I don't know whether it's the lack of video game stores to go around and look at here deployed in Iraq but recently I've been in touch with my independent side and have really started looking hard into the "Indie" genre of gaming. I only wish I would have started earlier. There's even a convention like "E3(Electronic Entertainment Expo)" for strictly indie games called "IGF (Independent Game Festival)" which I should have paid more attention to last year to see the must have indie games being released.

Anyway, as I'm finishing up reading through "PC Gamer" magazine I realize I haven't looked at the DVD it came with to see if anything is worth trying out on there. Usually there isn't but I popped it in the drive anyway. Some gameplay videos of the new Battlefield 1943 (cool), some demo to a game that scored a 35% in "PC Gamer," (no thanks, but I appreciate the demo for a terrible game you reviewed) and finally a demo for a game called, "Cortex Command". This looks interesting...

The game was more than interesting, it was brillant. You create your own base, arm your troops, battle with opponents as they try to overrun your base and destroy your brain (long story short, in the future humans can extract their brains from their bodies and take control of other people or objects so you are "the brain" and you control your troops and robots to protect your brain). Not to mention this strategy game is all in 2-D! It reminded me a lot of "Soldat" (another Indie) and "Worms". You can download the trial for freehereand you still get a lot from the trial you just have limited timed matches between CPU opponents. The game is still a "work in progress" but has a great community of modders to add on to the game. I've already found a mod that adds Solid Snake, the Left 4 Dead cast and a lot of new weapon mods. The intro music is almost worth it by itself, c.lassic 90s heavy rock, reminded me of my Duke Nukem days.

Another Indie title that has been topping the charts is "Braid". Braid is a platformer that lets you manipulate time to solve the puzzles in each level. It's much like a Mario platformer but with time manipulation like "Prince of Persia". Missed a jump and falling to your certain doom? no problem, rewind time and try it again! You can even manipulate time to save what you did 5 seconds ago then rewind and you'll have a shadow of yourself helping you out in present time. Braid has a playable demo available on Steam which I recommend checking out, it'll blow you away.

That's all I have for now (there's a lot more out there to discover though) before I make this post too long, try those demos out if you need a break from the usual Fallouts, Marios, Maddens or Zeldas and want to take a dive into the independent world of video games as I did.