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  • Mattias Gerdt, Music For IGF Nominee Cobalt: Part 1 [Interview]

    Oxeye Game Studio’s action platformer Cobalt has received honorable mentions in the technical and visual arts categories for the 2011 Independent Games Festival. It is also a finalist for excellence in sound design. IGF’s judges had this to say about Cobalt: “The soundscape in Oxeye’s Cobalt was also praised for “giving it the amount of [...]

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  • DIYGamer.com State of the Site + Updates

    Hello friends, fellow readers and indie game lovers. You may have noticed a distinct lack of content and updates from yours truly these past few months. Truth of the matter is that we’ve struggled to gain traction in a world dominated by up-to-the-minute news from mega blogs like Kotaku.com, Joystiq.com and, yes, even IndieGames.com/blog (for [...]

  • Same Ol’ Ball Game… Mount & Blade: With Fire and Sword [Preview]

    Earlier this year I had my first experience with a strategy series called Mount & Blade, and it’s successive sequel Mount & Blade: Warband. Despite being a huge strategy and RPG fan prior to playing these games I had, for whatever reason, completely passed them over when they were initially released. So, when I finally [...]

  • Nintendo Doesn’t Want “Garage” Developers, Who Don’t Need Nintendo

    Everybody wins! During this past GDC Nintendo of America President, Reggie Fils-Aime, told Gamasutra that the company wasn’t looking to “do business” with the garage developers of the world. Essentially, anybody who doesn’t consider themselves a full time game developer, either by choice or because they need another job to make money and support themselves. [...]

  • Have Many Laughs, Shoot Many Robots [GDC 2011]

    The Game Developers Conference is more than just showing off new technology for aspiring game developers and industry folk. In many ways, it’s a great place for developers to show off their work they’ve already completed to other developers and to people like us, the press (if we can so be called). So it was [...]

  • Mattias Gerdt, Music For IGF Nominee Cobalt: Part 1 [Interview]

    Oxeye Game Studio’s action platformer Cobalt has received honorable mentions in the technical and visual arts categories for the 2011 Independent Games Festival. It is also a finalist for excellence in sound design. IGF’s judges had this to say about Cobalt: “The soundscape in Oxeye’s Cobalt was also praised for “giving it the amount of [...]

    Related Posts with Thumbnails
  • DIYGamer.com State of the Site + Updates

    Hello friends, fellow readers and indie game lovers. You may have noticed a distinct lack of content and updates from yours truly these past few months. Truth of the matter is that we’ve struggled to gain traction in a world dominated by up-to-the-minute news from mega blogs like Kotaku.com, Joystiq.com and, yes, even IndieGames.com/blog (for [...]


  • mash2 Now here’s an interesting one. Bravehorse designer Curt Kling‘s entry into the Action 52 Owns game jam is a contemplative remake of the under-achieving side-scroller Mash Man. As Kling commented: “We tried to take the mood of the original game and expand on it, since it doesn’t really have any kind of unique gameplay elements to use.”

    That’s an understatement. In the original game you pretty much walk to the right and jump on enemies with your enormous feet — provided you can get around the collision problems. And eventually you’ll get hit and you’ll die. As a game, it’s a bit depressing and futile. Which is what Kling seemed to read into it as well.

    Without really expanding on the mechanics, Kling’s version saturates the game’s premise with as much emotional weight as possible. Apparently taking a page from early LucasArts adventure games, Kling positions Mashman as an unloved freak whose only role in his community is taken away by industrialization. Just as Mashman begins to contemplate his fate, the robots that had replaced him go wild and the villagers plead for his help. Cue a fairly short yet poignant encounter, with two possible outcomes. One ending is a bit more, shall we say, upbeat than the other; both are fun in their morbid ways.

    Somewhere in here, I’m sure the game makes some commentary about traditional videogame morality and narrative structure. Or maybe it’s just being daft. Hard to tell sometimes. Either way, the game is gorgeously stylized and the world that Kling has created here will stick with you long after playing. Best thing is, the game is short enough to show it off to your friends and traumatize them one by one.

    You can download Mash Man here

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