Independent Game Festival Finalists Announced

Via GameSetWatch, the announcement of the 2005 finalists for the Independent Games Festival to be held at the 2006 Game Developer's Conference. Gamasutra has a few more details. From that article: "Following a record total of 118 entries, competition was especially fierce, but the forty IGF judges, picked from mainstream and indie game creation and journalism circles, have singled out their pick of the outstanding indie titles. In particular, the finalists for this year's $20,000 Seumas McNally Grand Prize include Introversion's cult action-strategy title Darwinia, Ankama's French strategy-RPG MMO Dofus, Grubby Games' fiendish puzzle platform game Professor Fizzwizzle, Digital Eel's innovative 'short' space exploration title Weird Worlds: Return To Infinite Space, and Pocketwatch Games' ecosystem-building title Wildlife Tycoon: Venture Africa."

Cooperative games

[HanClinto]

Wow, looking through these games I've found some pretty cool looking things. In industry, there is a distinct lack of multiplayer cooperative games (especially ones that are welcoming to non-hardcore game players -- my wife just doesn't grasp the nuances of Starcraft or the controls of Serious Sam). I looked through a lot of them, and found some cool stuff (but not exactly what I'm looking for). Bempu [markegli.com] seems interesting, I'll be trying that out tonight. Does anyone know of any games in this crop that are good? (and preferrably coop in nature?) Which are your favorites out of this list?

Re:Cooperative games

[ajschatz]

Wives tend to like my game, Wildlife Tycoon: Venture Africa... it's a unique ecosystem building game (don't be put off by the word Tycoon, it's just a sales ploy!). You can download it at www.wildlifetycoon.com. For a more casual audience, I also really like Professor Fizzwizzle.

Re:Cooperative games

[triso]

Professor Fizzwizzle, http://grubbygames.com/games.php [grubbygames.com], is a great game that is available for Windows, Mac and Linux. The advanced puzzles are real brain-busters and the kids levels are great for the young-uns. Fun for the whole family.

2nd time's a double charm!

[Musenik]

As one of the lucky finalists, I'd like to share our success story. Last year we submitted The Witch's Yarn [mousechief.com] as a beta and got totally snubbed. Fortunately we finished the game, shipped it, improved it several times and submitted it again. Yea us, but seriously, don't hesitate in your quest for fame, fortune, and whatever. Our double charm was, it's our second placing as a IGF finalist. Flagship Champion [mousechief.com] was picked in 1999.

Check out some of those games!

[Bad Boy Marty]

I found Darwinia to be a very cute and very fun game; though it felt more like a 3rd person shooter, it did require significant strategy. There is a version for Linux, as well (works just fine for me with my RHFC3 box with Radeon 7200/QD). It's a little on the short side, and replayability is kinda low, but I feel the investment was well worth it. I'd love to see a follow-on to this one, for sure.

The technical category is worth a look

[wulffi]

Among other things you find examples of the best the indie community has to offer.

And for all linux gamers you might find Tribal Trouble interesting. It's available for both Linux, Mac and Windows. All with a single license.

Plus it's written in Java, how geeky can it get?

tribaltrouble.com [tribaltrouble.com]

Also crazyball is pretty cool, might wanna check it out too.