In 1993, a new star appeared on the NES horizon. A big man with big dreams, big muscles, a big mustache and no shirt, Abobo had nowhere to go but up. Recently however, he was lured back to spotlight by a team of developers, including ThePoxBox, Pesto Force, JackSmack, and the guys at I-Mockery, hoping to make the ultimate love letter to the Nintendo Entertainment System. The result it Abobo's Big Adventure, a retro arcade action-adventure game years in the making. It's a bold, brassy, over-the-top labor of love that pushes 8-bit nostalgia to its very limit.

Dateline: Quadrilopolis. To the world at large, mild-mannered office worker Cube Kent seems to do nothing more than work at the office of Office Work Incorporated. However, due to a mysterious accident as a young involving a radioactive chemistry set, whenever there is a call for help, he need only to duck into a convenient telephone booth to become... Square Hero! NDGames' Champion of justice, and puzzle platforming protagonist extraordinaire! He's here in his poly-bagged, holographic, foil-embossed, varient-covered, action-packed first issue, and while it's not quite Eisner Award-worthy for innovation, it's definitely a fun romp, true believers.

Hey, Super Crate Box, the awesome arcade and shooting game released by Vlambeer way back in 2010. What are you doing on the iTunes App Store? What's that? Being as awesome as the PC/Mac downloadable version? Sounds great! With handfuls of unlockables, perfectly-tweaked touch controls, and a constant worldwide tally of crates collected, you'll be short on excuses not to play this lovely, crazy little game.

A crazy, multiplayer romp through a visually lush game featuring three moderately-mad fantasy characters with their own unique abilities? Show us where to sign and we'll be there! Actually, now that you mention it, Trine 2 happens to be all of the things described above, plus a whole lot more. It's got action, it's got physics puzzles, it's got both single- and online multiplayer modes, and it's got a sense of humor that will probably remind you of Magicka. It's a modern-day version of The Lost Vikings, and any gamer will be proud to experience the world Trine 2 has to offer!

All That Matters is a puzzle platformer that takes its inspiration from games like The Company of Myself and Limbo while remaining unique in its own ways. You must maneuver the five Greer family members, each with his or her own abilities and handicaps, through twenty-five deviously tricky obstacle courses while collecting as much love (hearts) as possible. Doing so unlocks bonus levels and achievements. If that's not enough, make your own levels with the editor. All That Matters is not only creative and heartfelt, it's endlessly fun. When was the last time you had so much fun with family?

Goime 500, a platformer by Cary Huang, might look a heck of a lot like Achievement Unlocked. And, with its 500 achievements to earn for every tiny little action, it plays a lot like it too. Comparisons are, of course, inevitable, but its webtoy feel and whimsical humor certainly helps make up for its lack of premise-innovation.

Developed in 8 weeks as a class project, Orpheus is a puzzle platform retelling of the classic myth of a man's quest to bring his love back from the dead. Players who can look past a few rough edges will be amply rewarded with the lush and abstract yet accessible art.

Raise your hand if you've heard this one before: The evil Dr. Mad has corrupted the programming of six thematic robots and has sent them out to do his bidding, each utilizing a weapon that would be suspiciously effectively against exactly of their evil kin. The only thing possibly standing in Mad's way is the new creation of the good Dr. Thane: the high-jumping, fast-dashing, laser-blasting, ability-stealing Rokko Chan! Okay, Japanese developer King admittedly isn't exactly trying to hide the inspirations for his retro platformer. But if Rokko Chan may look and play like a ROM hack, then it is a very lovingly crafted one of high quality.

Making Monkeys is just as charming and quirky as Greg Sergeant's previous game Use Boxmen. With only 11 true levels, this puzzle platformer is definitely brief, but it works well as a coffee break game, maybe along with some monkey-shaped toast and a banana.

Originally released as a WiiWare download back in 2008, LostWinds has finally wafted its way to the iOS device world, bringing with it the same shining visuals, imaginative gameplay, and creative use of physics, all told through the wide eyes of a young boy. LostWinds combines traditional platforming elements with a touch of wind manipulation, giving you control over more than just the main character as you explore the lush world before you!

A sidescrolling, action platformer with RPG elements set in the Epic Battle Fantasy world. It has the same set of characters as his previous titles, with Natalie being kidnapped by a big, bad guy driving a big, bad tank. It's up to you, as Matt, to travel through worlds of enemies, coins and chests galore to save her. Twenty levels of fun await you (perhaps along with some bonuses...), and each level contains 100 gold coins and 10 chests to find.

