Like gems? Yeah, well so do the big bad uglies coming up the garden path. And, not to point fingers, but someone forgot to close the gate. Luckily, in Keeper of the Grove, a ferociously cute new tower defense game from Booblyc, you'll have a whole cornucopia of plants, rocks, and water elementals to throw at 'em.

You have three choices of base towers. Sprouts are cheap, but fast and can shoot far away. Aqua towers are more expensive, but worth every penny in upgrades to slow the creep onslaught. Most expensive and powerful are rock towers, but you'll have to wait awhile before you can upgrade these bad boys. After a few levels, you'll unlock the ability to research better towers, which you'll have to do again at each new map. Sounds simple, right? Not even close. From these three base towers you can research 9 more, creating a lot of strategic possibilities with a load of replay value. But, without a doubt, your best weapon is the [spacebar], which puts the game in slow-mo and gives your addled nerves a breather.

Don't be fooled by Keeper of the Grove's Sunday afternoon Candyland exterior; underneath all that cute lies a monster of a tower defense game that will keep you up at nights... unless you remember to choose Normal difficulty on the opening screen, which is what you'll want to do if you are just looking for a nice walk in the park.

Play Keeper of the Grove

The Podge's cute, cuddly, and ever-infernoey insect is back to set the world on fire yet again in Firebug 2, a puzzle platformer. As before, Firebug wants nothing more than to bounce about levels and add to his collection of yummy jelly beans. Sadly, his incendiary nature means that all the wooden platforms he touches will catch on fire and quickly disintegrate. This can be quite a problem considering the icy ocean lurking beneath. Of course, there are other creatures, switches, and actuators that will help (or hinder) you in your quest, but they seem pretty darn flammable too. You'll have to think quick and tread lightly if you hope to blaze a trail through all 33 levels.

Firebug 2 takes all the best aspects of its predecessor and builds on them. Though, like the first, speed is a larger element than in most puzzle platformers, here there is a greater emphasis on timing and careful fire placement. Firebug 2 isn't afraid to let you lose a level a few times, so you may discover its tricks. The first time you hit a switch, and realize it closed a door you really wanted to keep open, will have you cursing The Podge for his equal brilliance and apparent sadism. Some other refinements, like a more fluid double-jump and the larger number of hats and sprite skins just waiting to be unlocked, only add to the belief that this may be the definitive firebug experience. Whether already a fan or new to the series, Firebug 2 is a great way to burn through a coffee break.

Play Firebug 2

Aimlessly walking can lead to many discoveries as you wander down the byways of whatever city or town you happen to be in. Ambling without purpose you might find your feet leading you through a plain, bricked alleyway to a mysterious door as a plaintive tune tickles on the ivories of your mind. It was with one such imaginary journey four years ago Tesshi-e made their debut upon the room escape scene, and as the anniversary looms it is time once again to visit that strange alley and door in Mild Escape 5.

Every year that strange room that the door in Mild Escape leads to gets sparser and stranger. This time around Tesshi-e appears to have taken some design hints from other room escape mavens such as Robamimi with a set of puzzles that are more difficult and more elegant, including some items providing the solution to more than one puzzle and even an interesting new twist on the dinosaur of room escaping, the wobbly picture puzzle. The room in Mild Escape 5 has even less furniture, decorations, and clutter than usual, giving the gamer a space that while appearing empty is actually chock-full of mysteries. The usual two escape scenarios (featuring the happy coin, of course) give way not to a night on the town, or a nice meal, but heartfelt thanks from the designer to those of us who have hung on for the room escaping ride of a lifetime.

There's really nothing to complain about in Mild Escape 5. The puzzles are tricky and satisfying with some neat solutions, the construction is at a minimum, the English translations are terrific, the controls are top notch, and the color puzzles come with text making them solvable even for the colorblind. With more minimal decorations than usual there is virtually no pixel hunting to be found. Who needs a changing cursor, anyway? It's time to raise a toast in celebration of Tesshi-e's 73rd astonishing room escape efforts and once again enjoy the tricky, twisty, mistily nostalgic mind of Tesshi-e.

Play Mild Escape 5

Another day, another dollar, another forty units of butter to ship. Working can be hard, but at the offices of the Big-Time Butter Baron, there's no shortage of puzzle fun. In this Tetris-like action puzzle game by Megadev, you've got to arrange boxes of butter on the shipping room floor, covering as much space as you can.

