It was the best of times, it was the worst of times – XBOX 360′s community games were renamed Indie in 2009 and we saw a huge surge in the number of releases, many of which flew by, and for good reason, for looking like nothing but rehashed version of startup kits with little imagination and far less game theory or design practice implemented. That said, we also saw some truly remarkable and imaginative choices from micro developers. XBLIGR (XBOX Live Indie Game Reviewer) chose ten games that, while no competition for Dragon Age, let alone Splosion Man, certainly did what indies should do: offer legitimately fun, engaging, pretty to look at, edgy content for less than five bucks, or in some cases less than a song on iTunes.

It is so important to encourage the indie gaming community; despite many shoddy releases, behind those titles we often find eager and ambitious young minds who dedicate an awful lot of time to getting their title ready and conformed for the indie marketplace. So we ain’t knockin’ ‘em, we are just waiting to see what they come up with next!

Here are our ten favorites, some which came from reader suggestions with which we were in agreement. We hope you get a chance to play them and enjoy.

Here’s to all the great new titles that await us in 2010!

Trino

Developer: trinoteam
Genre: Shooter
Price: 240 MS Points

What They Say:

“TRINO, an evolving alien, must escape the NANITES, an insidious nano-robot swarm, that have imprisoned trino for his powers! Use TRINO’s powerful TRIANGLE TRAP to defeat the Nanites and break free from their Laser Prison! Evade, outsmart and destroy over 15 types of deadly enemies! Evolve for power! Over 48 challenging levels! Live scoreboard! Save trino!”

What We Think:

The Qix and the Dead.  Guide your alien pod through each area, using your capture beam to trap Nanite enemies.  Ensnare multiple Nanites to rack up big points and bonuses.  As your creature evolves, you’ll be able to link up additional triangle force fields, and you’ll need them!  Act fast, because the fields don’t last.  Don’t let the leisurely feel at the start of the game fool you:  you’d best get used to the trap-and-collect mechanic while the enemies are somewhat docile.  As the levels progress, the enemies get more aggressive, and you’ll have to trap on the fly.  Trino is sleek, fast-paced, and highly addictive.

Screenshot:

Solar

Developer: Murudai
Genre: Action & Adventure
Price: 80 MS points

What They Say:

“Solar, a space simulation/action game where you play as the sun itself. You can complete a myriad of challenges or simply mess around in an infinite, sandbox universe.”

What We Think:

Here is what our reviewers thought when we originally covered this title:

“Players are put in the role of the sun and they can collect other celestial bodies to complete different tasks. You can choose between two modes of game play: the first is called Sandbox and this mode allows you to explore and navigate freely throughout the universe. Adding planets to your orbit and destroying stars for the fun of it makes this mode addicting.

The second mode is called Challenge and is comprised of eighteen levels in which you complete objectives to get more skills. The purpose of each level is pretty straightforward and the overall appearance is very clean and modern.

Solar does not have a multi-player mode and it is suitable for all ages. It isn’t extremely violent and is completely unique compared to other games out on the market. The music is ethereal and really creates a sense of being in outer space. This game is very relaxing and can be played for hours at a time. There are no sound effects when the sun smashes into stars or planets. I think it would have taken away from the whimsical feeling of the game if there were loud crashing sounds.

I would highly recommend Solar to other Xbox Live users. This game is so cool that you are almost sad when it is over.”

Screenshots:

Miner Dig Deep

Developer: Robir
Genre: Action & Adventure
Price: 80 Microsoft points

What They Say:

“Dig and expand your mine to find greater treasures from the depths. Build the deepest mine so you can make your fortune in rare gems and metals from the earth below.”

What We Think:

Here is what we wrote about Miner Dig Deep in 2009:

“Miner Dig Deep is a great looking game with excellent sound design and music (the soundtrack sounds like a hip Silverlake indie band) and most importantly: the five-second play cycle is perfectly executed – easy to pick up, detailed enough to sustain interest and very responsive to user input.

Far too many developers fail to understand that if a game doesn’t work at the basic control level, if a user does not “get” or feel comfortable with how to puppeteer their avatar, let alone how it looks when it moves, then the rest is irrelevant.  Too many games, even those with multi-million dollar budgets fail at this basic level.

