Look, the videogames coming out this week are dreadful. I mean, there’s one nice looking game for the Xbox Live Arcade, but otherwise you’ve got a ‘Bleach’ game and a ‘Phineas and Ferb’ game. I can’t change that fact, but I can recommend some titles that will help you get through the awful summer drought.
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The only game coming out this week worth talking about is ‘Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet’. It looks like a side-scrolling shooter version of ‘Limbo’ with amazingly fluid animation and heavy use of silhouettes.<\/p>\n
In gameplay, it sounds like it’s more of a “Metroidvania” style game. You can roam freely through the planet, though you’ll only be able to access certain areas after you’ve collected certain upgrades. It’s an interesting approach to mixing genres and should provide a very cool gaming experience.<\/p>\n
Whether you’re looking to donate to charity or you just want to pick up some of the coolest indie games of the past few years at a ridiculous price, ‘Humble Indie Bundle 3’ is a great way to go. You can pay whatever you want and you get games like ‘Crayon Physics Deluxe’, ‘And Yet it Moves’ and ‘VVVVVV’.<\/p>\n
On average, folks are shelling out $4.67, at least at the time of this writing. If you’re buying on PC, I’m encouraging you to pay more than that. Mac and Linux users are killing us, with the average Linux user paying $11.35. By comparison, PC users are paying an average of $3.72. Not too good, is it, chief?<\/p>\n
If you haven’t given ‘League of Legends’ a shot by this point, you really should. The game has been out for two years, and it’s only been growing and improving since then. There are more characters, more skins and a huge online resource to help get you started.<\/p>\n
‘League of Legends’ is a free-to-play game that’s based on the ‘Defense of the Ancients’ mod for ‘Warcraft III’. If you’re not familiar with ‘DoTA’, it’s something like ‘Diablo’ mixed with ‘Warcraft’ with a little bit of tower defense thrown in for good measure. The cost of entry is just right, so give it a shot.<\/p>\n
If you’re looking for a way to zip right through these hot summer days, ‘Civilization V’ may be the ticket. It’s just as involved and addictive as previous ‘Civ’ titles, but drops the complicated and time-consuming combat for simplified combat that’s slightly less time-consuming.<\/p>\n
Playing a turn-based strategy game, especially ‘Civ V’, is a great way to kill time while waiting on commercials, waiting for a match to start in ‘League of Legends’, or waiting for ‘Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet’ to download. It’s also a great way to accidentally stay up until four in the morning because you kept saying “Just one more turn!”<\/em><\/p>\n