0 Buttons Game Roundup

August 31st, 2010

August’s ZERO BUTTONS theme had a whole mess of quality games, 40 to be exact. While a few games broke the rules and opted to use a button or two most followed the theme creating a bunch of awesome mouse-only game, with some microphone and camera based games thrown in for good measure! Hopefully September will be as fruitful – we’ll have a fun announcement tomorrow for next month’s theme.

Until then, get to the gamin’:

Capz Machinery, by Harry Trautmann

A glimpse into the glamourous life of the bottle capper. An addictive, additive mouse-only game.

Jitter, by MDVD

Shake the whole world using the mouse to get the cube to the star. Sharp visuals, and a fun mechanic work together really well.

UFO on Tape, by Troshinsky

Keep the UFO on screen as long as possible. Love the grainy, retro look.

Avoidal, by Hybrid Mind Studios

Lure enemies into mines to destroy them – has a nice combo sytem and a good difficulty ramp. The retro aesthetic works very well.

Somnius ex Machina, by Nathan McCoy

Discovering the meaning is half the fun. The best I’ve managed is 13 dreams – anyone done any better?

Movie Theater, by Teijo Mursu

An interesting experience, and a literal example of why the games-to-movie comparison doesn’t work. Play the game once, then a second time after reading the spoiler.

Dragonflute (Microphone Only), by Tobias

A fly and collect game powered by the sound of your voice.

Balance, by Zink Interactive
Guide the blue cube to the green zone in this level-by-level physics based game. Lovely visuals and good song choice here.

No Buttons, by Piotrek Beska

Control the entire level with the mouse to guide the ball to its goal. Left and right movements control one set of items, while up and down control the others.

Legacy of Wisdom, by Jeremy Kang

Avoid trees, collect powerups in this metaphorical game with a strong Asian-calligraphy theme.

Shatter, by Katesw

A physics toy which has you shattering cubes until they’re completely destroyed. Pretty mesmerizing.

A Field of Beartraps (Microphone Only), by Mr. Alistair

Talk into the microphone to make your character jump over incoming beartraps. I really wish it recorded and used my scream when I died.

Stairs to Heaven, by Michalebe

Never ending vertical platformer – use the mouse to guide your character ever higher.

Bug Invaders (Webcam Only), by Marco

Crush bugs with your webcam and barehands. Man I look awkward playing this game.

Jigsaw, by HRJ

Auto-created jigsaw puzzles that get increasingly difficult as you proceed. Mouse-only, but does involve pressing some mouse buttons.

Zombie Breakdown, by JF

Story based, zombie-escape game. Use the mouse to guide your character and escape the cosmetics building.

I’m the Thunder, by MICMOC

Use the mouse to determine the amount of electricity you fire. Don’t let any of the clouds get past you.

Poin, by Daniel Rapp

Draw lines to protect the red ball from incoming enemies. A little buggy, but it strikes a good balance.

Old Tyme Bombers, by Abethke

Avoid enemies, while using them to explode each other.

Sinuous, by Hakim El Hattab

A dodge-and-destroy game pitting you against an endless field of evil red dots.

Mouse Fitness, by J Tremblay

Move the mouse back and forth quickly to reach the cone before time expires.

Smite the People, by Juan Bosquecillo

Presentation is nice, but it feels like there needs to be more variety/challenge. Scrubbing the screen with the mouse seems to be the best strategy.

Cube Dodger, by Roan Contreras

Navigate a field of evil cubes. Gets increasingly more difficult as new enemy types are added.

Hyperdodge, by Keeweed

Dodge meteors and try to survive as long as possible with your auto-shooting ship.

I Was Throwing Bubbles to the Sky, by Mark Skyzoid

Use the mouse to control the angle of your bubble canon. I would love to see this expanded further, and it feels like the bubbles shoot a little too slow.

Meteor Mash, by Kris

Dodge incoming meteors, which can come from either direction of the screen.

