Platform Game Engine

The Platform Game Engine project is exactly what it sounds like, a game engine and toolkit for creating platform games. It seems very complete and feature-filled, with an advanced editor with all sorts of tools as well as advanced game features such as warps, doors and world maps. Long story short, if you want to create a platforming game without coding, this might be a good place to start!

Editing backgrounds in The Platform Game Engine.

Azimuth

Azimuth is a really nice looking metroidvania inspired by greats such as Super Metroid. Fly around freely with your ship exploring the insides of a huge planet while fighting enemies and uncovering the story. The game is at version 1.02 and looks really polished, complete with bosses and many other challenges. A genre I really can't get enough of, so this should be worth a try!

The Dark Mod - 2.07

Impressive stealth-game The Dark Mod has got a new update. It's primarily a stability release that improves many of the new things introduced in the last release, such as soft shadows. There are also various smaller improvements to gameplay and a few new assets. As before, this is a very polished and nice looking game!

Sneaking around in The Dark Mod. Notice the impressive shadows!

Infinite Tux

Infinite Tux is a free and open source variant of a game called Infinite Mario and replaces the proprietary graphics with free alternatives. The game generates platforming levels procedurally so you will always have something new to play. It creates both worlds and levels and seems to play really smooth and well. Have a go if you fancy some fast-paced platforming!

Running along the platforms in Infinite Tux.

The Legend of Edgar

I just noticed that I have completely missed to mention the nice metroidvania-like platformer The Legend of Edgar here! This exploration-focused 2D platformer with huge persistent levels, boss battles, several weapons to wield, etc. is really well made and also has the benefit of being complete, with story and all! Also you can play with a gamepad, which I always find is a big plus.

Edgar with sword in hand on his epic quest.

Open Fodder

Open Fodder is simply put an open source clone of the game Cannon Fodder. As with most similar remakes you will need the original data files to play, and because I don't have them I can't say how far the project has come. But it seems to be rather complete juding from the screenshots and available information, even having support for several different campaigns from various versions of the game, so fans of this classic ought to check it out.

Flare - 1.08 - 1.09

The action-RPG engine Flare, with its accompanying campaign, has received another two fine updates. While 1.08 mainly brought bug fixes and translation updates, 1.09 has lots of goodies: several interface improvements, new options for mouse movement and a new alchemy system that makes the creation of potions deeper while balancing the game. Again, this is a very polished engine and the Empyrean Campaign is really well made and is well worth a try!

The new alchemy system in Flares Empyrean campaign.

Unvanquished - 0.51

After several years it seems Unvanquished is still alive and well, and proves this with an enormous new release! In case you missed it, Unvanquished is a tactical shooter with base-building elements where a team of humans fight against a team of aliens. Each team has completely different gameplay styles, creating some very interesting dynamics and variation. It looks really good and plays even better, and this new release has a massive changelog: a new launcher, many gameplay improvements, loads of work on game assets including some new player models, code clean up and performance improvements, lots of work on maps, new and improved sound effects, better bots, etc, etc. It also seems a beta release is near, so this is probably a perfect time to try this excellent and unique shooter!

A new damage indicator is another big improvement in Unvanquished.

C-Dogs SDL 0.6.6 - 0.6.8

More than a year ago since I last mentioned the classic multiplayer shooter C-Dogs! There has been several releases with lots of new stuff. Two new spooky campaigns (though I saw this a bit late for Halloween!), several HUD-improvements, semi-transparency effects, a separate key for throwing grenades (trust me, that is useful) and more. To get a full overview of all new stuff, have a look at the projects news section!

C-Dogs showing off the new grenade-button.

Oolite 1.88

Open-ended space opera Oolite has got lots of nice new stuff in it's 1.88 release. Perhaps most noticable are several graphical improvements. The game now has a much improved lighting system, making for some very dramatic and immersive scenes. Planets and atmospheres have also reveived nice improvements and look really pretty. There are also improvements to control, among which is the ability to use up to four joysticks as well as some improvements to AI and scripting. Together with add-ons in the form of expansion packs this can become the space-game of your dreams with a bit of tweaking, so make sure to take a look if it sounds like your thing.

Awwesome new lighting effects shown off in Oolite.

OpenTomb

OpenTomb is a game engine remake for the classic Tomb Raider games. The engine re-implements game 1-5 and preserves these classic action-adventures for posterity by providing a modern and free engine to run them on. Since I don't have the original games I can't try it and comment on how complete it is. But development seems very active, so if you have one of these games laying around you might want to give it a try.

OpenTomb engine displaying trap emitters.

