Indie

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

Most of the browser games that have been talked about on Freeware Friday have been by the esteemed Flashbang Studios. However, it's time to break that trend with a game that is just as good as anything Flashbang can or has come up with. Farbs' Captain Forever was released a while ago to those who have donated, with the promise of it being released for free at a later date. That later date has arrived, and Captain Forever is now available to the general public. It's an excellent game, and one that you can easily lose a lot of time to, which makes it both a great freeware game and an amazing browser game.

Some may have doubted Mr. T's overwhelming hacker skills, but it looks like he's finally put all naysayers to rest and changed the face of World of Warcraft. Introducing, the Mohawk Grenade. It's an in-game item that can be hurled at other players to give them a "T-riffic haircut." Mohawk Grenades can be claimed from any Night Elf Mohawk NPC camped outside every starting zone. How long will these grenades be available? Until the Night Elf Mohawks decide that their work is done and move on...

Download HD World of Warcraft Mr. T 'Mohawk Grenade' Commercial (29 MB)

If you like saving money, even if its just the beginning of the work week, then we are happy to help out with some new PC game sales that have popped up today:

• Direct2Drive has launched a new bundle of seven indie games for just $24.95. The bundle sale, which ends on November 16, includes the games Project Aftermath, Aquaria, I-Fluid, And Yet It Moves, Acceleration of Suguri, AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! and Crayon Physics Deluxe.
• Steam has cut the recent first person shooter Dreamkiller's price down to $19.99 until November 16. Also, 3000AD's games Angle of Attack and All Aspect Warfare have had their prices cut by 50 percent
  
• GoG.com has lowered the price of the RTS game Knights & Merchants to just $4.99 for one week.

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

Way back in May there was a little game that scared my pants off with some truly disturbing imagery and sound. That game was All Of Our Friends Are Dead, and it is still one of the scariest games I have ever played. It doesn't stop with just that game, however, as the developer made a thematic sequel with the confusingly titled Au Sable. Where All Of Our Friends Are Dead was spooky, Au Sable cranks it up even further. There are few games that I have to stop playing for reasons pertaining to creepiness or terror, and none that force me to do it as much as Au Sable did. This is an improvement on All Of Our Friends Are Dead in every way, and that includes the scaring your pants off.

If we were to judge a competition by simple the number of entries received, then the 2010 edition of the Independent Games Festival is already a huge hit. The 12th annual indie games competition had 306 entries for its Main Competition, which is its highest number in its history.

You can check out all of the entries at the IGF's official web site.All the games submitted will be reviewed by over 150 judges. The finalists will be named in several categories in January and the winners will be named in a ceremony to be held at the Game Developers Conference in March 2010 in San Fransisco.

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

War games and procedurally generated games are favorites here at Big Download. We Want YOU fits both of those models, and does it in a way that is funny, fun, and subversive all at the same time. It pulls from inspirations such as Spelunky to make a game that is part platformer, part shooter, and all excellent. It has finally been released from beta status into standard, release candidate status, which means it's about time that people seriously give it a try. After all, with a list of changes from build to build that only serves to impress, you'll be hard pressed to find a game quite as engaging as We Want YOU that is also as well-designed and funny.

We've followed the game Dyson all the way from its origins as an entry in the TIGsource procedural generation competition. It stole our hearts, and later went on to make itself into a freeware game with some added features. Finally, a year later, it has been released under the new title Eufloria. While the title has changed and the gameplay has been tweaked, this is still the Dyson we know and love from so long ago. It's just received a facelift and the trappings of commercial, retail release. While it may appear to be a strategy game on the surface, it's actually something much different, and sets itself apart through its liberal use of procedural generation and an incredibly unique atmosphere.

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

Most rogue-likes tend to be of the role-playing variety rather than the action variety. Instead of whipping out guns, you hack apart goblins, gain levels, and traverse through dungeons. But what if it was much more simple, action-oriented, and just plain fun for your average joe? That's where DoomRL comes in. A rogue-like of id's classic shooter, it manages to be both a great remake into an interesting gameplay system as well as a compelling game on its own. It could easily be adapted to different settings or expanded to include even more goodies, which is the real beauty of it.

