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'Bury Me, My Love' brings a Syrian refugee's tale to your phone
After creating a big buzz within the indie gaming community, interactive dialogue-driven game Bury Me, My Love launches today on iOS and Android. Based on real life stories, the game tells the tale of Nour and her husband Majid, both caught up in the violent and dangerous Syrian conflict. Nour has decided to flee their war-torn country while Majid stays behind to care for elderly relatives. With only a smartphone to communicate with her husband, she begins her perilous journey, telling Majid a Syrian farewell saying: "Bury me, my love" (which means, in essence, "don't die before me").
Your next favorite songs are the backbone of 'Metronomicon'
Rhythm games live and die by their soundtracks. The problem is, if you're holding a plastic instrument in your hand, you've probably played through the same songs over and over whether it's in Rock Band or Guitar Hero. Regardless of how advanced the gameplay is, then, at the end of the day, if you're tapping through Bon Jovi's "Livin' on a Prayer" in one game, you might as well be playing it on any of the popular franchises. That's where The Metronomicon: Slay the Dancefloor makes a bold left turn.
IndieCade's 'resist' theme at E3 holds a mirror to society
IndieCade CEO Stephanie Barish operates at the heart of the independent-development community, running shows throughout the year that highlight some of the most innovative, thoughtful and beautiful games the industry has to offer. This year, IndieCade sponsored the #ResistJam, an international competition "about creating games that resist oppressive authoritarianism in all its forms." The #ResistJam took place in March, not long after President Donald Trump unexpectedly signed a contentious, and ultimately unenforceable, executive order banning travelers from seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the US. Protests sprang up around the nation, and the jam was meant to give game developers a unique outlet for activism, organizers said.
Video games are more important than ever
When Bob Dylan won the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature, it shocked the humanitarian world. What's more, Dylan himself hasn't behaved like a traditional Nobel winner: He hasn't commented on the honor and has yet to give an acceptance speech. At least one member of the Nobel panel has called Dylan's silence "rude and arrogant," and the public has been reminded that if he doesn't give a lecture within six months, he won't receive the $900,000 prize money. It's a new kind of strange in-fighting scandal for the Nobel community. However, it's not surprising. Selecting Dylan as a Nobel laureate may be contentious, but it's mostly a sign of growth for intellectual society -- at least in Literature, no one is off-limits, not even mumbling masters of wordplay and songwriting. Growing pains are expected as the world of mainstream politics, activism and academia is suddenly forced to consider the potential of new industries and vice versa. Songwriting might just be the beginning. With the growing accessibility of high-end living-room consoles and virtual reality headsets, it's easy to imagine a video game on a list of Nobel nominees in the near future. Nowhere was that more apparent than at IndieCade 2016, an annual festival celebrating independent video games held in Los Angeles, California.
The game that makes drone warfare personal
Killbox is a game that creates humans out of brightly colored 3D shapes, only to slaughter them in the most dehumanizing way: a drone strike. And not just any drone strike -- the game is based on the first real-life UAV mission ever carried out in an unofficial warzone. Killbox has a heavy-handed message delivered in a direct, uncompromising fashion. It's a two-player game; one person embodies a sphere in an simplistic yet idyllic farming landscape. This player cruises along pathways to collect tiny white motes that emit a pleasant sound whenever the 3D ball rolls over them. There are no instructions, but the objective is clear: Collect as many motes as possible. The sphere rolls along the flat green grass and down pathways lined with balls of soft white light, passing other bright beings that appear to be frolicking, playing and dancing around each other. Larger pear-shaped creatures wander around the area, changing colors with an adorable sound every time the player's tiny sphere runs into them.
