Thinking back some of the better times I'v had gaming this year were with starships unlimited and dominion wars both games that I learned about from this site. I'd hate for any gems like these to slip through my fingers. So I'm wondering are there any main sources where you guys get your information for independant games?

Also any chance of more reviews for independants? Or at least know of a place that does give reviews for them?

p.s. Anybody played strifeshadow yet? I'v been playing the demo quite a bit if you like multiplayer blizzard games you'll probably love this.

What do you mean by independents? Do you mean self-publishers? Most of my info comes from here, Qt3, but I get some info from word of mouth as well. It helps that the industry is pretty tight knit.

Haven't played Strifeshadow yet. Good bunch of guys, and I hope they find a way to get it to retail. Right now it's only available through EBgames.com.

- Alan

Sorry for not clarifying Yah I meant self-publishers.

Well, you can always follow the competitors in
this year's Independent Games Festival at
http://www.igf.com...

In the interest of full disclosure, yeah, I am
one of them :)

Most of the independent stuff I've run across in the last few years was found by reading USENET. Depending on your genre, you'll often find out about games like Starships Unlimited there first. That's where I first saw it. Specifically comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic The other groups in the CSIPG hierarchy are often just as good for finding out about little known games. Just expect to sort through the haystack to get the needle.

--Dave

-Dave I'v never used Usenet before but I'll go delve into it now thanks.

-Sparky That was a useful link Several of those games look pretty interesting thanks. Also your a game designer, cool! What one's yours?

KING OF DRAGON PASS is supposed to be very good. It is a couple years old, though. Never tried it myself:

http://www.a-sharp.com/

It's based on the RuneQuest paper RPG mythos, and some very good illustrators did the graphics.

"King of Dragon Pass" was an IGF winner in
2000. Very nice art.

Doug: We're "They Came From Hollywood".

There really *should* be a site with
independent game news and info. Not
the crapzillion shareware
Tetris/Pong/Asteroids clones,
but large-scale self-published games, like
KoDP, MindRover, etc.

I'd love to do an indie news site myself, but I
don't have the time. :(

Go here for a great independent game:

http://www.introversion.co.uk

Don't forget the Avernum series at www.spiderwebsoftware.com , some of the best RPG's around.

http://www.spiderwebsoftware.com

Why didn't that other link show up as a link?

Sparky you're doing They Came From Hollywood? That was the game that jumped out at on the list! I used to love playing SPI's The creature that ate Sheboygan and your effort seems to have more than a passing resemblance to that favorite classic. I remember doing a preview for a similar title a few year back at GD about another strategy monster stomping game, but it died before ever seeing the list of day. :( In fact after looking at your site, the screens, I really REALLY want to play this one! Need a beta-tester!? ;)

Dave

list = light

dooh.

typo chump

"I remember doing a preview for a similar title
a few year back at GD about another strategy
monster stomping game, but it died before
ever seeing the light of day."

Was that "Monstro"? It was 3D,
and emphasized monster-vs-monster
fighting (kind of a "Big Monster Tekken"), if I
recall correctly.

I wonder if their demise had anything to
do with trademark issues, since their "giant
lizard" looked an awful lot like Godzilla, and
you do NOT mess with Toho's big guy unless
you want them to get all "Destroy All Monsters"
on your ass...

Actually the game I was thinking of was called Kaiju. I found the archive on the old preview and provided the url below...if you're interested in checking it out. I soooo wanted to play this game! :) Now I'm rampaging for 'They Came From Hollywood'!

here is the link... http://www.gamesdomain.com/gdreview/zones/previews/dec97/kaiju.html

Hey, cool, Sparky really is the chick from They Came From Hollywood:

http://www.theycamefromhollywood.com/

BTW, shouldn't your game title have an exclamation point at the end? :) Which looks better:

They Came from Hollywood

or

They Came from Hollywood!

Of course, it's didn't really help Fly! all that much. Can't wait to see how that turns out.

-Tom

Actually, the doomed "Monstro!" had an
exclamation point, too, now that I think of it.

But how about an umlaut over one of the o's in
"Hollywood"?

That would be too "Headbanger's Ball", no?

Hey I tried the Uplink demo today, and it looks pretty fun. Unfortunately its got a nasty bug that took me down to the desktop after 20 minutes.

Strifeshadow looks like warmed over Starcraft with a little more thought put into the design (this after playing demo for not too long).

And I don't know if Gothic is an "independant" but the demo is really very, very cool. The graphics rock out, and I like the Escape From New York -style background. I'm off to Gothic right now.