All-time Best Games
Listing of the top 500 games to be reviewed here on JIG, and rated by you, the JIG community (ordered by ranking):
David Scott has just released a sequel to the stylish tower defense game, Vector TD, appropriately titled Vector TD 2. Using Vector TD, a computer simulation of Vectoid attack scenarios, deploy and upgrade towers to zap foes as they walk by, preventing them from reaching the end points on each map. Earn cash by defeating foes and keep your defenses strong to stave off the increasingly powerful hordes!
It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a... OW! Ew... is that a spleen? The fifth chapter of the puzzle-platforming Karoshi series is here, and it's one of the best of the bunch. This edition comes with a flying, indestructible, Super Saiyan alter-ego, a dubious power when the goal of the game is to kill yourself.
An adventure puzzler with a "choose your own" path style. This unique and animated game uses a comic book motif to present the various paths the player may take when choosing what to do. Very stylish and fun, the comic stills mixed with the animation is a nice touch. Fun, quirky puzzles, a surreal premise and a fantastic score make this game enjoyable to play.
In a style reminiscent of Castle Crashers or classic games like Final Fight, Portal Defenders lets you take on the role of real-life Newgrounds head honchos Tom Fulp and Dan Paladin as they defend their Flash portal against hordes of cartoony parody villains. You might recognize some famous names from the Flash development world, like jmtb02 or Tyler Glaiel, right before you bash their heads in with your favorite kitchen utensil. There are enough in-jokes to keep any fan happy, and the production quality is top-notch. If you are not averse to ridiculous amounts of gratuitous violence, Portal Defenders is a blast!
You Are Lucky! is a gorgeous little game, created by Shuichi Oshida, that is a cross between a point-and-click game and one from the Grow series. The aim is to uncover all ten of the characters (who look a bit like WarBears with pastel coloured turds on their heads). Unlike Grow, you don't have a list of items to check off - simply click things and see what happens.
Normally, mixing real estate with casual gaming wouldn't seem like a smart move, but HipSoft's latest release proves you can take a complex subject matter and make it fun. Build-a-lot 3: Passport to Europe continues the highly successful Build-a-lot series with just the right balance between familiarity and innovation to lure new and veteran players alike. Hone your real estate skills as you buy, upgrade and sell houses, collect rent, and attract new residents to neighborhoods that need your expert eye.
99 Rooms is a beautiful Flash point-and-click adventure of the 'escape the room' variety. The object is to make it through all 99 rooms to the end. The game makes use of gorgeous photography for visuals, and a moody atmospheric soundtrack for effect.
You don't know where you are, and you don't know what you're doing there. You just know you have to get out. Such is the scenario that The Doors drops you into when this excellent point-and-click adventure game begins. Truly one of the best of its kind.
Deep from within the bowels of the seriously twisted mind of Robin Allen comes this Flash game simply titled: Hapland. The author claims that it is "more an interactive world of bizarity" than a game, yet there is indeed a 'win' condition and it has something to do with lighting both torches to open the stone portal and thus unleashing the power within. And now with sequels: Hapland 2 and Hapland 3!
Dirty Split is an old-school-style adventure game where you investigate a murder shrouded in a mysterious broken engagement. The game manages to dodge familiar detective cliches as well as the high tech gadget riddled whodunits of the present to provide what is a truly unique experience in the genre.
Liquid Webtoy is a Java-based application very similar to the Falling Sand games we're all so fond of. Rather than playing with solid elements, however, this game is focused on two things: liquid and color. Fill the screen with water, slosh it around with your mouse and add different shades to the mix. It can be as relaxing or chaotic as you like and is a great time-waster.
Frost Bite is another great-looking game from Nitrome, creators of Hot Air and Scribble. Your goal is to climb to the top of each stage, fending off monsters and collecting bonus items along the way. The best part is that you get a grappling gun you can use to latch onto platforms and swing yourself upwards. The gun doubles as a harpoon to attack enemies and gather items, making its use a central element in the game.