Don’t Die Fat Man, by Joe Gribbin

Guide the fat man to the flag without touching the walls.

Tug O War, by Built by Man

A 2-player fight over the mouse kinda game. Could get violent, don’t play with strangers.

Crazy Collector Boy, by Jacob

A simple grab and dodge game.

ZBame, by Alexander Chernov

A scrolling path-tracing game. Avoid touching the black parts of the screen.

Ultimate Ninja Attack, by Ben Brunton

Protect yourselves from ninjas with your ridiculously big sword.

Catch the Green Square, by Guhritta

Avoid the red squares while grabbing the green ones.

Cat & Mouse, by CHUNKYLOVER53

Dodge incoming evil mouse curors.

Banana Defense, by Scott Washington

Position canons to defend the banana from incoming enemies.

Suicidal Sojourn, by MisfitByte

A top-down dungeon tile-pushing game, inspired by Karoshi and the Final Fantasy series.

Man in Hat, by Pedro Sousa

Give umbrellas to men jumping off of buildings to save them. Like the idea, but it was a little hard to see the umbrellas.

Ultimate Bomb Escape, by Aizen Sousuke

Avoid squares with bombs as long as possible. An odd, odd game.

The Mouse Eats the Cheese, by Matt Perrin

It’s all in the title, really – and the sound effects are quite charming.

Deflect, by Roybie

Deflect projectiles back at enemy circles.

Cursor Defender, by James

Mouse over anything that moves to kill it.

Forest Fight, by Switchbreak

Use mouse gestures to defeat incoming tanks. Love the idea, but I had difficulty picking up trees.

20 Comments | In: Games | tags: Best of the Net, Games, Zero Buttons | #

High Velocity Roundup

May 31st, 2010

May was a busy, busy month for all of us here at EGP, and probably just as busy for everyone else out there – what with your schoolin’ finals and whatnot. Still, despite all of the overall busy-ness people managed to make 21 games this month. Probably because making games indoors beats the crap out of the rising temperatures outside.

Check ‘em out:

Starfall, by Alex Bethke

Collect dreams, while avoiding nightmare in this gorgeously tiled environment. A fun game that induces a trance-like state.

Lightspeed, by Zink Interactive

A beautifully polished flying game by the guys at Zink Interactive! Use the mouse to steer through rings and pick up speed and points.

Warped, by Nathan McCoy

A shooter where each level gradually ramps up in speed. Pretty neat, I just wish I could shoot faster!

High Velocity, by Darshell

A psychedelic, high score driving game – dodge skulls, and collect coins. Great aesthetics on this one.

Full Speed, by Reese

Extremely fast, cognitively intense challenge. Take control of 2 ships (WASD, Arrow keys) and dodge oncoming obstacles.

Fission, by Luke O’Connor

A simple, but addictive game. Split atoms with your shot, while dodging the resulting split atoms. My high score was 14, but my reflexes are admittedly slow these days.

Runout (Mac only), by Mark Sachs

A parody of Outrun, or so I gathered from his post. Does anyone have a Mac?

Circle Skydiver, by Roan Contreras

Use the arrow keys to collect powerups, and health while strafing to avoid helicopters, eagles, and other obstacles.

Orbital, by Katsew

Race around a giant distorted sphere. I’d love to see this one developed further, but it’s interesting to just watch it.

Freeway Fighter, by Rujo

A racing game, and tribute to Road Fighter.

Vanishing Road, by Bolin

A Spy Hunter style game. Avoid taxis, but destroy other cars.

Pill Bug, by Frank Force

A take on the sonic the hedgehog, with shooting and slow-motion capabilities.

veloCity, by Jorge Goyco

Following in the vein of Canabalt, except you’re running on a circular world. Press the left mouse button to jump.

Squigglies, by Nathan Korth

A pretty toy, but no game just yet. Reminds me of “Attack of the Killer Swarm” minus the people you fling up in the air.

