Version tested: Xbox 360
When some of the best indie games struggle to sell four figures, it can make bigging up the indie scene feel a little like shouting into an empty room.
But there are so many competing platforms now, it's hardly shocking if gamers end up passing over things that they would almost certainly love. The answer, unsurprisingly, is to try to make a bigger noise by being organised and running special seasons like the Indie Games Summer Uprising on Xbox Live's Indie Games channel.
I'm not convinced that even this has made anyone sit up and pay attention to what's going on, but it's not going to stop us from giving it the space such an idea deserves.
Admittedly, the line-up isn't truly stellar. Compared to some of the genuinely excellent stuff that has appeared on Xbox Indie Games over the last couple of years, it's not quite what we had hoped for - but at least two, possibly three of the 10 games are well worth your time. And for a few quid (with free demos to assess), it's a reminder of the alternatives to the endless sequels out there in the 'real' world.
T.E.C. 3001
- Xbox Live Indie Games - 240 Microsoft Points - £2.04
T.E.C. support!
The curious Canabalt sub-genre will literally run and run - possibly forever, in all manner of directions until it does ever-decreasing laps of itself, falls over dizzy and throws up over us all. Presumably that's where T.E.C. 3001 comes in.
With the cold-hearted logic of a robot, the Tesla Energy Collector is on a mission through virtual space to harvest humans' leftover energy. What that means for us is a 21-level sequence of third-person 3D athleticism, as you sprint, jump and slide your way to the finish line.
What could be just a throwaway retread of an overused idea comes alive with its arresting, cold, cybernetic visual style and a spongy control system that has you weaving past obstacles like a desperate commuter across a packed train concourse.
The relentless trial-and-error nature of its one-minute-long levels means that frustration is rarely far away, but that won't stop you coming back for another 20 attempts to nail safe passage through these increasingly complex environments.
If T.E.C. 3001 were an XBLA title, few would question it, so to discover it nestling in the bargain racks of the Indie Games channel might give you an inkling of the quality you can find when you bother to look hard enough.
8/10
Train Frontier Express
- Xbox Live Indie Games - 240 Microsoft Points - £2.04
It's like they knew. With my nipper resuming his choo-choo obsession these past few weeks, Team Train Frontier's sterling efforts couldn't have arrived at a better time.
A sandbox landscape-builder and train-riding game will either sound like some kind of cruel and unusual punishment or a soothing, absorbing means of messing around with computerised model railroading. Either way, I wouldn't blame you for spraying coffee across your keyboard.
But if tinkering with pretend trains is your guilty pleasure, this is a remarkably fully featured offering, with an impressive number of different props, trains and carriages to place at your leisure.
More importantly, it appears to have been designed by people who understand that intuitive interfaces make people feel all warm inside. With nary a line of tutorial guff to put a crimp in your day, you're off placing tracks and morphing landscapes with ease, and plopping down a strange assortment of houses, roads and billboards to give it personality.
This iiiis the aaaaaage of the traaaain. This is the aaaaaage... OF THE TRAIN.
Then when you're done creating your masterpiece, you can choose from a couple of dozen trains, add an assortment of carriages, and ride it to your heart's content, with various zoomable camera angles to coo over.
Once you're happy with your baby, you can share it with the rest of the world, or see what others have been up to by downloading theirs. And it won't take long to realise that plenty of people take this sort of thing very seriously indeed, with some impressively elaborate creations to mess around with.
For the sake of two quid, Train Frontier Express could well be the cheapest form of childcare ever invented. It certainly beats laying track out all around the living room, let me tell you.
8/10
SpeedRunner HD
- Xbox Live Indie Games - 240 Microsoft Points - £2.04
If you're the kind of cool cat that follows the Flash gaming scene, you may already be well aware of SpeedRunner's energetic 2D platforming charms.
Buffed up in HD, its arrival in the Indie Uprising line-up proves to be welcome thanks to the effortless comic-book charm of the visuals and the purity of its frantic get-to-the-bomb premise.
