Connor Ullmann fires up the Wayback Machine for those gorgeous little retro action adventure inspired by classic 2D games like Zelda. As a little boy who was apparently born from a breath of wind, your quest for self-discovery and the wishes of your maker will take you across a huge world teeming with enemies, secrets, treasure, puzzles, and more. A beautiful little gem with classic gameplay and a satisfying adventure that is well worth checking out even if you weren't born when games like this were in their heyday.

The gophers are coming, the gophers are coming! In this vibrant, kid-friendly tower defense game designed to dust off the ol' graphing skills, you defend a carrot from waves of hungry gophers, who need to be fed until they burst into rainbows. Plot points on the graph to reveal your enemy's marching path, dig up valuable rubies, and place upgradeable towers to keep your carrot safe from the waves of starving critters.

The original Lee Lee's Quest left players with a lot of unanswered. Will platforming hero guy Lee Lee ever make peace with his cubey neighbors? Will Marcus Richert ever run out snarky fourth-wall breaking dialogue? Answer: APPARENTLY NOT. Just as hilarious as the first installment, Lee Lee's Quest 2 is the laugh-out loud sequel every fan could have wanted.

You are a pariah of the Gentlemen's Council, who became jealous of the length of your gun, which doubles as a sort of jetpack, immediately after giving you said weapon. Make your way through their headquarters, past lava, spikes, and enemies with much smaller guns in this physics based platform shooter game.

Need a new merit badge to add to your collection? An alien has crash landed at Camp Pine, where your scout troop is on camp. Help the alien repair his ship and get home in this cute point-and-click adventure from Selfdefiant. It's a fun, coffee break sized distraction without the frustrations of illogical puzzles or hard to find items

When it comes to providing creative puzzles, pleasing design and a relaxing respite any time you need a little pick-me-up, Robamimi can always be counted on to prove that one scene is all it takes. Just as in the first three installments of the series, this escape-the-room game will have you exploring many angles and views along a single wall for clues and codes to break until you discover the exit. Short, affable and undeniably fun!

Completely refurbished and revised, this redux of the first installment of William Buchanan's two-volume adventure game series is meant to supersede the original. You wake up alone...where? Someplace unearthly. Ominously void of life. Imbued with insinuations of wrong doings. Point-and-click to explore your surroundings, gather tools and solve contextual puzzles. As you read the narratives found within each room, not only will you find clues to help you successfully "escape," you'll collect pieces to a story that leaves you with as many questions as answers. There's two possible endings, also. Recommended: play the "Director's Intent" mode in a dark room with the volume up for the maximized experience.

The jetpack-wearing weapon-wielding dinosaur star of jmtb02 and Jimp's new jump and run and gun action platformer knows that when an apocalypse happens in the world of casual gaming, it's usually a good idea to Run Right. Frenetic fun with a lot of puny humans to squish, Run Right is a charmingly unique spin on the Canabalt-styled concept.

Everything is better with friends! Especially the constant threat of explosive death! In this challenging, puzzling platformer, guide a bunch of buddies who all move simultaneously through cleverly designed death trap stages, past exploding crates, spikes, platforms, and more. Your goal? Sweet, sweet pixelly trophy glory. You'll need to be light on your feet (fingers?) and put your thinking cap on for this one.

All you need is a mouse to play the point-and-click games in this week's Vault!... well... okay, and a computer. ... and some electricity... and I guess a house to put it in... and some soft pajama bottoms for comfiness... and some internet... but other than that a mouse is all you need!

You're a typical nerd. And yet you have somehow managed to avoid getting shoved into a locker... until now. Stepping in to defend a new student from a bully, you quickly find yourself trapped. Can you escape? Locker Escape is an entry into our 10th Casual Gameplay Design Competition, with the theme of "Escape".

An escape the room game where you're not the only person who wants to escape. Interlock is an entry into our 10th Casual Gameplay Design Competition, with the theme of "Escape".

Use your Mouse to point & click on the rooms. Find objects and use them to help you escape this scary subway! Risk Subway Escape is an entry into our 10th Casual Gameplay Design Competition, with the theme of "Escape".

Help the girl escape reality by meditating. The real world is sometimes amazing, but being in it all the time is often quite tiresome. Help the protagonist empty her mind by systematically preventing her thoughts from disturbing her meditation. Tao is an entry into our 10th Casual Gameplay Design Competition, with the theme of "Escape".