Use the mouse to move the next buttery block around the grid and click to drop it in place. You can also click the arrows on the right-hand wall to rotate a piece, or dump it in the garbage bin on the left. In every level, your goal remains the same; you've got to place forty units of butter on the grid. The more butter you can plot, the better, because the level ends when you can't place the next block. Any open spaces are filled in with junk boxes that disappear over time, but don't count toward your quota.

How long can you keep building bold, buttery bases before being bombarded by a blow-out of blocks?

Play Big-Time Butter Baron

The king has lost his precious Golden Bottle, and you have just the team of mercenaries to retrieve it for him! Start your quest at the inn with Rune Raiders, an easy to pick up but hard to put down turn-based strategy game by Retro64. What begins as a simple quest for a bottle turns into a fight for the kingdom. You have what it takes to defeat the Dark Master, right?

You start with three heroes for hire and just enough money to recruit them all. Once you've selected your team you'll head to the playing field, an area packed with rows of tiles. Use the arrow buttons on the bottom of the screen to move the entire group in that direction. You can also order them to stand in place, or drag and drop each character to change their formation. Step forward and you'll run into a wide variety of enemies, each with unique abilities that will slow you down and, well, try to kill you. Solution: kill them first!

Luckily each of your characters, none of whom would be out of place in a Saturday morning cartoon series, has unique abilities as well. There are heavy armor creatures, who like to be up front to take the damage. There are long distance attackers, who deal death from afar. Each one has a different attack range and damage. Many can be upgraded with special abilities such as knocking an attacker back, or crushing walls that hinder your progress. Upgrades are essential as they also provide longer attack range, better armor, and more attack power. The key is to get the right mix of abilites that will allow you to easily dispatch the enemies in your way.

After each move, if an enemy is in range, your heroes will attack. This is followed by an enemy attack. Click an enemy before moving close to check its attack range. Note also that every time you move forward, your team regains a bit of health, even if you are playing without a healer. Despite this, occasionally a hero will fall in battle. If you think you can live without her or him, carry on. If, however they are essential to you finishing the level, you can use your accumulated cash to ressurect the fallen. Each enemy you kill drops a sack of money. Make sure you click on them all so you have enough gold to fund your next expedition!

Rune Raiders is also available as an iOS download. The iOS version features two additional heroes and five more levels, but otherwise plays the same. Both include survival mode which doesn't involve gold. Just select your team and fight until everyone is dead. The humor in the game will have you smiling all the way through, and each hero has a distinct personality which adds to the overall charm of the game. The soundtrack, while well made, gets repetitive after awhile, as do the sound effects. If they start to bother you, you can turn one or both off in the options menu. It would be nice to have some input into which monsters you attack when multiple ones are in range, but the game usually does a good job of judging what should be hit. With three difficulty levels, Rune Raiders is a well made game, with solid strategy elements, which is sure to please.

Play Rune Raiders

iTunes App Store (iOS):
Get Rune Raiders (iPhone, iPad)

Whether you're rolling d20s, soloing a paragon Ancient Wyrm, or reminding Kefka just who's boss, you can't deny it; fantasy is just awesome. But it doesn't all have to be fair elven maidens, forth-with and prithee, or even involve a THACO table. After all, it may be easy to forget, but there are a lot of games out there that can let you get your fantasy fix and aren't RPGs. Shhh, we're a little scared too, but just take our hand and we'll crack open the Vault together this week for a batch of our favourite fantastical journeys.

