indiecade-2011
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IndieCade 2011: Tom Sennett cares about Deepak Fights Robots
When Tom Sennett stepped on stage to pick up the Game Design award at this year's IndieCade, his entire speech suggested strongly that he doesn't, um, really care. But here's his secret: He actually does. "I take the work very seriously," he said. When it comes to Deepak Fights Robots (currently available on Mac, Windows and Linux), Sennett actually cares very much. Sure, the graphics look like they were created with free software and a mouse (they were), the action ranges from surreal to nonsensical, and the game's funky soundtrack and aesthetic (that extended even to the signs around Sennett's IndieCade display, as seen above) might make you think Deepak Fights Robots is just a joke. It is funny, but once you dive into the game mechanics at play here, there's a surprising amount of depth and insight built on just a few standard platformer-style tropes.
IndieCade 2011: Molding The Swapper out of clay
The Swapper is one of IndieCade's most fascinating finalists this year. While the trailer will definitely pique your interest about the title (it features some really interesting "create-a-clone" gameplay -- more on that in a bit), what's most incredible about this one isn't how it looks or plays. It's how it was made. The Swapper was created by Facepalm Games, which is actually two teenagers named Otto Hantula and Olli Harjola (along with a sound designer) from Helsinki, Finland. They've created a few games, "but nothing as big as this one," they told me. You may think, given the amazing textures and bump-mapping on the game, that they used some kind of high-end engine to create it. Unreal Engine 3? CryEngine, maybe? Nope. "They're actually made of clay and some other stuff," said Harjola. As in, actual physical clay, which he modeled, photographed, and then put into the game with lots of dynamic lighting. "I probed a lot of different graphic styles," he says. "I don't really like 3D modeling, but I really like doing stuff with my hands, and this is what I came up with."
IndieCade 2011: Desktop Dungeons' inspiration, past, and future
If you enjoy PC games, especially action RPGs like Diablo, but you've never once played Nethack, you probably should. No, seriously -- go, right now, download it, and check it out. Sure, it's hard, not very accessible (there are no graphics, only ASCII symbols to represent the player, items, and monsters), and enormously complicated. But it's also essentially the root of the "roguelike" genre (named after a game called Rogue), featuring random dungeons with dozens of levels, exciting turn-based combat, and plenty of unpredictable magic. Desktop Dungeons is a game that continues in that tradition, though with one important twist: While Nethack, Rogue, and all of the other roguelikes take place over huge dungeons with multiple levels and lots of complexity, Desktop Dungeons champions simplicity. It takes place on basically one screen, in one grid, and that dungeon will cause you to level up from start to finish in just about ten minutes. It's the roguelike genre, boiled down into its most essential ingredients. And it's glorious.
VVVVVV coming to 3DS in late 2011
Terry Cavanagh's topsy-turvy challenge, VVVVVV, is coming to the Nintendo 3DS courtesy of Nicalis. It'll be available on the 3DS eShop later this year, complete with "full 3D awesomeness." VVVVVV's cheerful 8-bit aesthetic will stretch across two screens now, with a real-time map on the bottom screen offering some direction in the action platformer that takes great pleasure in eschewing basic navigational rules. The 3DS version will also feature new levels and "future content updates." If you want to play VVVVVV's new incarnation before it launches, head to the ongoing Indiecade in Culver City, California, and ... track down Terry Cavanagh. Remember, it's pronounced with six Vs.%Gallery-136044%
Fez, Johann Sebastian Joust win at the IndieCade 2011 awards
The 2011 IndieCade Awards were held in Santa Monica last evening and, in a pretty informal event, Phil Fish's Fez came away with the biggest wins of the night. It received two awards, one for Story/World Design, and the second for the Best in Show prize. Johann Sebastian Joust, a physical game that challenges players to hold PlayStation Move controllers still while getting audio feedback in musical form, also picked up two awards: one for Best Technology, and another award for Impact on the community. Tom Sennett's manic Deepak Fights Robots won the award for best Gameplay Design, Superbrothers' Sword and Sworcery EP picked up the award for Visuals, and Proteus, in which players are offered up a musical environment to explore, won for best Sound. Interaction went to German physical game Ordnungswissenschaft, and the Special Recognition award went to side-scrolling puzzler platformer The Swapper. The ceremony itself was short but wacky. Presenters like Samm Levine and Martin Starr (of TV's "Freaks and Geeks"), as well as web video stars Team Unicorn and Sandeep Parikh, cracked sometimes awkward jokes, while the indie developers themselves acted (unsurprisingly) indie. Joust's team used one of their awards speeches to silently demo the game, and Tom Sennett took the stage to simply announce, "I'm Tom Sennett, and I don't give a fuck!" Fish himself (above) laughed maniacally after winning his second award, and then joked that he thought the Canadian Sword and Sworcery team was going to win. "Take that, Toronto!" he joked. We'll be at IndieCade over the rest of the weekend, so stay tuned for more coverage.
Indiecade 2011 preview: Ten games to watch for
IndieCade 2011 kicks off this weekend in Los Angeles' Culver City, shining a spotlight on some of the biggest and best games the indie gaming community has to offer. The full list of finalists was announced a while ago, and all of those developers are expected to be live in person during the event, with demo units of each game available for the public to play all weekend long. The event really gets into gear this evening at the IndieCade awards, where developers and their games will be chosen for a series of categories like Fun/Compelling, and the Jury and Audience Choice awards. We'll have more on the results of those later on this evening, but before the festival begins, here's a look at ten of the biggest finalists, including some you can load up and play right now.
Indiecade 2011 finalists announced, include Fez, Skulls of the Shogun and Sword and Sworcery
The IndieCade Festival has announced its list of finalists for next month's event in Culver City, California, and it's going to be a packed house. There are no fewer than 36 indie titles on the list. From bigger profile titles like Bit.Trip Flux, Fez, and the XBLA-bound Skulls of the Shogun to smaller affairs like the great Desktop Dungeons and the five-year-old powered Sissy's Magical Ponycorn Adventure, the festival's games run the gamut. There will be developers from all over the world at the event, and all of the finalist games will be playable at the festival on October 8-9, with the last 10 awards being passed out at a Red Carpet Awards ceremony on October 6. The finalists were chosen from 446 submissions to the festival by group of 100 jurors. Past IndieCade finalists have found lots of success, either as downloadable titles on PC, or even indie releases on XBLA or PSN. And with the quality in this year's list, that trend will likely continue.