In a world of repression, you managed to stand out and survive the changes. It is not a safe place, but now you stand a chance to survive. Can you activate the machine in time and escape to another dimension? Train is an entry into our 10th Casual Gameplay Design Competition, with the theme of "Escape".

Escape from a treasure island as fast as you can! Click the hand pointers to move around the island locations and use the mouse to interact with objects, gather items and assemble a few of them to make useful tools. Treasure Island Escape is an entry into our 10th Casual Gameplay Design Competition, with the theme of "Escape".

Alone in a library, you find a mysterious book that quite literally draws you in. You'll have to learn every lesson it contains if you ever want to be seen again. The Grimoire is an entry into our 10th Casual Gameplay Design Competition, with the theme of "Escape".

Follow an ancient myth inside this pyramid, solve the puzzles and get free of this sand tomb!. Euridissey is an entry into our 10th Casual Gameplay Design Competition, with the theme of "Escape".

The CGDC turns 10 this year with this competition and we are very excited that this promises to be one of our most unique and exciting competitions ever! We are pleased to announce the next theme is: ESCAPE, and you may use any browser-based technology platform you are comfortable with (Flash, Unity, Javascript/HTML5, etc.). Please read the official competition announcement for all the rules and details.

It seems that an ANSI face has gotten a second shot at the big time in Ozzie Mercados Jump Face, a one button puzzle platformer.Jump Face is a delightful skewing of common platform game mechanics, and indeed, it's certain that its unusual character gravity and momentum will frustrate some at first. Those who survive the initial rage-quitting impulse, though, will find a charming little game with some interesting puzzles.

Being a llama does have its good points: you have a trampoline to bounce up and down on all day, your fur is soft and durable, and you can spit like it's nobody's business. Because it's not. You hate those intrusive zoo visitors who keep trying to get up into your face. So spit on them! Use your mouse to aim and then click to spit in this engrossing and fun shooter by Peter Sperl and Simon Parzer. Strategic use of upgrades is required as the later levels become quite difficult but the charm of the wooly jumper is also hard to resist. It begs the question, Which is worse: having a llama face or having llama in your face?

What'll turn your frown upside down? Well, if you're a monkey in this point-and-click puzzler, the answer might be a little weird. Choose your monkey and then solve a series of increasingly bizarre levels to cheer them up in the latest installment in Pencilkids' simple, bright kid-friendly series of break-sized gaming.

Conjure magical flaming walls to deflect rocks in Wizard Walls. Use the mouse to draw the walls to defend yourself, your sheep and your townsfolk from the nasty goblins and trolls. Upgrade your magic to include fireballs and bubble walls. Give the baddies a taste of their own medicine with a stone to the face!

A little robot is lost and alone in the galaxy after being crippled by a radiation wave... but hope isn't lost yet. Travel to a series of remote planets and dig for valuable resources in this mining game, searching for everything you need to finally find a way back home. Fans of Motherload will find a lot to appreciate here, with a gorgeous presentation and a few new elements dressing up the familiar gameplay.

Ah, young love. You know how it is. You're enjoying some time on a lily pad with your favourite green beau, daydreaming about your future tadpoles... and then some stork comes along and ruins it all. Every. TIME. In this short and cute point-and-click puzzle from Begamer, help bring our warty hero safely back home to reunite with his lady.

Lonely, stuck on a unknown planet, and trapped in a underground cavern with no foreseeable way of escaping sounds like a pretty bleak situation, doesn't it? Unfortunately, that is the station in life that a little blue space creature is stuck with, and it is your job to rescue him, and return him safely back to his ship in ConmerGame's physics puzzler, Help Me. Luckily, you aren't totally without any resources; you can use three of the alien's friends to help you along the way, each one of them having their own unique powers. All you need to do is figure out where they can be best utilized in each level.

Mr. Y is back with more room escaping goodness in Tesshi-e's 75th escaping effort, Escape from Mr. Y's Room 3. It features all that is good about Tesshi-e room escape design from the beautiful backgrounds to the easy-to-handle inventory. Welcome to Tesshi-e's world where random friends and strangers spend days creating puzzle-filled rooms for you to solve your way out of.

Atom-Soft's mellow and oddly engrossing little physics puzzler makes a comeback with this simple yet engaging sequel. Place badges to influence your eye-ball buddy as he rolls along a path to collect stars and mingle with his friends. It's the perfect, chilled-out soft of gaming to enjoy whenever you need a break in your day.

