda game, especially with a party fight along side. Like all MMOs, you can play it solo if you want but its not as good as playing with a group, so your mileage may vary. The art for the game is great, lots of color and fun designs, you can tell the artists had fun with this project.

"Hey"

The reason why I never talked about this game before was because of the system that would limit how many dungeons you could enter per day, and how many times you could resurrect after dying per day, and seeing as they let you just buy more time that was HOW THEY GOT YOU, but in a recent patch they've eliminated that system and the game is getting a second wind because of it, so if there's a time to jump in, its now.

ADVENTURE is calling

If any of that sounds good to you, or you just want to play dress up in a video game, or you like the idea of robots wearing armor, or you're one of THOSE people and just want to scream obscenities into the chat to bug other people then Spiral Knights might just be for you!

Time to go fight EVERYTHING

You can snag Spiral Knights here

Ten billion players: only ONE map

Time to tell you about a video game genre that's so stupid and convoluted that no one can even agree on what to call it. DOTA-like? Multiplayer Online Battle Arena? Action Real Time Strategy? Aeon of Strife Styled Fortress Assault Game Going On Two Sides? People argue endlessly over the name of the genre, and that's before we even get into the games themselves or the legal mess surrounding the original game this mess sprouted from, proving that they're played by the some of the worst people on the internet.

"Wow, never even heard of some of these curses before"

 How the genre works is that on the games one map there are two bases, each with a team of guys and their goal is to smash up the big fancy thing at the opposing base while not letting the other guys take out theirs. Each side has computer controlled armies that move toward the other side in regular waves, usually the first step in the game is to follow these dudes and NOT fight beside them, but instead hide behind them and  jump out only to get the last blow on the guys from the other side as that's how you get money to buy items. Eventually you become tough enough to fight the other team, and past that you'll level up enough to storm their base, break all their shit, and win.

"Whats all the fuss about?"

 For each game in this genre there are some differences but that's the gist of it. You might read that and go "Well that's not so bad". YES, IT IS THAT BAD. I wasn't joking about these games being played by the worst people. Between people with languages you don't understand making you incapable of working with them, people flying into a frothing rage at the slightest opportunity, or those same people bragging about their great skill at commanding one unit in a RTS game. For other multiplayer games I've said that playing with friends is fun, implying that the game is less enjoyable but still playable with strangers. This is not the case here. Playing with friends is MANDATORY for having a good time while playing these games, everyone else out there will let you down or scream at you for reasons you cant really understand.

You might not understand Spanish or Russian, but you'll know smug superiority when you see it

 These games aren't going away, too many E-celebrities doing commentary on matches, and with Valve throwing their fat sacks of  cash into the ring the tournaments are going to have even bigger cash prizes. Oh yes, there are tournaments. You dont know depression until you've seen someone win over two hundred grand by pressing "R" at the right time.

"Could that be me? Dare I try?" (no, and you shouldn't)

If for some reason any of that sounds appealing to you, theres DOZENS of flavors for you to try!
Like this one, or this one, this, this one for mythological fans, or this one!

Punch that guy to death, then watch two swords and a bunch of cash explode out of his body.

Ok so, you've been framed for crimes you did not commit, and you were found guilty. Next thing you know you're kicked out of the country and left to rot on some gross, zombie ridden beach on a forbidden continent. Given that forming the A-Team is out of the question, what do you do? If your answer is "Kill stuff until you find out who is responsible, then kill him" then do I have a game for YOU. It's called Path of Exile and I think it's right up your alley.

Watch out the floor is becoming lava!

 Path of Exile is an action RPG made by Grinding Gear Games, other notable examples of the genre being the Diablo series, Bastion, and Torchlight, so if you played any of those then you know what you're getting yourself into: lots of loot, lots of monsters, and lots of clicking. What makes Path of Exile stand out from the rest of the pack is the crazy amount of customization. The skill tree is less "tree" and more "Spiderweb on LSD", it goes all over the place, that along side the skill gem system and six different classes lets you build your character pretty much any way you want.