Xbox Elite controller opens up games to people with disabilities
AbleGamers program director Craig Kaufman knows he's done his job when a kid comes running up to him on a busy convention show floor and screams, "I can stab people now!" "And I'm like, you shouldn't yell that in public -- but it's exciting," Kaufman says. "All the kid wanted to do was stab people and we helped him." Kaufman is talking about stabbing people in Call of Duty, not real life. The AbleGamers Charity's core mission is to open up gaming to people with disabilities, which often means giving away specialized controllers that respond to breathing, can be mounted on wheelchairs, or offer single-click solutions for more complicated actions like using analog sticks. However, AbleGamers is always looking for simpler and more accessible options, and this year they found one: the $150 Xbox Elite controller.
IndieCade is the best it's ever been at E3 2016
IndieCade's E3 installment always features a lineup of nifty games from independent developers, but this year it went above and beyond. Multiple games on display used physical objects or installation pieces as part of their gameplay, making the entire IndieCade booth a hub of joyful activity.
Hack 'n' Slash changes its IndieCade 2014's Grand Jury Award variable to True
Hack 'n' Slash, Brandon Dillon and Double Fine's adventure that pushes players to solve problems via hacking and tweaking variables, has penetrated IndieCade 2014's databases to grant itself the Grand Jury Award. Indie Game Reviewer's recollection of the ceremony's winners notes additional victories, including the Twitch chat-driven Choice Chamber, which won the Technology Award, and the comic book-style noir adventure Framed, which won the Visual Design Award. Alex Rigopulos, CEO of Rock Band series creator Harmonix, was also awarded the Indiecade Trailblazer Award, with N++ earning the Special Recognition Award. Hack 'n' Slash follows 2013's Grand Jury Award winner, Quadrilateral Cowboy, which beat out Towerfall, Nidhogg, Gone Home and Kentucky Route Zero (all of which still earned alternative recognition). [Image: Double Fine]
Humble Bundle celebrates IndieCade: Proteus, Ibb & Obb
This week's Humble Weekly Bundle is courtesy of IndieCade, the annual independent games festival being held in Los Angeles this week. The IndieCade 2 bundle features seven PC games and benefits both developers and the IndeCade Foundation, and it ends next Thursday, October 16. Three of the games are available to all donors: Cube and Star, Lyne and Ian Bogost's A Slow Year, an IndieCade 2010 award-winning game. Those that spend at least $7.25 as of this writing will receive Ibb and Obb as well as Proteus, the former as a "Best Friends Forever Double Pack" that includes a second Steam key to give to a friend. By dishing out at least $8, players will also get Dinosaur Polo Club's Early Access game Mini Metro and Incandescent Workshop's Artemis Spaceship Bridge Simulator. The latter is a multiplayer-only game, which is why it will also come with a second Steam key for fellow starship troopers to enjoy. The final tier gives players four more copies of Artemis Spaceship Bridge Simulator in addition to all the other games listed, for $17. [Image: Humble Bundle]
Risk of Rain, Jazzpunk among IndieCade 2014 finalists
Juried game event IndieCade has announced its 2014 finalist picks, revealing a lineup of standout independent works that will be featured at this year's festival in Culver City. Featured picks include recent releases like Jazzpunk, Hack 'n' Slash, Risk of Rain, and Mountain, along with upcoming games such as Elegy for a Dead World, Classroom Aquatic, Hyper Light Drifter, and Never Alone. All finalists will compete for a spot in the Closing Awards ceremony on the event's final day for the Festival Audience, Developer, and Media Choice Awards. IndieCade kicks off this year on October 9, and runs through October 14. [Image: IndieCade]
IndieCade at E3 is full of hugs ... and games
The IndieCade booth at E3 showcased 30 games that might be highlighted at the actual IndieCade festival in October, including Asher Vollmer's Close Castles, Nova-111 from Funktronic Labs, Elegy for a Dead World from Dejobaan Games and Popcannibal Games, Sportsfriends, Bounden, Hotline Miami 2, 6180 The Moon, Fract OSC, Bloom, and so many more. Mostly, though, the booth was filled with hugs. [Image: IndieCade]
Here is IndieCade's E3 showcase lineup
