Previews!

By: Derek Yu

On: February 9th, 2010

The Behemoth’s “Game 3” is now officially called BattleBlock Theater (website under construction).

On the Super Meat Boy front, here’s a sneak peek at Chapter 2, which takes place in a haunted hospital. Lots of hypodermic needles abound! Possibly inspired by Edmund’s gruesome surgery? More videos of this chapter can be found at IGN.

Notch has been hard at work on Minecraft. This fan-made video shows off some of the new additions to the game, including crafting, farming, and DYYY-NO-MITE!

Sky Invader is a really nice-looking MMF2 game that’s in early development. In the game you control a giant alien spaceship against an army of Earth defenders. Clement, the creator, promises in the YouTube comments that the final game will be “more tactical than shooter”. Thanks to the Pixel Prospector for prospecting this one!

Lots of progress on Michal “Soldat” Marcinkowski’s Link-Dead. Michal’s been working hard on AI lately – the above video shows him fighting one of his new bots, which has pathfinding and cover/reload logic. (The graphics are still procedurally generated.)

Also, no videos but… fans of Gesundheit! and Cortex Command will be happy to know that their creators are updating once again.

Thanks for tuning in!

  • orange

    Gesundheit! I’ve been eagerly awaiting an update.

  • Smithy

    Groovy.

  • http://shigi.wordpress.com/ Laura

    100 prisoners forced to act in deadly plays? BattleBlock Theatre made me smile.

  • Alex

    I’m in love with Minecraft. I’ve been playing almost since development started and I’m still loving it. /indev is just amazing and is worth every penny for the early access.

  • xhunterko

    psst:

    http://www.bytejacker.com/blog/kokoromi-needs-your-help-bringing-gamma-4-to-san-francisco

    I didn’t know if you guys knew this or not. Sorry if its a bit off topic.

  • Skofo

    BattleBlock Theater is lookin’ pretty good!

    Don’t know what to think of Super Meat Boy yet, but it looks smooth.

    MineCraft is looking pretty interesting as well. I think it is especially interesting that it has made around $60k despite it looking like it is rather simple to develop, especially graphically. The ‘work smart, not hard’ mantra proves true yet again!

    Sky Invader is definitely very pretty. Doesn’t look very promising in terms of gameplay, however.

    Link-Dead is honestly pretty disappointing considering how long it’s been in development. The levels look bland, and the gameplay looks like a slower, clunkier version of Soldat’s.

    I have not heard of Gesundheit! before, but it looks pretty.

    Cortex Command is definitely an interesting game, but it has surprisingly restrictive DRM for an indie game; IIRC, the game can be registered on only one PC. After I discovered that last August, I requested a refund. I never heard back from them. =( Data Realms could definitely use some work in the customer service area.

  • anothergol

    nice, Link-Dead reminds me of Hunter Hunted

  • http://lumberingdream.com/ !CE-9

    Sky Defender looks and feels ace (and so do Willay Clement’s other MMF2 projects), but it’s not indie because I can’t see a fucking pixel over it.
    (:3)

    The rest of them are scary good too, then again, they’re indie household names.

  • Hideous

    Super Meat Boy is coming out in March, yes? So says Steam, anyway.

  • Mooseral

    As far as Link-Dead goes, there’s the whole “graphics are still procedurally generated” thing. I think his plan is to have them always procedurally generated, so yes, them being “still” procedurally generated is certainly true.

    Skofo:
    Link-Dead is going to be more of a squad-based tactical thing, and apparently the creator hopes it will be nothing like Soldat. Definitely looks a tad bland now, but seeing as how it’s still basically a tech demo at this stage it’s still impressive.

  • Phoned-In

    Needs more normal maps.

