Wow, a roundup on Friday the 13th, the unluckiest blog post ever! Hope folks are doing alright. I’m listening to the Phil Collins album Face Value right now because my Plex said it’s the 45th anniversary of it coming out and I would just like to say that aside from one or two tracks, I remain firmly on the side of Peter Gabriel. If you enjoy these roundups, even all the rambling that comes at the beginning of these, consider giving a few bucks to game designer Rob Fearon, who immediately needs some aid for him and his kids. It would mean a lot to me since I’ve been playing his games for 20+ years. Alright, here’s some games.

New Video Games

No ICE in Minnesota is a bundle on Itch raising money for the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota. Even though ICE is supposedly winding down operations in Minneapolis (I’ll believe it when I see it), folks there will still going to need money and support for a long time to recover from the damage ICE as done. It features a ton of games you can buy for just $10 or more, including my 90s edutainment inspired ttrpg MindExplorer.

Relooted is an Africanfuturist heist game where you reclaim real African artifacts from Western museums. It’s fucking great. I’ve only played a little bit so far but everything about it just feels great to me. Incredibly smooth movement too. I can’t recommend it enough. There’s a demo if you want to try it out.

Gradient.horse is a browser game where you draw a horse and watch it run with other horses people have drawn. 10/10.

Jennifer Reitz has created a new version of her classic shareware game Boppin’, originally released in 1992. You can download it for free on her site.

It’s been a pretty busy week for point-and-click adventures. Shadows of the Afterland (Steam/Itch.io) is a a supernatural murder mystery featuring fully voiced characters. It just looks really nice! People in the adventure games community are sometimes a little bitter about the adventure games are dead trope that gets repeated in games articles once in a while, but sometimes it’s hard not to be when you have multiple adventure games coming out every week.

We also got Gobliins 6 this week on Steam/Itch.io. It’s another point-and-click adventure where you usually have a goal in a room/level that you need to achieve and switch between your goblins to solve the puzzles. I’ve been a fan of this series since I was a child so it’s wild to me that we got 5 and 6 in just a few years. One of the fun things about following along with this series is seeing the numbers of i’s that appear in the title of the game, which corresponds to the number of goblins you play as. Some some entries have 3 i’s, meaning you switch between three, others have two like this entry, and Goblins 3 just has the one goblin, but you play as other characters too. This one is a sequel to Gobliins 2, but you really don’t need to play previous entries to get caught up on lore. It’s just little guys doing goofy stuff. Muriel Tramis came back to help with this one too, which is always great to see. I’m a huge fan of hers and it would be great to see her working on more games.

I already mentioned in a previous week that point-and-click adventure Perfect Tides: Station to Station came out on Steam. Well now it’s on Itch.io. You should pick it up on either platform because it’s an incredible adventure game filled with new adventure games.

she danced in the wind like a holographic dream before the world died is a short game/interactive fiction by Nathalie Lawhead where you are the last flower left on Earth, bringing peace to long dead soil. I haven’t played it yet but I love everything else they’ve made including the electric zine maker. Available for pay-what-you-want.

Aerodynamic Armored Soldier TURBOTROOPER is a fun and free little Geometry Wars-like made for the Bigmode Game Jam.

i miss the bugs is a collage game for browsers where you are a little bug walking around in nature. Even if I’m not a bug enthusiast, I thought this was a lovely game that I found very relaxing, and it made me look forward to Spring.

Doom Spiral is a new fast-paced FPS with really trippy visuals where you have jacked into a mainframe and need to escape while the level crumbles. I don’t think I can play this one just based on the gifs on the Itch page, but it seems like something a lot of other folks would be into.

I just got an email that ENCHAIN has entered Early Access on Steam. ENCHAIN is a first person shooter where you are a skeleton running around shooting other skeletons and using a grappling hook. I don’t even remember adding it to my wishlist but yes, it seems like something I would be into. It has a demo too that I’ll have to play.

And Hellscreen is a FPS that has just exited Early Access. You do the Doom-like thing of running around shooting demons, with the twist being that you have a rear view mirror to see enemies behind you, including some that can only be seen in the mirror. The wild thing about this release is that if I’m reading it correctly, it’s cheaper to buy the bundle that comes with Vaporwave Pinball? I liked that one a lot, so maybe consider getting the bundle even if you’re just a pinball person. Weirdly enough, I think I’ve hit a bug in Steam where I cannot buy that bundle apparently because I own Vaporwave Pinball, but if I put just Hellscreen in my cart, it tells me that it’s available at a cheaper price, which is the bundle that I cannot buy.

Demiurges also left Early Access. It’s a turn-based strategy game like Heroes of Might and Magic but the combat mechanics are heavily influenced by Slay the Spire.

Null Space is a ttrpg where you are a crew of freelancers in space in the 24th century, doing jobs and trying to get by. It’s currently Itchfunding, which in this case means that the game is available but the more money it makes, the more they can put into it to improve the book.

