IOS Spotlight #29: Naught 2

Title: Naught 2
Developer: Blue Shadow Games
Platforms: IOS Universal
Price: $1.99
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It takes a lot for a platformer to stand out on the App Store. Naught 2 caught my attention due to its atmospheric art style and gravity shifting gameplay.

The first aspect that stands out is the art style, a mix of Limbo-esque black and grayscale environments, contrasted by bursts of color. The game has a textured organic look, with pulsating grasping roots, oily dripping pools, and other weird fauna and flora. But navigating these game's 30+ levels are not as simple as moving and jumping; instead you rotate the environment itself. Your character Naught is nicely animated, maneuvering into a slide when you turn the floor into a steep slope or landing in a crouch after a long fall. The rotating mechanic allows for curving twisting world, moving obstacles, and hazards at all angles. And later levels drop you into the dark underwater depths and unleash dangerous creatures and bosses to evade. I didn't find the game that difficult but the exploration, cool gameplay mechanic, and visuals made up for that in my opinion.

Replay value consists of hard-to-reach or well-hidden diamonds in each level, as well as a time trial mode that unlocks after you complete each zone. The developers are already working on more levels that will add "new enemies, more skills and many more secrets" and they hope to release the game on Steam Greenlight and PS Vita later. You can purchase Naught 2 for $1.99

No Money, No Problem: Dengen Chronicles

Title: Dengen Chronicles
Developer: Mangatar
Platforms: PC, Browser
Price: Free to play
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Trading card games have been around for decades; I remember the Pokemon, Digimon, and Yugioh crazes when I was a kid. The recently released free-to-play Dengen Chronicles mixes card-based battles with manga art, and RPG elements.

Choose your bloodline, be it ninja or robot, and then you'll be thrust into various battles against varied and challenging opponents. Each battle, you choose from a selection of offensive and defensive actions, as well as a number of stat boosting or support ability cards, and then engage. These battles play out in short comic panels, and victory grants you currency to upgrade your characters. The RPG elements had some depth to the gameplay, allowing you to equip gear and level up, and the art is vibrant and stylish.

I'm that well versed in the card game genre, but the game was fun and offers the play some strategic depth thanks to the gear and skills. You can download Dengen Chronicles from Desura or play the game in your browser here.

PC Spotlight #43: Papers, Please

Title: Papers, Please
Developer: Luca Pope
Platforms: PC, Mac
Price: $9.99
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Strip away all its other elements and Papers, Please would still be a fun game of logic and matching. But amidst the story and premise, that simple game of logic and studying documents becomes a thoughtful experience with surprising emotional resonance.

You're the lucky citizen who's been tasked with running the border patrol booth of the USSR-esque country Arstotzka. From this tiny booth, you hold incredible power; with your stamp of approval, you can allow the tired huddled masses into your country or turn them away. At its core, that's the extent of the gameplay: look for discrepancies and signs of errors and forgeries, interrogate the suspicious citizens, and make your decision. But Papers, Please is so much more than that. From your little window slot and desk, you become the linchpin in fates both big and small, from the entire country to the individuals before you to your very family. Do you allow that mother into your country, separated from her son for so long, despite an erroneous entry ticket? Do you overlook mistakes to earn more money for your starving family, barely clinging to life in their government-provided tenement? Do you abuse your power to strip and search the people before you, or turn them over to Arstotzka's secret police for more earnings? It's these choices, this subtle world building, the realization that your decision is more than a simple Decline or Entry, but that effect the entire lives.

Across both its story campaign and endless mode, Papers, Please is an engrossing experience that may surprise in its ability to test your morals and present difficult choices. You can purchase the game from the developer's site, Steam, and a variety of other stores.

No Money, No Problem: Path of Shadows

Title: Path of Shadows
Developer: 5 Students from IDEC
Platforms: PC
Free
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Of all the genres I've played, stealth is one of my favorites. There's just something so satisfying about out-thinking and out-maneuvering your enemies rather than using brute force, about moving through the darkness mere inches from unsuspecting foes. Path of Shadows offers a new take on the stealth genre by granting you dominion over the darkness itself.

Crafted over ten months and submitted for IGF 2014, Path of Shadows is fantasy stealth action: you play as a reincarnated warrior, given purpose and power by a dark deity. The game is merely a taste of what a potential full project would offer, but the thirty minutes of gameplay demonstrates a promising and fun foundation.

Your shadow- and sword-wielding warrior moves through a cel-shaded world. You're able to use special vision to see through walls and create distractions to divert patrols, but your most powerful ability is to manipulate shadows. You can teleport between shadows, create new shadows to hide, use the darkness to swallow up bodies, and even perform aerial attacks and dual kills with the shadows.

The current demo is essentially a proof of concept; the developers are hoping to find a developer or a source of funding to continue making the game. Be warned that since the game is early, it's not well optimized and may not run well on some computers. You can download Path of Shadows here.