In games, you want to win. After all, isn't that the whole point of playing them? But what if you don't know where you're going, or why? Is it worth it to keep moving on, even if you have to make sacrifices and lose people along the way? Chelsea Howe and Michael Molinari combine their talents once more for this simple, evocative platformer/interactive art piece made in just 48 hours for the Global Game Jam.

Fresh out of their game-making oven, Detarou brings you another surreal escape game in Zakari. Slathered with code-deciphering puzzles and heavily sprinkled with bizarre characters, it's everything that makes their games so yummy. Give it a taste to discover the three endings hiding within. Panda will thank you.

We've got your boom-boom-boom this week on the Vault, with high-flying cats, bullet-slinging fairies, and one knight who might seriously reign indefinitely as "most adorable defender of the land". It's action time, so saddle up, strap on your lasers and sword, and get cracking!

Strike Force Heroes, by Sky9 Games, is a frenetic action arena shooter that proves that the best way to unravel a shadowy conspiracy is blasting everything in sight. Shares a developer with Raze 2, and many similarities with that game. Still, Strike Force Heroes offers a lot of variety and customization, and even if online multiplayer is a sad omission, pwning CPU newbs has never been so satisfying.

Here's a fun, quick escape-the-room game with all the classic characteristics we've come to expect from TomaTea—enjoyable puzzles, a beautiful design, user-friendly features, and a creative theme. Gameplay is the right balance of relaxation and mental stimulation. Just point-and-click your way around, finding clues and puzzling together the codes needed to find your way out.

Chunkadelic, developed by Noel Berry and Chevy Ray Johnson for the Full-Indie 48-hour Game Jam is one third Atari, one third WarioWare, and one third discotheque. That adds up to a work that's 100% a love letter to arcade retro-gaming. Ephemeral, and a little heavy on the strobe-lighting, but overall an amazing spectacle.

Nitrome seriously overhauls their balloon-centric action avoidance adventure series with this latest installment! When the family pooch is stolen by a malicious spiky baddie, it's up to the son of a hero to venture out into the hostile wild blue yonder and explore stages packed with wild hazards and enemies. With a complete engine revamp, checkpoints, and more responsive controls, it's still a challenge, but not an impossible one!

It's not clear how the scenario of Magic Island Escape 3, an atmospheric escape by Kamikaze Worm, came to be. Whatever the case, you're here now and you need to escape, and to do so you need to activate the magical portal arch by finding and using four colored keys. Got fifteen minutes to kill? Put them to use escaping an island, by all means.

Scientists have spent years and millions of dollars to turn a regular cat into The Magnetic Cat. His frizzy ferromagnetic fur allows him to stick to all sorts of surfaces, and, as the scientists unfortunately discovered, to easily escape from secret government labs. Now, he wants nothing more than to settle down with a family, but there's still 30 levels of obstacles in his way. A puzzle platformer developed by GrimToyz, The Magnetic Cat's well-conceived central mechanic and multiple-solution level design make up for the minor problems of implementation.

Witherworth University Professor Nathaniel Paynuss believes that proof-reading is meant to be a weapon to get back at those snotty collegiate brats making fun of him on "The Face Book". In First Person Tutor, an "educational" arcade game developed by Big Blue Boo Labs for the 7 Day FPS Game Jam, you play the role of beleaguered TA to the evil professor, held captive by a huge pile of student debt. You have a stack of papers to mark, and a score of professorial grudges Paynuss would be happy to settle by GPA proxy. You know what you have to do. The unique premise of First Person Tutor should appeal many on the internet, but it's very polished for a Game Jam work. The dark satire of college politics should give it wider appeal.

In this escape-the-room game by Fuwayura, help the little girl find her raincoat and boots so she can go outside and play. With its simple pastel design, affable puzzles, cheerful music and an overall motif of cuteness, Raincoat Escape provides a perfect intermission whenever you need on a bright ray of happiness to shine on your day.

Haven't gotten your weekly dose of zombies quite yet? No horror movies laying around to give you a nice squishy feeling of gore induced terror? Look no further than Bounzy 2 to not only get carnage but to get your quota of zombie deaths done. The best part is these ones can't reach you to try and kill you. Oh, and there's chickens.

