The PlayStation Vita launches today in both wifi and 3G models in the US and EU territories. Digital titles Super Stardust Delta, Escape Plan, and Tales from Space: Mutant Blobs Attack!!! have hit the US PlayStation Network, and Frobisher Says is a free preorder incentive to those in Europe.

Independent studio Housemarque brings Super Stardust Delta, a spherical arena shooter that uses the dual analog sticks to handle the core mechanics. It also makes use of Vita's touchscreen to create black holes and fire missiles and tilt mechanics to view what's on the other side of the planet. The action looks pretty frantic and fun below:

Fun Bits Interactive (whose producers worked on Fat Princess) made touch-intensive puzzle platformer Escape Plan for the Vita. Players swipe, squeeze, poke, slap, and tilt to manipulate the characters and interact with the environments. Escape Plan also has pretty slick gray-scale visuals:

Video pinball has seen a resurgence in popularity recently with the success of Zen Studios' Pinball FX and the Farsight's classic table compilation Pinball Arcade. Despite early efforts like Pinball Quest and the Devil's Crush series, however, few video pinball titles attempt to add depth that goes beyond simple mode progression and score-based gameplay.

This Spring, the Netherlands-based Paladin Studios plans to self-publish its own unique take on the genre, Momonga Pinball Adventures, for iOS and Android devices.

Momonga Pinball Adventures features traditional pinball objectives mixed with level-based gameplay -- the result is somewhat like a pinball platformer. The gameplay clips shown above bring to mind Sony's super-bizarre (but awesome!) Flipnic for the PlayStation 2, which is definitely a good thing.

Nope, The Journey Down HD is still not available for purchase. However, we do have this glorious trailer here to make the waiting even worse. The original version of this lovely little point & click adventure received a lot of positive feedback and, well, for good reason. It's pretty nifty. In case you've never heard of the game before, here's a convenient link that will permit you to download the first iteration of the game.

Unless you're an unrepentant cynic, The Fabulous Screech is probably going to make you melt a little on the inside. It might even inspire a few tears. Before we launch into a description of the game itself, here's a little bit of a background. A few months ago, Jonas Kyratzes was comissioned by a girl named Angie to create a present for her boyfriend who is a big fan of Kyratzes's work. Because money was short, the game was designed to be a combination of Christmas, Valentine's and anniversary gift.

The Fabulous Screech is set within the world of Oddness Standing, the setting first introduced in The Book of Living Magic. And as is often the case with Kyratzes's games, there isn't all that much to outside of clicking on things and enjoying the read but there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. The game opens with you being told that your partner has acquired a ticket for you, a ticket for a rather fabulous performance. Eventually, you'll find yourself visiting The Fabulous Screech's past, Heaven and a variety of weird and wonderful things. Have you ever wondered what God's carpet would be made of? Do you think he gets post cards? Things like this get answered.

The game's short, whimsical and everything you would expect from a Kyratzes production. Are you having a bad day? Go play it. It will probably get a smile out of you unless, of course, you don't like cats.

Play The Fabulous Screech here.

Indie Loop Garden is a sort of match-making site for developers to add custom sound in their indie games. The site was created by Vince Webb and has a pretty strong lineup of audio talent behind it, with such soundtracks as Fez (Rich Vreeland), Hydorah (G87), Soulcaster(Ian Stocker) and Aiko Island (Sean Beeson).

The website seeks to offer a service to developers who prefer to invest in high quality custom sound for their projects. "Our site is aimed at connecting them with these composers of different musical styles to save them the trouble of trawling through forums as well as equipping them with some useful resources along the way," says Webb. "We strongly believe that original tailored sound is integral in creating a special gameplay experience."

I spoke with Rich Vreeland (Disasterpeace) briefly about the new site. He says that he can't yet speak about any experiences with jobs from the website, given the site is only a few days old. While I recognized some of the audio developers on the list, I wondered if any more would or could join. Vreeland replied, "I don't believe we're looking for more members at this point. We're all focusing on certain styles of music so as to not over-compete with each other. If we had more members that would make things more difficult to manage."

The site appeared a little bare-bones, so I asked what he thought could help improve its current state. "Word of mouth, feedback from composers and developers, regular content, a professional layout, these are some things that could help improve the site over time."