You have fun with that

 Of course, now we get to the most important part of this post
HOW THEY TRY TO GET YOU
Taking a look at how the game's multiplayer works (PVP, ladder races), it seems that there is no "pay to win" option, so good on Grinding Gears, what they DO try to get you to buy are either cosmetic things, such as pets, custom colors and effects for spells and items, and even special animations for your character, or things tied to your account, such as extra character slots, or a bigger shared item stash. Nothing that makes the game easier, so you could play this and never give Grinding Gears a red cent.

These four dollars are all I have left YOU'RE NOT TAKING THEM FROM ME

If you like ARPGs, clicking, crazy over powered named monsters (quickened, lighting enhanced, poison, fire aura, strengthened), loot, then Path of Exile might be for you. If you got friends who want in on it, thats even better as playing solo does not compare to playing with others. If you want a challenge then Path of Exile provides both Cut Throat mode (everyone fend for yourself PVP mode) and hardcore mode.

Hardcore mode is the only mode you should use

  If any of this sounds ok to you, then you can snag Path of Exile here

Who you gonna call?

Got another weird indie RPG for you today, its got ghosts, bats, and onion rings (maybe?). It's called OFF. It's hard to go into detail about this game and not give anything away so I'm going to keep this short and quick. First off: ghosts

GONNA GETCHA

 Ghosts are the primary enemy of the game. There are big ghosts, small ghosts, typical ghosts, weird ghost, upside down ghosts, stretchy neck ghosts, people ghosts, animal ghosts, and even more types of ghosts. The art for the enemy sprites in the battle screens are also well done, they're exactly as weird as you'd expect for this game. Moving on to the second topic: Bats

This kind, not the flying kind

The protagonist of this game is known only as The Batter, and his goal is the purification of all specters everywhere. At his disposal are the various bats you find through the game, and his moves, which are all named after baseball in one way or another. No pitches though, so that kind of sucks, but then he'd be the pitcher, not the batter, wouldn't he? Moving on to the last topic: Onion Rings.

Hmmmmmm

By "Onion Rings" I mean everything strange in the game, from the music (all great, especially the battle theme), the plot (no spoilers here), and the world  that the game takes place in and the people that you meet there (The over world map is mostly a black void with strange voices whispering at you). You'll eventually see what I'm referring to in the game by Onion Rings, though they aren't golden or delicious.

CRITICAL HIT

The only problem some people might have with this game is that they might see it as a poor attempt at being "deep". But that's down to personal preference, and it's a part of what makes the game weird. Still, if you like RPGs, oldtimey stripped baseball uniforms, ghost busting, things that are shaped like onion rings but aren't actually onion rings, and talking cats, then you should like OFF.

Watch out, ghosts

You can snag OFF here.

I have no idea whats going on and neither will you

The Mayan day of reckoning, December 21st edges ever closer, gotta get more video games up here before time runs out! What I got for you today is so strange, so odd, so far out there that I need to put up a warning first before I start talking about it. The game for this week is Middens, and I cannot recommend it if you have a poor mental constitution, are prone to nightmares, or are easily over stimulated, because this game really doesn't screw around.

This game might cause mental illness, we don't know

Middens jumps right on the crazy train right at the start and never lets up. Even the title screen is strange, what with the earth being in the middle of getting a new piercing in the background. All aspects of the game art ooze surreal weirdness, from the strange shifting sprites to the backgrounds where freaky beings roam just out of reach.

Why yes, that gun does have a face

The sound work in this is top notch, the sound sometimes being actual music, others just ambient background noise. It is dissonant, disturbing, delightful, and probably other describing words that start with "D" that I cant remember, the point is: its awesome.