This simple and strangely compelling toy was just released onto Web featuring a primitive drawing interface with which to create a track for a little character to slide upon. Save and load tracks and even try to attain objectives to increase the enjoyment from this creative little sandbox webtoy.
You all are in for a treat. King's Quest III is a classic from the early age of graphic adventure games. Originally designed by Roberta Williams and publisher under Sierra Online, the game has been completely re-made by Infamous Adventures in the Adventure Game Studio engine and released as a free download. They even have a voice-pack! Somebody canonize these people as saints.
Casual adventure games are gaining ground as titles such as Azada and the Dream Chronicles series cut out the complexity and serve up a little lighthearted gaming alongside item-based puzzles. Natalie Brooks - Secrets of Treasure House follows suit in an adventure that uses optional hidden object scenes to earn hints to solve puzzles in the main quest. It's a good blend of genres that, despite its rather short length and occasional grammatical hiccup, holds your attention with an interesting story and varied gameplay.
MAD: Mutually Assured Destruction is a souped-up rendition of Missile Command with great art by Brad Baum and clever resource management design by Nic Daniel. Shoot missiles in an attempt to intercept other missiles, just like in the classic arcade game, but with a twist: Each missile you fire garners some resources that can be spent to upgrade buildings.
Meeblings is a fun and quirky new action puzzle game from NinjaKiwi. If the title makes you think "Lemmings" then you're on the right track, but Meeblings is something different still. The objective is to get the target number of little Meeblings to any of the "Way Out" signs present in the level. Some levels have only one "way out", others have more.
As any guy with a bottle of super glue and his ex-girlfriend's CD collection can tell you, it's fun to stack things on top of each other. So here's the deal: Super Stacker 2 offers 40 levels of shape stacking, ranging from pathetically easy to hand-crampingly difficult. If that's not enough, I have three very special words for you: Level. Editor. Booya.
You tell yourself you don't care about her anymore. She broke your heart and to forget the pain you throw yourself into your ninja training, pushing your muscles further than any human should rightly expect of their body. You tell yourself it doesn't matter, and for a while you think you might believe yourself. It's not until your friend informs you that she's been kidnapped by the ruling species, werewolves, that you come to understand that it's all a lie. You still love her enough to rip through every single werewolf keeping you from her, or die trying.
The original Shift was an interesting platform game that used negative space as an entertaining hook, but it came with a few problems that ultimately made it feel unfinished and experimental. Now, Tony of Armor Games has released Shift 2, which is basically the game the first one should have been. It's not enough of a leap forward to warrant the "2" in its name, really, but it refines and expands upon the original concepts to deliver a smoother, more drinkable dose of run/jump/puzzle distraction.
Stick Ranger is a unique RPG with physics-based combat and starring tiny stick figures, from the creators of Irritation Stickman and Powder Game. Create your four-character party by assigning a class to each member—there are the Boxer, the Gladiator, the Sniper, the Magician, and the Priest—and send them on their way through stages with austere backdrops, fighting stick figure monsters for gold, items, weaponry and experience. You may interfere as you see fit by dragging them around the screen.
Zeebarf returns and you'll be pleased to know that his work just keeps getting better. Your job is to guide opportunistic exterminator Reemus and his ursine companion Liam through a series of eight oddball misadventures on a quest to... well... do something or other. Go to a castle and save the world, I guess. They get sidetracked a lot.
A new webtoy designed to steal your afternoon and be a playground for your creativity. Earth Editor uses similar particle physics and materials as previous games but adds a unique twist: centralized gravity. Drop some sand on the screen and it's pulled to the middle. Add water and you have yourself a little planet. Then you fling some meteors and watch the fun explode!