• How to Raise a Dragon - You should already know Gregory Weir and his talent for weaving unusual narratives into even more unusual gameplay, but this simple adventure game managed to plug deep into the squealing twelve year old girl who has always wanted to be a dragon that lives inside all of us. (Yes, even you, Dudely Reader.) In this story that takes you from hatchling to mighty beast, the choices you make determine everything from what type of dragon you are, to whether you're feared or reviled, and even the ultimate outcome of the inevitable confrontation. But what sets this one apart is that the choices aren't simple "do you want to eat the orphanage Y/N" decisions, but rather circumstances that come about because of the way you play and treat the world around you. It's short, but smart, and a great way of allowing the player to have a much more honest hand in their character's destiny than a karma system.
• Knightfall - Take a puzzle and an RPG, then smoosh them together while making kissy noises, and you'll eventually get something like this gorgeous and clever little hybrid from Megadev. You play as a knight with a mighty drill lance in a world where the devil (yes, really) has stolen your princess and you must smash your way through a series of unique match-3 levels where you flip and rotate the board to bust through enemies and other hazards to collect treasure and do battle. It isn't quite as streamlined as it could be, with the lack of an in-game tutorial being a bit of a disappointment, but if you have the patience to get the hang of it, Knightfall is a vibrant and decidedly addictive little gem that will be hard for some players to put down.
• Barbarian Onslaught: The Secret of Steel - Turns out it's entirely possible to make mass murder and cartoon levels of violence adorable. Just check out this over-the-top hack-and-slash action game and prepare to squeal in macabre delight as your enemy's head and torso go pinwheeling in entirely different directions. Control one lone barbarian hero in a bloody, sidescrolling massacre against hordes of enemies, bosses, and barrels packed with meat. While it's true that the morbid spectacle of it all is a big factor in Barbarian Onslaught's appeal, the snappy, easy-to-grasp action and breakneck pace makes it the perfect choice for a little bit of midday mayhem.
• php Zork - While this incarnation of the cult classic interactive fiction title has a few dings and scratches from a somewhat unwieldy implementation, it's hard to deny that this '70s text adventure is iconic for a reason. You begin west of a house with little instruction, but a bit of poking around will soon reveal that the house is hiding some very big secrets... like treasure, danger, traps, and grues. If you've never experienced Zork before but are willing to put your thinking cap on, Zork is still well worth experiencing for a bit of challenging gaming history. Just remember not to go into the dark.

While we welcome any comments about this weekly feature here, we do ask that if you need any help with the individual games, please post your questions on that game's review page. Well, what are you waiting for? Get out there and rediscover some awesome!

Monsters' Den Chronicles has come to save you from the grips of boredom and misfortune! Go, worthy knave, and crawl through some dungeon! The adventurous at heart will be thrilled to see Monstrum Games has released the sequel to their very popular Monsters' Den: Book of Dread, and this installment leads the dungeon crawler RPG turn-based strategy pack. If you're looking for a brief respite from your own waiting, for whatever it may be, I'd recommend taking a jaunt into this enchanting tale of heroes.

Starting a campaign requires you to choose four out of ten characters. There are five different classes and two separate specializations of that class. However you set up your party, navigation and adventuring is still a snap. Just click around on the various rooms to advance. If there is a room connected to the one you're, in it will be revealed and you'll discover some villainous group, gold, a treasure chest, or a much needed restoration shrine. But... probably monsters. It's not like the game is called "Accountant's Den" or "Bunny Rabbit Chronicles".

During battle you'll choose the placement of your four fighters, range being more proficient when in the back and melee being effective toward the front. Each player starts with three basic moves. Some are actual attacks, and others are defensive boosts to different powers. If your attack requires mana, you'll be glad to know it regenerates over time... faster depending on what you have equipped. Each character gets three different auras to choose from and the aura is available to be changed with each new turn. Pick wisely based on how many foes are on the field, what their health is, and which move you plan to use to defeat them. You can choose between four levels of difficulty and you even have the choice of choosing the penalty for losing a battle. Word to the wise, it's more convenient in the long run to lose items than it is to lose experience... especially when playing in any mode higher than beginner.

As you gain experience and level up, at the bottom right of your screen your characters will have small up arrows on their portraits. Click on these to bring up the three different spells you can choose from to add to their repertoire as well as adding points to talents like intellect or dexterity. At the bottom left of your screen you have character, inventory, emporium, achievement, and options buttons. Use the character button to view your players' armor and switch it out with that which you've acquired and stored in your inventory. In the emporium you can buy and sell items, though once you run out you have to spend your gold on research to restock items. This is especially necessary with potions.

Chronicles is refreshing in the fact that it's one of those sequels that doesn't conform to the idea that being exactly the same as the original is a good decision. While the game carries over many of the good qualities of the first game, it also improves itself with new features like fully viewed characters, more character options, sleeker dungeons, new spells and abilities, and even a more efficient inventory and store. If you're a good strategist and you've built your team with precision then you will have less issues defeating the enemy as you delve further into the dungeons, but it still won't be some simple task.

This game isn't a stroll in the forest where you're the monsters you encounter are little blobs to be knocked over in one hit. That's part of the greatest appeal of the game. You actually need to think and pay attention to the abilities your four champions bring to the table. Should you choose a cleric, a mage, a warrior, and a ranger? And if you do, which specializations of those should you pick to benefit your battle plans? Whether you're supposed to be doing something or you've got time to spare, you'll find yourself glued to your computer screen battling skeletal guards and trying to get proof of cultist activities. Go forth and, to put it simply, destroy!

