This week we head to the clouds (we also head below the clouds), with the likes of the scrumptious Cloud Below, and the equally scrumptious Afterglow, Wibble Wobble and more. Free games continue to inspire and delight me, and here are five more inspirational, delightful things.
Claw Champion Earth by From Smiling
This Indies Vs Gamers Jam game concerns that rigged claw game you find in amusement arcades. Here it's not (apparently) rigged, and you actually stand a decent chance of grabbing and retrieving precious items before your opponent snaffles them from under your nose. Oh yeah: this is competitive clawing, where you're often locked in a battle of grabbers, fighting over that shiny jewel or DVD. When both player and CPU tussle over the same object, points rack up at an alarming rate, with each tug swaying the points counter this way or that. A smart expansion of an existing game.
Celeste by Matt Thorson and Noel Berry
PICO-8 is a "fantasy console" that lets you make, share and play little games using a surprisingly powerful and expansive set of tools. Prolific indie devs Matt Thorson and Noel Berry have used it to make Celeste, a clever platformer where you die repeatedly on spikes and down sheer pits. Between these deaths are brief moments of progress, where you learn to master the game's novel and well-implemented dashing mechanic. You can dash in any direction, and also in the air, but you'll need to land in order to 'recharge' it. You know that a recharge is due by the colour of your hair, which changes from a reddy pink to blue. The music is ace, the colours look lovely, and you'll want to keep playing to get better at it.
Wibble Wobble by Daniel Linssen
A very wibbly wobbly Indies Vs Gamers Jam game that tasks you with collecting stars while avoiding nasty red spikes. Two things make this difficult: the constantly fluctuating ground, and the reddy badness that pokes up through the floor when the wibbles and wobbles pass below the dotted threshold. The music, by Shannon Mason, is incredible, evoking Jeremy Soule's exceptional Secret of Evermore soundtrack. (The other parts of Wibble Wobble are very good too: this is a compelling, and oddly serene score attack game.)
Clouds Below by Tree of Life
A gorgeous and fairly computer-hungry game about exploring a series of floating islands. You have wings, and in the game, and you can use your game-wings to shoot straight up into the air, and then to glide across the map. This is a wonderful feeling, which evokes some of the joy of movement found in thatgamecompany's games.
Afterglow by Swofl
Swofl's remarkable puzzle game makes great use of shaders, swish visual effects and sounds, but it's the brainteasers themselves that cause me to recommend Afterglow. They're tough, unusual puzzles that require you to investigate your homely/scary/doors-keep-shrinking-on-me environment in exquisite detail. (And if you find them too much for your brain, like I did, you can lower the puzzle difficulty, and see the world adjust instantly.) Highly recommended, unless you're already feeling a bit queasy.
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