When the head of the Weardd Academy's School for Responsible Reanimation mysteriously dies in a fire, the students blame each other and take up sides. They summon up the undead and dispatch them into battle. Welcome to Corpse Craft: Incident at Weardd Academy, a new zombie game from the makers of Whirled that mixes real time strategy with block clearing to create a unique new game experience.
Neutral Halloween mini-game is what I'm calling this cute and easy escape game with a Halloween theme (well, it used to have a Halloween theme. The pumpkin has been replaced with a piggy bank now.) It features the same excellent implementation features of all the other Neutral games, along with simple yet appealing and effective graphics. I'm sure you will find this one worthwhile of your time!
Super Energy Apocalypse, 2nd place prize winner in our 5th game design competition, plays a bit like a tower defense game, in that most of the time is spent getting ready for the next wave, and the player is offered no control over the targeting of the enemies. Planning for the battle is the critical strategic element, rather than the battle itself. The zombies come out only at night, so use the daylight wisely!
Minions is a Flash version of the ridiculously popular Defense of the Ancients mod, but instead of medieval fantasy warriors, you control little tank-bots with powerful weaponry and big muppet-like googly eyes. Created by Flash tower defense gurus David Scott and Paul Preece.
Sometimes you run across a new game that feels exactly like a classic—like it's been around for years. The mechanism behind Michael Le's Jelly Blocks is so simple, so intuitive, and yet so versatile that it's a wonder that nobody has come up with anything quite like it before. In short, it bears all of the hallmarks of a great classic puzzler.
Yes, Guybrush, Elaine, and even LeChuck are back for more adventures in the first installment of the new Monkey Island episodes from Telltale Games. I'm happy to report that this classic adventure series is in very good hands.
Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble is an innovative and award-winning download game for both Mac and Windows that defies classification. It's a unique genre-bending game that includes puzzle and RPG elements, as well as a variety of mini-games. All these disparate elements synthesize remarkably well, and the gameplay quickly becomes intuitive.
Ah, human drama. The trials and tribulations of star-crossed lovers, the agonizing decisions made on the battlefield, the ...supreme annoyance of having some rotten kid try to steal your favorite toy? And so unfolds the very entertaining yet surprisingly complex scenario of baby vs. baby in this unique one-room themed piece of interactive fiction.
The latest of the point-and-click puzzle adventures to pop onto the Flash game scene is a short little story about a girl who has lost her head... literally. With gameplay very similar to that of Samarost, this game is charming and very enjoyable, the only downside is that it is over way too soon.
Trapped is a series of 5 adventure puzzle, maze games that start with a minute long "training level" and progresses to 30 minute long (if you play it ten times and memorize the maze) high quality casual gameplay experiences. You are a lonely little arrow, trapped, as the title suggests, in a maze full of simply-shaped enemies set on keeping you there for eternity. Escape if you can.
Castlewars is a Flash turn-based card battle against either a computer or live opponent where you try to build your castle up to 100 or blast your opponent's to rubble. The game is quick and easy to learn, and can be played against a friend anywhere in the world.
As an unnamed stick figure stuck in a prison cell, you've got to break out of a remarkably dangerous dungeon armed with nothing more than your reflexes, wits and patience. The rapid fire pace of the rooms in Dungeon Escape can be surprisingly tense, and the depth in certain areas goes beyond any interactive movie I've seen before.
From developer Lucas Paakh comes a journey into the fantastic with William and Sly. Take on the role of an agile fox in a fantastic world, working to uncover all of it's secrets and find out the reason why a network of teleportation runes has suddenly stopped working. With a massive map to explore, achievements to earn, and powers to acquire, William and Sly is almost more experience than game.
Karoshi is a platform/puzzle game where your goal is the exact opposite of most such entertainments: you have to die. Throw yourself onto spikes, zap yourself with electricity, smash yourself with a falling safe. It's like an extended version of the cathartic moment when you get finally get sick of Mario's empty-headed cheerleading and just hurl him off a cliff.