Miner Dig Deep has a brief but logical learning curve.  It then succeeds at the next flagpole: the five-minute play cycle offers the player opportunities for simple level advancement by virtue of the stickiest game ploy of all – improve your abilities, sell stuff you have found questing for cash with which to upgrade your gear, rinse, repeat – addictive gameplay.  Of course this simple formula in and of itself is not enough to make a great game, but in this case, the blend of Dig Dug, N+ problem solving and Arkadian Warriors simple upgrading systems make this one a winner.

Screenshot:

Decimation X

Developer: Xona Games
Genre: Shooter
Price: 80 MS Points
Players 1-4
Co-op 2-4

What They Say:

“1-4 player intense retro shmup. Classic 2D fixed gallery shooter. Features: Insane firepower, progressive defences, tons of power-ups. Smooth 60 frames per second, pure arcade action.”

What We Think:

Holy particle emitters Batman!  If you like Space Invaders, and you like glow sticks and maybe water bottles and pacifiers and plush to backpacks, then you literally could not find a more perfect game to suit your cerebellum.  Fast and furious shooting to a throbbing trance soundtrack and more flying sparks than your eyes can eat, Decimation X is a space shooter of the highest caliber, and a price that can’t be beat by any Arcade game; at 80 MS points, it’s a complete steal.

Screenshots:

Storage Inc

Developer: Stolpskott Studios
Genre: Puzzle & Trivia
Price: 400 points
Players 1-4
Co-op 2-4

What They Say:

“Cooperative arcade puzzle game for 1-4 Local players. 100 Maps, all with full coop support. Easy to learn. Simple controls. Work together as goods keeps dropping in. Organize stored goods to save both time and well needed space. Plan ahead, and make sure ordered deliveries are out in time.”

What We Think:

A well designed, addictive and increasingly complex game requiring that you organize stored goods to save both time and well needed space. Plan ahead, and make sure ordered deliveries are out in time.  We really liked the challenge ramp up as organizing the incoming and outgoing orders, while negotiating available space becomes ever more demanding.  Kind of like a day job, but far ore fun due to the ability to watch the havoc ensue with impunity.  Would be even more fun if knocking over towers of boxes with your forklift meant destroying an entire vodka factory.

Screenshots:

Arkedo Series – 03 PIXEL!

Developer: Arkedo
Genre: Platformer
Cost: 240 MS Points

What They Say:

“”MORE BLUE” : Arkedo/Pastagames’ answer to Avatar.”

What We Think:

Hip to be Squares – If Mario ever had a Tamagotchi, his virtual pet would be PIXEL! the cat.  This platformer may not be a big spender in the graphics department, in fact paying tribute to 2-bit graphics, but what it lacks in flash, it makes up for in charm.  All of the character sprites and playable areas are constructed using monotone pixels, but the animations slather this title in all kinds of awesome.  The soundtrack is enjoyable, and the gameplay, while a bit repetitive, is tried and true.  If you’ve been itching for a good side-scroller, PIXEL! will find the sweet-spot under your chin.

Pixel! released at the tail end of 2009 is already one of the Xbox Indie blade’s top rated games (by users).  See also Jump! and Swap!

Screenshot:

Square Off

Developer: Roonda
Genre: Shooter
Cost: 240 MS Points

What They Say:

“Wield shotguns, bombs and missiles in up to four player co-op or deathmatch action. Features beautiful sound and graphics, LIVE online highscores, hordes of vicious aliens and absolutely loads of addictive fun.”

What We Think:

With bright and well done animation, excellent sound design and even some well integrated particle physics, this Castle Crashers styled science fiction platform shooter allows up to four players in co-op mode.  You can always tell the game is working when you hit the demo timer expiration and huff a sigh of frustration that you have to go to the purchase screen.  It’s another good sign when you forget you are playing an indie game because you go to look for it under your Arcade menu.  Solid all around, not perfect in that at times the play density can get a little thin, but better than most.

Screenshots:

Platypus

Developer: Escapist Games
Genre: Shooter
400 MS Points

What They Say:

“Platypus, the acclaimed and thoroughly addictive claymation shooter, comes to the Xbox360. Fight your way through 20 stages of intense action, either solo or cooperatively with a friend. Countless enemies and end of level bosses to beat, plus loads of bonus pickups and other treasures to help you on your way. Can you defend your home planet of Mongola and defeat the invading plasticine army?”