The bouncy blue elephant is back for another installment in the wildly popular puzzle platform series! There's just one level in this whole game... but once you get to the end have you really beaten it? Packed with riddles, pastries, challenges, and even a little bullet action, it's the perfect way to spend your free time.

Popular developer Mateusz Skutnik wishes us all a Happy New Year with another entry in his "Where Is..." series of New Year's games! In this installment, players help a gnomish-looking Santa find the infant personification of the new year. The adventure-platforming gameplay is fun, if not particularly difficult; and the quirky character design, watercolor background art, and atmospheric music and sound are all quite engaging.

Imagine if And Yet It Moves with smooth world tilting instead of 90 degree shifts, and instead of being a little dude, you're a little ball, so your big choices are to rotate one way or another way, except you also have a fire charge skill and you can stick to walls and you can shoot lightning and also drag scenery... yeah, Sideroller throws a lot of puzzle platform mayhem at you very quickly, but that just makes it more fun.

This sequel to Lucas Paakh's William and Sly is a vast, richly layered feast for the eyes. While gameplay remains much the same, there are also marked changes (improvements as far as most players will be concerned): no more darklings or boss battles yet plenty of exploration, item gathering, and questing. Gaining helpful abilities involves your platforming and puzzle-solving skills to add just the right amount of gameplay into what is a sumptuous work of interactive art.

Verge is a puzzle platformer originally developed by Kyle Pulver (maker of Depict1) for a TIGSource game competition, and now ported to flash by Kristian Macanga. Its tone can best be described with the HP Lovecraft quote that was the game's inspiration: Life and Death - Death-its desolation and horror-bleak spaces-sea-bottom-dead cities. But Life-the greater horror! Vast unheard-of reptiles and leviathans-hideous beasts of prehistoric jungle-rank slimy vegetation-evil instincts of primal man-Life is more horrible than death. The twin opposing horrors of life and death is a haunting, challenging concept, and thus it should be no surprise that it makes for a haunting, challenging game... one where death and rebirth is the only way to progress.

In this short yet beautifully artistic puzzle platform adventure decisions become turning points after two basic choices: evolve or destroy? Guide Cadence, the title character, through a series of decisions, each determining how the story continues. Several puzzles are based on those choices and there are two endings to choose from as well. Love's Cadence is as much a thought-provoking poem as a game and should be appreciated for how its graphics, narrative elements and game play coalesce into a melodious composition.

Farmer Vlad has built a paradise for piggies. He sends a letter to the closest litter, inviting them to vacation in his literal hog heaven. Unfortunately, all sorts of danger lies in their path: bears, wolves, birds, UFOs... A reflex platformer by VladG, 300 Miles to Pigsland takes the non-stop gameplay of Canabalt, sends it through the cute-ifier machine and adds a sprinkling of upgrades, making for a fun, if repetitive, time.

This tricky little puzzle platformer will force you to forget any "nobody gets left behind" policies you might have, since someone's gotta bite the bullet for you to win. The Green and Red astronauts are stranded on a planet, and the only way out is for the Reds to nobly sacrifice themselves to open the way forward. A simple but challenging concept when both of them move at once.

It's hard to figure out what just happened. You took a walk in the park, like you do every night. This time though, there was a man... there was a gun. Now you find yourself a dark industrial world of shadowy figures and shifting backgrounds. You'll have to rearrange every single room to have even a chance of escaping... and you just know that time's running out. Five is a puzzle platformer from Z3LF where changing reality comes with the click of the mouse.

Poor Kichu is little and blue, so very blue. In this platform game by Prasan Games, help Kichu by navigating your way through obstacles and deadly traps, collecting diamonds so the melancholy pipsqueak can be big in riches and find true happiness at least. Little Life has solid controls, short levels, and some areas of high difficulty albeit nothing out of the ordinary in platforming. Yet it is so cute and heartwarming, both you and Kichu are sure to be smiling by the end.

Something is wrong in Volcania. A mysterious darkness has suddenly befallen the harsh, inhospitable home of a race called the Celheads, and you alone are left to unravel the mystery with only cryptic clues to guide you in this clever and engaging puzzle platformer.

Like Portal? So do the folks at HighUp Studio, who openly took inspiration from it to craft this challenging little puzzle platformer about robots put to the test. While Invertion may not be an entirely unique game, it definitely offers a test of your patience, perseverance and puzzling skills with smooth controls, creepy narration and nicely detailed animation.