A new, creative puzzle game has surfaced, and it rocks:
A little gem from Candystand that's called Electric Box.
The premise is quite simple, and I'm sure you'll agree:
You've got some power at point A, so get some to point B.
There's many tricks and gadgets you will have to use to win,
Like doodads that give power out, or things that take it in.
A short and sweet old-fashioned adventure game from Videlectrix, the faux video game company of the animated Homestar Runner universe. For the Homestar un-hip, "Dangeresque" is the hard-boiled detective alter-ego of Strong Bad, who is the lead narrator and practical jokester at homestarrunner.com. Strong Bad/Dangeresque must solve a murder case from the confines of his office, because the chief thinks the case was solved months ago.
Warfare 1917 is a rather excellent World War I strategy title from Armor Games that concentrates on the use of trenches as strategic choke points. The gung-ho cries of your troops make it hard to lose them, and if you waste too many lives, you run the risk of losing the battle to low morale. It's a real gem of a wargame that works on more levels than just pew pew pew KABOOM. Though certainly it provides that as well.
Synapsis is a new and exquisitely detailed, 3D modeled and animated, point-and-click adventure game that was just dropped into our suggestion box by one of its authors, Rob, and he had this to say about it: "It's really hard to explain it, I made the game and I'm not entirely sure what its about. It's the voyage into the mind of David Carter, possibly dead, possibly mad, or maybe just in an alternate reality."
Haluz 2, the sequel to the surreal Samorost-like point-and-click adventure Haluz, is now entirely free! When it was first released in August, players could experience the first half of the game and pay a modest fee to access the second chapter. Now the creator of Haluz, Tomas, sends word that both versions are available online for the low low cost of absolutely nothing.
Viridian Room is a place you wish to escape from, but have you the soul to withstand the challenge? Muha-ha-ha-ha-ha! This point-and-click puzzle game was one of the very first escape-the-room type Flash Web games. Nicely done with eerie sound effects.
In this world of change, however, there is one constant. Come rain, come sun, come snow, there will be rooms to escape from. When the glaciers melt and California falls into the sea, there will still be screwdrivers and scraps of paper to collect. And in billions of years, when the sun finally blooms into a red giant and consumes the Earth, we will be here, faithfully, delivering Weekday Escape to you every Wednesday. ...Well, ok, maybe not then. Definitely up until the week before, though. After that we'll be updating from Mars.
Avenue Flo features everyone's favorite waitress as she tries to help her fellow business owners salvage what could be the biggest wedding Diner Town has ever seen. Tony and Vicky are finally getting married! Maybe. Quinn of Wedding Dash fame is at her wit's end. The rings are missing, the cake has gone bad and all of the butterflies have flown away. Flo quickly springs into action and hits the streets of Diner Town in search of answers.
Excit is a puzzle game set on top of a page from a spreadsheet. If you have ever wanted a game to look more like work so that you could play in the office without fear of someone glancing over your shoulder and seeing particle effects shooting toward all edges of your computer screen while you're dodging asteroids and flying monkeys, then this is for you.
Acrobots are little 3-legged acrobatic robots that hop and jump around and react to each other. Together they form an unsual webtoy that includes impressive physics as well as some very fluid animation. Very nicely done by the same Vector Park folks that brought us Levers, and Feed the Head.
The Gotmail team of Japan has just released their latest point-and-click adventure, and I am pleased to report this one has an English version available. The Shochu Bar takes place in a familiar setting for anyone who has played the other gotmail games, but the story here is a different one. This is the story of a woman who was considering leaving her boyfriend for good.
Dracula 3: The Path of the Dragon exists within that journey from the reality of Vlad the Impaler, the madman the Count was based upon, to the myth of the best-known vampire, Dracula. It's a long, deep and satisfying adventure game laden with volumes of text, and a pleasantly eerie setting that's brilliantly illustrated.