Play Monsters' Den Chronicles

What could be better than exercising your brain while pretending you're fighting your way through a dark dungeon filled with goblins and skeletons and stuff? Nothing, that's what. Not even a machine that dispenses strawberry ice pops whenever you give it a high five. MatchHack from Game Cook elegantly combines a game of ten card memory with a light and casual RPG, wrapping it up in a lovely pixel package that also happens to be open source!

Each floor of the dungeon puts you against a single enemy in the center of the grid, surrounded by ten face-down cards. Tap a card to turn it over, then tap another to turn it over as well. If they match, you attack the enemy. If they don't, the enemy attacks you. If you run out of hit points your game is over, but if you win (ok, when you win), you get to move down to the next floor where a tougher opponent awaits you. After each victory you get a few bonus points depending on how you played, but you also get to open a treasure chest. Inside that chest will be a collectible inventory item you can use to dress your character up so he doesn't look so... pitiful.

You're not entirely alone in this matching game. Potions are one of the icons on the cards you flip over, so if you match a pair, you'll regain some hit points. If you do this strategically, you can finish the level with a full gauge and score some extra points. You can also crank up the difficulty to lower your maximum hit points as well as decrease the likelihood you'll find a potion. Hope you're up for a challenge!

MatchHack is elegantly simple and contains the precise combination of elements needed to create a successful casual mobile game. It's instantly recognizable, as practically every human on the planet has played a game of memory match in one form or another. And because you get to collect and wear equipment, there's plenty of impetus to come back and play it again. It also aims for a degree of hipness with its pixel art and humorous RPG exterior. So no matter your mood, you'll find something entertaining in this great little game!

Play MatchHack

Google Play Android Games:
Get MatchHack (Android)

Nook Apps:
Get MatchHack (NOOK Color/NOOK Tablet)

NOTE: This game was played and reviewed on a NOOK Tablet. Game was available in the North American market at the time of publication, but may not be available in other territories. Please see individual app market pages for purchasing info.

From long-time casual game creator Terry Paton, Waste is a simple but highly-polished puzzle game featuring every child's two favorite things: monsters and goopy green sewage! The undeniably cute release combines quick-action puzzle solving along with a little bit of old fashioned error-driven pressure, forcing you to make decisions that are not only efficient, but economical, too. It's an easy game to pick up and play, no matter what mood you're in or how long your "coffee break" happens to be!

Waste features a cistern at the top of the screen that contains a bit of sludge. Below is a 5x6 grid of pipes, each of which can be rotated with a simple tap. You can also drag rows and columns in any direction, adding another layer of complexity to the strategy. The goal is to line up the pipes so everything drains out the bottom of the screen. The catch is that each move you make causes the cistern to fill a bit more, forcing you to think before you start wildly flopping pipes all over the place!

Waste has a classic sort of feel to it, drawing design elements from arcade games and early browser games we fell for so many years ago. The simple dynamics play off each other brilliantly. You can't drain waste without making moves, but making moves creates sewage. The solution? Be smart, be thrifty, and make heavy use of the "bulging" pipes that hold more waste than regular pipes. By playing a steady game, you can keep the sewage at a minimum and the tiny monster at the top of the screen happy! A fantastic casual mobile game that's a perfect fit for any device.

Play Waste

iOS App Store:
Get Waste (iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch)

Nook Apps:
Get Waste (NOOK Color/NOOK Tablet)

Amazon Appstore for Android:
Get Waste (Kindle Fire/Android)

NOTE: This game was played and reviewed on a NOOK Tablet. Game was available in the North American market at the time of publication, but may not be available in other territories. Please see individual app market pages for purchasing info.

Ladybugs and gentle-mites! Bring your larvae and hatchlings to see the spectacular Buzz and his friends become stunt rider legends in Stunt Bugs! Ride and flip across 48 high flying levels to collect star balloons and coins to hire new trick performing dreamers in this bike-riding physics adventure game. This bunch of feat performing pests have special moves to wow their fans and make grabbing extra points so much easier. It is a cutesy game with a wonderful cartoon visual style that the whole family can enjoy on most major mobile devices. Maybe these little critters' antics will keep those young, impressionable children from being dare-devils themselves. No promises, though.