Blue Sunset is a 5 minute escape from TomaTea, this one featuring a variety of tricky puzzles wrapped up in the usual gorgeous TomaTea scenery. With a nicely balanced mix of logic problems, use of found objects, and at least one color-based puzzle, Blue Sunset is a perfectly delectable mini-escape treat. It's a perfect challenge for a break from work, school, or just life in general.

As a child, do you remember those polyurethane bags of green, plastic army men that you could purchase for around a dollar at any drug or discount store? Being part of pop culture as they are, they have shown up a few times over the years in all sorts of modern media, and BeGamer's's newest point-and-click puzzle, Soldier Diary, is the newest entry into the milieu. You are a footsoldier in the heroic green army, however you are currently detained in prison by the evil red army. Use your cunning, skills, and logic to find a way to crawl, climb shoot, jump, and slide your way past the soldiers, so you can alert your allies to send help, and get you out from behind enemy lines.

Grab your Photonic Laser Blaster, and get ready to bring a little light to the creatures of the dark in Photon Baby, a genre-busting platformer by Jeremias Babini. Drawing inspiration from all manner of genres, Photon Baby is a unique little creation, with influences as far ranging as Laser Physics puzzles and the 16-bit classic "Zombies Ate My Neighbors". Some of the later levels get a little busy with competing inspirations, but overall Photon Baby is perfect for arcade gamers who wish Halloween lasted all year.

Whether you're a die-hard tactic enthusiast or a timid strategy newcomer, this week's batch of games offers up some varied and challenging gameplay for all players. From a suspiciously simple looking dice game to the end of the world as we know it (but we feel fine), they're great ways to engage your brain and have fun doing it.

Drawing has never been so fun as it is in this physics puzzle. With so many smiley faces cheering you on to give them a nice comfy line to hang out on it's hard to not want to play. Luckily Fun Instinct has made this game just for the softie in you wishing to make smiley faces exist everywhere! Oh and for those who like to draw too.

Ever wonder what pigs would do if they could fly? In Kamikaze Pigs, a chain-reaction game from Monstro Games, you can find out. With one click, cause a big enough reaction of squealing pigs to clear the level. Earn stars to upgrade units to cause even bigger explosions. Fight your way through 40 levels, including bosses. Do you smell bacon?

Are they conveyor belts? Are they fallen trees? To be completely honest, we can't figure out what those strange laser-emitting bricks in increpare's aptly-named Puzzles are supposed to be. All we know is that they cause trouble if you touch them, but yet that danger might be the key to solving the eight enigmas in this game.

Think fast! No, faster than that!... no, even faster! NinjaDoodle serves up another gorgeous set of clever little puzzles where you'll have to be ready for anything and willing to work under pressure. Short, sweet, and a great exercise for your lazy brain if you can handle robots, zombies, cows, aliens, and... toilets?

Enter The Suspense II, a platform adventure game by Black Square where you can switch between life and death to possibly escape your own fate. The subtle difference between the worlds is pleasing to the eye and manages to be dark without feeling as if you entered a haunted house. Honestly, death never looked so good or seemed so fun.

With this latest installment in the 10 Gnomes series, Mateusz Skutnik has provided an addictive and gorgeous little puzzler with the standard lovely black and white visuals set against a creepy soundtrack as you race to find all of those vacationing little gnomes before time runs out

Though one should strive to live without regrets, considering all the different paths a life might have taken is an inherently intriguing concept. Some games attempt to analyze the psychology of our decisions and their consequences. On the other hand, some games, like Relive Your Life, an interactive movie by FrozenFire, will have you button mashing to fend off a competing sperm, before failing to acquire a preferred toy at recess kicks of a chain of events that leads to a popular resurgence in nudism/bear-wrestling. And it'll rhyme too! Clever prose and voice-acting by Egoraptor are highlights, and make up for tacked-on minigames.

The only sure way to survive a zombie invasion is to avoid it! In Zombie at the Gates you play a king who must defend the castle, giving you time to construct it into a flying castle to get away from the zombie masses. Upgrade yourself and your weapons to beat back the zombies and collect the resources you need to fly your castle to safety. So long zombies!

On a planet that seems straight out of a Disney digital world, there is a war going on that can only be won with some mech fighting expertise. Sortie in ten missions of varying objectives from simple reconnaissance to an all-out fire fight for survival.The war seems to be a losing struggle, but you can turn it around with a little cash and a lot upgraded parts. Can you handle the strain of an entire war on the metal shoulders of your robot piloting skills?

