25 Feb 2012

Cradle, what can we expect?



Yesterday I got totally caught by the first gameplay video of this game, its name is Cradle and I believe that it is going to offer something that the indie, and more in general the gaming, scene is still missing! Now that I have gathered the needed details I just can't wait to write the few usual thoughts. Sadly, there is still nothing playable, we'll have to wait till this spring;
I'm just hoping to bring some interest in it.

Flying Cafe for Semianimals?


Believe me or not, that is the name of the studio working on Cradle, it was founded in January 2011 and it counts not more than a dozen of really experienced game developers.
It's also interesting to understand why, and how, did they choose their name, so, here's the story: They wanted to provide games with a fresh visual impact that makes the player feel like being part of them. So, the idea of a flying cafe was perfectly matching the needs of being a "different" game developing studio, but, the cafe was missing the costumers by that time. That's why they added thier target, these semianimals (us, the players), people in need of a  well-structured virtual refuge.

Reach them here: flying-cafe.com

But, what is this?


Let me throw right here the first gameplay video:


(gotta love the soundtrack, for real)
Here we are, Cradle is a sci-fi first person quest game that involves freedom by any meaning. The plot is based on a love story between the protagonist and a mechanical girl that find themselves in the desert Mongolian hills.
I also have to say that the strong point of this adventure appears to be the incredible setting such as:

or also:

By now, there's nothing clear about this, except some spoilers that the devs shared with us, like, there will be two main locations and one of them will be a small fun park dominated by brain teasers with some arcade components. The other one will be a place to reflect about the original events that are completely aside the puzzles. Err, at the moment I'm afraid that these sentences are just causing some mess.

So, we just have to wait, as usual :\

21 Feb 2012

Should be Indie is totally renewed!






Aw yeah guys! I finally got my own domain, plus, a better theme I believe.
Now I'll look way more professional (even if I'm not), but really, during these days I realized that Should be Indie is getting more traffic every day that passes. And this moring, finally, I'm publishing under shouldbeindie.COM!

Would like to thank everyone that made this possible, you are awesome!

P.S: Update you bookmarks!

18 Feb 2012

Mojam bundle!


Sup guys!
Tonight's topic is Mojam bundle, even if I think that most of you already know what is this about, I just wanted to share my personal opinion about it.

What is it?




The video is pretty much selfexplanatory, but lets say a couple of things more.
Mojang team, in association with humblebundle.com, is creating a new game. The game, which is at the moment unnamed, has to be done and fully working by the end of this Sunday, as they promised, will they make it ?
Why is this something that deserves some attention?
The answer is simple, first: during this weekend you can preorder the game with the method "pay what you want", second: they are live streaming the whole work from the beginning to the end (18 hours left), third: ALL the revenue will be donated to charity!
Sadly, if you have already watched the video, you can see Notch aiming for 1 million dollars, at the moment they are slightly above $300.000,  and the counter doesn't seem to move as fast as yesterday.

Some thoughts


Well, beside the noble purpose, I want to talk a little bit about the game in itself.
Still in case you didn't know, last week, mojang.com run a poll asking for what did they have to make including the genre and the setting, but! they were going to combine the first place with the last one and here is what happened: we are going to see a Real time strategy shoot em up ambiented in an ancient Egypt steampunk, I mean, WHAT?
While the theme is not that hard to make, I'm really wondering how can a shoot 'em up be combined with an RTS, I can't even think to any already existing game that could barely match those requirements.

Tomorrow we will find out!

12 Feb 2012

Driftmoon, your indie full featured RPG


God, I'm so glad that I've finally found a game that could remind me that, no matter what, RPGs are just the better games that have been ever invented.
Today I'll just spend some time describing Driftmoon, a great RPG currently under heavy developing by Instant Kingdom.

Few words about Instant Kingdom


It is an indipendent game developement studio based in Finland, well, it is more likely an indie project kept alive by Ville and Anne Mönkkönen. Actually, this is just their newer game, they have worked on many other games that I will personally try out in the next days, anyways, you can always find more on their official website: instantkingdom.com.

The true roleplaying experience




Alright, according to the website Driftmoon is a roleplaying game that tells the story of the Pendant of Life, there isn't already an official release date, we just know that it will be anytime soon in 2012. You can already preorder the game paying 14.99$, but! Fortunately, they just released a pretty long demo (downloadable for free) that definitely changed my mind.
The game comes with 4 difficulty levels, and right after having chose one, you'll need to distribute your first points through the old style stats that were, and are: Strenght, Dexterity, Agility, Constitution, Intelligence. Everything begins with a letter from your quite scared father that asks you to go to his inn as soon as you can.
Once you get there, your mother pushes you into the well right behind you ( i know that sounds pretty weird) and your adventure begins!
I really don't want to spoil anything else, I'm just here to recommend this amazing RPG to all of you, fun is completely guaranteed!

P.S: If you don't like to read a lot then this game might not be for you, but DAMN YOU! this is how RPGs are supposed to be!
Download the demo here: Download page

7 Feb 2012

Backworlds!


Hello folks!
Today I'm here to write a bit about an indie game, probably unknown to many of you. As you can easily see, its name is Backworlds and it has some interesting features really new to me. By now, you can only download the demo, which is available for PC and Mac directly from their website: backworlds.com.

About the developers


The game is entirely made by two guys from sweden, Juha Kangas and Anders Ekermo. They are trying to release a full featured game while leading a fund campaign on IndieGoGo (HERE), unfortunately, it isn't going too well from what I see; This is basically why I decided to let you guys know about this.

A "not so intuitive" gameplay?


The official trailer says it all


Don't know how to call this, it's a 2D platformer, with another 2D world right behind the scenes, with your brush, you'll be in need to discover actually the "backworld" in order to find the right elements, bridges and utilities to keep on walking through the level. The graphics are quite simple but also damn cute, every colour matches perfectly the others creating a great visual sensation, like here:


But, theres just one single thing that I really have to admit, what the hell should the main character be? a green cat? Totally don't know, what do you think?
Anyways, as you already have read, the demo is free to download, so, why don't you just give it a try? it's a great way to spend some time having fun instead of dying in front of the TV or anything related to that.

See you!

3 Feb 2012

_ensnare_ scores once again, with Binary Opposition


Exams are finally done, or well, I passed one of them at least, so, you guys know what does this mean?
No? Then let me explain: I AM FREE! free of updating as much as I want Should Be Indie, free of finally do what I really find interesting, expect an explosive February!

There couldn't be anything better than a post about _ensnare_ and his new album, produced also with another talented chiptune artist, .mpegasus (the dot is not even a typo). _ensnare_ recently released a live mix where you can also listen to some of the new songs and, believe me, these will be 30 minutes well spent, give it a try just by clicking on the play button down here, you won't regret!


So if you still dont know this guy you could just head over his blog, ensnare8bit, or read what I've wrote some months ago here.

Binary Opposition


So, yeah today's topic is Binary Opposition, a tasty album composed by 10 tracks that you can buy from his blog for less than 10 bucks, as I said 4 of the songs are completely made by _ensnare_, other 4, by .mpegasus and the rest are made in collaboration. Personally the best one is "Ask Me Anything" which climbed in less than 2 days the top 25 songs of my iPod, mostly because, it transmits real feelings. I'm pretty sure that you will get what I've just said when you'll listen it for the first time. I wish I could share some tracks but it's impossible and I just hate those who upload songs on youtube that are not free to download, _ensnare_ really deserves to live off his work.
Can only drop here the preview and say goodbye:



Stay 8 bit!