In common with other madcap platformers, progress relies firmly on diligent use of your abilities: in this case, grappling hook, homing missiles and wall jump.
But what promises to be the indie scene's answer to N+ and 'Spolsion Man falls a little flat through a combination of slightly flaky wall jump controls and a lack of levels to play through.
The need for speedrunner.
As much as you'll want to admire DoubleDutch's efforts, you'll rip through most of the levels without breaking much of a sweat, and just as the game is getting interesting it's all over.
Matters are salvaged somewhat via the four-player same-screen multiplayer, with everyone racing for the prize by way of evil sabotage tactics.
As a proof-of-concept demo, SpeedRunner HD is definitely worth a look, but unless you plan to torment your friends repeatedly any time soon, the price tag starts to look a little steep.
6/10
Redd: The Lost Temple
- Xbox Live Indie Games - 240 Microsoft Points - £2.04
Ever since the mighty Atic Atac blew our tiny minds a million years ago, discerning gamers have known the power of the humble top-down action-adventure.
Blazing Forge Games evidently knows all the tricks and makes no apology for pushing Redd: The Lost Temple down the path less travelled.
Looking every inch the lost mid-period 8-bit title, Redd sends an intrepid explorer into a spooky subterranean network of abandoned temples in search of treasure. What our intrepid torch-wielding adventurer finds, of course, is a plethora of sinister hazards, collapsing floors and traps to tiptoe around.
Redd dead evolver.
Armed only with bombs, Redd is certainly no action hero. Progress relies more on nimble avoidance and patient exploration, but there remains a niggling desire to keep playing despite - or perhaps because of - the game's rather limited scope.
If you're in the mood for nostalgia about how you wish old games used to be, dim the lights and make believe that's a Competition Pro in your hands.
7/10
Chester
- Xbox Live Indie Games - 240 Microsoft Points - £2.04
With Chester's proud use of NES-style cover art, you know exactly what shapes developer Brilliant Blue-G wants to throw.
Yes, we're firmly in retro 2D platforming territory, but it's a hyperkinetic offering with a few interesting tricks up its sleeve.
During this restless tale of stolen cupcakes, you find yourself scooping up - among other things - stamps. Grab enough random tat over the course of the game and all-important stuff unlocks that not only allows you to switch between new characters, but also to re-skin each level on the fly with a completely new visual theme.
The search for Ian Rush goes on.
In terms of the characters, it's not merely a different-looking dude you'll be switching to, but one with different weapons and slightly varying jumping abilities, which have subtle implications depending on what you're facing at any given moment.
Flicking between them is seamless and can often completely change the feel of the game. This is often just as well, because the fundamental level design rarely feels very interesting once you strip away the novelty value of flicking between different characters and visuals.
Still, for a couple of quid, a basic 20-level platformer with a couple of neat tricks earns a nod of appreciation from me. It's no Apple Jack, sure, but Chester is still better than 95 per cent of the drivel you'll find on Xbox Indie Games.
6/10
The rest...
After some of the excellent releases that have appeared on the Xbox Indie Games channel, expectations were high that the Indie Summer Uprising would provide something of a showcase for the scene. But of the remaining five releases, the quality is, to be polite, variable.
Bottom of the pile is undoubtedly the truly dreadful hack-and-slash Raventhorne. Battle High: San Bruno, meanwhile, has a stab at a high-school-themed Street Fighter II but fails pretty miserably by being too easy to win by repeating the same move over and over.
Cute Things Dying Violently should have been awesome, with a name that good, but with its painfully frustrating aiming system, the business of throwing things at critters soon becomes a chore. Take Arms fares a little better with its valiant attempt at blending side-scrolling 2D platforming with Capture the Flag and Deathmatch, but ultimately falls flat where it matters most - the combat. Doom & Destiny isn't too bad, either, but my tolerance of top-down RPGs was never high in the first place - never mind 20 years after the fact. Your mileage, as they say, may vary.
