Tripwire’s lo-fi mining game, Dwarfs!?, has arrived on Steam. It has a demo, and harkens backs to games like Diggers and other 2D tunnelers. It might not look like much from that screenshot there, but it seems to escalate pretty spectacularly, and also to have its heart in the right place. It manges to reference both Dwarf Fortress and> Lemmings in a single promotional blurb. If it really is the arcade version of Dwarf Fortress then I suspect the internet is beginning to eat itself, but that’s probably inevitable anyway. Eventually we’ll just end up with some much reciprocity that the internet will turn inside out and vanish in a puff of meme.

Also, I don’t trust anyone who says they don’t like digging. Or mining. We all like it>. Or else. Trailer below.
(more…)

Portal 2, which appears next Tuesday (how did that sneak up on us so fast?!), continues sneaking its way into other games. I imagine using portals. There must have been a more imaginative way of my phrasing that. Almost every member of the Potato Sack has gained content relating to the cryptic influence of GlaDOS, including Killing Floor, The Ball, RUSH, Super Meat Boy, Toki Tori and even Amnesia: The Dark Descent, which has got some new, free and somewhat cryptic DLC.
(more…)

What are you doing right now? Working? Smiling? Breathing? Well, stop with that nonsense and go straight over to the Steam page for The Potato Sack, a new bundle of indie games offering £108′s worth of great indie games, including Amnesia, Super Meat Boy, Toki Tori (which you can read Kieron shouting about here), The Ball (which Jim and John talk about here) and Defense Grid: The Awakening, for a paltry £27. I’d eagerly pay £30 for those five games alone, and there are another eight in the pack.

While if you already own two or three of these games you might have a tricky decision ahead of you, if you don’t own a single one of them then this is an absolute no-brainer. Buy! Buy it now! There’s even a Team Fortress 2 hat in it for you. And just in case only one or two of the participating games catch your eye, each of them is currently enjoying a 50% off sale. Amazing.

Last night I got an exclusive sneak preview of the Christmas update to Killing Floor, in which the familiar range of nightmarish mutants are replaced with an even more disturbing group of gingerbread men, murderous elves, fiery snowmen, and super-powered death Santas. It’s an impressive piece of work, and also a little strange, and comes with free stuff for TF2 players. More on these things, to the slightly off-key tune of Jingle Bells, below. (Also, a seasonal trailer.) (more…)

In the relatively thin history of first-person puzzle games, The Ball stands out as having the largest metal ball and also the most terrifying ape. It was knowledge of these two facts which motivated us to speak to Sjoerd “Hourences” DeJong, bossman at Teotl, and project lead on The Ball, and ask him all about matters pertaining to the spooky Unreal-powered puzzler.>

(more…)

Just over a week back, Jim and I found ourselves recommending you play The Ball. A full-length first-person puzzler, which costs £15. “But £15!” you cried. “That’s enough to get almost one large pizza at Dominos!” You already know you like a large pizza at a price so unbelievably high that it makes your insides clench, but how are you supposed to know if you like The Ball? Well, listen, okay. It’s possible. There’s now a demo. It’s got a few levels, and one of the Survival maps, which seems like a reasonable chunk to whet appetites.

The Ball is released today, via Steam. Jim and John have been playing it for the last couple of days, leaving them no choice but to have a chit-chat about it all. Which you can read below. Warning: contains monkey death.>

(more…)

Tripwire has released the third free content pack for their co-op multiplayer zombie-shoot, Killing Floor, as well as a new 99p character pack, which is currently available at half price. 49p! That’s a bag of crisps. The Incendiary pack brings a new weapon and four new maps, as well as upgrades for the Firebug perk. Bonanza! A video of some professional-sounding people completing the West London level of killing floor awaits your judgement beneath. (more…)