The protagonist looks pretty slick in this

Gameplay wise, at the surface Middens seems like a "regular" RPG, or at least as close to regular as anything gets in this game. But thats not the case: in every battle you start off alone and you muse summon aspects of your mind, body, and soul to fight alongside you. Middens is structured around freeroam exploration, you are given the vaguest hint of a plot and then set loose upon a strange ever shifting landscape. Getting lost is part of the game, and part of the fun if you ask me: wandering around seeing new things is great, especially when you pass through an area you've been before and you discover new stuff. Though it might seem like its trying pretentious, it doesn't seem that way to me, rather that it's just trying new things.

How do i get back to the bus from here?

If you like turn based RPGs, open world exploration, weird music, or really screwed up art, then Middens might be for you. It might even prepare you for the aftermath of the Mayan apocalypse (that is if whats left of the world is a shattered and twisted landscape filled with broken souls, otherwise it wont help). Again, I cannot recomend this if you dont have the mental fortitude. If you play this then only have the drab concrete walls of your bunker to look while angry mutants claw at the doors you might lose it if you cant handle it.

An open window? Dont be crazy, they'll throw spears at you through there! Get some bullet proof glass

You can get Middens here

"Philip is okay with this"

Today I got...well, something for you, certainly. Its like an RPG maker engine took a few dozen blotters of acid and went to an Independent Film Festival where they were playing nothing but depressing movies all night, and then maybe hung out at an Emergency Room until the trip wore off. Its a weird game, is what I'm try to get at here.

BLOOD

This game is called Space Funeral, and while there are some coffins, the game takes place neither at a funeral, or in space. The weird name is only the tip of the iceberg, the whole game is screwy from top to bottom. The art and game sprites are like something someone committed to a mental hospital drew, and the walking and fighting animations for the protagonist are either the best or worst ever.

Meet the protagonist

The actual RPG game play is still turn based, so they didn't mess with the basics, but that doesn't mean its completely normal. Not even getting into the strange enemies you fight during the game, there area number of odd status effects such as "Distracted" or "Moral", and there's even a special move you can do once per battle that has a chance to do anything!

ANYTHING

Space Funeral's soundtrack is top notch and frankly one of the best parts of the game. Using strange and disjointed music cranks up the weird factor even more. Using that kind of music rather than chip tune tracks (Not that there's anything wrong with chip tunes) that are all credited at the end of the game makes it that much better, so if you think that battle theme is pretty catchy you can look up the song and the artist later!

This is just the start, it only gets worse

If you like weird surreal stuff, turn based RPGs, neat music, or any combination there of, then you should give Space Funeral a shot. Its only a couple of hours, but it certainly leaves an impression.

Most likely this kind of impression

You can sang Space Funeral here

Sharing gold is for communists

Got a neat little game here for you today. It’s a short little RPG called “Dungeons of Fayte”. Released back in 2010 as an entry for “The Independent Games Source” Assemblee competition, the programmer Brent Ellison (or “pulsemeat” as he goes on the forums) didn’t win the competition, but the game itself was still considered to be great, and it has been supported with multiple updates since its release.

$6.22? Nope, this is free as its gets

The reason why Dungeons of Fayte looks similar to Realm of the Mad God (another game I talked about) is because the guys who made the games both came from the TIGS community, and they used community made art assets, which accounts for the similarity, they both play completely differently.

Each class has a special ability

Dungeons of Fayte plays like Four Swords Zelda, not just in the combat and gameplay, but also in the fact that it has four player co-op. The cooperative gameplay is local however, not online, so if you plan on playing this with friends be prepared to play with mutliple game pads (which the game supports) or cramming together to share one keyboard.

Like this, but 8-bit

The plot of the game is that you (and your friends) need to defeat the BONELORD in four months time, and you use the time to train, go through dungeons, get equipment, and deal with special events that may give you stat increases. There are a large number of classes available to choose from, and multiple endings depending on stats and your class of choice. If you’re down for some quick RPG fun or you feel like Co-op with friends, then Dungeons of Fayte is worth a download.

Are you and your friends bad enough dudes to stop the BONELORD?

You can snag Dungeons of Fayte here, and see the game's TIGS forum thread here

The dev team really DOES think of everything...

