JUEGOS RANCHEROS’ FISTFUL OF INDIES: DECEMBER 2013

Every month, as part of the regular monthly meetings of the Austin, TX independent game community JUEGOS RANCHEROS, we do a very casual & chatty rundown of the ten or so games from the previous month for the audience, to give people — especially those curious onlookers from outside the indie community itself — a look at what they may have missed. The featured games are both local and global, and both indie and, on occasion, a bit-bigger-budget — what binds them together is simply that they’re all amazing.

In keeping with the tongue-in-tobacco-packed-cheek tone, we call these run-downs A Fistful of Indies, which are presented here on Venus Patrol for your reference, each fully-annotated, -linked, and off-the-cuff blurbed, in addition to their home on the JUEGOS RANCHEROS site.

Tearaway

Developer: Media Molecule | Platform: PlayStation Vita | Get it: Here

“…if you already own a PlayStation Vita, this is a super essential download — its papercraft world is a huge pleasure to spend time in, and it gives as well as it gets in terms of mutual love between the game and you, the player…”

Vlambeer Clone Tycoon

Developer: Rik Nieuwdorp & Martijn Frazer | Platform: Web | Play it: Here

“…as you can probably guess, it’s simulation of what it feels like to be an unscrupulous developer racing against the clock to clone a Vlambeer game before they can release their own version. If you can get down with the in-jokey-ness of it all, it’s too clever, and smartly parodies a whole bunch of stuff about modern indie culture.”

Famaze

Developer: Oryx | Platform: Web | Play it: Here

“…a super tiny little roguelike which just recently got released for free as a web-game… a perfect, fast play if you’re looking to kill some time with some dungeon crawling, and scored by Disasterpeace, the musician behind Fez, so it sounds as good as it plays.”

Night Rider Turbo

Developer: Sos | Platform: Web | Play it: Here

“… a little game put together in a couple days by the developer behind McPixel, which is very clearly inspired by the cult classic Enviro Bear, but manages to be even MORE chaotic, as you’re just trying to gun it, full speed, as far as you can down a highway before your car falls to pieces.”

Bear Stearns Bravo

Developer: Synydyne | Platform: Web | Play it: Here

“…a live-video web game sort of akin to old Sega CD games like Night Trap, by the guys behind the brilliant viral video This Is My Milwaukee. They actually launched this the same day that they revealed that they’d been behind the twitter bot @horse_ebooks for the past couple years, which instantly put the internet into core-meltdown mode, and led everyone to basically gloss over the fact that they’d launched a videogame that’s well worth digging deep into…”

Party Bueno

Developer: Major Bueno | Platform: Web | Play it: Here

“…after cranking out a game a month for more or less the past year, they’ve rounded it off with this adventure game which takes place at a party where all of the guests were submitted by players — around 750 people added themselves in. Both this and all of their earlier games from the year are super worth a look.”

Icycle: On Thin Ice

Developer: Damp Gnat | Platform: iPhone/iPad | Get it: App Store

“…a super wonderful and beautifully surreal little platform game that never stops being inventive all the way through, from the creator behind the similarly wonderful Wonderputt…”

Risk of Rain

Developer: Chucklefish | Platform: Windows | Get it: Steam

“… if you’re a fan of rogue-likey platformers like Spelunky, you’re gonna flip for this, a game which warps you onto this alien world and sees you immediately beset upon by a thousand aliens at once, and then provides you with an ever more ridiculous arsenal to contend with them, with until you’re basically a one-person army. There are a load of unlockable classes on top of that which all play quite differently & overall bears out a ton of repeat replay…”

The Entertainment

Developer: Cardboard Computer | Platform: Windows/Mac/Linux | Get it: Here

“…the latest free interlude chapter from Kentucky Route Zero, this is an interactive stageplay where every part around you is explorable just through the act of looking. It’s actually also the first game in the series that supports the Oculus Rift, so if you’ve got one of those you can literally feel sat in the scene and turn your head to explore. In typical Kentucky Route Zero style, this is insanely beautiful and has an incredible, unique atmosphere.”