This is the playable demo for Eufloria (aka Dyson). System requirements are shown after the jump.

"Eufloria is an ambient game of space exploration and conquest that employs surprising themes of plant growth and bio mechanical evolution.

The game allows the player to explore a beautifully realized universe rendered in a style that is both unique and compelling. Gameplay revolves around conquering asteroids in space and using their resources to literally grow and nurture new semi-organic plants and creatures to do the player's bidding."

Download Eufloria Demo (22 MB)

LucasArts has been lagging behind in original content over the past few years. Once known for their incredibly engaging and original games, they have instead focused on expanding their established franchises of Star Wars and Indiana Jones. As a part of the revitalization of old and original LucasArts properties, the Secret of Monkey Island game was remade in high-definition. One the team was done with Monkey Island, they decided to make something else. Something original. Lucidity was the result of this. A mixture of puzzle, adventure, and platformer genres, it's nostalgic both through its simple gameplay and in the notion that LucasArts genuinely wants to create new, valuable properties for their portfolio. It may not be mind-blowing, but it's not half bad either.

Sometimes you just need to sit down, slide a floppy into your A: drive, and enjoy gaming retro style. We know this all too well! That's why we have a list of the best and brightest from days long gone. These are some of our favorite games of all time, and we're sure that you'll love them as much as we do, if not more. Welcome to Boot Disk, and enjoy the retro ride!

Boot Disk covers a lot of genres, from shooters to strategy games to RPGs. However, the one under-represented genre is easily sidescrollers. Since Interplay has been releasing their old catalog out into the world once again, PC users have access to one of the best sidescrollers ever made. Earthworm Jim is one of those games that is not only good, it is ridiculously good, and it leaves nothing but fond memories for those that have decided to play it. With the creative dream team of Shiny and Doug TenNapel, it came out of nowhere to show us just what surreal fun can be like.

From time to time, game journalists get accused of not understanding how games are made by developers. Usually this happened when a critic slams a game title and then the developer defends it. But could journalists get a better critical viewpoint of games if they tried to make one themselves?

That's the opinion of Dan Marshall of indie game developer Zombie Cow. In a new chat at Gamasutra, Marshall states, "I think all games journos should be forced to make a game somehow, see how they get on. It gives you a more rounded perspective." While we think journalists shouldn't be "forced" to do anything they don't want to do (First Amendment and all that) there are certainly lots of relatively easy ways to make a simple game out there for anyone to make. And ultimately that's the best thing about making PC games; total freedom to make any game you want without having to worry about console companies' approval or license fees or even getting approval from an app store. And if game developers have that freedom then game critics and journalists should have the same freedom to write about games.

We've written about how cool World of Goo is previously and if you haven't tried out this innovative and more importantly fun game from developer 2D Boy, you are really missing out. This week marks the game's first anniversary and to celebrate the dev team have a unique promotional offer.

From now until October 19, you can download and purchase the PC, Mac and Linux versions of the game from their site for any price you want. Yep, that's correct. You can pay as little as one cent or as much as $1 million; it's all up to you. We suspect that 2D Boy would like to have people pay as close to its normal $20 price tag as possible but hey, whatever floats your boat. It's all up to you.
Download World of Goo Demo (32 MB)
Download World of Goo Mac Demo (32 MB)

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

Anybody who has ever played a Sega Genesis knows about Sega's old mascot Sonic the Hedgehog. An incredibly fast hedgehog, his games were all about finishing levels as fast as possible and with the highest score. In a way, RunMan: Race Around the World is the spiritual successor to that formula, but does away with all of the trappings the blue hedgehog has become associated with and focuses on the sheer fun, which is something that Sonic lost sight of a long time ago. It's a stellar donationware title that was four years in the making, and those with a love for classic platforming should not miss it.

A military shooter, the latest Star Wars game and three downloadable titles are the highlights in new PC games for the next week:

Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising: Codemasters developed this military shooter sequel on their own (the first game was made by Bohemia Interactive). The game is set in the near future where US and Chinese forces fight over a fictional island. Look for 70 weapons in the full game, support for realistic ballistics and multiplayer for co-op and deathmatch modes.