Goldburger To Go is a short flash game where you must position various components in a Rube Goldberg-type device in order to assemble a tasty (but unhealthy) snack on a skateboard at the end.
Can you torque the talk? In this unusual Flash adventure game your spacecraft crash lands on an alien planet, and to escape you must observe the culture and learn a new language to communicate with the inhabitants of this alien world. Remarkable in its originality and design, as well as its gameplay.
Who could ever be satisfied just upgrading weapons systems and defensive towers? In Upgrade Complete, a shooter from Tony of Shift fame, you can upgrade practically anything you can think of. The title logo, the menu screen background, the user interface buttons... and oh yes, your weapons systems, too. How fast can you upgrade everything?
The title sounds like the name of a top-secret Cold War superweapon, or perhaps a very specialized brand of bleach, but Red Remover has nothing to do with either Soviets or stains. Instead, this latest offering from Gaz charges you with the task of removing all of the melancholy red blocks in a level while keeping all the exuberant greens.
The Majesty of Colors is an expressive interactive story about choices and consequences. You play the part of a nightmarish Lovecraftian beast from the undiscovered ocean depths, as it creeps to the surface and encounters the human race for the first time. A first-person narrative provides context, and helps guide you through your emotional encounter with this confusing new world.
Matt Sandorf: Journey to Endless Entertainment is not just an artistic point-and-click game. It is an advergame—a promotion for the Sony empire from music to gadgets to games. It was created by Rodrigo Roesler, creator of the very popular Trapped series of games, and this one follows similar construction.
Rodrigo Roesler is back with the third and final installment of his Trapped trilogy of point-and-click adventure games. Trapped Pt. 3: The Labyrinth puts you right back into familiar territory: you've just killed a man and now you must escape from a strange house. Oh, and it's about 18 years in the past.
Proximity is a classic turn-based strategy Flash game that is somewhat like a cross between Risk and Go. It is surprisingly simple to learn and takes about 5 minutes to play. You can play against the computer, or against a friend at the same computer.
Proo, a mischievous but good-hearted little girl who accidentally crash-lands her father's spaceship on a bizarre planet, must relearn basic skills like walking and jumping in order to navigate an enormous and beautiful world. With rising plumes of energy that can lift you to new heights, streams of red-hot lava that cascade into underground pools, and adorable pixel art, Pieces fulfills in ways most unexpected.
The Eternal Maze continues where the first game left off with a beautiful blend of puzzles, adventure, object finding and Myst-like environments. You play Faye, a mortal woman whose fairy husband has been kidnapped and daughter imprisoned by Lilith, the Queen of Fairies. By solving a series of puzzles you can reach Fidget and awaken Lyra, but the Queen is always one step ahead!
A sequel to the fast-paced bow-and-arrow blast-fest so many of us loved, it's Twin Shot 2. Take your chubby cat-cherub duo through 100 new levels of twisted, cartoony Greek mythology, perforating curious little gelatin-demons of all shapes and sizes.
Hey look, it's Dream Chronicles 3: The Chosen Child! The latest installment in the Dream Chronicles series has arrived, and its as breathtakingly brilliant everyone would expect. A little bit of hidden object finding, a little bit of puzzle solving, but a whole lot of adventuring can be found in this superb sequel, along with some of the most gorgeous scenery you've seen since looking out your own window (assuming you live in a fantasy world with fairies, fountains, and vibrant gardens). It's an excellent follow-up to the previous Dream Chronicles games and a fantastic game in its own right.
In his ongoing, mad quest to give us all nightmares about geometry, Tonypa has unleashed Cobacoli upon the world. It sounds like a deadly bacteria, but no, it's an elegant puzzle game based around 2-dimensional ball physics, although in many ways it qualifies as an infectious disease. Symptoms include intense concentration, swearing, and the inability to pry your hand away from your mouse. Updates include a level select screen and better high score memory.
