Indie Links Round-Up: Floral Derangement

In today’s Indie Links , you can go to hell, with two different “bullet hell” games, another game that’s hellishly difficult, a game about prison (which some might consider a kind of hell), and an article about the indie gaming scene in Vancouver which… okay, yeah, which isn’t really hell at all and probably doesn’t belong with the rest of the items in this list.

Brand New Worlds: Gratuitous Space Battles(Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“The release of the conquest modefor Gratuitous Space Battlescaused me to reinstall and lose a couple of weekends plotting and planning. Conquest provided a campaign to sit alongside the standalone bouts of ship wrecking and, lo, it was good. A few months ago, unbeknownst to me, a clever sort who goes by the name Pendra on the Positech forumsreleased a random galaxy generator, providing Endless Consecutive Contextual Gratuitous Space Battles. There was an update to the generator this morning, which Cliffski mentioned in the Twittersphere, and I’ve copied some details into the emptiness below.”

Aeternum(Indie Gamer Chick)
“And now we have Aeternum, designed by Brooks Bishop of Two Fedoras, with an assist in writing from Nate Graves of Gear-Fish.  What is Aeternum?  Why, it’s a bullet hell!  See though, there’s a difference between this game and the Pong game that Dave made.  That difference is this is the type of game Brooks has always wanted to make.  My gut tells me that Dave never dreamed of making a Pong game.  As a kid, he probably did imagine making a game with rocking Genesis box art, but I’m sure his vision probably involved Mega Man fighting Saddam Hussein or something.”

Impressions: Prison Architect(Rock, Paper, Shotgun)
“There’s a mental leap I have to make while playing Prison Architect, to embrace a dissonance from management games as I know them. I’m well accustomed to the tiny people – customers, patients, monsters – who pass beneath my birds-eye gaze being at best impassive towards me interests, and in the case of Dungeon Keeper I’m already familiar with actual unwillingness to behave. Prison Architect is something else, though – these people are jerks.”

Review: Sine Mora – A Diesel-Punk Bullet-Hell Shooter With Story Mode(Indie Game Reviewer)
“When I found out that Suda 51’s company Grasshopper Manufacture co-developed Sine Mora, I almost deleted the game. In fact, there are some people who just stopped reading this review. Goichi Suda, or Suda 51 , is probably a really nice guy, but he also polarizes the gaming community at an almost visceral level. Suda is known for making games that are stylistically unique, with storylines that are at times unapologetically absurdist, and that are as much about the experience of the game as the game itself. Or, he’s known for making stupid games that take themselves too seriously, and that only bachelor shut-ins in their 30s who own Sailor Moon DVD boxed sets would actually claim to enjoy.”

Ask An Indie: KRUNCH (LaGrudge & Rugged)(IndieGames)
“Vieko Franetovic and Michael Lohaus have begun discounted pre-ordersfor their 100-level, quick-reflex game KRUNCH, coming to Windows, Mac, and Linux next month. As part of “Ask an Indie,” the developers agreed to come talk about KRUNCH in the comments below.”

Pong World Paddles Out Into iOS App Store(Joystiq)
“ Pong World is not the Atari take on McWorld (hey, it could happen). It’s the winning entry in Atari’s Pong Challenge, which has just been officially released on iOS. It’s the “first-ever official new PONG game for smartphones and tablet devices,” at the cost of all those unofficial ones.”

Vancouver Indie Development Scene Has ‘Sky-Rocketed’ Since 2011(Polygon)
“The indie games industry in Vancouver, Canada has “sky-rocketed” since 2011 despite a highly publicized rash of mainstream game studio closures, Whitney Donaldson of The Digital Media and Wireless Association of BC tells Polygon.”

StarforgeAmbitious And Awesome!!! (Independent Gaming)
“Sometimes indie game developers amaze me. Sometimes with their compassion, understanding and wiliness to help people in their time of need (Indie Hug, anyone?). Sometimes, though, it is just their totally awesome games, and that is what hooked me into writing about StarForge . I would say it is my dream game.”