With E3 just over a week away, IndieCade revealed its lineup of games at the event. The "Showcase @ E3" will feature 34 games and installations, marked by Dennaton Games' top-down shooter sequel Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number, Spry Fox's Road Not Taken for PS4, Vita, PC and Mac and Hohokum. Sony Santa Monica revealed earlier this month that Hohokum will launch this summer for PS4, PS3 and Vita. Games included in the showcase were selected from submissions for the upcoming IndieCade Festival, slated to be held in Culver City, CA in October. IndieCade will also host a Sportsfriends PS4 tournament at its booth during the week, which qualifier periods held on Tuesday, June 10 and Wednesday, June 11 with the tournament planned for the morning of Thursday, June 12. Head past the break to see the full list of games in the showcase. [Image: Dennaton Games]
IndieCade returns to L.A. in October, now accepting submissions
IndieCade is accepting entries for this year's independent games showcase event ahead of its October debut in Culver City, California. Developers interested in having their works featured and judged by IndieCade's panel of more than 100 industry judges can submit their entries here. Event organizers note that all types of games are accepted, "from video games to tabletop board and card games to experiential inventions." The deadline for entry is May 15. This year's IndieCade Festival will kick off on October 9, and will extend through October 12. All developers who submit entries will be given access to IndieCade's IndieXchange Summit, a business-oriented workshop and panel discussion event on October 9. [Image: IndieCade]
Nidhogg, NecroDancer headline IndieCade East eSports, Night Games lineups
Indiecade East, a festival celebrating indie creations, runs from February 14 - 16 in Astoria, New York at the Museum of the Moving Image. The folks behind the indie games festival have announced full lineups for the eSports and Night Games showcases today. The eSports showcase, highlighting competitive games from the indie community on Saturday and Sunday, will be headlined by Messhof's fencing game Nidhogg. Other standout eSports offerings include Videoball from Action Button, Glitchnap's space-jousting game Laza Knitez and dodgeball simulator Stikbold from Reign Bros. The Night Games showcase will offer up "a diverse mix of live action games, multiplayer games, theater projections of upcoming indie games and more," the press release past the break says, and goes down on Saturday night, February 15, from 7pm until 10pm. Among the highlighted games are rhythm-based roguelike Crypt of the NecroDancer and Tether, a multiplayer game where players must work to collect orbs but are chained to their opponents. Tenya Wanya Teens, from Katamari Damacy creator Keita Takahashi, will also be on-hand. Full festival passes for Indiecade East are still on sale for $100 through the end of January. Starting in February, the cost for a full pass will go up to $125. Daily passes run $45 for Friday, $55 for Saturday (which includes the Night Games showcase) and $45 for Sunday.
IndieCade East re-enters New York's Museum of the Moving Image
IndieCade East will be held at the Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, New York, for the second year running, this time from February 14 - 16. IndieCade East includes seminars and panels from high-profile indie developers, academics and journalists, plus seminars, an eSports competition and Night Games East, an outdoors exhibition of physically interactive games. Keynote speakers this year include QWOP creator Bennett Foddy and Tale of Tales co-founder Aureia Harvey. Both QWOP and Tale of Tales' The Path are part of the Indie Essentials exhibition in the museum through March, which showcases 26 indie games including Gone Home, Braid, Kentucky Route Zero, N., Quadrilateral Cowboy and Spelunky. The festival's Show & Tell space allows developers with full access passes to show off their games in two-hour slots on February 15 or 16. Sign ups are available here. Among all of the indie devs, IndieCade East will feature booths from Sony with the PlayStation 4 and Vita, plus Oculus Rift and Facebook. Festival passes are on sale now, $100 through January 31. From February 1, passes will be $125. Individual days run $45 for Friday, $55 for Saturday including access to Night Games East, and $45 for Sunday.