I am a big fan of point-and-click games and recently I enjoyed playing the escape games from Aztec. Now, as luck would have it, a sequel to the previously reviewed Escape from Octlien has only just been made available. The game is called Dr. Dokkoy and it is just as satisfying as the first game. If you haven't played the other games first, it is recommended that you play them in order.
Lyle in Cube Sector is a relatively old Metroidesque platformer in traditional NES style. You play as Lyle, who adventures through Cube Sector, using cubes for everything from attacking enemies to playing basketball to feeding a dog, with the ultimate goal of retrieving his cat Keddums.
Ransom of the Seven Ships is a puzzler's dream come true. Cryptograms, slider puzzles, matchstick manipulation, a Blokus variant, and the hardest game of underwater Sudoku you'll ever encounter are just a few of the many challenges you and Nancy must overcome. With hours and hours of casual gameplay, a solid plot, tons of educational content, gorgeous graphics, and a bevy of challenging puzzles, Nancy Drew: Ransom of the Seven Ships is no mere child's game.
Twang, as the sound of the title implies, is an elastic platform game in which you 'twang' a ball from start to goal in each level by pulling and releasing points that propel you forward as from a slingshot. It's the latest game from Nitrome, and it's a whole lot of fun.
Platform Game is, believe it or not, an action-puzzle platformer. But wait, there's a plot twist! There are two characters that you have to guide to the exit! And most of the time, you'll have to guide them through separate routes, due to some exquisite level designs that require teamwork to get through.
You are the CEO of a major international oil company, your job is to make money: Democracy, environment, and global economic health are irrelevant. Explore, drill, corrupt governments, hire mercenaries, engage in covert operations, fix elections (which are clearly broken without you) and most of all: have fun.
Dogfight 2 is the newest entry into Rock Solid Arcade's quality series of arcade-style airplane fliers, which includes the first Dogfight and the previously-reviewed Stunt Pilot. Once again, they have based some nail-bitingly tough levels around the tricky but satisfying flight controls from classic DOS game Sopwith. All told, a difficult game with high production values worthy of your time investment.
Arachnophilia is an arcade-style simulation of a night in the life of a spider. Your goal is to survive as long as possible, your venue is the empty midnight space between tree branches, and your method is to trap and devour the hapless insects who blunder into your web. It's a simple but sophisticated game, made with a deep love for both arachnids and early 80s arcade games like Tempest.
Tower Core is another shining star from John Feltham, the author of the previous "Core" series of games. It continues the story line established in Soul Core without a hitch, and even provides a recap accessible from the main menu. An alien being has decided to attack Earth while it was vulnerable. We can't let this happen. Unfortunately, the planet's defense systems are powered by a special Power Core Deluxe which someone forgot to charge before leaving.
It's that most special time of year again. Time to get on your softest, most comfortable pajamas, and make a mug of peppermint hot chocolate. A crackling fire would be nice, accompanied by Bing Crosby crooning about white Christmases and silver bells...as you sit down, with a sigh of contentment, to play Neutral's newest holiday room escape game. Ah, that most special time of year, indeed.
The Lost Vikings? Old news. This is Hans Hans the Biking Viking, who, along with his friends Freya and Thor, must escape from the nefarious but incompetent Loki's lair. Use Thor's strength, Freya's magic, and Hans's... well... jumping bicycle to outwit an 11-level dungeon full of tricks and traps.
RGB is another great-looking room escape game by Japanese developer neutral, author of the previously reviewed Sphere. Not only is this game great looking, it plays exceptionally well with several puzzles that will perplex and confound you, though it won't take you long to solve. There are two different ways to escape, can you find them?
Build-a-lot has a new competitor in town: Divo Games' Be Rich, a strategy-oriented casual tycoon game of real estate planning, building and investing. The game's title gives away your ultimate goal of raking in cash by constructing and upgrading houses in various cities to increase your profits and up your credibility. It takes a more real estate-centric approach to building than the Build-a-lot series does, although the similarities between the games are hard to ignore.
