Alpha Beta Gamer

Lugdunon is a charming retro 2d multiplayer RPG/sandbox game that is reminiscent of the 16 bit console era that allows players to make the game their own.

The game features PvE and PvP combat, crafting, trading, character leveling and customisation options. The most impressive feature however, is the ability of designated players to become ‘Game Masters’. This allows players to create new crafting recipies, add and edit NPCs and mould the landscape as they see fit. It’s a great feature, allowing players to effectively make and run their own world and craft their own adventure within the game.

Lugdunon is currently in Open Alpha, with Beta testing starting soon.

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Dusk of D.A.W.N. is a great looking trading card game that sees you taking on the role as C.E.O. of your own Megacorporation in a world that has been ravaged by a psychotic Skynet-like AI.

You’re tasked with battling other corporations for supremacy, using tactical and strategical weaponry, defences, abilities and synergies, all in card based form.

The game mechanics of Dusk of D.A.W.N. are solid, making for some very entertaining and strategic battles, and the futuristic setting fits well, makings for a refreshing change from the usual Tolkienesque fantasy style of trading card games.

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First Person Flappy Bird is exactly what the title suggests. You take control of your flappy bird and guide it through gaps in Mario-esque pipes in glorious 3D. There are a couple of fundamental differences though, at the moment the pipe layout isn’t randomly generated and game is ridiculously hard, with the dev himself only managing a high-score of 4 (ours was 3).

While we’d like to see the difficulty toned down a bit, the game still manages to pull off the Flappy Birds trick of taking up far more of your time than it really deserves. Also, if you get fed up of banging into things, repeatedly tap the space bar at the start and you’ll soar high above those pesky pipes!

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The Last Disbeliever is a Satirical, Art-Driven First Person Action/Adventure/Shooter game set in an alternate world, where the US has started a merciless campaign for global domination. It tells the story of an ATF Special Agent Sebastian Arise who was sent to track down a suspicious cargo delivered by a US illegal firearms dealer. You end up stranded near a small village in eastern Europe, being run by a ruthless religious cannibalistic cult. Things start to turn even stranger, as you investigate Imortal emotion sapping Daemons, and even time-travel back to the year 1366 A.D.

It’s not a gung-ho shooter, combat is slower and more tactical, with all out gun-fights best being avoided. There’s a great atmosphere in the game, with a real sense of tension and danger throughout. It’s an intriguing game, that will keep you wondering (and dreading) what will happen next.

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Cashtronauts is a fast-paced, retro arcade-style game for 1 to 4 players. It’s not just your average shooter, players can choose their own play style, focusing on mining, pirate hunting or just pillaging and looting.

You can play through a campaign in single player or co-op, trying to make it as far across the galaxy as you can before you die. Warping from system to system, scrounging together enough cash to pay your way through the next warp gate before your pursuers catch up to you.

There’s also a fun skimirsh mode, a competitive game mode where the goal is to make as much cash as possible within three rounds. That cash can also be used to buy powerups and upgrades in the Black Hole Market. Prices fluctuate based on player action, dynamically balancing the game.

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The Lady is weird, pure and simple, you play as the hideously deformed lady, pictured above and have to shuffle across the screen, avoiding such things as falling glass and barbed wire and confronting versions of yourself.

The game is a short and surrealist journey that takes The Lady through a series of fever dream like hallucinations, while being at odds with her own inner struggles with anxiety and depression. She encounters multiple versions of herself throughout the game, unsure of who to trust.

The whole thing feels like a surreal nightmare, with it’s hand drawn stop motion art style and creepy soundtrack combining to make a very strange and very freaky game.

The Lady feels more like an experience than a game, it’s an interesting and slightly disturbing experience, and one you’re unlikely to forget.

Download the Pre-Alpha, Free

Soulbound is an action-adventure game in which you play as the Beastmaster, who roams the city of Caladan catching, taming and fighting monsters, using their skills and weaknesses to your advantage. It’s no Pokemon clone though! You roam the world from a top-down Diablo-style camera angle, with your selection of monsters tethered to you, battling against enemies in real time.

The game’s still early in development, but it’s a great idea, it’s real-time Pokemon with a pinch of Diablo

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Fictions (spotted by Indie Statik) is an interesting expolration and stealth game that has been made as a Pre-Alpha build for the upcoming game, Somewhere and inspired by the book “The Approach to Al-Mu’Tasim” by Luis Borges.

Fictions (and Somewhere) has a beautifully surreal visual style, set in a small barren dessert, with floating buildings, burried tellephones, lots of clocks and odd looking gangly characters. It’s great fun exploring the area, discovering new oddites and strange artworks.

Other than the wonderfully strange art style, the other main hook is the ’character flip‘ game mechanic. This allows you sneak up behind other characters and swap places with them, allowing you to experience the world from their perspective. It’s a great concept, that’s central to the gamplay, and makes for a greatly satisfying experience.

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Sky Rogue is a fun flight sim with a great cell shaded visual style and an infinite number of procedurally generated islands to explore. It’s easy to play, with your planes controlling wonderfully, making airial dogfights and alr to ground based combat a joy to take part in. There’s also a nice array of enemies to destroy, looking very pretty in all their cell shaded clory, but all quite deadly if you give them a chance.

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’Build, Drive, Fight’ is Robocrafts’ mantra, and it does all 3 of these things rather well (although your driving and fighting may be hindered if what you’ve built is garbage!).

Building is where the most fun comes in Robocraft, with vehicles being crafted in a similar way that you’d build something out of Lego, slotting stuff together and seeing if it works, and (most importantly) how it looks. You can build small and nimble vehicles or big cruisers, there’s a large assortment of weaponry and defensive equipment to choose from, and you can forgo wheels for propellers and take to the air.

Building is fun, but the driving and fighting is satisfying too, especially when a well aimed blow smashes up half of an opponents vehicle. Matches are arena based destruction derbies, similar to Twisted Metal, where the last one standing is crowned the victor. The carnage on show is wonderful and compliments the building section of the game nicely.

’Build, Drive, Smash to smithereens’ may be a more fitting mantra, but I guess ’Build, Drive, Fight’ will suffice.

Thanks to mr-penniston for informing us of this Alpha!

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