I decided to post games for each of the days that have been missed this week. that's three days. rO usually posts Thursday and Friday on the weeks that I usually post, which I think is this week (Got a little confused with it all recently, lol). The following are the second lot of games from Indiebird developers. I was really impressed with most of the games they have available on their sie so decied to post them enmass (so to speak). I'm supposed to be taking a sabbatical from posting as it had wore me down a little. Plus it's given me the oppertunity to search out more games and complete or start other projects. G@rgoyles free games synopsis is half way completed. (It hadn't been updated in over three months) Anyway, here's the games for today:
Swarm: (5Mb)
Swarm is a customizable strategy game created by Alex Vostrov in one week, where players assume control over a colony of bugs in a two-way battle for supremacy over the map. Health is indicated by two rows of coloured dots at the top of the screen, while waypoints can be moved around by dragging them to a new location using the left mouse button.
Add additional waypoints by clicking on the black flag on the left, choose any location on the map, then left click on the hive and drag a separate arrow towards the new waypoint. Multiple waypoints which are connected to each other can also be designated by using the left shift key when clicking on an existing waypoint.
There are three upgrades to acquire, and AI difficulty can be increased by using command line parameters.
Instead of gathering resources, building or commanding teams of units, you control a swarm of ravenous insects that constantly emerges from your hive. The challenge is to guide your swarm through setting waypoints. The objective is to collect enough upgrades to raid and destroy the enemy hive.
Waypoints
Waypoints lay out a path for your swarm to follow. They look like a flag with a circle around it. The arrows connecting the waypoints show which way the swarm will go. You can drag the waypoints with the left mouse button.
In order to create a waypoint, click the black flag button on the left. If you want to delete a waypoint, right-click it (or control-click it on Mac). You can connect waypoints to the hive by dragging from the hive to the waypoint.
An advanced way to make waypoints is to SHIFT-drag an exiting waypoint (or the hive). This will make a new waypoint, connected to the one you dragged.
Hive:
The hive has 30 health points in the beginning of the game. When its health drops to zero, the owner of the hive loses. Protect your hive with your swarm and watch out for enemy flanking attacks.
Upgrades
Upgrade orbs periodically appear on the field. There are three types, each improving a different aspect of your swarm. The level of your upgrades can be seen on the upgrade meters to the left.
• SPAWN RATE: This upgrade has an icon that looks like a bug. It will increase the rate at which your hive produces the swarm. Getting to level 10 will double your production rate from level 0.
• SPEED: This upgrade looks like a lightning bolt. This will increase the speed of your swarm and the speed at which upgrades are taken to your hive.
• ARMOUR: This upgrade looks like a shield and will make your swarm tougher. At level 10, your swarm will be twice as resilient as level 0.
In order to capture an upgrade, direct your swarm to it with a waypoint. Some of the swarm will sacrifice themselves to capture the upgrade. Once 20 swarmlings have attacked the upgrade it will start pulsing with your team color. After a short while it will start to move to your hive. Once it gets there, you will level up in that category. Of course, if the enemy intercepts the upgrade, they can take it back to their base.
Other:
The game has a difficulty switch that will give the computer or the player additional upgrades in the beginning. Run Swarm.exe (or Swarm.app on Mac) with the “-difficulty X” where X is a number from -30 to 30. The default setting is 0, giving the computer no advantage. Positive values will help the AI.
You can run Swarm in full screen mode by passing “-fullscreen” parameter to Swarm.exe. You can also run the provided .bat file.
If you get tired of the awesome IndieBird splash screen, you can turn it off with “-nosplash”. Just be sure to view it once in a while to keep the subliminal messages active.
Also, the game can be paused by pressing “P“.
Download:
http://www.indiegames.com/blog/2008/08/freeware_game_pick_swarm_alex.html
or
http://www.indiebird.com/blog/?page_id=13
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Circuit Breaker (<1Mb)
Circuit Breaker is a strategy game where the players fight not with armies, but by placing different buildings. The player controls sentient electronics components that make war upon each other. The goal of the game is to destroy the opponent’s CPU.
The players build nodes by using energy. Energy is obtained via various means in the game, like extractor nodes. You can see your total energy pool as a bar on the bottom of the screen. You can also see your current energy income above the bar and your opponent’s income below the bar. It takes a fixed amount of energy to build each node. You can see what that amount it by pressing the corresponding button above the playing field and looking at the hilited section of the energy bar. Be careful with how you use your energy, without any income, you’re a sitting duck. Conversely, the best way to beat an opponent to to force them to waste their energy.
You can select a node to build by clicking the apropriate button or by pressing the number 1-5 hotkeys. There are 5 different node types that the players can build and one that that can’t – the CPU. You can find out more about them by reading the tooltips. Here is an overview of the nodes in the game:
CPU:
This is the node from which it all starts. The goal of the game is to destroy the opponent’s CPU, while protecting yours. The CPU has a lot of health, the most of any nodes. It provides you with a starting energy income of 4 and gives you a large build radius to start.
