Posts from ‘Freeware’ Category

Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup v0.10: “Save the Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus”

By: Paul Eres

On: March 5th, 2012

TIGSource hasn’t covered Crawl since 2007, back with Linley’s Dungeon Crawl, and it’s changed a lot since then. Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup is the living branch of Linley’s Dungeon Crawl (the original branch hasn’t been updated since 2003). Most fans of roguelikes have played it or at least know about it, but for those seeking to get into roguelikes this is a good place to start. Ortoslon got me into this particular game, and it became the first roguelike I ever finished (albeit as a Minotaur berserker, one of the easiest combinations to beat the game with).

The new update added (among many new features) a new species, octopodes, which can wear eight rings, but can’t wear armor except hats. In Crawl, species matters a lot more than starting class, class just determines which skills and items you start with, but is non-binding because you can always learn other skills and find other items: so you can begin as an elven fighter but then find a spellbook and decide to focus on magic anyway. Your species determines how fast you can increase different skills (varying from -5 to +5 learning rates), your movement speed, body size, metabolism, whether you have horns or claws or other features, and so on. If you get into the game you’ll probably try out all the species at least once, but then stick with a few favorites.

Read the rest of this entry »

Coming to Steam: Realm of the Mad God

By: Alehkhs

On: February 18th, 2012

Realm of the Mad God, the free-to-play, bullet-hell MMORPG will soon arrive on Steam.

Realm of the Mad God

Originally an entry in the TIGSource Assemblee Competition, Realm of the Mad God has continued to gain popularity for the past two years, and was announced as a Main Competition finalist for the 2012 Independent Games Festival. The game’s move to Steam, early next week, shows just how popular it has become and will introduce achievements to the game as well as a stand-alone client (though players will still be able to play in their browsers, if they so wish). The game will continue to be free to play, and it’s almost certain that the team intends to add new content throughout the foreseeable future as the player base continues to grow.

Congratulations, Wild Shadow Studios!

 

TIGdb: Entry for Realm of the Mad God

Dwarf Fortress 2012

By: Alehkhs

On: February 14th, 2012

Dwarven Throne Room

A new release of Dwarf Fortress has arrived from the Mountainhomes!

Release 0.34.01 fleshes out world generation (including massive cities complete with sewers, dungeons, catacombs, marketplaces, and outlying farmland), creatures (including werewolves, vampires, mummies, and necromancers capable of raising the dead), and many other features.

Click here for a more comprehensive list of changes and additions.

(Image Source: Fault, of the Bay 12 Forums)

Review: Katawa Shoujo

By: Derek Yu

On: February 8th, 2012

[This is a guest review by Tof Eklund.]

Katawa Shoujo, by 4LeafStudios
“Everyone wants someone there to pull them up, out of their self-pity.” -Hisao Nakai

Katawa Shoujo is a visual novel that takes place at a school for the disabled. The game’s protagonist, Hisao, arrives there reluctantly after a long hospital stay for life-threatening arrhythmia (irregular heartbeat). His first episode occurred when a girl at his school confessed to him, setting the tone of heartbreak, isolation, and the difficulty of human connection for the game. Thus the game’s logo, a yellow heart criss-crossed with bandages: wounded and frightened.

This is a relationship/dating sim game, but it is closer in feel to Evangelion than any of the “harem” anime and manga (Tenchi Muyo, Love Hina) that it may seem, on casual inspection, to resemble. Each of the girls that Hisao can wind up falling in love with at Yamaku Academy has a different disability, and that, combined with the fact that there is (semi-)explicit sex in this game, is the reason some people have dismissed it, unplayed, as a fetish-fest.

Read the rest of this entry »

Zelda Classic Quests

By: Derek Yu

On: February 4th, 2012

[This is an overly enthusiastic guest article by vinheim that was originally posted to TIGForums. Zelda Classic is an enhanced remake of the original Legend of Zelda that runs custom quests built with ZC’s editors.]

Hey TIGers, prepare your anus for a waaaaall of text.

I bet some of you who’ve played the Legend of Zelda series and enjoyed it are probably thinking “Damn, these are incredible, it doesn’t get better than this!” or “There’s no way a LoZ fan game could compete with these.” Well I’m here to tell you that you are completely wrong and it gets better. Much, much better.

I’d like to introduce two types of LoZ fan games. For the rom hack games, I’ve made some short reviews on [a TIGForums] post. There’s one post near the top and another near the bottom. Don’t worry about the negatives, the gameplay makes up for it.

Second, for the Zelda Classic games, which may as well be the pinnacle of gameplay in the history of videogames since forever. These quests take the core engine of LoZ, add some additional functionality, graphics, and music through scripting and the level editor and let their creativity do the rest. One of the unique functionalities is how people have emulated side-scrolling screens.

Here’s some of the best I’ve played. Assume that graphics, gameplay, sound, and exploration is already awesome and the story is mediocre before reading the additional comments.