Speedy Crash, by Suvozit

Speed up and crash into asteroids to destroy them. Fun, but it feels like the destruction could be a bit jucier.

Be Irresponsible!, by Joe Gribbin

A simple game with a fun art style, go as fast as possible while dodging upcoming walls.

Sonar, by turboRamble

Shoot and dodge enemies using the arrow keys. Z shoots, X heals.

Birdette, by Ed Scheindlin

Hold down the left mouse button mouse to direct your bird toward the cursor. A little twitchy, but an interesting experiment.

Recurring Nightmare, by Frugal Games

Press Z & X to pump those legs, and steer your guy to victory…or else crap yourself. Luckily I don’t have such nightmares.

High Velocity Typist, by MisfitByte

Type quickly to extend a platform for your character to walk on. I wish it had typing goals, since right now the best strategy is to spam “asd.”

Super Running Rescue, by Joaquim

A game about illegal immigration and running from the law in Arizona of all things. Use the arrow keys to run away and jump to avoid oncoming obstacles.

13 Comments | In: Games | tags: Best of the Net, Games, High Velocity | #

Best of the Net: Repeat

April 30th, 2010

Surprisingly, there were very few April Fool’s jokes this month and lots of solid entries, 25 to be exact.

Have at them!

Line Patterns, by Erik Leppen

A striking puzzle game that involves filling a grid with a chain of line sequences. With 26 levels, this one is sure to keep you busy for a while.

Auto Cannibalism, by Krimelo

Features RepEating uses of the theme. The low-bit aesthetic, music, and dialog combine to make a hilarious experience. Plus, when was the last time games explored the delicious theme of cannibalism?

The Sound Fight!, by RPM Collective

Pits songs from your computer in a fight to the death, generating units for each based on the strength of the first 10 seconds of the song. Really fun to watch!

Robert Recurring, by Ben Wilhelm

Time traveling with Timecop-like rules in this puzzle-platformer. Some fun brain teasers in here. I’d love to see this expanded upon.

Push Puzzle, by Suvozit

A nice sliding-tile style puzzle game with a very charming aesthetic. Definitely worth a play through.

One to Tango, by Nathan McCoy

Time Cop rules be damned! One to Tango is a time-traveling game that draws its inspiration from such gems as Braid or Cursor * 10. Plus the protagonist’s name is Hatbox, what’s not to like?

James Replay, by Rujo

Falling in the vein of the Misadventures of P.T. Winterbottom, James Replay is a platformer-with-clones style game with the twist that once you clone yourself your previous body is frozen in space – laws of Physics be damned!

Restricted Recall, by Zhou Xuanming

A really interesting platforming style game. Navigate a series of rooms by looping through 3 commands by pressing the space bar, e.g. “walk”, “jump”, “turn around”.

Oh No, Spaceman!, by Switchbreak

A repeating Astroid-like shooter with a time loop mechanic. Judicious use of bullets is the only thing that will save you here, as previous loops of yourself can hurt you.

Flowearty, by Elday

Copy and paste terrain to help navigate a flower petal back to its stem. The mechanic is somewhat reminiscent of Snapshot, but is more versatile in some ways. Controlling the flower is tough at times, however.

Sisyphus, by Ben

Although it was meant to be a joke game, it’s nice to see someone thought of repetitive Greek Mythology punishments when looking at this theme. Good thing he didn’t do Prometheus.

Repeat, by Ben

A platformer game where the level periodically resets. Explore the level, unlocking abilities and extending your time in order to escape!

Revolutions, by Zink Interactive

Circular levels with an interesting rotation mechanic, and lovely, lovely aesthetics.

Pixels Can Crack Too, by Turtlesoup

A repeating, ever growing level. All that’s missing is a bottle that says “Drink Me.” It’s an interestingly play that shows the advantages of vectors.

Move the Ball, by Knut

Move the ball to the goal without colliding with previous successful attempts. Sounds a little confusing, but is actually quite fun. Also follows Timecop rules.