Beethro Budkin has had to face all sorts of challenges crawling through the first eight floors of Dugan's dungeon. Now though, he stands on the precipice of levels nine through twelve, and they're filled with Deadly Rooms of Death of all kinds! Caravel Games' series of turn-based puzzle-strategy games gets just a bit more hair-pulling in DROD: King Dugan's Dungeon Lite - Episode 3.

Forests aren't born evil, you know. Their dislike of heroes can usually be traced back to one traumatic event. In this case, it was the arrival of an evil necromancer, who brought the forest with him courtesy of a magic crystal. Naturally, it's up to you to stop both necromancer and forest in Evil Forest, a 50 stage action RPG with roguelike mechanics.

If you want to join the club, then the titular hat is requisite. It's just that simple. But getting to this millinery accoutrement is not as straight-forward in this platform puzzler by David Durham. Use [WASD] or arrow keys to move about, pick up items, and enter doorways and the [space bar] to jump as you pass by obstacles such as disintegrating tiles and rolling barrels—all while keeping that hat on your head. The difficulty of this feat varies by your agility and timing, yet the production values are consistently excellent. So hold on to your hat and get ready for the fun!

Oh, Deadly Rooms of Death! Never has a redundant name heralded such awesomeness! The easy part of Beethro Budkin's quest to rid King Dugan's dungeon of terrorizing baddies is over, as he descends to floors 5 through 8. But even an expert smitemaster like Beethro may be stymied without a little guidance from you. So ready your Really Big Sword and enter DROD: King Dugan's Dungeon Lite - Episode 2, another great installment in Caravel Games' series of turn-based puzzle-strategy games.

This unassuming escape-the-room game by Kiteretsu might have a scary sounding name, but there is nothing horrific about the puzzles you'll find inside this ordinary four-walled apartment. As per the requisites for this genre, you are trapped inside a room, no notes or friendly invitations brought you here. You are only here. Now you must piece together the clues to break the codes and find your way to freedom.

The Empires of Arkeia are under attack and the king needs your help defending them. In this game knowing have to effectively use your forces is imperative for success against some less than friendly foes. From a casual infantry man to a trained warrior, every person counts and with experience you can help upgrade their fighting and survivability!

A classic turn-based strategy dungeon crawler, Deadly Rooms of Death finally comes to to the browser in King Dugan's Dungeon, from Caravel Games. Join Beethro Budkin, exterminator extraordinaire as he seeks to slay all the underground creatures in King Dugan's Dungeon. With its emphasis on exploration and puzzle-solving, Flash DROD is a perfect gateway for those intimidated by turn-based strategy, while still fun to hardcore genre fans looking for the challenge of finding optimal solutions. It's a bit slow to start, but stick around and you'll fall in love with the game's cunning design and impish sense of humor.

What rotten luck to have your ship crash land on a zombie-ridden planet that you now need to fight across to escape. With a more vocal protagonist than you had before, shoot and calculate your way through this Metroidvania style physics shooter where zombies are just as plentiful as your headshot count. With sixteen levels to survive through and plenty of side missions to keep you occupied, your time with the undead hordes will be engrossing and quite challenging. Polish off the old boomstick and get ready to bust some heads if you hope to survive.

Ladies and Gentlemen! Boys and girls of all ages! Come on down to JayIsGamesLand! The Casual Gameiest Place on Earth! We have some wonderful games in The Vault this week: a gorgeous piece of interactive art exploration, a high-stakes espionage puzzler, and a platformer that gives you all the time in the world. All of the fun, and none of the lines or sunburn!

Senso Rabbit, the star of Mighty Ducks Entertainment's debut action-strategy game, may lack sight, but he'll need all his other senses to make it through the minefield and grab his desired carrots. An unusual game with a strange sense of strategy to it, Senso Rabbit might not appeal to players in the mood for something twitchy. Those of a methodical mindset, however, should find it quite charming.

Continue your journey with Rick as he explores the chambers of the mysterious hotel to save his true love, Lily. Point and click your way to explore a chain of rooms, each containing a puzzle that unlocks the next room and at least one esoteric clue to help you solve it. Between the mocking messages that await you in every room, the gauntlet of dastardly puzzles, or the exhausting journey of traveling through buried memories, Myosotis 2 asks how far a defeated and self-hating man is willing to go for love.