Read the rest of this entry »

Katawa Shoujo

By: Derek Yu

On: January 28th, 2012

Katawa Shoujo, by Four Leaf Studios

Katawa Shoujo (lit. “Cripple Girls”) is a visual novel that was developed by Four Leaf Studios, an “international team of amateur developers”. Based on a sketch by doujinshi Raita Honjou (who’s also the character artist for Valkyria Chronicles), the game takes place in a high school for disabled teenagers. 4 years in development, Katawa Shoujo was released early this year and the team disbanded soon after.

I haven’t played it, but most of the comment threads about the game seem to start with someone wondering out loud whether it’s as perverted and exploitative as it sounds, to be answered by fans who claim the subject matter is treated tastefully and that the actual sex, which is minimal, takes a backseat to the development of the characters and their relationships.

Brogue

By: Derek Yu

On: January 15th, 2012

Brogue, by Brian Walker

Brogue is a roguelike that’s been in active development since 2009. It’s unique in that it eschews all other attributes – dexterity, intelligence, charisma, wisdom, etc. – in favor of strength, which can only be gained through potions. Likewise, this single stat only determines one thing: whether or not you can wield better weapons and armor without incurring a penalty. Potions of strength are obviously important in Brogue, but so are scrolls of enchantment: enchanting items not only increases their power, but also reduces their strength requirements.

In a game like Nethack, for example, you’ll often encounter monsters and items that are similar to one another, like the four different types of short swords that only deal slight differences in damage. In Brogue, however, everything is much more distinct. Many monsters have unique attacks, like thieving monkeys or goblin conjurers that summon spectral blades to chase you. And it’s easy to tell whether a weapon or armor is better by simply looking at the strength requirement (although some types of equipment have special abilities, too, like hammers and spears which deal damage across multiple spaces).

Brogue is streamlined, and even though it sports ASCII graphics it reminds me of console roguelikes like Shiren the Wanderer, due to its intuitive interface (fully mouse-accessible) and simplified mechanics. It still manages to be challenging, but the challenge lies less in knowing trivia about the game than simply making smart decisions. The graphics are actually very pretty, too – Brogue’s dungeons are quite naturalistic and sport all kinds of colorful areas, from green-and-brown fungus forests to blue-and-purple sun-lit grottos. Even caustic gases and deadly wildfires look great as they spread slowly across the floor… just make sure you don’t get backed into a corner while you’re admiring them!

TIGdb: Entry for Brogue

Hydra Castle Labyrinth

By: Derek Yu

On: January 10th, 2012

Hydra Castle Labyrinth, by E. Hashimoto

Hydra Castle Labyrinth is a nice Galious-like by E. Hashimoto (aka “Buster”), who also made Akuji the Demon. The game was released last year and has been fully translated into English by Gary the Krampus.

TIGdb: Entry for Hydra Castle Labyrinth

Hyper Princess Pitch

By: Derek Yu

On: December 1st, 2011

Hyper Princess Pitch, by Daniel Remar

Hyper Princess Pitch, the latest game from Daniel Remar (Hero Core, Iji), is a top-down arena shoot ’em up. A remake of Beaucomm Interactive’s Operation Carnage (DOS, 1996), Pitch seems like it plays more like the faster-paced Smash TV (Arcade, 1990), with lots of enemies streaming in quickly from the walls and sides of the screen. It’s quite short, having only 4 stages, and an average player shouldn’t have too much trouble completing it on the medium difficulty settings. However, the highest difficulty setting is no joke, as the bullets are much more prodigious and the bosses are given an extra attack pattern after they would normally die. You also only start with one extra life.

The scoring system is quite simple: playing at higher difficulty settings grants you a bigger score multiplier. By completing a level you not only get an extra life, but you also get bonuses for each room that you beat without taking damage. It’s worth noting that enemies do drop pickups randomly in this game, making luck a factor in scoring.

Pitch is set in the same world as Garden Gnome Carnage, and as such, it’s very light-hearted. The main character, the princess, fights an assortment of Christmas-themed baddies, from elves to ornaments. As for her arsenal, she has piledriver special attacks (see screenshot), uses black cats as options, and holsters two versatile secondary weapons: an ice shot that destroys yellow bullets and a bouncy rainbow shot.

Fans of Remar know he puts out fun games – this one is no exception. Happy Holidays!

TIGdb: Entry for Hyper Princess Pitch

Read the rest of this entry »

2012 IGF Pirate Kart

By: Derek Yu

On: October 20th, 2011

2012 IGF Pirate Kart

Weighing in at a hefty 1.36 GB, the 2012 IGF Pirate Kart was assembled as a celebration of the small, quirky freeware titles that often go unnoticed amidst the higher-profile games entered into the Independent Games Festival. Over 100 people contributed over 300 games to the project, which was submitted to the IGF earlier this week. Cool effort on the part of Mike Meyer, the kart’s curator, as well as its numerous participants.

The original Pirate Kart was an entry in TIGSource’s very first competition, the B-Games Compo.