Robot Wants Puppy

After playing Robot Wants Kitty what better way to finish off your afternoon than to play Robot Wants Puppy. While the previous game was mysterious with it's lack of explanation, this game comes with a introduction sequence giving you details into the characters involved and their motives. This proves completely invaluable unvaluable, and the game plays very similar to it's precursor. The main difference this time being the addition of your newly aquired sidekick - the kitty.

Acheivement Unlocked 2

After the success of Acheivement Unlocked - a game where you play as a dark blue elephant to complete a collection of 100 tasks - there is now Acheivement Unlocked 2! In the sequel you play as a light blue elephant, and there are now 500 acheivements to unlock. There are also five "level packs" to purchase using the in-game coin system. Is it possible to have too much fun?

Robot Wants Kitty

Robot Wants Kitty is an endearing tale of one robot's love for his kitten. Evil alien-type things have kidnapped (kit-napped?) the kitten and it's your quest to return him/her. During the game you obtain various power ups which give you access to delve deeper into the alien's lair.

This classic platformer takes about twenty minutes or so and there's no way to save your progress, so when you have a spare moment why don't you help the poor robot out?

PuzzGrid

If you've ever seen the hit TV Quiz show Only Connect and wanted to play along at home then this is the puzzle site for you. This site contains many "connecting walls" to play, as well as the facility to submit your own puzzles. Incidentally, you can play the official grids here.

All PuzzGrid needs now is a few Victoria Coren monologues...

Open Transport Tycoon Deluxe

Open Transport Tycoon Deluxe (or OpenTTD) is based on the classic game Transport Tycoon. You can build road and rail networks, as well as airports and docks and then instruct your vehicles to carry cargo between destinations. There are several AI opponents to play against, or you can play online against the community of players who have probably devoted way too much time to the game. OpenTTD has just reached a milestone in its history as version 1.0 is finally available. Apparently the game ends in the year 2050 but it would take about 24 hours of playing for me to find out, so I haven't... yet. Overall this is well worth a download if you enjoy micromanagement games.

Bloons Tower Defence 4

Bloons Tower Defence 4 is quite a good tower defence game. To be honest I'm not sure how it compares to BTD1, BTD2 or BTD3, but I will endeavour to play them to find out. I think the most surprising thing about this game is that it's based on possibly the most dull game in the world - Bloons. All things considered though, it's quite entertaining to build you way up through the different available towers, bursting your way through progressively more resilient levels of balloons.

Red Alert

As well as the link from this post's image it may also be helpful to see this page about how to play Red Alert without burning it onto a CD. Red Alert is a great old game, that was released as freeware to mark the release of Red Alert 3. I spent many days playing it when it was first released, and since rediscovering it I have spent many hours more. Compared to some of today's games standards the AI can seem quite stupid, but I think the range of units and buildings in this game still makes it one of my all time favourites.

Zombie City Tactics

Zombie City Tactics is a turn based strategy game themed around a zombie infested city. It plays a little bit (but not much) like chess - with the humans and zombies taking it in turn to move their pieces around a grid. There are three types of humans - bog standard one square per turn, soldiers who take a piece without moving, and slayers who can move two spaces per turn. They can be dropped into the playing field, but cost different amounts of energy to summon. The energy is gained by holding land against the zombies and so there's a balance to find between all out offence and simply staying put. Overall the game is nicely put together and the 3D layout is pretty cool.

Wordle

Create a cloud of words using a website or text document as input. Style it how you like and then astound your friends and family with your skills. This could be useful if you want to create a tag cloud, or maybe if you want to find out the important elements in a story without reading it... Or (more likely) it could just be something to play around with for a couple of minutes and then throw away.

ASCIIpOrtal

ASCIIpOrtal is a 2D ASCII version of Valve’s Portal. Run around, fire portals, jump through portals, dodge barrels, push switches and enjoy the company of your companion cubes... all in wonderful text format.

Interestingly (or not really) the character set used isn't ASCII - for instance the green player character (see Wikipedia). Also the game's author lists his inspirations as "Increpare’s Portile game, Super Serif Bros, and Valve’s Portal". So it's not ASCII, nor is it just Portal, but it is definitely awesome.

Tone Matrix

A really nice melody maker. Click on the boxes to light them up, and then listen to the music it produces. Toggle more boxes on and off until you've got a tune you're happy with and then... um, well there's not really a then - you can just listen to it. Anyway I thought it was really cool, and it uses the pentatonic scale which is also cool.

Shift 4

Shift 4 shares much with Shift, Shift 2 and Shift 3. Once again you are stuck jumping around in a maze of walls and not walls, which become not walls and walls (respectively) as soon as you hit the shift key. However this time there is the added complication of more people to control. A great game with an almost comprehensible "rescue the family" plot line; I give it five stars.

NetHack

If you're more a fan of game play than graphics and you like games that need you to explore and think and explore some more, then NetHack could be a game for you! Filled with far too many different weapons, potions, creatures, tools, clothes and ascii characters NetHack is probably impossible to complete, but very fun to die trying. You have a choice of thirteen different rolls (Wizard, Archeologist, Tourist, Knight, ...) in five different races which all play very differently from each other. Admittedly learning the keys takes a few games, but you can see a list of the keys by pressing '?'. I've been informed that there are a lot of spoilers on the web, but have been quite content playing the game for the last two weeks without looking beyond the guidebook text file it comes with. NetHack generates a new world each time a new game is started - so no two games are ever the same.

GemCraft Chapter Zero

One of my favourite games from last year was the addictive tower defence game GemCraft Chapter One. This year the makers have created the prequel to it - Chapter Zero. If you're anything like me then you'll have forgotten that the original game was loosely fitted around a storyline - and this game is a continuation of the same storyline backwards. I for one was certainly wondering how all these gems obtained magical powers and this instalment sheds exactly no light on my puzzlement.
Anyway, Chapter Zero is very similar to Chapter One, but with a load of new levels, a load of new enhancements and a load of new bonus towers on each level.

Shift 3

The title of this, the third game in the Shift series, won't come as a surprise to many; Shift 3 is incrementally titled after Shift and Shift 2. It introduces a new element of adventure with the PDA powered map. There are also a load of new achievements to attain and even a couple of secret characters to unlock.

 

Stickman Odo 1

It turns out that Stickman Odo was actually Stickman Odo 2. Stickman Odo is shares the same level of random guesswork as its older brother. However it's also humorously violent in a cartoon violence way and only takes about five minutes to complete, so is well worth a look.
 

Shift 2

After a weird opening Shift 2 quickly picks up pace and is a very good sequel to Shift. More puzzles and more strange in game text and a few extra things to interact with. Now there is also a level editor, medals and a high score table (which is of course impossible to get on).

Board Game Geek

If you're interested in board games then this site will no doubt be of interest to you. There are many many games listed on here from traditional games such as chess and Monopoly, through to more modern games like the Settlers of Catan and Puerto Rico.

 

Shift

A clever platform game where the floor is the roof and the inside of blocks is also the outside... Umm... Control the character with the arrow keys and then use the shift key to invert the man about the floor he is currently standing on. Collect keys to open gates and avoid the spikes (both sides of them). There is an in game timer from which you can find your score and plenty of in game text about the in game timer (almost all of which can be completely ignored :-)

Achievement Unlocked

The aim of the game is to "unlock" the 100 achievements by achieving them. The game is, in my opinion, brilliant although one of the achievements (#55) requires some rather specific knowledge, or a lot of luck.

Also I have no idea why you play as an elephant.