What We Think:

Smoosh!  Headshot!

Imagine an army of 10-year old boys had access to an unlimited supply of plasticine, and decided to construct not only a massive air force, but a landscape and sky for that force to dominate.  Toss in an inspired soundtrack reminiscent of the Commodore 64 days, and see how long it takes to figure out that some part of us just never gets any older.  Platypus harkens back to the glory days of games like R-Type, but gives it a nice squishy coat that you just want to sink your hands into.

As you damage larger enemies, your bullets sink holes into their pliable fuselage until they can fly no more, dropping from the sky with a blast that is also made of clay.  Even the numbers that make up your score mash together to reform as points rack up!  Collect weapon upgrades to keep the gameplay fresh and exciting.  Team up with a friend, and you can both tear Wallace & Gromit a new one.

Screenshot:

Dungeon Adventure

Developer: UberGeekGames
Genre: Role Playing
Price: 240 MS Points

What They Say:

“Classic ASCII dungeon crawling on your Xbox! Customize the game with remappable ASCII and graphical tiles, play with the precision of a keyboard or ChatPad, use your Avatar as the hero, and prove you’re the best on the Global Scoreboards. Unlock a slew of Awardments while enjoying endless gameplay, with an infinite number of dungeons to loot!”

What We Think:

Finally, someone who was clearly there for the good times of Multimate, or inserting a 5″ floppy disk (when they were still actually floppy) into a computer to load the operating system, when MUDs and MOOs and Infocom were teh l33t, made a video game we can play with an Xbox 360 controller.  Although combat involves little more than running into things, there are a lot of choices that can affect how such pixel collisions go – whether it be through weapons and armor, potions or other buffs or level.  The hero can fast travel across the screen when the “ASCII refresh” gets a little slow, but  chance of running headlong into a powerful adversary becomes a risk.  This is just awesome fun, brilliantly executed and totally faithful to the good old days of monochrome monitors and Ultima 1 – when imagination filled in the gaps and no one answered phone calls when you wanted a good game of pencil and paper D&D.  Much love.

Screenshots:

Ninja Bros

Developer: Dot Zo Games
Genre: Puzzle & Trivia
Price: 80 MS Points

What They Say:

“It’s Ninja action puzzle game , wao!”

What We Think:

No Ninja Gets Left Behind! This is one tricky puzzler to get your head around. You can have up to four ninjas on the screen in a stage. To clear the goal, successfully navigate each ninja to the exit door. Not. That. Simple. The left analog stick controls all of the ninjas at once, while each of A, B, X and Y buttons are each mapped to make one of the ninjas jump. Traps abound, and shurikens rain down from above. You must plot your moves carefully if you want to get all of your ninja to safety. If one of your ninjas should meet an untimely end, you must start the room afresh. You have to plan ahead, or try to be mindful of where all of your ninjas are at once. Minimalist graphics, but dying a lot isn’t supposed to be pretty. You’ll get frustrated, but I defy you to walk away from this game without saying “just one more try…” at least a dozen times.

Screenshots:

@udience Favor1t3!!!1

I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES!!!

Developer: Jamezila
Genre: Shooter
80 points

For a buck, an addictive song and lots of flying zombie guts this little monster of a game pretty much had everything going for it in the popularity contest. And popular it was indeed, even grabbing IGN.com’s Indie Game of the Year 2009 prize. We thought it was alright too.  The only thing it was missing was a half time where someone brought out free hot dogs and Dallas cheerleaders in bikinis washed cars at center field.

What They Say:

“This video game product represents a culmination of years of intensive psychological research, bleeding edge engineering, and artistic collaboration by over two dozen internationally recognized art houses, using such technologies as the HYPERMAGIC 3.0 engine to power never-before-seen eye candy with the MEGACORE X parallelization processor for smooth-as-glass presentation.”

What We Think:

Here is what our reviewers wrote when this title was first released:

“Featuring a twin stick shooter setup, the action will be immediately familiar to anyone who has played the XBLA game Geometry Wars.  In Zomb1es you play the part of, well, a tiny character running around a landscape riddled with zombies.  There are numerous weapon power ups at your disposal, including such zombie bashing classics as the flamethrower, the shotgun, and the machine gun, while adding new favorites like a missile launcher and a weird green tri-attack-star-shooting-thinger.  You’ll also enjoy the occasional extra life, speed boost, and temporary shield.  As you shoot more zombies, the game begins warping to include netherworld like backdrops and puddles of green slime, among other odd creatures.