Vreeland also clarified what Indie Loop Garden offers that other audio dev forums or portals do not. "Indie Loop Garden is a direct connection to some pretty good composers who are expecting to be contacted. Forums and portals are great too, but Vince is trying to appeal to folks who might be prone to buying 'ready made' music, or folks who might be looking for a go-to place."

Fresh out of Beta, Indie game distribution service Indievania have today launched proper, with over 200 DRM free indie games available. To celebrate the launch and to get lots of eyeballs looking at their marketplace, they've got a load of games reduced, with some great titles available for just a bit of pocket change.

Operated by Capsized developer, Alientrap, Indievania is an Indie games portal where "100% of the cost of the game goes to the developer", minus transaction fees. A far bigger share than many other services offer.

On sale are:
Defy Gravity Extended - $1
Swift*Stitch - $1.40
Cardinal Quest - $1
Dragons vs Spaceships - $1
Inside a Star Filled Sky - $1.99
Blocks that matter - $1
Metal Dead - $1
Climb to the Top of the Castle! - $1
Milkstone Studios Bundle - $1
Wizorb - $1
BEEP - $2
Chulhu Saves the World & Breath of Death VII - $1


Some great games at particularly low prices, anything there tickle your fancy? The sale is going to be running for "A few weeks", so you can take your time to ponder any purchases.

Mike Bithell, designer behind the graphically abstract puzzle platformer Thomas Was Alone has uploaded a new gallery of screenshots, showing off some of how the game has progressed since we last saw it.

I was fortunate enough to get an early hands on with this at Gamecity in Nottingham last year, and it's a promising little title. You take control of several different abstract shapes, with characteristics that you'd expect based on the their appearance. The tall thin block is tall and thin, the tiny little square is tiny and little, and so on. You switch between them, and need to use their different properties to work out how to get them all from A to B. Fun stuff.

Have a poke at the rest of the new screenshots over at Flickr. It's coming to PC/Mac and is due for a release some time in April/May. More info over at thomaswasalone.com.

Brian Soulliard, creator of the crossover beat-'em-up Indie Brawl, has released The Ultimate Celebration, a free PC platformer designed for speed-running.

The Ultimate Collection takes a laid-back approach to the genre; players cannot die, and obstacles and enemies only temporarily hinder progress. The plot is equally easygoing, as players must seek out 20 friends and invite them to a party.

"The heart of the experience is exploring the miniature world that the game takes place in," Soulliard notes. "The different locations can be explored in any order, but you will need to navigate them all to find every friend."

Following up on the recent App Store launch of Caverns of Minos, tireless veteran developer Jeff Minter has completed work on an iOS update for his classic shooter Gridrunner, which should see release soon, pending Apple's approval.

Originally released in 1982 for a variety of PC platforms, Gridrunner is a frantic shooter that expands on core gameplay elements from arcade titles like Centipede and Tempest. It saw sequels in 2002's shareware release Gridrunner++ and in 2010's Gridrunner Revolution.

The new iOS version of Gridrunner recalls the look and feel of '80s arcade machines -- the attract mode is especially Namco-ish in its presentation. Gridrunner for iOS will feature iCade support when it arrives in the App Store this month.

MiniBoss has released a free demo to coincide with the release of its charming puzzle-platformer Out There Somewhere. While I haven't played the full version, I did enjoy my experience with the demo overall.

The introductory horizontal shmup section doesn't last long enough for me, but the bread and butter gameplay is all about platforming with a portal gun. This isn't your standard, GLaDOS-fearing portal gun that requires exit and entry portals. Only one shot must impact a wall to make your character warp to the point of impact. The warping act also conserves your momentum, such that the jump you begin will complete after the warp. This becomes invaluable to avoid pits and enemies, circumvent or exploit different-colored laser fields, and retrieve your ship's parts.

MiniBoss's Pedro Medeiros (a.k.a. Santo or Saint11) won Ludum Dare #22 with the clever platformer Frostbite. Their pixelated, exploratory platforming skills show again in the demo of Out There Somewhere. The developers stated on Desura the game lasts about 2-3 hours on the first playthrough, with extra time required to get all the secrets.

Out There Somewhere is available for purchase on Desura or direct from the developer for $4.99. While only a PC version is available now, the studio states a Mac version is in the plans.