There's nothing more satisfying than world domination... that is unless it's world domination by robot! Robot House Games brings you their interpretation of this experience in the arcade-style game, Total Robostruction. Drag matching body parts together to create your mechanical army as you climb the ranks of an evil corporation. Just keep an eye on that timer cause, you know, there's no dilly-dallying in taking over the world.

What's a bear to do when a soda pop factory suddenly sets up shop in the bear's neck of the woods? Growl a lot! Oh, and seek revenge by drinking up all the cola and destroying the factory. In Cola Bear Float, you've got to guide the grizzly to the goal while playing with a gaseous twist in this high-difficulty platformer.

You don't have to be a vegan to enjoy fruit, though this may be a different interpretation on the usual form of enjoyment. Instead of chomping down on a succulent orange it's your responsibility to keep them safe from rain. Yes, rain. Not the usual type of rain but the type that is spiked and deadly. With plenty of physics puzzling to please even the most persnickety player, it's up to you to keep something sweet from turning into something dead.

LovePunks: The Game, developed by a group of the same name and with help from the Yijala Yala cultural arts program, is strange, crazy, bizarre, and absolutely wonderful. It has all the energy and vitality that you would expect from a creative band of 9, 10, and 11 year-olds, and they were clearly having a blast putting it together. Though its showcasing of the photo-realistic animations makes gameplay feel a little aimless, overall it is a singularly unique piece of interactive art.

Conceptis' latest Conceptis Light puzzle suite, Hitori Light, certainly is a mind-bender. In it, you're presented with a square grid of seemingly random digits ranging from 1 to the grid's size, many repeating throughout. Your job is to shade or circle every square in the grid according to three important rules. Each puzzle is fairly entertaining and has its own unique solution, and it's easy to start formulating strategies based on specific patterns of numbers that turn up often. Looking for a mind-bending distraction for a few minutes of your time? Then come shade and circle some squares. I know I am.

Bart Bonte is back with another sugary sweet installment in his popular particle physics puzzle. While adhering to the same basic concept and gameplay mechanics of the prior two Sugar, Sugar games, this sequel delivers 30 more clever levels of imaginative obstacles in a simple block design plus jazzy tunes.

Just when you might have thought that everyone's favorite digital restaurant mogul was resting on his pixellated laurels, Flipline Studio's Papa has returned with the latest spicy addition to his culinary empire. Papa's Wingeria is hiring, and only your mastery of time management and a dexterous control of your mouse stand between you and stacks of buffalo wing-scented dollars.

Robots? Check. Bad guy? Check. Orbital laser and other ridiculously overpowered special attacks? Check check check! Awkward comedic translation?... uhhh... Berzerk Studios serves up an over-the-top arcade shooter complete with a heavy sense of parody, flashy attacks, and just enough frenetic bullet action to spice up your lunch break.

Nyan and Wan have been named "Most Valuable Escapers" and you get to join them in the first course of an escape game tournament. Mission cards will provide hints and provide the premise for this delightful installment in the continuing escapades of the charismatic pair. While purposefully on the easy side, It Happens Escape Game: Beginner Course has a clever presentation and enough heart-warming charm to have you smiling all through the week.

Thanks to the huge success of games like "Angry Birds" and "Crush the Castle", the physics projectile genre is one of the hottest in casual gameplay of late. Smokoko's entry, King's Game, puts a twist on the style: your targets can fire back! Obviously, it would always be your best option to decimate your opponent as quickly as possible, but in this game, it can become a necessary strategy. The AI is a fairly accurate shot, and doesn't miss that often, even on the beginning levels.

Attention all doodlers! Drop your pen and strap yourself to the keyboard, because Francisco Ferreres is here with another in the series of hand drawn, top-down, vertical scrolling shoot-em-ups, Notebook Wars 3. Be prepared for the margins to run red, green, and blue with pencil shavings once more! Generally a refinement and extension of its predecessors, the addition of Keyboard controls and Frenetic Mode, which speeds up the pace of the game considerably, makes this a release that all shooter fans will find noteworthy.

What brought you here perusing through the pages of Jay Is Games? JIG has a long history of providing the perfect escape from (select from your list of snore-inducing or stress-loaded whatevers) with heaps of surrealism, fantasy and a little bit of oddness. This week's Vault selections aren't making any exceptions—make your heart smile with a sweet little escape-the-stables game, delight in discovery by playing with surreal artwork, and grow your sense of adventure through experimentation. So welcome to the JIG community. Kick back and stay a while!