PC Spotlight #42: Creeper World 3

Title: Creeper World 3
Developer: Knuckle Cracker
Platforms: PC, Mac
Price: $14.99
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Tower defense is a genre that has spread and thrived on every platform, from Fieldrunners and Sentinel on IOS to Toy Soldiers on XBLA. The strategy of tower placement and holding back the enemy hordes has proven to be an addictive thrill and Creeper World 3 takes tower defense to new heights with a massive amount of content and imbuing the genre with aggressive offensive tactics.

Set eons into a future where the universe has been terrorized and ravaged in a struggle with the titular Creeper, you travel from system to system, clearing planets and unlocking new weapons and equipment. The campaign is massive, divided between three different modes with more to come, and user-generated content with strong community support.

On each map, you face the Creeper threat: a liquid menace that flows across the landscape and destroys everything it touches. The only way to stop this enemy is to disable the emitters peppered across each map; this simple change shifts the whole focus from simple defense to going on the offensive. Set your base in a strategic location and build a network of reactors and energy collectors (but don't go overboard or you'll strain your ammo and power production). You'll need to set up a defensive fortifications, lest the Creeper flows in from an unprotected angle and ruins your plan, and then go on an aggressive offense. Set up beachheads with mortars and cannons, leapfrog your energy relays and guns, take back higher ground or terraform the area to build barriers and gain a height advantage. You can even build anti-Creeper turrets and remote drones for aerial assaults.

With each level, new map formations and dangers will test your strategic planning. Spores, asteroid-shattered worlds, overwhelming Creeper from all directions, and much more will offers a variety of challenge throughout the game's campaigns. Creeper World 3 provides an addictive mix of tactical defense and offensive strategies and hours of content. You can purchase the game now from the developer's site, GamersGate, and ShinyLoot; Creeper World 3 will be available on Desura on November 9th.

The Watchlist: Confederate Express

Title: Confederate Express
Developer: Kilobite
Platforms: PC (possibly Mac, Linux)
Releasing 2014, on Kickstarter
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Confederate Express is all about exploration, fighting enemies, and making your way towards the main goal: trying to survive while delivering a package. Packages vary by size, weight and fragility; which makes every delivery a unique experience, ranging from a quick 15-minute tasks, all the way to a challenging journey throughout various events and locations. The more difficult the delivery, the greater the rewards: mercenaries, gear, weapons and ultimately - greater challenges.

We've seen zombies invade a lot of genres. First person action, arcade shooters, survival horror, and countless others. But Confederate Express hopes to innovate the genre by mixing gory zombie mayhem with the open-world tactical RPG (with a dash of roguelike elements on the side).

Set in a wartorn future where technology gone wrong has led to the undead roaming the land and various factions fight for supremacy and survival, you play a simple delivery man. It's a delivery service staffed by convicts and armed to the teeth, but a delivery service nonetheless. Tasked with escorting important packages across this hostile world, you'll need to hire the best crew, assemble the best weapons, customize your vehicle with best parts, and choose the optimal route. Each delivery, an infinite world is procedurally generated; you plan your route across a sector-based overworld map and each sector is a level with enemies, loot, and random events. But plan wisely and try cautiously, because the threat of permadeath will always be looming on the horizon.

Your crew will level up as you complete jobs, increasing skills such as leadership and marksmanship, and unlocking new items, weapons, and even implants like bionic and weaponized limbs to equip. And you'll need all the gear you can get because zombies aren't the only threat; rebels, Confederation troops, and automated machines will also test your skills and tactical prowess (the action is real-time, with the ability to pause and issue commands).

Condederate Express is planned to be released in 2014, and is currently on Kickstarter; it's already been funded and now hoping to achieve stretch goals, which include additions such as destructible environments, XCOM-style base management, playable mechs, other playable factions, and multiplayer. You can support Confederate Express here.

IOS Spotlight #28: Beat Leap

Title: Beat Leap
Developer: weRplay
Platforms: IOS Universal
Price: Free
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Combine simple one-tap controls, minimalist visuals, music-based gameplay, and some stealth and puzzle elements and you'd get Beat Leap

Across 100 levels, you only have a simple goal: collect the gold hearts scattered across the screen and reach the red heart to finish the level. Tapping on the screen moves your little dot to the location, smashing through any walls in your way. Hazards abound, from lasers to various saw blades, and one hit kills. Those elements alone would make Beat Leap a fun game, but what makes it a challenge is that world moves to the music of the game's soundtrack. The screen flashes to the beat, and you must tap to the rhythm, or else you lose those precious gold hearts. Enemies move to the beat too and you only have a limited amount of time to complete each level. You can also break only through three blocks per level. All these factors turn Beat Leap from a simple avoidance game to something akin to a puzzle stealth game. You'll need to tactically position yourself to break as few blocks as possible, while avoiding the "enemy" patrols and always watching the clock, all while tapping to the rhythm.

Beat Leap isn't an easy game; it will challenge you with its mix of rhythm-based gameplay and tactical puzzle mechanics. And best of all the game is free, with no IAP; I've only experienced one ad in at least two or three hours of play and it wasn't obtrusive at all. You can download Beat Leap here, and more support will allow the developer to add new levels in the future.