No handlebar peripheral needed to control these airtime enthusiasts; just tap and hold the virtual throttle button on the device's bottom right corner to start moving. The star button in the screen's bottom left corner activates the bug's particular stunt move and is quite handy for grabbing those out-of-reach balloons and coins. As you jump and soar through the air, you can tilt the device to rotate your rider for sweet flips or direct their flight if they are floating on air currents. Your goal is to hit the big time at Bugopolis, but you need to pass each level with at least one star to hit your next action venue. Everything you run into gets the player points, but coins are only for employing new stunt bugs and the balloons are for increasing your star rating for the level. Its got the high score beating fun of Angry Birds with a child-like charm that makes reminisce of the classic cartoons of old.

Stunt Bugs takes the combo-scoring stunt games away from the norm and puts loads of thoughtful game assets that these games typically lack. The standard Hero's Journey plot structure, if a bit overused, gives Buzz and the gang a reason to achieve their dreams and they look good doing it with the delightful game art for all the riders and environment. Random House Digital made a quirky casual title that will put a smile on your face with its mild difficulty and adorable little insect friends to cruise around with.

The game has some great riding tunes for each different area that ranges from a barnyard hoedown to some city-slicker rock 'n' roll. I still wait at the main menu just to hear the buzzing theme song every time I open up the app. Can you reach the legendary status of Weevil McNeevil and become the next big star of Bugopolis? It will take a few friends and a lot of determination to figure it out.

iTunes App Store (iOS):
Get Stunt Bugs (iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch)

Android Marketplace:
Get Stunt Bugs (Android)

Nook Apps:
Get Stunt Bugs (NOOK Color/NOOK Tablet)

NOTE: This game was played and reviewed on a iPod Touch 3rd Generation. Game was available in the North American market at the time of publication, but may not be available in other territories. Please see individual app market pages for purchasing info.

Ports galore! Mobile markets are a great breeding ground for new and interesting game ideas. They're also ripe for ports and remakes, since almost everybody loves taking their favorite games with them wherever they roam.

realMyst for iOS - Myst for iPhone has already happened, as well as Riven for iPhone. With iPad support for both games still in some sort of strange lymbo, CyanWorlds has released a teaser video for realMyst, the fully-3D remake of the original Myst game (read: no still screens, you can actually walk around). realMyst has been around for a while, but the mobile port should spark some renewed interest in the classic series. The release date is still listed as "spring 2012", so, you know, that could be any time now!

Trainyard does Android - Fans of the phenomenal iOS logic puzzle game Trainyard by Matt Rix have had a monopoly for long enough! Just a few days ago, Trainyard was released for Android, sporting 100 levels and half as many extra-difficult bonus puzzles. The game features a draw-your-own-solution puzzle mix where you guide trains from spawn points to stations, mixing colors and switching directions as they pass. It's a brilliantly-designed game from top to bottom, sporting a hefty level of challenge and a robust community of users who are just as stumped over certain puzzles as you are!

Linux Tycoon mobile bound - Fans of Linux are everywhere, as are fans of tycoon sims. Combine the two and you get Linux Tycoon, the "premier Linux Distro Building Simulator game". If you've ever wanted to design and release your own version of Linux, maintain it, streamline it, and get the world to download it, but were too afraid to, you know, actually do it, this is the game for you. It's already out for Windows, Mac and Linux, but Android and iOS versions are also in the works, which is a pretty geeky and exciting thing to look forward to!

Fans of Metroidvania style games, rejoice, and put on your virtual sneakers! SubMu Entertainment's latest release, Blockstachio, incorporates quirky, blocky graphics, and a soundtrack that solidly consolidates retro bleeps and bangs over the top of the heroic theme music that will drive you towards your goal. More importantly, it also packs enough platform action to keep you happily satisfied, while running and jumping your way through each level, in your pursuit to save the world.

Use the [WASD] or [arrow] keys to maneuver around and jump on the heads of your enemies, and to avoid the obstacles and traps that you will encounter, and [spacebar] to fire once you obtain the ability. Keep your eye out for upgrades and powerups, as some will allow you to explore new areas, and others will toughen up your character, to turn you into a more finely-tuned killing machine. Expect to encounter bosses along the way that are tough, but not unbeatable, especially as you refine your strategy while you play. Finish the standard game to unlock the impossible level, or store your progress at one of the many in-game save points, and attempt the challenge level, if you are feeling particularly ambitious.

With its perky graphics and easy to conquer style of gameplay, this is pure platform fun. The world needs saving, and it is up to you and your cubic hero to do it. Are you up to the challenge?

Play Blockstachio