Indie Links Round-Up: Smashing Idea

“On Saturday night one warehouse in downtown Phoenix was overrun with independent games, developers and players, backlit by bumpin’ live music and an array of food and drinks.

Today’s Indie Linksinclude coverage on The Swapper, Dungeon Smash and Snowden’s Leaks: The Game.

Made in Phoenix indie game night was a cool party in a hot warehouse(Joystiq)
“On Saturday night one warehouse in downtown Phoenix was overrun with independent games, developers and players, backlit by bumpin’ live music and an array of food and drinks. It was the first Made in Phoenix: Indie Game Demo Night presented by local indie game incubator, Game CoLab.”

The Joystiq Indie Pitch: Dungeon Smash(Joystiq)
“Dungeon Smash is about being a heroic champion, surviving insurmountable odds, rescuing the princesses, vengeance, love, duty, lust for power, forgiveness and bringing peace to the kingdoms.”

The Swapper Review: Impossible Soul(Polygon)
“The Swapper is the first puzzle game that’s had me questioning its puzzles after they’ve been solved. The handful of hours it takes to explore the mysterious rooms of an abandoned ship on the outskirts of space are mentally taxing, no doubt. But more of my time has been lost post-credits chewing on grander universal riddles. In a medium that’s often straightforward to a fault, The Swapper is a game brainy enough to admit that it doesn’t have all the solutions.”

Hobo Cat With A Chainsaw(Kotaku)
“This is CATDAMMIT! It’s about a cat, described by the devs as “a milkoholic hobo”. His milk was spilled, so now he has a chainsaw, and he is destroying everything.”

Untitled(Kotaku) “Aaron Hernandez might not make it back in time for the next Madden, but if you want to play a topical video game (not about a crack-smoking mayor), try Snowden’s Leaks: The Game. It was made by Dutch developers in 72 hours. No, it won’t report your high scores to the NSA.”

Impressions: Card Hunter Beta(RPS)
“Ah, that’s the stuff. I couldn’t have wished for anything more stabilising during a week when the games industry seems of the verge of eating itself. A game about games, a game where all this came from, a game about the purity and the silliness of escapism, a game about boardgames, card games and pen and paper roleplaying games. Console scenesters might have their Monster Hunter; on PC, we have Card Hunter. Card Hunter, I heart you.”

Kickstarter Katchup – June 30th 2013(RPS)
“Last week I was at Rezzed instead of looking at Kickstarter pages but I’ve made up for it by spending most of today browsing through projects. Thoughts of Kickstarter’s purpose have been hanging in the air (on twitter and in chatrooms that I frequent) and I have been pondering how I see the site. I have backed projects knowing that I’m essentially pre-ordering something that I assume will be released and will be as expected, based on the team’s previous work and a comfortable place in a familiar genre. But I mostly back smaller projects that I want to support and to play because they are different, risky and challenging. There’s a great deal of innovation among the nostalgia.”

Two buttons combine to make One Finger Death Punch a thrill on XBLIG, PC(IndieGames.com)
“Let’s be honest here: Silver Dollar Games is a developer with a wildly diverse catalog. They’ve made a name for themselves on XBLIG by releasing game after game at a breakneck pace, seeming to use every idea from every brainstorming session the team may have had. With that in mind, I was skeptical about One Finger Death Punch before I started playing. Despite it winning Microsoft’s Dream.Build.Play competition in 2012, I was still worried this one would be more like No Luca No than something of quality. Those worries melted away quickly once I got into the combat, though. Silver Dollar has put together a thoroughly enjoyable and unique little game here.”