Bite the Bullet is the latest creation by 9_6, developer of the colorful Hyper Wars: The Mega Firestorm. The game plays very differently from standard shooters, in which the player has to avoid bullets for as long as possible to increase the bonus count.

Shooting with a bonus greater than ten will activate the autofire mode and imbue the ship with temporary invulnerability. The number of homing projectiles shot during this period depends on your bonus counter.

Press the A key to shoot and hold the S key to activate the slow motion mode, but only if the gauge shown at the top right of the screen is filled up. This bar replenishes steadily over time, and holding the same button will change your ship into a hit box, allowing players to easily dodge bullets.

The bonus counter increases when the player doesn't fire any shots. Destroying an enemy ship awards the player with a health collectible, though acquiring one can be a rather difficult task as your adversaries do not stay around for long.

Name: Bite the Bullet
Developer: 9_6
Category: Shooter
Type: Freeware
Size: 2MB

Found this gameplay vid of a homebrew game called "Odyssen" by SteevTee on YouTube. The game is said to be in an early development stage, but the graphics are already slick and the gameplay looks fast paced and varied.

The development diary for Puppy Games' Time Bandit tribute, Treasure Tomb can be found over at the javagaming.org forums.



Nream is a commercial engine (made using Blitz3D) which allows the creation of 3D adventure games with little effort. There are different modules to help make maps, define events, make tiles and more. Almost all aspect of the engine is scriptable, including menu, save/load menu, and even the title screen.

A new set of screenshot for the upcoming vertical shooter Yakouga 4 posted.

Hurrican updated to version 1.0.0.3; switching weapons now work for the gamepad. [review, cheats]

cactus is working on a 3D update for Fractal Fighter.



There's a huge post about GR3's Rose and Camellia; presumably the game will be released sometime in July.

Pictured right, a Go Nintendo scan from Maniac! (a German magazine) showing exclusive shots of how the student project De Blob will look like on the Wii.

De Blob is currently being developed by Blue Tongue Entertainment, and will be published by THQ as a Wii exclusive sometime in 2008. The original school project is still available for download from a GameDev.Net forum thread posted last year.

- Go Nintendo article
- GameDev.Net forum thread
- Kotaku article

Frederator Films, an indie feature film company with the aim of producing 2-D animated genre movies with a budget of below $20 million, had recently announced three upcoming projects - with one of them being a claymation feature based on The Neverhood. The original creator, Doug TenNapel will be involved as the writer and director.

As stated by Doug himself, "I have absolutely no desire to redo the Neverhood game look... that was what it needed to be for 1995. I'm putting everything on the table story-wise and saying, What is the Neverhood about and who is Klaymen? I've been redesigning the characters and figuring it all out again with a feature-length story in mind."

- Fred Seibert's post
- Variety.com article
- Doug TenNapel's post
- Adventure Gamers article

Gameplay videos from Wilfred, the Hero and Bite the Bullets.

Vortex is a new abstract arena shooter by Jordan Browne, a Game Maker developer known for his Shuttle series. Use the Z and X key to shoot in either direction, and eliminate twenty enemies from each wave to complete a level.

An extremely promising project marred by poorly implemented controls.

Name: Vortex
Developer: Jordan Browne
Category: Shooter
Type: Freeware
Size: 2 MB

Warning: Contains strong language and graphic scenes.

Purgatorio is a short adventure game by Jonathan Lynch which tells the tale of Frank O'Shea, a soldier on a peacekeeping mission who was knocked unconscious and injured in the line duty.

He awakens to find himself wounded and in a strange, but somehow familiar town. The game features a mix of photograph and hand drawn art, with the results looking far better than another similar attempt called Soviet Unterzogersdorf.

Name: Purgatorio
Developer: Jonathan Lynch
Category: Adventure
Type: Freeware
Size: 100MB

Bite the Bullets is a tech demo made by Ishi to test out a new bullet pattern creation system, hence the lack of enemies and intricate level designs. The gameplay is simple, avoid bullets while directing your shots at an abstract geometric shape to score points. Players shooting from a shorter distance are rewarded with extra points.

Hover the mouse pointer around a menu option to make a choice. No button clicks are required.

Name: Bite the Bullets
Developer: Ishisoft
Category: Shooter
Type: Freeware
Size: 2MB

Pictured from left to right, top to bottom: Paul Cunningham's Doppelganger and Kevin's Interferon: Core Defence. [Alien Abduction]

Pictured above is a screenshot from alillm's Shmup-Dev competition entry, Bullet Symphony. May not seem like much, but the mention of Abstract Sea and Neon 2 as Ali Maunder's previous works will more than likely make anyone sit up and take notice. Quote:

I've had over 3 years experience making games in flash, which unfortunately struggles a bit in regards to speed, which means making decent shmups can be quite a challenge (especially when like me, you like the screen to be full of bullets).