  • xhunterko

    “Sky Defender looks and feels ace (and so do Willay Clement’s other MMF2 projects), but it’s not indie because I can’t see a fucking pixel over it. (:3)”

    Um, wha-? Beg pardon sir, but wouldn’t that make Overgrowth, Minecraft, and that other FPS marine vs alien type game not indie? Since when did a games graphics not make the game indie? Do they all have to look like CaveStory/La Mulana? I should hope not. Or perhaps the reason that an Excellent looking game is being made in MMF2 which, in your mind, is still klik n play game? And therefore not good? Would you mind explaining your position on excluding Sky Defender from the “indie” genre? I can tell you right now. I am 100% certain that it’s not going to end up on steam, xbla, wiiWare, or DSIware, or any other “wares” site you can think of. This game, unless he other wise says so, is going to be 100% free, and probably only available on TDC and his site. You won’t find it anywhere else, maybe here. So, please explain your position on not including it in the “Indie” category? Hmmm?

  • FFFFFFFFFUCK

    well somebodys sarcasm detector is broken.

  • http://www.bradkav.com kavs

    I saw game3 at PAX and was somewhat underwhelmed to be honest, but it really seems to be pulling together very nicely. Watching that trailer got me all hot and bothered. :3

    I never saw the appeal with meat boy, but watching that trailer and seeing how smooth it runs is making it seem like a day one purchase. Looks charming and I love the feature where you can watch all the lives after a level has been cleared.

  • Hempuli

    xhunterko: Unless you were joking yourself too, pay attention to the ‘(:3)’ in !CE-9’s post.

    Minecraft looks seriously amazing, I should dig out some money and buy it!

  • xhunterko

    Excuse me while I crawl under a rock and hide now…I won’t be out for awhile. Can I borrow a riot shield anyone?

  • http://lumberingdream.com/ !CE-9

    xhunterko: no, but you can borrow my facetiousness detector.=)

  • http://www.roachpuppy.com Chris Zamanillo

    Sky Defender looks so beautifully painted, the silhouette look works well where it’s used. The UI doesnt seem to fit well with the art style though, hopefully it’s temporary. I wouldn’t dismiss the gameplay right away either, it could be fun depending on the levels and how far it goes to the tactical side as mentioned.

  • bateleur

    Love that Minecraft vid. Was anyone else amused by the fact that he appeared to be breaking blocks by hitting them with his bundle of TNT? (Nooo! Bad plan!) ;-)

  • Dinsdale

    Dear God almighty, Sky Defender looks like the most awesome thing ever in the world but then again so did Gratuitous Space Battles and that turn out not so good but be as it may, Sky Defender looks like the most awesome thing ever in the world!!

  • xhunterko

    @!ce-9: I’m sorry, my bad. I may have still been fumed over a comment that Joe Laarson(whats his name?) made about click and play games. My bad.

  • http://vacuumflowers.com/ Sparky

    Dang, Minecraft is looking awesome.

  • A

    Well, actually Sky Invader is not indie since Clement is payed by Clickteam to make MMF2 technical demos like Luor.
    In addition, one of Clement’s demos (Ghost Hunter) is a clone of a Construct demo.

  • Anthony Flack

    I like the look of the monochrome characters in Battleblock Theatre; it complements Dan’s art style really nicely.

    Gesundheit has some the best 2d art and best music around; seriously awesome presentation.

  • theTrav

    Minecraft indev is getting pretty sweet, but he needs to make survival mode multiplayer.

    creation mode multiplayer is a little too free-form, survival mode single player is a little too solitary. Together they would make sweet sweet love… erm, I mean gaming.

  • Phasma Felis

    Sky Invader looks real nice, but the there is not nearly enough content in that trailer to justify the runtime. Of the five control buttons he spends 30 seconds poking. two (fist and blank) don’t visibly do anything, and one (move arrow) doesn’t do anything useful. Then it’s a minute and a half of lasering the same four enemies while slowing moving forward.

    I’m sure he’s got a lot more gameplay in store for us than what’s seen here, but man, there’s only about 30 seconds of interesting content in there right now.