Observer, by Dariuou

Observe creatures to pick up their abilities, which can be stored in one of 3 slots and then reused by pressing the corresponding button.

Full Circle, by Jorge Goyco

A spinning puzzle game taking place within various regions of the digestive tract. I didn’t play until the finish, but I’m pretty sure I know where it ends…

Africa Repeat, by Ryan Atkinson

Part geography game, part observation. Difficult at times. Africa is a tricky continent, it would seem.

Greed, by ATS

Platforming…with a message.

Ghost Curses, by Joaquim

A very moody game. You’re trying to search for the bathroom in a giant repeating maze. Control with the arrows and “X”.

Rebecca, by Ed Scheindlin

In this month’s version, Ed has changed it so every time you die you age, changing the ending. I’m not completely sure, but it feels like your older character can’t jump as high as his teen equivalent.

(Re)define, by Ryan McGreevy

Navigate a ball to the star by placing gravity wells.

Gost, by vazor

Help ghosts make it to the afterlife by eliminating them in the right order.

Blue Roller, by Roan Contreras

Scrolling arcade-style platformer with randomly generated obstacles. Get a higher score by collecting coins.

Flag Island, by Roan Contreras

A non-stop capture the flag style game. The AI becomes overpoweringly strong unless you kill it quickly.

10 Comments | In: Games | tags: Best of the Net, Games, repeat | #

Hero Programmer Quest

April 1st, 2010

by Petri Purho

Coming in just under the wire is a new game by one Mr. Petri Purho.  In Hero Programmer Quest you play a programmer tasked with keeping new NVidia drivers safe.  You’ll be given a series of levels, each 10 seconds in length, where you’ll have to scan lines of code looking for various syntax errors.   This is definitely a game for those in the code monkey family, so if you’re rusty when it comes to scanning such things (like I am), you’ll want to get those code muscles limber!

Hero Programmer Quest was made in 2 days.

Play

Play the game: HERE

10 Comments | In: Games | tags: 10 Seconds, Games, Petri Purho | #

Best of the Net: 10 Seconds

March 31st, 2010

10 Seconds proved to be more than enough time in March. With a whopping 30 34 entries, this has been the most productive theme so far.

Check ‘em out:

10 Second War, by Almost

A really well made shooter-strategy game. Control multiple units, 10 seconds at a time to beat each level. Tons of units, weapon types, and enemies.

Redivider, by Nathan McCoy

A simple, but awesome game. Use the mouse to draw lines to either divide, separate, or avoid shapes.

Minima Time, by Graduate Games

A limited time platformer where the player can slow or freeze time. Extend the amount of time you have to live by collecting clocks.

Blind, by Tayron

An intriguing audio-only game! Try to use sound to locate a target space in 10 seconds, then watch the replay.

Contentric, by HybridMind

Collect time, while avoiding swirling boxes in this soothing, ambient avoid-’em-up.

I Can Hold My Breath Forever, by Jake Elliott

An atmospheric exploration game. Your character can only hold his breath for 10 seconds (despite the title), so get to safe areas fast!

Flashlight, by Local Ghost

Navigate a dark cave with only 10 seconds worth of battery for each level. Reminds me of the invisible platform puzzles in old Zelda games.

Kill Birds with Rockets, by Kyle Rodgers

A herding/shooting game. Fire rockets to destroy the target number of birds. The action pauses every second to allow you to position and fire a new rocket.

10 Seconds to Save Claire, by Robson

An interesting puzzle game. Cut the right fuses to prevent the explosives from detonating. Each fuse costs a certain amount of time, so make sure you don’t go over 10 seconds.

Earth is a 3D Planet, by Manuel Van Dyck

An Asteroids-style game. Gain extra time by destroying things and flying dangerously.

No Good!, by Ed Scheindlin

Blow through 5 bosses in 10 seconds. A pretty simplistic shooter, though slightly confusing.

