Best PC games Games of the Year 2019 Best graphics card 2020 Best free games Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order tips Runeterra best decks
Maps are brilliant. Turning complex landscapes into a flat series of sharp lines and abstract symbols is an art, and I've come to love poring over a good atlas as much as slapping together a fictional world map of my own. David King's free map-maker Tiny Islands is a delightful little toy for penning your own coastline, using simple puzzling to help build a rustic…
Adventures With Anxiety is a free work of interactive fiction by Nicky Case. It's about Sergeant Jack Magnum, elite leader of the deadly facepunch squad. Or it's about anxiety, whatever. You play as the anxiety. It's a little red dog that clings to its human like a raincoat, but detaches when it detects danger it must warn them about. It'll take about half an hour…
PuzzleTales is a choose-your-own-brainteaser browser adventure with a demo
Maybe it's John Walker's lingering influence, but I've been on a bit of a puzzle bender, and PuzzleTales scratches that itch nicely. Part sci-fi short story, part traditional puzzle-book with a little bit of branching game-book to it if you're smart enough to figure out alternate solutions. The brainchild of author Lavie Tidhar and puzzle-smith Jake Olefsky, it's perhaps more videogame-adjacent than anything with bleeps…
As part of Minecraft's tenth anniversary celebrations, Mojang have dusted off an early 2009 iteration, packaged it up into free, browser-friendly format and called it Minecraft Classic. This nearly-decade-old build is an interesting museum piece, not quite a game yet, but it was still unmistakably Minecraft at this point. Players are free to generate and explore procedurally generated worlds and build with a palette of…
It's a kind thing to do, feeding a friend. You like your friend, don't you? You want them to eat? You don't mind if it gets a little intimate? A little sensual? And you don't mind if it gets a little horrifying? Of course you don't. You're a good friend. That's why you'll feel perfectly uncomfortable with Utsvulten, a wee free browser game from the…
It's the middle of the week, it's time to unwind a little, so let's take a stroll back up the spike-lined paths of Celeste mountain, but this time as Kirby. Ingeste, by EX.ULT VIDEOTAINMENT is a free, browser-friendly mod of the original Celeste for Pico-8 starring HAL Laborotory's famously friend-shaped pink puffball. It's a cute little subversion of a Matt Thorson's tough platformer, letting you float…
Talk about promo games normally make me think of high profile stuff like Carmen Sandiego invading Google Earth, so I've got to tip a weather-beaten stetson to IFC films for going low-fi with The Wind. They've tapped Airdorf, solo dev behind the Faith series of bible-quoting exorcise 'em ups to produce a short browser horror game based on their upcoming movie. It's only a few…
Every year, the 7 Day Roguelike Challenge spawns a few gems. One of the most consistently intriguing development jams around, it's exactly what it sounds like - seven days to develop a roguelike. This year's entries are in, and while voting on the winners is still ongoing, I'm throwing in a nomination for Pawnbarian by "j4nw", a stylish, clever little browser game that mashes Chess…
Isotopium: Chernobyl lets you remote-control robots in Ukraine
Two minutes ago, I was controlling a robot in Ukraine. Thanks to Isotopium: Chernobyl, you can too - right from your browser and all. Remote Games have set up a scale model of Chernobyl and populated it with tanks hooked up to the internet. You can jump into one within a minute, though you'll probably only get to play for just as long before you're…
Feature: kiss.jpg
Smooch.click: experience the weirdness of kissing without doing any kissing
I’m not a massive fan of New Year’s Eve celebrations. This is partly because I’m the sort of petulant child who rebels against being told that we are definitely having scheduled fun with an air of calculated, sulky misanthropy. It is also because NYE is one of those occasions that make complete strangers think it’s okay to touch each other and you, with no preamble.…
It feels like there's been a flurry of activity recently in PC games stores. Discord recently added a retail section to their multi-chat client, and now browser game hub Kongregate is getting in on the action. Kartridge is their new store, available in both browser and desktop app forms. It's mostly focused on smaller independent studios, as well as supporting a number of free downloadable…
Curious Expedition: Rivals is a free-to-play MMOish version of 2016’s best roguelike
"If Spelunky were a slow-paced top-down exploration game, it’d be The Curious Expedition." Adam (sob) said that back when we declared it the best Roguelike of 2016, and I can see where he's coming from: they're both games about weaving stories from procedurally generated calamities. In the beta for Curious Expedition: Rivals, other players can wriggle their way into those stories. I've been exploring new…
I move the pawn on the far right side forward two spaces. That's my go-to starting move. It frees up my castle guy. I know many things about the Chess, including the names of all the pieces. Like Castle and Horsey and Pointyhat. I know things. That's why I know that something has gone wrong when the Kingperson piece on my opponents side of the…
Angelina is an AI that makes games, and now you can play some online
Have you heard the good word about Angelina? It's the spawn of AI researcher Mike Cook, which he describes as "an artificial intelligence-powered research project that designs videogames". He's been tinkering with different versions of the system for eight years now, and yesterday he uploaded a collection of Angelina's best hits to Itch. They're all free to check out, and for my money that's definitely…
Failbetter Games have launched a shiny redesign of Fallen London, the browser-based alt-history Victoriana horror RPG which spawned Sunless Sea then Sunless Skies. Failbetter last updated the site's look in 2009, when I'm not sure computers even had came in colour? Now it looks fancier and it works better on different screen sizes too, so I suppose you can fill your pocket telephone with horrors…
Google have reverted a recent change to their Chrome browser which was intended to block annoying auto-playing sound and video on websites but had the knock-on effect of silencing many browser games. After outcry from developers, players, conservationists, and the ol' paper-shaking press, Google have temporarily undone the damage - but only temporarily. Google plan to reimplement the change later this year, saying the problem…
Every silver lining has a cloud. While much of the internet may be jumping for joy at Google Chrome's latest update disabling auto-playing video and audio by default, the new feature may have a rather nasty knock-on effect on many older sites, including a multitude of art and game-related projects and many newer HTML 5 pages being left partially broken. Many sites and some games…
Sometimes, all you need on that first day back at work is something to make you smile. I've yet to wipe the big daft grin off my face from playing around with Froach Club's Titonic Fisherman, a little browser-based software toy/music synthesizer with an adorably doodled aesthetic, and a very silly range of samples to annoy the neighbours with.
Y'know those browser games where you click things and numbers get bigger and bigger - you like 'em? If so, you might enjoy a spell of clicking on Dunno Dice Incremental ("I didn't know what to call the game", says creator Psidereal Games), which has us rolling dice and hoping to hit combos which each big bucks. We start with only one dice and ten…
I'm hiding in a bush with my AK at the ready. There are only 6 players left, and the encroaching zone of death has left us all with very little room to manoeuvre. Someone approaches. They could spot me, if they looked hard enough. I hold my breath as I let him draw just a little closer, then pounce out and secure my place in…
Page 1 of 3
Older posts