Robots Can't Think, Z3lf's newest puzzle platformer, has you controlling a robot through a set of challenges. You can pick up, drop or throw blocks; climb along walls and ceilings and, most importantly, warp through space and time. When you die, the system will attempt to 'rewind' to a previous safe position, but to help prevent death, you can scan the level with a click of the mouse. Robots Can't Think is a challenge, so don't be surprised if you find yourself creating a pile of scrap metal, but it's worth it.

Shaun, Shirley, and Timmy are on the road once again entirely by accident. The sheepish trio finds themselves far from home in London, and the way back is a bit more complicated than a hop, skip, and a jump. Help guide three different sheep back home through fifteen levels of physics puzzle platforming in this stunning (and stunningly cute) game from Aardman.

You've got to appreciate those evil overlords who go out of their way to spend that extra buck for solid dungeon construction. Now, if only they didn't leave their door keys lying around, their treasure would be safe from the local green-hooded retro hero contingents. Oh well. Dangerous Dungeons, an arcade platformer developed by Adventure Islands for a month-long game jam, has an old-school style and old-school difficulty to match.

Those darn emo kids have accidentally summoned a horde of alien-zombies to destroy the city! Who should we call? The police? A dashing bandit? A Victorian-era, impressively side-burned gentleman thief? A redneck in a trucker's hat? Jason Vorhees? Well, all are options in Random Heroes, the new platformer from Woblyware. Random Heroes is a solid run-jump-and-shoot action game with a very cool aesthetic design that goes very well with its parallax scrolling effects.

You're probably familiar with level editors, where you can take all the time you want to make the perfect level of your favorite game. Here you'll have to put those skills to good use in a puzzle platformer with a twist. With a further 35 levels, people who've cut their teeth on the first game should be ready to ace this one, and those who passed over the first as too easy might want to give this one a go.

Our little hero feels out of place and ignored by society, but a new power to manipulate shapes might bring him the wrong kind of attention. A strange and somewhat clunky but silly little narrative wrapped up in a physics puzzle platformer, with some good old fashioned ancient cult business as the cherry on top.

The Podge serves up another installment of this popular bloodless shooter series, this time dropping the tiny commandos into a jungle environment full of Baddies to blast, buildings to blow up, and civilians to save. Run, jump, and shoot your way through missions, earning stars to upgrade your units and cash to hire more powerful mercenaries to your cause.

The original freeware platform adventure game Cave Story was released by Daisuke Amaya (Pixel) back in 2004. An English translation from Aeon Genesis followed just two months later, opening the game up to a much wider audience and allowing to vault to the top of the indie gaming world. Featuring amazing music, a well-written story, power-ups, upgrades, and a big world to explore, saying Cave Story was a hit is a gross understatement. Several years later, the game has been ported to half a dozen other systems and re-released with remastered music and updated HD graphics. Now, Cave Story+ is here, upgrading the freeware experience to something your eyes and ears can more fully appreciate!

Think open world platform adventure games like Knytt Stories are falling out of favor? Treasure Adventure Game is happy to prove you wrong. With its massive open world stocked from end to end with treasures, secrets, characters, quests, puzzles, and more, this old school throwback manages to combine adventure, RPG, and platforming genres into the kind of game you'll only have the honor of experiencing a few times in your life. Also: it's free!

Every other member of the rebel army is dead, but in Armed With Wings: Culmination, the tyrant Vandheer Lorde is finally within your grasp. Can you hunt him down and put an end to his threat of world domination? Grab your katanas, folks, because Sun Studios has outdone themselves again with their latest action platformer of the Armed with Wings series.

Pixel Quest is a retro-themed platform adventure starring Rex, an adventurer who wears a spiffy little hat. Finding treasure is his favorite activity, and today he's on the hunt for the Golden Frog idols. It's your job to keep Rex alive as you dash through several dozen levels, each well-stocked with falling spikes, lava pits, and traps that come out of nowhere. You know, standard treasure-hunting stuff!

Imagine that you want to get some delicious jelly beans. However, when you attempt to get them, you set the floor beneath you on fire, and if you're not quick enough, you drop into the unfathomable ocean. That would pretty much suck, right? How about if there were also disturbingly cheerful creatures hanging around who seemed to take unseemly joy into bursting into flames and setting ablaze floor you hadn't even gotten to yet? Such is the unfortunate life of Firebug, star of his own puzzle platform game.

