Solitaire Chess

by Bill SchoonmakerI'm sure many of you know how to play chess. You probably know how the pieces move and you might even know a few opening moves but how often do you really get to sit down and practice? With Solitaire Chess by ThinkFun you will have a world of practice right on your phone. Solitaire Chess is not your average chess game. Instead, think of individual chess puzzles that you must...

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Zenonia 3 is now available in the Android Market

As much as the Apple AppStore still dominates on the gaming front, it's great to see that there are now PLENTY of great Android games to the point that I just don't think it matters, from a gaming perspective, which platform one gets.Today we see the launch of Zenonia 3 from GAMEVIL as another Android freebie! And I still haven't even had time to play Zenonia 2...

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Burn the Rope

Edit: Burn the Rope is the second of a block of three puzzle games we are reviewing (the others being Nano Panda and Cut the Rope).Burn the Rope is a puzzle game that involves setting rope on fire and who doesn't like setting stuff on fire? Ok, so now that I've revealed my inner pyromaniac that reminds me of a story. Back when I was younger my brother and I broke the long, green, plastic...

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Nano Panda

Edit: The next three reviews will cover Nano Panda, Burn the Rope, and Cut the Rope (all recently release puzzle games that hit the same part of the brain). The first two are currently available in the Android Market and Cut the Rope is set for imminent release on the Android Market and can be obtained from getjar.com until then.Nano Panda is another entry into the crowded genre of cute puzzle...

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Origins 2011

Just a quick post that I'm still alive. The good news is that I've had time to play lots of new Android games. The bad news... I still have to find the time to write them up.I've actually been at the Origins 2011 Game Fair from Wed-Sun of this past week and while that has little to do with Android gaming it left me with time to do half the work on several upcoming revie...

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Dev-corner: How to request art for your FOSS game project (and how not to)

During my tenure thus far as the head of OpenGameArt.org, I've run into a lot of different requests for art by various projects. I'd like to start out by saying this: Please, if you need art for your FOSS project, don't hesitate to come ask us! That's why we're here. :)That being said, there are ways to ask for art, and ways not to. Unlike some places, we'll never yell at you for not asking correctly, but there are still some things you can do (and avoid doing) to make your request more likely to be filled. I'd like to go over these today.Be...

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Midnight Outlaw: 6 Hours To Sun Up (ENG/RIP)

Developer: Babylon Software - Valu SoftPublisher: Pointsoft InteractiveGenre: Arcade - SimulaitonOn the game: The game Midnight Outlaw: Six Hours To Sun Up You have to plunge into a world where speed controls nitrogen cooled off and the asphalt under the wheels. Your whole life - it's adrenaline, speed and race from dusk till dawn. To win the race and get the respect you need to learn to hear and feel my machine - every sound, every even the smallest...

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Trucks & Trailers (ENG/FINAL)

Publisher: Excalibur Publishing LimitedDeveloper: Excalibur Publishing LimitedGenre: SimulationTrucks & Trailers puts your driving skills to the ultimate test with over 50 individual truck driving challenges. Choose from 7 available trucks, work with a wide variety of cargo.Compete against the clock to complete intricately designed courses and tasks that put you firmly into the driver's seat. Can you avoid obstacles whilst reversing a trailer?...

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The Timebuilders: Caveman's Prophecy (ENG/FINAL)

Developer: bigfishgamesGenre: StrategyExplore a forgotten time when dinosaurs ruled the earth in The TimeBuilder: Caveman’s Prophecy, a fun Time Management game! Guide your tribe out of their cave and into the world. Discover new lands filled with dinosaurs, carnivorous plants, and mischievous saber-toothed kittens. Use all your skills to manage your people, build houses, and gather resources while creating awesome inventions to help your people!Features...