Today I got something special. One of the most well known of all roguelikes: Nethack! Originally released way back in 1987, and its roots can be traced back to the game “Rogue” which was released in 1980, Nethack is likely older than you, and its still being worked on today.

It will still be going after you die

The goal of Nethack is to obtain the Amulet of Yendor from the beyond the Mazes of Menace, and then get out alive. If the name of the dungeon doesn’t tell you this game means business than how about the fact that there are over fifty levels to that hell hole? Nethack doesn’t screw around.

Nethack knows who you are

At the start of every new game you choose your race and class with a number of selections to pick from. Classes have the typical ones you would probably expect, such as wizard, knight, and priest, who are basically what you imagine they are but Nethack also provides stranger choices, such as archeologist who start off with scientific tools, cavemen who start with high strength but ancient weaponry, or tourists who start off with a lot of money and a camera. Races who can choose from are the basic human, and dwarves, elves, gnomes and orcs. You also choose an alignment at the start, Lawful, Neutral, and Chaotic which has an effect on monsters and how hostile they are to you.

Nethack knows where you live

There is a lot to Nethack, from the randomized levels (with a few special exceptions), the cursed and blessed items, pets and Gods, you wont even see a fraction of what the game has in one go, odds are you wont see all that there is to Nethack period. What really makes Nethack is the high level of complexity and interaction in the game world. Your character can go blind, shape shift, lose limbs, then replace those lost limbs, wield dead monsters as weapons, make wishes, and starve if you don’t pay attention, and that’s really just the start.

Nethack will kill you in your sleep

Nethack uses ASCII graphics, though the option of tilesets is available if you're not into that.Whats even crazier is that Nethack can be configured so blind people can play it. I want you to think about that for a second.
...
Ok, now if any of that sounds appealing to you, you can snag Nethack here for whatever OS you use
and heres a guide for the game in general because damn this is complicated

Prison Commander

Today, we’re going to step back through the misty curtain of time (or take a delorean) back to the year 1987, the time of Predator and Spaceballs to check out a game that sold forty thousand copies in its first year and was ported to eight different platforms. For its time that was kind of a big deal. That game is DUNGEON MASTER.

"You drew the short straw, so you have to carry the candlestick"

Dungeon Master is a grid based action RPG that takes place in a horrible death pit of a dungeon, full of traps and evil creatures out to kill you. At the start of the game you choose four characters from the twenty four available, all with their own stats and starting equipment, and different ranks in fighter, ninja, priest, and wizard. With your dream team chosen, you have to arrange them in the two by two formation that the game works with, since if your characters get attacked by something, the side they are getting attacked from determines which two characters are getting hurt.

Of course there's only one guy your party REALLY needs

Not only do you need to worry about the usual dungeon crawling terrors such as the undead and spiders, but you also need to keep in mind the last time your characters ate or drank, as each character has a hunger and thirst bar and if you get stuck or waste time, starvation and dehydration can become a real problem, thankfully food can be found in the dungeon, and you can use a water skin that you can refill at fountains.

See this guy? Wasn't prepared

The effort that went into making this game playable is dedicated to say the least, and it was worth it, given that the game is playable on Windows, Mac, Pocket PC, Linux, and MacOSX because of it. Even better, Paul R. Stevens (the guy who did all the work) didn’t just make it so you could play Dungeon Master, he did Chaos Strikes Back as well, the expansion to Dungeon Master. Chaos Strikes Back has 24 new characters to choose from, some of which are hidden! It was possible to import characters to Chaos Strikes Back from Dungeon Master in the original game, though I am not entirely sure if that’s possible with this recoded version of the game. Even so, those games are still considered to this day the best among all of the clones that were made in its wake. So go, form your party, descend into the depths and go punch mummies in the face

C'mon, bring it!