Find the key, get to the door, advance to the next level. Sounds like your everyday platform game, right? Well, it could be, but not in this instance. Strap on your straitjacket, and step into the psych ward of Funcrow's Psychout, where not everything is necessarily what it seems. Level by level, the laws of physics will continually change; sometimes gravity is controllable by a press of your finger, and sometimes you can scale a wall, and cling to ceilings just by walking.

Stick Figure Badminton 2 is a simple, yet satisfying badminton simulator with a great physics engine, featuring a good variety of AI opponents and some fun character choices (robots!). Regular badminton players will appreciate the smooth way the game handles smashes, drives and drops and non players will get a great introduction to the game that will make them want to go outside in the sunshine and play for real. How many other flash games can make the same claim?

Developed by advergamesters supreme B-Reel, Cube: A Google Maps Experiment transforms locales across the globe into levels inspired by those maze toys where you must roll a tiny metal ball through a labyrinth, all while highlighting features of Google Maps. A little ephemeral in gameplay, but very, very pretty, Cube is smart futuristic fun.

In a world where traffic and urban emergencies run rampant, there is group of anthropomorphic response vehicles looking to set things right. Vehicles Level Pack delivers more levels in the physics puzzle series that puts you in the driver's seat of cute little cartoon cars. Move the obnoxious black SUVs out of the way to reach your designated emergencies in time.

This modern take on the classic by Hans Christian Anderson (forget about Disney!) was created in 58 hours for TOJam #7. Point and click your way around a minimalistic environment of office space and city streets, holding very one-sided conversations with those you encounter. While it has some rough edges in terms of navigation, it does a good job of eliciting sympathy and will especially strike a chord with those struggling with shyness.

Find yourself trapped inside these ancient limestone walls with only your wits, a few clues and a patent love of solving puzzles as your means to freedom in this escape-the-pyramid game from TomaTea. While not markedly long or arduous, Long Time Ago has a number of enigmatic moments with just a few textual indicators and a glowing cursor to nudge you in the right direction. The clues are occasionally inconspicuous, but they're all there for those who seek them out—so, experiment a bit, put on your Indiana Jones hat, and tell that sphinx to "Bring it!" .

If a snake eats a pellet in the forest, and no one is there to control the joystick, does it still score a point? There's no need to get philosophical with Netgrind's Snakes On A Cartesian Plane, but you do need to put your thinking cap on. Each level puts a twist on the classic snake game, like disappearing traps, weirdly warping walls, and twisted controls. How many points can you rack up?

Gaz Thomas adds a new spin to the phrase "slice and dice" in this sequel to a favorite physic puzzle game. 3 Slices 2 brings you back into the hacking fun of cutting blocks apart in three swings to meet the goal of each level. A new colored block with opposite physics, the good old gold target challenges, and precise planning makes the game quick yet demanding enough to sink your teeth into. Can you prove that you are a cut above the rest of the puzzle gaming crowd?

This gorgeous scene from Robamimi is filled with charisma as well as fun puzzles. Just like One Scene and One Scene 2, all the gameplay takes place along one wall. Point and click your way through every picturesque detail, finding the clues needed to "escape" the scene. The quality of design and the affable features make this a relaxing and beguiling experience. When something is this good, it's always a happy occasion to find more!

In Sagittarian 4: Berger by Hyptosis, you rejoin your old friends, Sage, Dusty, and Anna, in their quest to find safety after the zombie apocalypse. The small band of survivors are no longer strangers, but friends. Some are even lovers. Can you protect these people you've grown so close to over the last four games, or will you have to send them to their certain deaths for the good of the group? Combining great artwork, funny and well-developed dialogue, and even a dynamic soundtrack, it's an experience that really sticks with you.

Detarou returns with yet another whimsically unusual escape-the-room game to give you a few healthy doses of confusion, chuckles, and challenge. Point and click your way around the bizarre characters and devious puzzles to unlock the final door that leads to freedom. Compared to the previous two titles, Pattsun March ups the ante in difficulty, making it all the more rewarding to tackle and discover all three of the possible endings.

Nutty Mania is a fun and relaxing new physics game from FlashRush Games with a silly premise and relaxing puzzles. But this cute little diversion won't be just any old walk in the park, you'll have some interesting obstacles to overcome (dinosaurs!) and some clever physics to navigate (portals!). Nutty Mania sports 42 levels to explore and even features a level editor, which will keep you entertained for many coffee breaks to come.