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Hide and Secret: The Lost World

Developer: bigfishgamesGenre: Hidden objectTravel deep into the mysterious jungle of the Lost World! The nefarious treasure thief Jacques has kidnapped another damsel, and it’s up to you to stop his evil plans before she is sacrificed at the spooky full moon ritual. Journey through haunted ruins and diabolical traps on your quest to find the secret Golden Treasure, and unravel the mystery of this epic adventure before it’s too late in this exciting...

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Jenga

In the board game community one of the game classifications is "dexterity game". Jenga clearly falls under this class of game. And recently Jenga earned a special place in my heart when it became the first game that requires some thought that I could actually play an intelligent and competitive game of against my 4 year old. So how do we translate a game that requires the infinite precision of...

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Some thoughts on commercial FOSS game development

It's been a while since I last stirred up controversy on the freegamer blog, so I thought today I'd talk about -- gasp -- developing FOSS games commercially.There's a common misconception out there (although I'm guessing a majority of the readers of this blog are aware of it) that software can't be both libre and commercial (I use libre here instead of free to make it clear that I'm referring to free as in speech and not as in beer). This is a problem that the FOSS community has struggled with since the very beginning. Writing FOSS full time...

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Assorted bunch of news

Yes... slow days here on FreeGamer... so we will try to give you a bunch of smaller news and projects to check out:First another Minecraft clone (this time for the PSP, but with GPL code): Lamecaft (which is a title I approve... generally ;) ). Then we have a open-source reimplementation of the famous jump&run Cave-Story: NXEngine. Maybe it is something nice to make your own platformer with too?A bit more high profile I guess is this game I recently cam across: Turtle Arena, which you might have guessed is another game based on the ioQuake3...

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TMNT: Mutant Melee

Genre: FightingPublisher: KonamiDeveloper: Konami HWIThe perfect game for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle fans, TMNT Mutant Melee is the ultimate TMNT party experience. The game offers hours of bashing, crashing and trashing fun with more than 20 playable characters, a competitive Adventure mode and a huge variety of mini games and unlockables. Gamers can play as their favorite Turtle, Casey Jones, April O'Neil, Master Splinter and even the villainous...

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Secrets of the Dark: Temple of Night Collector's Edition ( Final )

Genre: Hidden ObjectDeveloper: bigfishgamesYour friend is a journalist who is staying in a seemingly quiet desert town. After getting involved with a story involving the dark forces, he is kidnapped by three dark priests! Now they are getting ready to sacrifice him to provide the Demon of Darkness with limitless power, and it’s up to you to stop them! Save your friend in Secrets of the Dark: Temple of Night, a challenging Hidden Object Puzzle Adventure...

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Terrorist Takedown: War in Colombia (ENG /ISO)

Developer: CITY interactiveGenre: First-Person ShooterThe only beneficial crop in non-industrial, mountainous region of Colombia is coca - therefore 70% per cent of its society is either directly or indirectly involved in production, distribution, purification or smuggling of cocaine, which makes cartel from Medelin and other mobsters be widely supported by the Colombian society. Criminals are flooding the U.S. with drugs thus earning loads of money...

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Press Release: CrossMaster

:: ZARAGOZA, SPAIN - MAY 26 2011 ::Noemar Games Studio, an upcoming amateur game development team based in Spain, is glad to present their 1st game released for the Android platform called CrossMaster.CrossMaster is a puzzle game with a simple concept. Challenges are composed by a grid of blocks, which player have to clean up by crossing them. What looks a simple task, become more complica...

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Reiner Knizia's Labyrinth

Renier Knizia is a prolific game designer. He designed what I currently consider to be my favorite game of all time. He's also a big time egomaniac as demonstrated by his insistence on renaming all of his works from "Game X" to "Reiner Knizia's Game X". His earlier games showed off Knizia's brilliance, but his latest games are often rehashes of shoebox formulas in game design so I'm always...

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Press Release: Tiny Bee

Edit: I tried posting this before my vacation a couple weeks ago and BlogSpot was down. Better late than never...“Tiny Bee” now available on Android Marketplace and AndroidPit for Android phones!This afternoon, just in time for the weekend, the full version of “Tiny Bee” will be available on the Android Marketplace. After putting up with great reviews and comments on the demo, the much...