Becca, by Ed Scheindlin

Longer than most of the works here, use the arrows keys to navigate. More of a short narrative than a game.

Ye Olde Faulty Battle Projections, by Matthew Elvey Price

An RTS style game. Order your troops in 10 seconds, then watch them do battle for 10 seconds. Repeat for victory!

10 Seconds, by Roybie

A grab-and-dodge style game. Touch green circles to get more time, while avoiding red circles.

10 Seconds of Awesome, by Aaron Styles

A more appropriate name would be “10 Seconds of Gameplay Preceded by a Minute of Dialog”. Not sure if it’s a text experiment or not, but the main puzzle portion is hard to reach.

The Bus, by Morusque

Why do I feel like I’ve been punked? Wait for the bus to show up, then press a button to jump on. Cute presentation – and quite possibly a comment on casual games, not sure.

Let’s Get This Over With, by Perrin

A really tough avoid-’em-up. I could only last for 6.5 seconds.

Orbit Launch, by Ben Bruton

A 2-player rocket launching game. The delay between the button push and the rocket is 1-second, so it’s hard to play.

How Long is 10 Seconds?, by Maciej Czekala

A time estimation challenge more than a game. Press ENTER to start the clock, and space to stop it. Try to get as close to 10 seconds as possible.

Time Sensitive Materials, by Adam Durand

You only have 10 seconds to get an alien chemical to a safe container! A series of different platforming challenges.

Last Stand, by Dariuou

Ration power to destroy all incoming missiles.

The Colony, by Emperorben

A puzzle-platformer where you control a colony of aliens looking for a new home. Each only has 10 seconds to live before becoming a statue.

10 Ten, by Anthony

A shooter where enemies and the player alternate moves/attacks in a 10 second period.

Falling Space House, by Joaquim

Arrows to move, up arrow to rescue others. One of the few games that you actually play in only 10 seconds.

Paincube, by Nihilocrat

Knock enemies off a platform with your paincube in this mouse-driven 3D game.

Slug Defence, by Stig

Ultra simple tower defense game. Defend your cake from disgusting slugs.

Map Maker, by Super Sausage Dog

A platformer where you can modify platformable areas with the mouse. Stay outside of a safe zone and you only have 10 seconds to live.

Cold As Death, by Gorm Lai

A text adventure in 20 seconds. Read fast, type faster.

Time Factor, by Steve Nuttall

Quick multiplication slows down time, while wrong answers speed it up. How long can you last?

Turn Out the Lights, by Anthony

A puzzle game where clicking one tile changes the colors of all of the surrounding tiles. You only have 10 seconds per puzzle, but can click for a time extension (at a penalty).

*UPDATE*

Some additional entries:

Illumination, by Alexis Bacot

A puzzle-timing order game. Move tiles to the appropriate place with the time limit, but be careful in how & when you place them!

Word Hunt, by Zink Interactive

Click on the object that matches the target word (ignore the “spell”, it’s slightly confusing).

SurViral, by Darth Mike
Corrupt parts of the computer and spread your virus around. New decoys buy you additional time as you attempt to destroy critical parts. I just wish there were more levels!

10 Second Path, by vazor222

Click on shapes to walk down a simple path.

31 Comments | In: Games | tags: 10 Seconds, Best of the Net, Games | #

Run Jesus Run!

March 29th, 2010

by molleindustria

Just in time for Easter, comes Paolo Pedericini’s Run Jesus Run! Detailing the life of the Messiah in 10 seconds, run around doing Jesus-y things with the space bar, and make sure to get to the awesome ending scene.  I confess, I don’t know much about the man in the game, but some parts of it seem a little out of place.  All in good fun!

From the Artist

It’s a kind of prequel of Everyday the same dream.
Made in 4 days – about 12 hours (4 of them dedicated to the 8-bit arrangement of “Jesus is a friend of mine”)

Play

Play it HERE

17 Comments | In: Games | tags: 10 Seconds, Games, Paolo Pedercini | #