pixel posts

Well, you can't fault a developer for naming their game something simple and snazzy that perfectly describes what the game is about. Pixel is an arena shmup that tasks you with blasting away enemies using... well, pixels. No fancy bullet designs here! With simple enemy designs and an interesting health/score combination mechanic, it's one of the better shmups you can play online! It's a shame it's not longer.

Pixel is controlled entirely with the mouse. Move by dragging your mouse across the screen, fire by left clicking. Shooting depletes your score, which doubles as your health. You can increase your score by collecting the pixels released from defeated enemies. This causes your ship to shoot out pixels (does not drain your score) and gain score dependent on your multiplier. Your multiplier is increased by chaining together enemy deaths, which you do by leading enemies into free-floating pixels. It's a simple, but addicting system. You can play the game on Kongregate.

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

No self-respecting freeware gamer can talk about freeware games without mentioning one of the masterpieces. It's a simple and yet absurdly good platformer/shooter, developed by one Japanese man over the course of 5 years. It's quite possibly the best freeware game of all time. I am, of course, talking about Cave Story (Or Doukutsu Monogatari for those who want the Japanese name) by Pixel.