In all of the simplistic glory that unfortunately too often comes with an Indie Game, I would hesitate to call title truly original or even mildly thought provoking (unless of course you aren’t fluent in l33tsp3Ak and are caught in the headlights by the game’s actual title). That aside, Zombies still has a lot of good things going for it. The graphics are both polished and smooth, the controls are very responsive and the addictive soundtrack is comprised of one long song hammering on about making a game with, well, zombies in it.   At 80 Microsoft points, the zombie killing is frantic, the pace is unyielding, and most importantly, the game costs 80 points.”

Creator:

Price: 200 Points

Countries: Canada, France, Italy, Spain, United Kingdom, United States
Languages: English

Publisher’s Description
“FrogSlayer Studios presents, Go, an ancient Chinese game of strategy now available on XBox Live Community Games. Learn to play with our interactive tutorial and then play against your friends locally or against players at all skill levels via XBox Live.”

What We Think:
I recently read a tattered, vintage paperback copy of the book The Master of Go by Yasunari Kawabata which revolves around a newspaper journalist’s chronicle and analysis of the last great Go competition with the master of the old school of Go in Japan that took place during the early part of the 1900′s.

While some of it is fictionalized, the book, a winner of the Nobel Prize in literature, uses a spare and honest look at the actual plays made during the game and how the incumbent young champion manages to defeat the old Master. It is  a strangely compelling and easy read, but despite all sorts of updating graphic charts of the gameboard, nowhere in the the book is there an actual explanation of the rules of the game.

Deeply curious as to how this simple game could be so devastatingly complex that some tournament matches could drag on for three months, I was delighted to find Go 3D in the Xbox Indie Game marketplace and dropped the two dollars to check it out and see if I could learn something.

The Xbox version comes with an easy to understand and rather comprehensive tutorial that relies on, and even seems to come from the American Go Association.  With hands-on lessons, this alone was worth the price of admission.

The game’s design uses a true three-dimensional object for the black and white stones and game board, so that it can be rotated and viewed from all angles.  The game does not have AI built in, however, and I imagine that trying to create the AI for something as rich as Go would be extremely daunting  as Go quickly becomes as challenging if not more so than Chess, so one can not expect this from an indie Xbox game.  Instead the developer allows you to play both the black and white stones while enforcing legal moves in solo mode.

Everything works out just fine in two player mode as the game has solid implementation for two controllers.

An excellent way to learn and practice the game, with a lovely Zen score and pretty visuals.  A strong recommend from us for this commendable and needed effort.

Rating: ★★★★★ 

Have you played Go 3D? What were your impressions?

Title:

Price: 400 Points

Countries: Canada, United Kingdom, United States
Languages: English

Publisher’s Description
Save the city… or destroy it! Play as the hero and save the city by calling in tips, surrounding suspect buildings, and running down the bad guys. Or choose to destroy the city by avoiding the patrolling heroes and setting bombs inside the buildings – leveling the city building by building.

What We Think:
Chalked succeeds where so many other game developing upstarts have failed – the basics.  With simple and intuitive controls, wonderfully inventive and beautifully realized black and white visuals (the characters look like faceless Gumbys) and an awesome soundtrack, this seemingly simple take on Simon – that is, matching button combinations, is rather more challenging and multi-layered than it seems at first glance.

The game actually combines a variety of games – the Simon element, a puzzle solving element involving figuring out what buildings to topple in strategic sequence, and then the classic Pac Man – run from the ghosts element.  You see – you play the role of a miscreant with an insatiable lust for bombing buildings to the ground.  When destroyed, a building dissolves into the ground leaving a space where once it stood.  Then the “good guys” come after you for your misdeed.  It’s not an easy game at first, but it’s easy enough to navigate and fun enough to look at that it holds interest long enough to figure out some basic strategies.

We wish all community games merited the 400 points like Chalked does.

Rating: ★★★★☆ 

Have you played Chalked? What were your impressions?