Planet Blupi

I read a headline saying Planet Blupi had been open-sourced, and it didn't sound familiar at all. But then I saw the screenshots of small yellow creatures exploring and building stuff and realized: I have played this! A really long time ago, but if I remember right it was quite fun... Turns out Planet Blupi is completely free now, including media assets. The game is described as both adventure and strategy. Using the Blupi-creatures you will build things, grow flowers, make food, devise traps or in other ways try to overcome the games 30-ish levels. This version seems to have many bug-fixes and code modernisations compared to the original, so if this unusual mix sounds interesting I believe it could be fun to try.

Cute animations of idle Blupies.

Beyond Dying Skies

Beyond Dying Skies is a 3D FPS-RPG with a futuristic setting, survival elements, crafting, a leveling system and classic skill-based FPS movement, inluding things like jet packs and grappling hooks. It's designed as a single-player experience, which is commendable as many games of this type seem to be multiplayer-focused. This unique genre-blend certainly has some interesting ideas and I was thrilled to read through the description thinking "This sounds really cool!". Development also seems really active. Have a look at some videos here and get the game here.

A glimpse into space from Beyond Dying Skies.

Laundred Sheep

3D Platformers! I can't get enough of them yet so few are released. A project that tries to mitigate this fact is Laundred Sheep. A completely Free 3D platformer inspired by the Blender Open Movie Cosmos Laundromat. The game is still early in development, but there are several levels to explore, items to pick up and enemies to avoid. This project will be interesting to follow!

Taisei Project

Taisei is a Free clone of the Tōhō series of games. It's a bullet hell shooter with some nice art and six levels. There's even some well-drawn artwork and cool 3D backgrounds. It is also pretty much completed at version 1.1. It looks cool and it's a genre I like, so it's cool to see a Free game like this. Well woth a look for fans of the genre! (Oh, and you might need a video to really appreciate how this plays.)

Taisei showing one of it's promised bullet hells.

Hexoshi

I'm temporarily stepping away from my usual practice of only featuring games that has a playable release, because Hexoshi looks so cool! Inspired by the fantastic Metroid series of adventure-platformers, Hexoshi will be spanning hundreds of rooms in a huge maze-like world ripe for exploring. Collect artifacts to gain new abilities and reach new areas while fighting hoards of dangerous creatures. Work is currently ongoing for the Milestone 1 release, which shouldn't be too long away and will feature many of the games main features. If you want to support the project, check the crowd-funding campaign, where you can also read more on what's in store for this very interesting Free title.

A screne from Hexoshi, showing some really nice pixel art and character design.

ReTux

Todays title is ReTux. You might recognize the art assets from another Free platformer: SuperTux. However, ReTux has been written entirely from scratch and has a different take on platformer gameplay. Collecting coins yields hearts which represent health. Taking damage removes hearts, so you'll have to keep grabbing those coins. Cleverly utilizing this levels can be kept balanced but still challenging. There are of course powerups to help and lives and checkpoints are infinite, meaning you can always try a hard portion of a level again. The game containts 41 levels with both action and some lighter puzzle elements. Another cool feature is that the game is described as "fully accessible to colorblind and color deficient people". Nice to see developers be including like that.

A castle-themed level in ReTux.

C-Dogs SDL - 0.6.5

Frequent visitors know I like the game C-Dogs SDL. Besides being very fun, development is very quick with many new features to play around with in each release. This is of course also true with 0.6.5, which contains a new campaign, a new character editor as well as some additional weapons, using a new more advanced collision code. Look at the video below for a small example:

Example of the new hitscan weapons from C-Dogs SDL.

GNU FreeDink

GNU FreeDink is a new engine for the classic Action-RPG Dink Smallwood. Not only does this engine recreate the game, it also has compatibility with various mods and add-ons. Most of the original data-files seems to be free, so the game should be completely playable even though the GNU FreeDink project is still working on replacing a few of the sounds. Included with the project is a front-end for loading various mods and add-ons, so it should all be easy to use. The game sure seems enjoyable and quirky. Enjoy!

Wielding a sword and casting fireballs in GNU FreeDink.

Xonotic - 0.8.2

The super-awesome FPS Xonotic have released version 0.8.2 after over a year of work. It's a big release, with loads of improvements to UI, in game menus, spectating and all those small details that makes this a fantastic e-sports game. There are also several new maps, even nicer weapon models, several improvements to vehicles, mini-games to play while waiting for the next match, new game modes, a new type a grenade that slows down time around opponents and of course many many code improvements and fixes. Get it while it's hot and enjoy it's amazingly tuned gameplay and fantastic sense of polish.

A short clip from Xonotic showing of the new HUD shake effect.