Bejeweled Twist is PopCap's latest installment in the well-recognized series. Instead of clicking a single tile and then choosing an adjacent space to move it to, Bejeweled Twist turns your cursor into a 2x2 circle that spins its contents one quarter turn clockwise. The result is a new kind of match 3 that's fresh and fun all over again.
The hand drawn animations and old school Jazz music soundtrack of Miestas and Menulis set the tone for an experience that is just this side of cool. The simplicity in controls leaves you wishing for something more polished until you realize the environments more than make up for it. Both games create a surreal world interactive art adventure to point-and-click through.
Jack Frost, scowling star of the final game in Nitrome's informal 2007 winter trilogy (after Thin Ice and Snow Drift), is happiest when he is cold. Your job is to turn 40 levels of autumn-colored blocks and ladders into an arctic wonderland in this new arcade action game. Control Jack with the arrow keys: [up] to jump, [left] and [right] to walk, [up] and [down] to climb. Simply step on blocks or climb ladders to freeze them.
The first in a creepy new point-and-click series set in a Wonderland a few degrees off from the one you may recall. A gruesome sight greets you when you open your eyes in this fractured fairytale... but just who are you, anyway? To find out, first you'll have to find your way out and dig a little deeper into the mystery. Provided you're prepared for what you may discover on the other side of the looking glass.
In Learn to Fly, you play as a penguin who looked himself up on Kiwipedia and took the whole "flightless bird" comment as a mortal insult. So he decides that he's going to learn to fly, presumably so he can visit whoever wrote that and give them a stern talking to. Fly high, long, and far to gain money and upgrade your penguin with gliders and rockets. And when you're done, try playing again to see if you can do it faster.
Back to the basics again with Kagi Nochi Tobira 2, the simple and original puzzle game sequel to the very well-received Kagi Nochi Tobira from September of last year. There's not much else to say other than the raw creativity and sense of discovery in these simple puzzle games create an exceptionally engaging and appealing experience. Another example of why simple ideas are often among the most fun!
Pizza City has so much in common with the first two Grand Theft Auto games it seems to fall somewhere between spoof and demake. Like the notorious crime sims from Rockstar Games, you roam a city with virtual free reign in your car via a bird's eye view. There is a main goal (delivering pizzas and working your way up the pizzeria career ladder), but there are also plenty of other side quests to undertake, too. Pizza City isn't for everyone and the relatively simple gameplay may turn some off, but there's more depth lurking here than meets the eye and it definitely rewards those who choose to stick with it.
A dice game of luck and strategy, race against the computer (or a friend) to 10,000 points. Earn points by rolling 1's and 5's, or by rolling 3 or more of a kind, or several other special configurations worth big points. Also known under a variety of different names, Zilch is definitely one of those games that's "easy to learn, hard to master."
Splitter is an intriguing puzzle game that tasks you with moving a yellow smiley face to the exit. To get there, use the cursor (which is a knife!) to slice wooden blocks and cut strings to unleash the fury of physics!
Adult Swim's Death Vegas, a superb technical fighting game from Spiritonin Media, serves up a rare mixture of thrills and substance. From the take-no-prisoners opening metal theme song, to the impressive character animation, to the pop-in close-ups of every brutal impact, Death Vegas will continually show you it means business. It won't rival Guilty Gear or Soul Caliber for complexity, but there's enough depth here to satisfy anyone looking for a good juicy brawl.
Created by the Fox Network as a companion game to the Web series of the same name, The Cell is a lengthy, highly entertaining adventure through an elaborate dungeon complex. Our hero, Spence, must complete a series of increasingly bizarre and dangerous challenges as he ascends to the surface. And he needs your help to escape.
Warbears Adventures: An A.R. Xmas stars Kla and Steve, as Kla stops by Bob for some holiday shopping and to pick up a few packages on order. But Steve has a secret mission in mind. The results are unpredictable as usual and a whole lot of fun. Enjoy this new holiday release from Gionatan Iasio of Italy.