And yes, Mewgenics was also this week I guess. Whatever

Demos

The creators of adventure games like Machinarium and Chuchel have an upcoming game called Phonopolis that just released a demo. It looks nice in screenshots but you really need to watch a video to appreciate the art. Holy cannoli.

There Is No Game: Wrong Dimension is a beloved adventure game and it’s getting a spinoff, Crushed In Time, where you play as the Sherlock Holmes and Watson duo from that game.

Wishlist

Michael Brough has a new roguelike being made, 868-BACK! I’m assuming it will be one of the best roguelikes based on everything he’s made.

I’m also a big fan of resnijars and their games, so I think their roguelike platformer Crescent Break is worth a look.

Crowdfunding

It’s zine month in the ttrpg world, which means there’s tons of crowdfunding campaigns happening right now. Here’s just a few:

I Have Lived A Thousand Lives is a solo ttrpg where you play as someone capable of entering the worlds of their favorite books, movies, TV shows, albums, or other works of narrative art, slightly changing those works while wrestling with their emotions. Because I’m incapable of avoiding the Boss Baby vibes meme, I get a lot of Myst vibes from it because that’s the only thing I ever think about.

The Endtimes Trilogy is a collection of 3 ttrpgs about the end of the world, for 2-5 players. Adam Bell and Sashah Li are great. It looks like there’s also a special zine you get if you back enough ttrpg zines on BackerKit this month?

Coyote & Crow: Legends & Icons is a supplement for the game Coyote & Crow, a game that I have not played yet but I’ve heard is very good.

Blades ’68 is a supplement for the classic ttrpg Blades in the Dark, that bumps the timeline up to the 60s. If you scroll down the list of who is involved, you can see so, so many great people involved with this one.

Shores Of Night – Redux is a surreal cosmic horror ttrpg without all the weird ableist stuff like sanity systems that you sometimes see in other cosmic horror games. It’s got a quickstart document if you want to see what they’re going for.

I am so excited that a Spirit Swap solo ttrpg zine is being crowdfunded. In fact, I was so excited that I was apparently the first person to back it. I loved the original game and I am a massive fan of the designer for this ttrpg, so it was a no brainer.

That’s all I’ve got for this week. Consider adding this site to your RSS feed reader if it isn’t already in there. Feel free to email me about your game (see About page) if it doesn’t use GenAI. I just like to hear about what folks are working on. Also consider doing your own blog posts about things you are enjoying. There’s so many great pieces of art that kinda get drowned out because it’s a lot easier to dunk on crap instead, I’m guilty of this too.

The Phil Collins album Face Value finished playing while I wrote this so I put on some Peter Gabriel music to listen to. Apparently it’s his birthday too. Happy birthday Peter Gabriel. Consider playing his weird but good multimedia cd-roms (he also did Xplora and a voice in Myst 4).

We made it through January. What a year. If you enjoy these roundups, please consider donating to people in Minnesota, who are struggling in the fight against fascists. A donation to help folks with rent would help them a lot

To all the rocks that bear me is a game where you explore Coruña both during the day and night. As a sicko for FMV, it was great playing a game that documents a place through an interactive medium and would love to see more of this.

It’s not a game but I really liked this free zine about cooking for others.

Fuck Ice is an arcade game for browsers where you tell ice to fuck off. Something a lot of us need right now.

Second Hand Computer is a toy that lets you make and play text games. I’ve only played Swords of Freeport in this collection but I feel that even that alone is worth the price. People that grew up with these sorts of games (old people, me) will probably really enjoy this collection.

I’m not actually sure what vextro is, but it looks like they had a game jam and now there’s 4 experimental games and writing by folks I like.

The Ocean Welcomes You is a murder mystery/horror interactive fiction game for browsers with inspirations like the visual novel Umineko When They Cry, the movie Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, and the TV show Poker Face. I’m a big fan of the VIDEOTOME game engine and love seeing works like this being made for it.

The 48-word RPG Jam also wrapped up and now there are hundreds of minimalist ttrpgs for you to check out.

MeowGun: Hell Denizen is a new fast paced FPS that has just entered Early Access on Steam. You play as a catgirl and run around shooting demons, zombies, and other monsters in an aesthetic heavily inspired by the Quake 2 era of FPS. There’s a demo available if you want to give it a try.

Adam Saltsman continues doing great work by making little games in PICO-8. KOLYDR is an arcade game for browsers where you fly a little ship around into blue circles to make explosions and get points. It’s a really lovely arcade game that I should play on something better than a macbook keyboard.

Lost Cave is a pay-what-you-want fan sequel to the classic arcade game Bubble Bobble on the Commodore 64, featuring 100 new levels.

Earth Must Die is a new comedy point-and-click adventure on Steam by the creators of Ben There, Dan That. The clever gimmick behind this one is that your character doesn’t want to touch anything himself and must make minions and other folks do everything for you.