The bad news is, the zombie apocalypse has returned. The good news is, so have the strangely charming, incoherently jabbering, self-sacrificing heroes who saved mankind the first time around. The team at Dreamgate Company brings us the sequel to their original, entertaining, and ruthlessly addictive action puzzle platformer with Mad Bombs 2, and it's chock full of as much zombie-exploding goodness as its predecessor. Bombs away!

In the latest installment of Launching Pad's magical puzzle platformer series, you, a desperate stage magician, are still trying to track down all the souls of your audience and escape from the alternate world you accidentally teleported everyone to. (It's a long story.) Can you master the new elemental powers at your command to find your way home through new tricky environments, or will the crotchety old sorcerer chasing you and your assistant, Eliza, prove more powerful than you expected?

Cling, swing, bounce and jump kick your way to the head of the class in Sticky Ninja Academy, an addictively unique take on the classic puzzle platformer genre from LongAnimals. Careless speed and reckless abandon won't get you far here; true mastery of the art of the sticky ninja depends primarily on patience, timing, precision, and, apparently, lots and lots of Velcro. Deftly maneuver though each stage in as few jumps as possible to achieve a perfect score, avoiding environmental hazards, collecting treasure, and defeating rival students along the way.

Shantae: Risky's Revenge is the sort of game retro-minded players will immediately snatch up. Modern players may look at it and think "another platform game?", but as soon as any human being plays it, it's easy tell that Shantae is anything but ordinary. Risky's Revenge is an action/platform game that's smartly focused on exploration in the style of a good old-fashioned metroidvania. It's a labor of love that's funny, challenging, creative, and absolutely gorgeous down to the last pretty pixel!

Trapped in a cave. Laser things shooting at you. Buttons everywhere. Spikes even more everywhere. It's a normal day for our featureless friend in Focus, a puzzle platform game originally by Karoshi author Jesse Venbrux. Ported to the browser world by Joseph Ivie, Focus features over 50 levels of extra difficult action, sticking you in enclosed rooms with all manner of dangers and challenging you to use your platforming skills to make it out alive.

It's a popular misconception that cats have nine lives. In reality they've actually got infinite lives and are forced to restart at checkpoints every time they lose one. Katwalk is a short, fairly easy platforming metroidvania game, so aside from one tricky section involving swimming you won't need catlike reflexes to succeed.

The title of Melee Man, a flixel action platformer by The Village Blacksmith and David Vs. Goliath, seems like it was decided on before the game was developed. After all, the guy has a gun and sucks at melee. Onomastic incongruity aside though, it's a really nice game. It's designed to the 160x144 specifications of the Gameboy Color, and, along with the kicking chiptune soundtrack, truly feels like an unreleased prototype for what would have been a really cool cartridge.

Expert diplomat Mr. Snoozleberg has a busy schedule: bullet-train inaugurations, movie awards, alien invasions, theme park visits. He can handle everything, though, as long as he's gets a good night rest... and his sleepwalking makes that difficult. Good think he has you to point and click all the obstacles out of his platforming path! Good Night Mr. Snoozleberg's first chapter was released back in 1999: practically ancient in internet gaming terms. It may be an oldie, but it's definitely a goodie.

We hold a truth to be self-evident that all squishy bouncy blob thingies are born with certain inalienable rights, including those of life, liberty and the pursuit of hat-iness. The hero of Pursuit of Hat, a puzzle platformer from Anton Rogov, is willing to risk all manner of life and limb for his head-covering... mainly limb though, since his are detachable. Literally tearing ones self apart over a head-covering may seem a little extreme. In all fairness... it's a pretty sweet hat.

Most people would pay money to use a matter-absorbing gun to run through a gamut of puzzles, yet evil scientists still feel the need to kidnap people to do it. In this platform puzzler from Peregrimm you'll need to absorb and rearrange various objects to solve puzzles and reach the exit of each level. You're given unlimited shots to play and an efficiency rating at the end of the level so you can replay each to find a better solution. It's a novel and unique game that is a lot of fun to play.

Everyone wants to get into this plummeting into the bowels of the earth business: robots, ninjas, skeletons, pirates, even Santa is jumping over ledges and rolling down slopes. What's down there? Cake and ice cream? Play Plumet 2, a simple but addictive action game from Person333 to find out.

Discount Mayonnaise, an action run and gun platformer by Etienne Bergeron Paquet and Samuel St-Germain, is one of those games that blurs the line between genre tribute and satire. The art style is a strange mix of Jhonen Vasquez and Salad Fingers, and is so exquisitely ghoulish that it almost makes up for the stickiness of the controls. Strange as it is to say, this is exactly what you'd think a game called Discount Mayonnaise would be.