Press Release - Developed by Budcat Creations and scheduled for a Q1 2008 release in Europe, Blast Works: Build, Fuse & Destroy is a side-scrolling shooter that lets players craft the game to their liking by building their own levels, ships and enemy ships. In addition, players can "absorb" the pieces and weapons of destroyed enemy ships to bolster their own defenses during battle.

Across more than 15 different land, air and sea missions, the goal of Blast Works is to destroy enemy ships while continually growing your own into a massive craft by absorbing their fragments. Players can also upgrade their ship in the Hangar by customising weapons, propulsion systems and armour. Creative types will further enjoy building a ship from scratch with the Ship Editor and then testing it out in combat on a custom level they've built with the Level Editor. To defend the Hangar, players must use the Wii Remote like an anti-aircraft turret to shoot down enemies attacking from all angles. Finally, the game's 2-player cooperative mode lets players work together to blast enemies, fuse debris to grow their ships and finish the mission as a team. [download Tumiki Fighters, strategy guide]




More screenshots: [1] - [2] - [3] - [4] - [5]

Wilfred, the Hero is a rare breed of RPG Maker games with entirely original content, save for certain sound effects. A collaboration between Brandon Abley and Teo Mathlein, the story is basically about two buddies named Wilfred and Kyr-Stan on a quest to save their world and rid it of evil once and for all.

Of course, things are never simple especially when the hero has doubts about his destiny. This theme is explored frequently, and the accompanying soundtrack does a great job of setting each melancholic scene perfectly. Some may remember Teo as the artist responsible for Sunset Over Imdahl, which explains the Misao award it won for the best visual consistency category.

The main characters are easily some of the strangest, with Wilfred acting as the Pyramid Head wannabe and Kyr-Stan assuming the role of Lugaru reincarnated. There are no potions to gather, since Hit Points and Mana Points are restored completely after each battle.

This download only chronicles the first chapter, while the music is available to download from this page.

Name: Wilfred, the Hero
Developer: maladroithim, Teo
Category: RPG
Type: Freeware
Size: 40MB

Download Hurrican

Massive spoilers ahead.

Excerpt from GamesIndustry.biz:

Too many developers are making "cheap knock-offs" of successful games and holding back growth of the casual games market, according to Jason Kapalka, chief creative officer at PopCap Games.

With low development costs, studios are able to churn out copycat games in a short time, but these titles rarely make enough money for developers to grow past a hand-to-mouth existence, says the PopCap founder.

"Very few games are developed without reference to past games. There's always going to be titles that build on a previous mechanic or game. But there's a fine line between that and very bold-faced rip-offs that aren't adding anything to the game and are just trying to make a quick buck," said Kapalka, in an interview with GamesIndustry.biz.

Read more, full interview [source: Teeth]

A finalist in IGF's 2006 Technical Excellence Category, Switchball's (then known as Crazy Ball) publisher was never made known to the public due to contractual terms. But digging through some dirt has revealed that the big S might possibly be the secret party which is expected to distribute the game once it is completed and ready to ship. Coincidence?

Based on impressions from the demo, Switchball has often been described as a spritual successor to Ballance - another ball-shuffling action puzzler. Presumably the new build will support the AGEIA PhysX physics hardware. Demos for both Switchball and it's predecessor are still available for download from Atomic Elbow's web site.

Surprisingly, The Underside hasn't been abandoned yet as Mr. Podunkian begins documenting his work on the second dungeon. Unfortunately it's still a long way from being completed, with school and homework cited as reasons for neglect. [Merry Gear Solid, The Underside preview]

PC Format writes a glowing review for The Blackwell Legacy. [view article in new window, The Blackwell Legacy web site]

PEKPOK could possibly be developing a Pengo remake. A 30MB demo for the recently released Irairadori is available for download as well, though the gameplay isn't particularly endearing. [Irairadori direct download link, Push Push Penguin]

Crostar might be working on a new game. [rhacp review]

Bloxorz is a puzzle game which involves shuffling a piece of block across a suspended maze. The objective is basically to get the block to fall through a square hole at the end of each stage, all the while trying to avoid falling off the edges.

The player will be introduced to switches, bridges, tiles which responds to different pressures and even teleporters to complicate matters. Later on, smaller blocks are introduced to increase the overall difficulty of each puzzle.

There are thirty-three stages to complete. Development notes can be found here.

Name: Bloxorz
Developer: Roboman
Category: Puzzle
Type: Browser