This week’s free game is a creepy one. But that’s OK, because we’re nearing October, the month of Halloween horrors!

Title: The Suffering
For: PC
Developed and published by: Midway
Age rating: Mature

A caveat first: “The Suffering” is the video game equivalent of a B horror movie, with all the blood and gore and scariness that implies. And like a horror movie, that’s a large part of what makes it entertaining. But take that Mature rating seriously; this one’s not for the kiddies. I first played this one when it came out on the original Xbox. It was pretty good, as I recall, though it has long since landed in the bargain bins of game stores. And now you can get it for free.

The corporeal dude in the picture up there is Torque, the anti-hero of the game. Torque is on death row in a fictional island prison off the coast of Maryland. He’s in for murdering his wife and kids. As the game starts the prison is overrun by monsters in the gruesome image of execution methods — a twisted being with swords for arms and legs represents decapitation, while syringe-studded wretches stand in for lethal injections, and so on.

These monsters are dumb but vicious, and there are also greater spirits at work on the island, like the vaporous guy in the photo, Hermes, who liked executing people so much that he committed suicide in the prison’s gas chamber so he could haunt inmates forever.

And then there’s Torque’s own inner beast to deal with. The most interesting twist of the game is that how you act while playing influences whether or not Torque was actually guilty of his crime. Leave helpless inmates to die — or worse, kill them yourself — and it’ll turn out that Torque murdered his family or was at least involved in their deaths. Work to redeem Torque and he’ll end up being innocent of the crime.

(Image from Mobygames.com)

This week’s freebie will totally “hook” you! Ha ha, get it? “Hook,” as in the title. Ha!

Anyway, the indie Web game “Gravity Hook” is about as simple to play as can be, and like so many simple games that only makes it harder. You’re this little yellow guy. You use the mouse pointer to hook on to and pull yourself toward one of the numerous floating mines in the air. Get too close to the mine you’re attached to and it’ll blow up, but time it right and you can let go and fly past it safely to grab one above it.

The goal is to get as high as you can without getting blown up or falling to the bottom of the screen. It’s tricky — really tricky. But it’s fun.

(Screen capture by Justin Hoeger)

You might have heard of a game called “Alien Hominid.” If you haven’t, the short version is that it was a banner example of indie-game success, a Flash game on Newgrounds that grew into a PlayStation 2 and GameCube release by The Behemoth, and later into Alien Hominid HD on the Xbox Live Arcade.

More recently the studio behind the game released “Castle Crashers,” a modernized four-player beat-’em-up in more or less the style of the old “TMNT” arcade games and other big coin-operated brawlers — except “Castle Crashers” is funnier and more twisted.

GET TO THE POINT, you say. Fine.

This week’s games are both by the same folks, and both are free browser-based games in the vein of “Alien Hominid,” featuring the singular art style that runs through both. The first is …

“Castle Crashing the Beard” is a spin-off that’s more of a joke than anything else — in it you play as the Blue Knight from “Castle Crashers” against the floating, scowling, bearded head of artist Dan Paladin, who is behind The Behemoth’s singular art style. It’s nothing complex, but it’s weird and fun. And weird. Which brings us to the second game …

“Dad n’ Me”  is more of precursor to “Castle Crashers.” It has similar arcade-brawler gameplay, but with a miniature Jason Vorhees-like character fighting with rival schoolkids on his way to meet his bigger, meaner dad on the other side of town. It plays a bit like a slower, less developed “Castle Crashers,” in fact. The game, like nearly all Behemoth games, has a twisted sense of humor and a fair bit of blood, so beware.

Neither game is rated, but treat them as Teen-rated games, as their content is similar to the T-rated console games these guys have released.

(Screen captures by Justin Hoeger)

 

You may have heard of a game called Galactic Civilizations II. If not, you’re about to. Lucky you!

GalCiv II is this monstrously complex and deeply involving strategy game from Stardock that has you shepherding a  race into colonizing the galaxy and hopefully becoming the dominant race in space. It’s a lot like Civilization, but set in the void instead of on terra firma. You build colonies, encounter anomalies, seek out new life and new civilizations, boldy go … well, you get the idea. Plus, you can design your own ships!

What makes the game truly exceptional are the many ways you can win, and the many, many ways you can go about winning in those ways. Instead of elaborating, I’m just going to direct you here and here. These are long blog entries detailing two long games of GalCiv II, the first using its first expansion, Dark Avatar, and the second using its most recent expansion, Twilight of the Arnor.

In the former game the writer decided to take on the universe with military might, only to desperately pursue a different path as doom closed in. The latter game is still in progress, with our intrepid blogger (a writer for PC Gamer) attempting a cultural victory, with no warships or direct attacks of any kind. It’s going to be fun to see how this game turns out. Fun for me, anyway.

Oh, and the races he plays as are his own custom creations — they look like rabbits.

It isn’t a free game, but I think it’s cool. So check these blog entires out (beware some swears), and the game’s demo if you’re so inclined.

(Image from GalCiv2.com)

The details are inconsequential, but events have conspired such that today’s Free Game Friday is once again a Failday. Sorry, folks! I’ll make it up to you whenever I can.