In this puzzle platformer by Arctic Arcade, control both heroes Sir Valiant and... err... Steve on their heroic quest to save the princess before they wind up killing each other. The 8-bit graphics, spot on music by Rayne Leafe, and the homage paid to classic console games are sure to please retro fans, while the snarky humor and challenging gameplay can make it a fun experience for any gamer

Damian Sommer created this short, no-frills little puzzle platformer to throw the player into a series of one-screen, "extremely distilled metroidvanias." He accomplishes this by first teaching the player some rudimentary game mechanics and then builds upon those rules incrementally while increasing the difficulty and complexity of each level's design. And it works quite nicely for a game made in just a day and a half.

Hamumu's latest creation for Boy's Life is a nightmare... literally! Help Pee Wee escape from his elaborate platforming bad dreams before he has to get up for school... OR ELSE. Run, jump, ninja-roll and soar your way past all manner of dangerous traps and obstacles through three stages of difficulty.

You are a box in this Lemmings-inspired puzzle platform game from Games Northwest, and you're going to have to use your special box powers to jump and slide to guide the little box buddies (called "Nabbles") to the exit of each level to progress. Push crates, create paths over spikes and use yourself as a means to reach higher areas. Collect power-ups and use them wisely because you'll need to be perfect as you reach the more difficult later levels.

Nintendo DS owners most likely recognize the name, but for everyone else, the Scribblenauts series is a relatively unknown treasure. That all changes with the release of Scribblenauts Remix, an iOS version of the phenomenal creativity puzzle game from 5th Cell. The tagline "Write anything. Solve Everything." couldn't be more appropriate, as Scribblenauts challenges you to solve puzzles by typing in words and phrases. If you can imagine it, you can probably do it, so feel free to summon a huge invincible flying pregnant angry rainbow giraffe to fight with Zeus, if you like.

They say that no jelly is an island, but jellies that cooperate can explore many mysterious islands. Georganism never gets too terribly challenging in terms of puzzle solving, but the character switching and ability combinations make for a well-made and entertaining diversion of a game, suitable for casual gamers and jelly fans of all ages.

No matter how cynical and jaded you are, it's hard not to be heart-warmed by the simple companionship of a boy and his octopus... especially when the boy is willing to help rescue the she-octopod of his pet's dreams from the evil kidnapping clutches of knights, archers and the dreaded Bad Mood Bear. With a wrench at Kit's side and a ready-to-be flung mollusc on his head, though, it'll be easy as octo-pie. Right? Jay Armstrong's Kit and the Octopod may sound like a silver age crime-fighting team, but it has a ton of charm to go along with its action-platforming.

Once upon a time there was a boy and a girl who couldn't stay apart no matter how often it seemed like the world and their own emotions were trying to make that happen. A puzzle platformer with a beautiful sense of style and a sweet, nostalgic look at relationships, Mattia Traverso's game is short but well made and surprisingly warm and fuzzy. D'awwww.

In Concerned Joe, the title character has to move or he'll die, and it'll take all your platforming skills to get him through nineteen fiendish puzzle and trap-filled stages. A high difficulty game whose superb voice acting, fantastic art and adroit programming provides rewards that are more than worth the effort.

The city is under attack! Regular citizens have gone red-eyed with uncontrollable rage, security robots are running amok, mutants are smashing up storefronts, and sales of crowbars and health syringes are through the roof. Could it possibly have something to do with all those high-frequency broadcasting towers that the mysteriously menacing GlobalTek Industries have constructed all over town? Well, there's only one way to find out. Put together a party, load up on weapons, fight or sneak your way past the psychos and start causing massive property damage! Legends of Kong, new from Nerdook, is a randomly generated action-RPG that never plays the same twice.

The cactus is back-tus! Cactus McCoy, spikey green distributor of western vengeance is back, and this time he has competition. He's met up with technicolor bird lady Ella Windstorm who spins him a tale of the Volados: a fallen civilization laid waste to by a mysterious cult known as the Reptaras. It seems that there's a secret vault that contains the lost treasure of the Volados, including the magical Serpent Blade. With Ella kidnapped, it's up to McCoy to find the vault before the Volados and their Enemigo henchmen, recover the Serpent Blade, save his possible love interest, and make out like a cactusy bandit with all the loot he can carry. A worthy sequel to the earlier installment released in March, Flipline Studios' Cactus McCoy 2: The Ruins of Calavera will steal as many hours of action-platforming as the original did, pardner.

