A man showed me his abdominal muscles today. It was unsolicited, but perhaps he was under the impression that that is what I wanted? Yes, you are probably fit by now. Was he training with the duck-faced lady in a football helmet? Can he explain to me what getting swaggy means or what Tupac and Michael Jackson have to do with indie games? Why do dimples scare you, lady?
Saturdays are odd. That doesn’t always bode ill – sometimes you find neat sneak peeks into what the smaller game developers have been up to amidst the weird stuff. Usually, that means screenshots. Sometimes .gif files. I heard a name for the phenomenon once: I think it was Screenshot Saturday.
Beacon by Monothetic
“Mutate your way to victory through repeated cloning”. Beacon is a permanent death action game fraught with genetic manipulation. Each enemy slain offers fragments of their DNA – bits and pieces you can use to mutate your character. These will offer minor statistic boosts or, potentially, corporeal changes both useful and horrific, and will carry over between cycles of death and cloning. That can’t be a comfortable process for our heroine.
Rise & Shine by Super Awesome Hyper Dimensional Mega Team
A behooded boy’s home planet of Gamearth has been invaded! Help him fend off Space Grunts and giant robots in a title that appears to revel in the tropes of its medium. This sidescrolling shooter sports fun, more densely detailed Saturday-morning cartoon depictions of ruined cities and overt references to beloved games of yore. The crew plans to make Rise & Shine a heavily story driven single player affair with “realistic” gun combat. That’s an odd word to describe a game like this with, but I’m interested.
Untitled project by Cuve Games
Alas, one of the dangers of browsing through the cool stills of Screenshot Saturday is risking excitement over something you’ll learn nothing about. It’s like showing somebody a wrapped gift box and refusing to let them open it until the 25th. What a tease.
Here‘s another beautiful shot. And with that, my available information is exhausted.
Schein by Zeppelin Studio
The man in this photo is standing in two different dimensions. The circle of not-light shining from below turns everything it touches. His own lantern exerts a similar force, the different shades opening new places. It’s an interesting mechanic that could lead to some fantastic puzzles. Heck, simply investigating the different appearances of objects is draw enough to try before you buy, right?
The Kraken Sleepeth by Team Pesky
Are you tired of Lovecraftian themes and forgotten tentacle monsters? No? Cool. “Kraken” may be a stand-in for a certain familiar yet unpronounceable god’s name in Team Pesky’s upcoming shooter. The maddening professor has insisted he sink his bathysphere to the depths of the world’s oceans. He’s searching for lost secrets defended by inky, squiggly beasts, and he’ll need the resources he finds along the way to ready his craft for the more abysmal abysses.