Your plane goes down on a mysterious and seemingly deserted island somewhere off the radar charts, and it is up to you to find a way to 'Escape from Island' using only the resources available to you. Thought-provoking puzzles and a well-illustrated environment together create an atmosphere ripe for adventure and captivating gameplay.
When we last left the Tipping Point series, it wasn't clear if we were wandering through a surreal dream or being teleported around by satellites and villains with 1980's technology and bad intentions. Tipping Point: Chapter 4 takes over just where we left off, entering another unknown tropical destination with our strange, homemade device in hand.
Grow Nano is another fantastic release from On at Eyezmaze, creator of the unforgettable Grow series of flash games. Each installment uses a common theme of placing objects in a certain order to allow a sequence of events to play out. Grow Nano tweaks this idea and introduces timed gameplay. Instead of moving and placing items, all you have to do is click on certain hotspots as quickly as you can. It's a lot more difficult than it may sound, but strangely enough, almost as rewarding.
From GUMP, the creator of Rental House comes another well-produced point-and-click, room escape game. Guest House puts you in a similar situation as most games of its type, and yet once you begin to move about the room and examine the various items and objects that await your puzzle-solving skills you will see that this is no ordinary room escape game.
Slouching Towards Bedlam is a work of interactive fiction created by Daniel Ravipinto and Star Foster. Set in the Bedlam Hospital insane asylum in a steampunk-style 1885 London, you begin in an office with a brass-laden phonograph playing a demented soliloquy. It's a subtly disturbing game that draws you into a rich, elusive world of intrigue and allows you to react to the story however you see fit, carving out five unique endings based upon your interpretation of the plot.
In the mood for more beach-themed Virtual Villagers-style simulation gaming? Escape from Paradise 2: A Kingdom's Quest is now available, and it delivers exactly what its predecessor did and quite a bit more. Instead of straightforward village management, Escape from Paradise 2 blends in mini-games to break up the action, and combined with a little hidden object finding and character stat upgrading, you have a game that will quickly sink its hooks in you.
With just over a year in the making, Azada: Ancient Magic, the sequel to the enormously successful adventure/hidden object hybrid Azada, has finally arrived! Fusing a large variety of unique puzzles with an undeniably intriguing atmosphere, Azada: Ancient Magic puts you in the shoes of a puzzle solver helping the young Titus disarm a magical menace. As you sift through the library of classic literature you'll help legendary characters such as Rapunzel, King Arthur, Dracula and more escape from stories gone awry. Expect some great puzzles and a lot of interesting minigames to come your way in this spectacular sequel.
In what is probably the shortest installment of the Grow series to date, the minigame Grow Nano vol.2 from Eyezmaze is still full of charm. The mechanics are the same as other installments, simply click the items and hope you found the right order. This time around there are just three things to choose from: a cape, a headband, and a stick. Experiment to find the right order and see what happens!
All room escape games have secrets. Some room escapes, however, keep their cards especially close to their chests, relinquishing their grasp bit by bit; these are sometimes the most frustrating, and often the most intriguing. Sagrario's Room is such a game, and a superb one at that.
If you've played the original, or the even better update to that one, then you probably will be thrilled to know that Tony has just released a third game in this fantastic series that takes the concept of negative space and turns it upside-down. Shift 3 extends the familiar jump and run, puzzle-platformer formula by adding a few surprises.
Viking Defense is a close cousin to Canyon Defense, a re-think of the tower defense genre that was released earlier this year. Game elements are introduced incrementally through a quest system. Once you build certain temples to the Norse gods, you get to use rechargeable powers, like the nuclear super-strike of the hammer Mjolnir. Fans of Canyon Defense will be happy that everything has been improved--the artwork, the map layouts, the weapon variety, and the overall game balance.

