As if I needed even more reason to play videogames, an intellectual woman goes and does a heap of research about it and provides the most convincing argument for why we should all play more games that I’ve ever heard. Below is a video of Jane McGonigal, a games designer and all-round awesome person who believes that “Reality is broken and we need to make it work more like a game.” It’s a 20 minute presentation, recorded in February 2010, and it’s one of the most thought-provoking things I’ve seen all year.
Dome Keeper is an excellent little spin on the tower defense game, in which you play the role of a jetpacking miner defending his base from swarms of aliens, whilst searching for a hidden relic buried somewhere beneath him. And now, with this huge free update, you can play it with friends.
I want to talk about Cloudpunk, a game where you get to be a flying-car delivery driver in a futuristic cyberpunk city. Its world is an incredible achievement of environmental design, and while the gameplay itself may be basic, the city of Nivalis is a thing of beauty to behold. Nivalis is built out of hundreds of hand-modelled cuboid buildings; there’s nothing procedural about it. Apparently it took 3 years for the devs to design the city, and it really shows.
I do love me some quality pixel art, and it doesn’t get much better than this. Cast n Chill is a cozy side-scrolling fishing game by small indie dev team Wombat Brawler, with absolutely gorgeous visuals. It’s simple to play, and you you can dip in and out of it at your leisure, making it a fine addition to our collection of coffee break games.
VVVVVV is one of the only 2D platform games that I have completed from start to finish, which makes it special to me. I became obsessed with Veni Vidi Vici, an entirely optional sequence of deadly traps that teases you with a collectible orb right in the very first room, which is blocked off by a tiny box. You can’t jump in the traditional way as most other platformer’s, so the only way to overcome the box is by leaping up through the ridiculously cruel chambers above, navigating your way to the top…and then back down again.
I do love me some quality pixel art, and it doesn’t get much better than this. Cast n Chill is a cozy side-scrolling fishing game by small indie dev team Wombat Brawler, with absolutely gorgeous visuals. It’s simple to play, and you you can dip in and out of it at your leisure, making it a fine addition to our collection of coffee break games.
The following took place in 2012, in the beta version of the DayZ mod for ARMA 2. It recounts the story of how I survived the zombie apocalypse by eating 87 cans of baked beans.
Chernarus is not a welcoming place any more. The lush green fields are now infested with hordes of shambling undead. And if the zombies don’t kill you, other wanderers surely will. Being alone is risky, but trusting the wrong person could cost you your life. In this harsh new world, you won’t get far without friends.
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