Extender
The extender allows you to build in new and exciting places. By default, you can only build around your CPU. As you place extenders, that build area will be increased. All nodes must be connected to an extender or the CPU. If the parent node is destroyed, everything that’s connected to it goes as well! This is why you want to protect the extenders that have a lot connected to them. Each extender can support 3 other nodes.
Extractor
The extractor funnels power out of resource sites and into your energy pool. Each extractor that you place will give you 4 energy income. Extractors can only be placed on resource locations.
Beam Emitter
The beam emitter is the simplest way to damage your opponent. Simply place the beam emitter and aim it toward whatever you want dead. After a while, a high-powered laser will be blasted at the enemy; they take some time to reach full power, however. Each beam emitter reduces your energy income by 2. Be careful if you place the beam emitter too close to the enemy, it will damage itself.
Shield:
Shields allow you to stop enemy beam emitters. Place a shield in the way of the beam and then aim the shield toward the beam. The shield will block the beam and not take any damage itself. There is a price for this, however. For each beam that a shield blocks, you lose 2 energy flow. In additing, should your shield stop being hit by any beams, you will lose 1 energy flow.
Absorber:
The absorber is a superior way to stop beam attacks. By placing the absorber in the beam’s path, not only is the beam stopped, but you also get 2 energy flow per beam. There is a danger to doing this, however. Whenever an absorber absorbs damage, it not only generates energy, but it also damages everything around it. This can have unintended consequences.
You can experiment with the different nodes in the Very Easy mode. The computer will not try too hard to beat you.
Download:
http://www.indiebird.com/blog/?page_id=70
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[strong]Gaia Dreams (<1Mb)
Rules:
At the start of the game, you will see an empty planet. You can press ‘R’ to re-generate the world if you don’t like the current one. You can drag the world view with the right mouse button.
You can create new organisms manually by clicking the buttons and then clicking on the world. You can only do this if there are less than 5 of that organism alive. Read the tooltips for the organisms by hovering your mouse over the buttons.
When you select an organism type, you may get the opportunity to adjust its various attributes. Hover your mouse over the upgrade icon to learn what that upgrade does.
Start out by planting some water bulbs and then make some fish. You will have to be careful to stabilize the bulb-fish ecosystem with the attribute sliders. Once the ecosystem is stable, you can make some crabs and watch the points roll in.
Download:
http://www.indiebird.com/blog/?page_id=39
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Thunder Brigade (1.1Mb)
Thunder Brigade is turn-based tactical tank battle game. The player and the computer control a number of tanks, both sides trying to eliminate the other or capture the goal. The game can be won by either destroying the entire enemy team or holding the center spot for 10 turns.
Rules
At the start of the game, you’ll have a chance to adjust the number of tanks on each side. Your tanks are green and the enemy is blue.
To control your tanks, use the number keys 1-10 to select a tank (selected tanks glow). When a tank is selected, you can give it comands for the next turn.
Controls:
1 to 0 .........................Select tank
Arrow keys .....................Moves or turns the tank. Miving back is slower than forward (it takes 2 periods)
W...............................Wait for one period
F...............................Fire the gun (this takes 2 periods of time)
BACKSPACE.......................Erase the last action
DELETE or RMB...................Erase all actions
SPACE...........................Start the next turn
LMB.............................Plot path
F1..............................Help
R...............................Restart
After you’ve input all the commands, press SPACE and your tanks will do your bidding. Of course, your enemy will be maneuvering his tanks at the same time. Each turn, 4 periods of time pass. When you need to plot long paths, use the mouse to direct your tank there (click on the spot where you want the selected tank to go).
Try to flank the enemy. Tanks can’t see behind them and if you can hit them from the side or the back you’ll do much more damage. Once a tank is too damaged, you might want to send it to the nearest repair station. Waiting at a repair depot (signified by a shell on the map) repairs 10% of health per period. Careful, however tanks at the depot are very vulnerable and take greatly increased damage.
Download:
http://www.indiebird.com/blog/?page_id=36
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Zama: (2.1Mb)
Zama is an abstract strategy game about territory control and bidding. The players try to capture hexes to enclose triangles on the board. The player who captures the triangles most efficiently wins.
Rules:
At the start of the game, both players have 19 stones. A player’s turn is comprised of placing stones on the board or passing.
To place stones, click on a hex. You can place multiple stones by clicking and dragging. To pass, click on the stone pile of your color.
Any number of stones may be placed on empty hexes. If a hex is occupied by the enemy, you must place a greater number of stones than is already there. In addition, you may reinforce a hex that you own with additional stones. You do not have to place any stones and may pass whenever you desire.
When both players pass consecutively, the game ends. At the end of the game, the triangles that are surrounded by a player give score to that player. Each surrounded triangle is worth 4 points. Also, if you have any remaining stones, they are worth 1 point each.
http://www.indiebird.com/blog/?page_id=34
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