Murasaki Baby is the weirdest game
Murasaki Baby is a very strange game, and I say that having played The Path. Mechanically, it's just a collection of pokes, prods and swipes on the PlayStation Vita's touch screen and rear touch pad. But everything else, everything else is about as bizarre as could be. The game stars a little girl (of sorts), whose only love in life seems to be a heart-shaped balloon she carries everywhere. Her affection is understandable, given that popping said balloon means her immediate death. You don't actually play as the little girl, though; instead you use your fingers to interact with the world, in some cases literally dragging the girl somewhere she doesn't want to be. Oh, and have I mentioned the little girl's mouth is on top of her head, and that watching her laugh is a nightmare on stilts?
Quadrilateral Cowboy invites you to hack the planet (or a hallway)
Hacking computers has become commonplace in video games. The subversive activity has worked its way into countless games, even those where it doesn't belong (really, TMNT?). Hacking in games is generally a vague abstraction of the real thing. You hold a button as a progress bar slowly fills, rotate panels in a thinly-disguised version of Pipe Dream, or maybe you connect circuits in a diagram. Quadrilateral Cowboy, the latest from Thirty Flights of Loving developer Blendo Games, takes a drastically different approach to computer infiltration. You aren't just pressing buttons or solving a mini-game; you're actually typing in code. Want to turn off a security laser? Easy, just type "laserX.off(Y)" into your portable hacking deck, where X is the designated number of the laser and Y is the number of seconds it will remain off. Sure, it's still an abstraction of the real thing, but hacking in Quadrilateral Cowboy requires a bigger investment in both time and forethought than most espionage games, and pulling off a flawless hack is thrilling.
IndieCade 2013 rolls out Red Carpet for winners
IndieCade announced the winners of its Red Carpet Awards, highlighting a number of indie standouts chosen by show attendees and a panel of judges. Gravity Bone and Thirty Flights of Loving developer Blendo Games took home the festival's Grand Jury Award for its hacking-themed adventure game Quadrilateral Cowboy. Nevernaut Games won the hearts of showgoers with SlashDash, earning it the Audience Choice Award. IndieCade's Media Choice Award went to Matt Thorson's Ouya-exclusive TowerFall, and Joshua DeBonis and Nikita Mikros won the Developer Choice Award with Killer Queen. Other honored games include Messhof's Nidhogg, The Fullbright Company's Gone Home, and Cardboard Computer's dual award-winning Kentucky Route Zero. A full list of winners follows after the break below.
Overheard@IndieCade: What's IndieCade?
The Los Angeles International Airport is crowded with League of Legends swag, the "2013 World Championship" logo plastered across backpacks and t-shirts, character pins on shoulder straps, Riot Games peeking out from under ponytails. The League of Legends world finals concluded at the Los Angeles Staples Center on Friday night, sold out to 11,000 fans – and on Saturday morning, a lot of them are heading home. They could stay and revel in even more video game joy at IndieCade, the indie game festival in Culver City, just 15 minutes away from the Staples Center. It's a casual, outdoor show featuring tons of new, innovative games on a variety of platforms: PCs, PS4, Vita, Wii U, Oculus Rift, tablets, phones and more. One game takes place with Oculus Rift and a light gun, inside of a human-size hamster ball. It's hard to miss. But at LAX, the League of Legends fans have missed it. I ask two if they'd ever even heard of IndieCade. "No," one fan holding a poster of the League of Legends champion Katarina tells me. "I'm not from around here, so I've never heard of it." His friend, wearing a bright red World Championship shirt, a branded backpack and a Rammus hat, shakes his head. "Nope."
All nominated IndieCade games offered Desura distribution and promotion
Linden Lab is offering free Desura distribution and promotion to all IndieCade finalists, the Second Life developer announced. The offer extends to all PC, Mac and Linux nominees in the games festival, which takes place this weekend in Los Angeles. According to IndieCade's website, 21 of the 36 nominees are eligible for the offer, which includes a spot on the indie game distribution platform without any listing fees as well as "promotional advertising" as part of Desura's partner program. The promotion and placement of the IndieCade finalists' games isn't a huge challenge for Linden Lab, as it acquired Desura in July. Still, it's the thought that counts.