Babies? Snacks? Magic cubes? Secret government projects? What could these games possibly have in common? Well, aside from the fact that they're all point-and-click adventures, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! Haha! That's right! I'm sticking it to the man and making a Vault article where the games have nothing in common whatsoever apart from the gameplay and interface and execution and okay maybe two of them are advergames BUT THAT'S ALL.

With its sleek iconographic aesthetic, twitchy gameplay, and impish sense of humor, Chris Underwood's Hanna in a Choppa quickly became a favorite here at JayIsGames. In fact, it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to say it's right up there with Stunt Copter and Comanche in the rotocraft gaming hall of fame. Now, after four years, and plenty of crossed fingers, the physics puzzle action returns in Hanna in a Choppa 2! Of course, the name is a bit of a misnomer, since it seems Ms. Hanna has earned quite a few more pilot's licenses this time around, from hot air balloons, to biplanes, to jetpacks, to ostriches. Cunning level design and satirical writing work hand in hand to form an instant classic.

Tiny world, tiny problems, right? More like "not right". Er, yeah. Anyway, Mini Quests is a pint-sized adventure/puzzle game by dishmoth available for Android devices and as a Java Applet for browsers. The chunky-pixeled isometric game puts you in control of a little guy out on an adventure, trudging through the fantasy lands as he hunts for treasure and fights/puzzles his way out of various scrapes, like you do!

Red Riding Hood was once a normal girl baking sweets, skipping through enchanted forests, wanting to visit her grandma without any ulterior motives. Little did she know that she was about to be thrust into a nightmare when her poor Granny was taken by some rude wolf. Now it's up to you, as Red, to brave 96 levels of puzzles to save Granny and show that wolf it's never good to mess with a girl who can master gravity.

First released in 2008, The Power was a behemoth of a Metroidvania-like shooter for downloaders only. Now, The Power is back and available for your browser pleasure! Search, shoot, and upgrade your way through a massive world to discover the mysteries of The Power, and why it's so important to a strange planet.

Wentworth is an enchanting point-and-click adventure from ClickShake about a space kitty on a mission: plant new life on an unexplored planet. But all goes awry when our feline hero uses too much magic fairy dust! Interact with gnomes, trolls, and leprechauns to help Wentworth on his mission to bring balance back to the forest.

Dreams can't hurt you right? Sequester puts that to the test when a deceased sister comes to call on her little brother in his dreams. She's stuck in limbo and she doesn't understand why but she knows that it's not where she wants to be. While you may not think a little kid is a suitable choice don't be so quick to judge! Taking on death itself, it's up to you to guide this nimble young lad and help him rescue the soul of his sister.

Lend us a hand? The dock workers down in Boston are missing two... or at least, the corpse they found is. The police department suspects it may be the work of a prolific serial killer who's been in hiding for years, and it's up to you to track down the evidence and the suspect in this gorgeous but finicky point-and-click adventure from PastelGames.

How do you follow up on a successful game like WereBox, where you can transform boxes into balls to solve physics puzzles? In WereBox 2, you've got to exploit the power of transforming boxes to rid the screen of reds, all while the developers have an existential meltdown over how to spend their budget. We suggest more zombies. Or kittens. Just get rid of the red shapes already!

Minigolf! In space! With explosions! And trance music! And lens flare! You'll find it all in Bomb Runner, a physics arcade game by Core Studios. Inspired as much by pinball as by golf, you must click, drag, and shoot your way through 24 beautiful levels. Some of the shots do seem to rely on luck as much as skill, especially in the later levels, but overall, Bomb Runner is an entertaining diversion.

Continue the adventure across the Plains of the Endless Grass in search of the Wiseman who knows every story ever told. Play as Myosotis and embark on a journey filled with fantastic creatures, breathtaking scenery and, of course, captivating stories. A Grain of Truth picks up (and leaves us) where The Trader of Stories: Bell's Heart left us: wanting more.

Continue the adventure across the Plains of the Endless Grass in search of the Wiseman who knows every story ever told. Play as Myosotis and embark on a journey filled with fantastic creatures, breathtaking scenery and, of course, captivating stories. A Grain of Truth picks up (and leaves us) where The Trader of Stories: Bell's Heart left us: wanting more.