Chromatic Conundrum is a first person adventure game where you solve puzzles by manipulating light and mixing colors. It has a colorblind mode as well. Recommended if you liked doing puzzles in games like Antichamber and Portal and want a shorter experience based on light-based puzzles.

Space Warlord Baby Trading Simulator is, and it sounds weird to say this, what it says on the tin. You are a space warlord, and you trade babies on a stock market like interface. It’s by the folks at Strange Scaffold, who have made a variety of wonderful games including the previous game in this series, Space Warlord Organ Trading Simulator. I also just really like the art in these games.

ABIDE is the new stop-motion game in development by the folks that made Judero. This one is a horror game and actually reminds me of the 90s experimental game The Dark Eye. It’s currently in crowdfunding and think you should give it a look.

That’s it for this week. Thanks for reading! If you haven’t already, consider adding this site to your RSS feed and sharing with a friend.

Once again I am starting one of these posts with “what a week.” Solidarity with Minnesota. I try to do one GoFundMe or whatever in each one of these because I just do the roundup posts for fun but ICE is just kidnapping multiple children a day so here are two GoFundMes to help with legal fees and food for families in Minneapolis here and here. It would mean a lot if you could send a few dollars to whatever one has less money at the time you’re reading this. Anyway, Minneapolis is winning and will defeat ICE and one day ICE will be crushed everywhere else. Help people around you if you can.

There isn’t really a good way to transition to talking about video games after that, sorry, but maybe you’ll find something to distract you from things or be compelled to post about things you’ve been excited about on your own blog.

Video Games

I guess I’ll start with some self promotion. The British Game Generator is a silly thing in development that spits out ideas for video games inspired by 80’s British computer games. Even though I didn’t grow up with that era of games and live in the US, I’m a big fan of a lot of them, especially Llamasoft. They have a very unique feel to me that I have a hard time describing but I feel is quirky and charming in a way that is unique to that scene.

Speaking of British games, Go-Go BunnyGun is a new game for the ZX Spectrum available for Pay-What-You-Want. Itch.io is home to so many good ZX Spectrum games and this looks like a lovely arcade shooter. It was highly recommended by Davey Sloan on Bluesky, who has also made quite a few ZX Spectrum games you should check out.

Perfect Tides: Station to Station is now on Steam. It’s a point-and-click adventure where you are a woman named Mara and must deal with all of the issues of being a young adult and features non-linear exploration and branching narratives. I was a big fan of the original game because of its art and how accurately it depicted being a teen in the early 00s, even the awkward and painful parts, so I’m looking forward to how this will recreate the experience of being a young adult in the same awkward and embarrassing ways I did. While it is a sequel, the game is designed so you don’t have to play the original game first. That said, I highly recommend that one too.

Folks should check out the indie game collective Cutie Collective and see all the games they’re making.

SEBI 16 is a collection of sixteen games of various genres made in PICO-8. I’m a fan of PicoMix and CorgiSpace, so it’s fun seeing more PICO-8 compilations coming out.

Karous is a rerelease of a shoot ’em up originally released back in 2007 for the Dreamcast. Don’t know anything about it, it just seems neat and I think it’s interesting that it is a port of a Dreamcast game that is almost 20 years old but also well after the console “died.”

TR-49 (Steam/iOS) is a narrative deduction game by the fine folks at Inkle. I’ve been a fan of all of their interactive fiction games so it’s fun seeing them do a game in the deduction subgenre that’s been picking up in popularity in the adventure game genre. People like mysteries! According to their founder on Bluesky, it’s been their biggest launch in the company’s history. As an adventure game fan, it’s always nice that I can post about multiple games in the genre coming out in the same week and they’re being critically well received and selling well. People are still going to do the lazy “adventure games are dead” narrative but it feels like a golden age for the genre.

Tabletop Games

I’ve posted about the mech tragedy ttrpg Dragon Reactor before but now you can pre-order the print version on the Dinoberry Games website. Even if that one doesn’t seem to be for you, take a look around their site, read some blog posts, and see what else they’ve made. I’m personally a big fan of their games Sprouts and Dinocar.

Breathing Techniques Against Monsters is a lyric game about dealing with negative thoughts via breathing exercises and intended to help you with your anxiety and stress. Available for Pay-What-You-Want.

Demos

Uncle Lee’s Cookbook is an upcoming point-and-click adventure where you play as the teen Ines as she tries to save the world caused by the fallout of her Uncle Lee’s experiements. There’s a demo playable in the browser on Itch.io.

Wishlist

Oh!Ware looks like a very neat Mancala roguelike to me. I don’t think I’ve seen Mancala in any video game form before outside of pure recreations of the game itself.

That’s it for this week. Thanks for reading. If you’ve got a game you’re working on and it doesn’t use AI, feel free to send me an email about it. See the About page here for contact info. I just like to hear about what folks are working on. Or feel free to send an email or post in the comments to say hi. That’s fine too.