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Release Changelog Bullets: Los, SaR2, HoA, NatR

Lips of Suna - 0.4.0Lots of sound effects.Master server and server browser.Climbing over obstacles.Merchants and trading.Attacks can be charged by holding the attack button.Projectiles and sword swings have speed lines.Controls can be customized in-game.Basic blood effects and beheading.More flexible map generation algorithm.Improved aer female, android female and kraken models.New items: crossbow, musket, revolver, barrel, bookcase, dewspring leaf, fruit.New spells: berserk, dig, firewall, light, travel.New quests: Brigands, Mining Guild, Sword...

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Minetest-c55

Minetest-c55Minetest-c55: it's kind of like m*nec*aft, but:C++ & Irrlichttechnically simple, stable and portablelightweight enough for a laptop with Intel 945GM graphics...

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Ardorcraft AI

TeamTeapotCraftArdorcraft is now an API for Ardor3D.Fortunately, they follow the philosophy of having biiig screenshots on the project's main page.Unfortunately, as a non-Java-savy person I don't know how to quickly test it.Fortunately, a video of its impressive AI/NPCs is available:ArdorCraft - First NPC te...

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Conflict: Desert Storm II: Back to Baghdad (ENG/RIP)

Genre: Third-Person ActionPublisher: SCi Entertainment GroupDeveloper: Pivotal GamesPart 2 in the series, Back to Baghdad is a squad-based shooter that picks up right where the first Desert Storm left off. John Bradley, Paul Foley, Mick Connors, and David Jones are back once again to team up and once again take on Saddam's henchmen. Whether it's protecting friendly choppers from enemy fire, the burning oil fields, Iraq's chemical weapons program,...

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Golden Trails 2: The Lost Legacy Collectors Edition (PC/2011/Final)

Genre: Hidden ObjectDeveloper: DragonsEye StudioLanguage: EnglishTravelback to the 18th century and uncover the secrets of bygone days withGolden Trails 2: The Lost Legacy, a fantastic hidden object adventuregame and the second title in Golden Trails series! This is a specialCollectors Edition release which includes exclusive extras you wontfind in the standard version of the game.In Golden Trails 2: TheLost Legacy, you play the role of Henry whose...

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Tales of Maj'Eyal and T-Engine4

My greatest desire worst nightmare* is being answered realised! Long have I desired a graphical roguelike that was less savage than IVAN, and a nicer play than the standard 'land in random dungeon, and head off' fare that comes with the likes of Vulture's Eye and Lambda Rogue (trailer) - both good games but just missing something for me.* These things can swallow days and weeks of a man's life!The first thing to notice is that TOME4 is gorgeous....

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Sigmore Mines 2

If you had only one word in which to interest me in a game, the word to choose is "roguelike". I have logged an astounding quantity of time playing roguelike games, including ascending every character class in Nethack, winning Angband with a half-dozen character or so and just basically playing these types of games as much as I can. Nethack, in fact, was the first thing I downloaded on my Dr...

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FOSS game engines put to great use

Disclamer: Yes I am fully aware that the following two game do not have libre media, and that one of them will never have unless they get away from the copyrighted IP!That said... the following two gems are really nice examples of what can be done with FOSS engines if some skilled artists work with them.. and they are free as in beer too :pThe first one has been mentioned before on FG, and is a Mod for the nice FOSS RTS Megaglest (Did we mention that one had a small new release too?). Annex: Conquer the World, doesn't seem to have it's one website...

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Nongame: Killer

KillerThe Killer is a flash/as3-based nongame. Talking more about it might spoil it so if you're OK with that, there's a discussion going on at TigForums.The source is "what you want" and hosted on github. Perhaps this could be ported to Haxe/Fixel.The developer has an interesting "support me" implementation. Exclusive updates and postcards....

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