You can get Dungeon Master and Chaos Strikes Back here

WELCOME TO THE JAM

Stupidly long gap between updates there, but that doesn’t matter. Today I’m here to show you something amazing, something you may just want to drop everything and play. Today, I’m here to tell you about “Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden”

Now, this game, this GEM, came out in early 2008, so you might have heard of it before, and that’s great, this post is now an excuse for you to pick it up and play it again! For everyone else, sit down and shut up, I’m about to bombard you with reasons to play this game while trying to be as spoiler free as possible, because you gotta go into this blind, you just gotta.

Get ready to slam

Somehow, a bunch of guys from an amateur game development board came together as the “Tales of Games” team when the planets were aligned or something and struck SOLID GOLD. Made as an unofficial sequel to Barkley Shut Up and Jam and Space Jam (Yes, that movie), you play as Charles Barkley, ex-NBA player in the ruins of Neo-New-York in the aftermath of the great B-Ball purge. This game is jammed to the brim with jokes about basketball, the internet, and video games. Between the enemies (B-BALL SPIDER), items (Tupperware armor), and status effects (Glaucoma) or the dating simulator (if you can find it) you will laugh out loud at least once when you play this, and not that laughing quietly to yourself bullshit people do when they use the acronym “LOL”, I mean actually laughing out loud.

Pictured: intense jamming in progress

Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden was made from the ground up to be both a parody of JRPGs, and a good game in its own right. For a parody game, the combat system, so named the B.A.B.B.Y system, is pretty good, keeping the battles from being boring by rewarding accuracy and timing and in some cases requiring multiple button presses. Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden is one of the most well known games made in Game Maker, and for good reason, people wouldn’t keep talking about it, and keep demanding a sequel and remixing other songs with the Space Jam theme song if it wasn’t great. This game is something you need to play, this game is something you need to keep on a flash drive so you can preserve it through the collapse of civilization. This game should make you look at yourself in the mirror and ask the big question: WHY ARENT YOU PLAYING THIS YET?

WELL? GET TO IT

You can get Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden over at http://www.talesofgames.com/barkley/

DOOM

WE'RE GONNA NEED SOME MUSIC FOR THIS

 Got another rogue like today. Its got shotguns, chainsaws, rocket launchers, exploding barrels, pools of acid, flaming skulls, zombies, demons, and blood everywhere. That’s right! This is DOOM: The Rogue Like!

This game makes no effort to hide what it is

Compared to other rogue likes, DOOM doesn’t have that much depth to it. However, its very easy to just pick up and play. Game play wise its actually fairly similar to the DOOM shooters, in that its dark as hell, everything is out to kill you, and you solve your problems with grievous violence, firearms and explosives.

This will be you at some point while playing this

Speaking of enemies and firearms, all the sounds in this game are the same as in the original games, from the satisfying shotgun blast to the sounds of an angry hell knight out there somewhere in the darkness. The game also makes use of custom music and remixed versions of songs from the DOOM soundtrack, giving the game that perfect feeling as you fight your way through hell and back.

This will also be you at one point

Like most rogue likes  the game consists of randomly generated levels with a staircase down to the next level. These levels are obviously filled with demons, and through killing these demons you level up, which is necessary as the later levels don’t screw around at all. As a bonus, the flavor text for each skill that you can choose from when you level up is all from the DOOM comic, and that’s perfect.

If you can get the BFG you will also know this feeling

The game also features special challenge levels that are all about risk and reward, since it’s far easier to get yourself killed in those, but its also how you get some of the best weapons in the game such as the BFG or the chainsaw. The core game play itself is solid, but there are also special game modes that can be unlocked that change the game. Like melee only, or a pacifist mode, or harder difficulties to unlock (which are all named after the ones in DOOM)

Typical rogue like conventions apply

If you’re a big fan of DOOM, or you’re just looking for a time sink this might just be your game. Even on the easiest difficulty you’re not getting through this game in one go. You know exactly what the game is going to be, so you cant really go wrong with DOOM.

Oh?

Ok fine, but that was just one time, everything else is great!
You can get DOOM the Rouge like at  http://doom.chaosforge.org/