Raze 2 by AddisonR and Juice-Tin is the latest in a long line of action shooters with spacey-marines and/or one-word non-indicative titles. Let's count them off: Doom, Quake, Halo, Descent, Unreal, and, uh... Haze. It's surprising there are any alien-demon-zombie menaces left to battle considering how quickly we're able to deploy a near-endless supply of Master Chiefs. It's a good thing then that Raze 2 has the quality gameplay and presentation to distinguish itself from the competition.

This gratifyingly fun action-platformer by Page52 departs from typical at its very start as your screen fills with intricately interesting sketches and then it continues into the extraordinary, stopping to command: "Draw your own..." weapon, hat, enemy. Although dotted lines suggest the shape of such invention, in your Sketch Quest notebook, you're limited only by imagination.

Guide a helpless, flightless, half-hatched baby bird from its nest to the safety of the ground below. Watch your step, slide down walls, and use powerups to avoid suffering too much falling damage in this simple, relaxing, vertical-scrolling platformer.

Celestial Mechanica is a quietly impressive platform adventure (a.k.a. "metroidvania") game along the lines of Knytt Stories and the Robot Wants series of games. Created by Roger Hicks (author of rComplex) and Paul Veer (animator of Super Crate Box), it's the sort of game that sits quietly off to the side, never begging you to play it, but once you do, you'll be hooked 'til the end.

Leila is a toddler. She doesn't know much about platforming, and even less about physics. All she knows is that she wants her bottle, and there are all sorts of 2x4s and I-beams standing between in her way. Fortunately though, she has an ally: a ball that she can call to her hand; a ball that will smash against anything in its path and which is just perfect for bouncing off from. She's got a lot of places to explore, and a lot of bottles to collect, but she would have to do it alone. Leila and the Magic Ball, new from Paul Gene Thompson, is a cute little game that will keep you playing right up until nap time.

You're in a cave full of monsters, which is bad. But you have a sentient gun to help you, which is good! But you seem to have run afoul of a mad scientist, which is bad. But Arkeus' newest action platform shooter is a ton of fun, which is good! Gather diamonds to upgrade yourself and your weapons, unlock new play modes, drink in the fantastic retro aesthetic, and discover the truth in this impressive reboot of a Ludum Dare entry!

Think you can play platform games? Try this challenging game from Paradoxon Games and test your reflexes to the bitter edge... all so that Stu can get a night's sleep. Following in the tradition of VVVVVV and Gravinaytor is Sleepy Stu's Adventure, probably the hardest platform puzzler game you will play this year.

Alright, let's make sure we've got everything: Black and white stripped shirt? Check! Domino mask? Check! Lock picks? Check! Green toque? Check! Anti-heroic sense of morality that makes you more than happy to lift some cash from the unfriendly neighborhood mob boss? Oh, you'd better bet that's a check! It's Bob the Robber, new puzzle platformer from Flazm. All you footpads out should be prepared to burgle until the whole burg is burgled. Robble robble!

Blocks That Matter, an indie game from Swing Swing Submarine, likes to do things a little bit differently. It likes to break the rules, mix up genres, tear down that fourth wall, and borrow the best from some of the most popular games ever released and turn it into something new. Blocks That Matter is part Tetris, part Minecraft, part Dig Dug, part platformer all wrapped into one, with a cute main character leading the whole thing up that serves as the perfect gateway to a game you won't be able to get enough of.

What do you get when you cross a stegosaurus with a bear? You get the lovable creatures in Tamus and Mitta, a new sidescrolling platformer produced by Lartar Games. The sun has had all its toys stolen by evil bats, and it's your job to get all 120 of them back. Find the tools and collect the toys, jumping on enemies to stun them, but don't let your candlelight run out! If you're looking for a well made, challenging platformer, try out Tamus and Mitta. It's kid-friendly and adult-approved!

Trapped in a cave! Gotta get out of there fast. There are flying jellyfish monsters, falling rocks, spikes, and other lovely bits of danger, but if you're fast enough, you can escape without harm. Connor Ullmann's Hollow is a platform game that's high on the challenge with a healthy injection of creative design on almost every level. You'll meet an untimely end dozens of times in this game, but you'll keep plugging away at it all the same. Practice leads to perfection!

A short-but-sweet platform puzzle adventure. Rather than raid the employee fridge, one behatted and unusually bouncy worker responds to his company's financial crisis by entering a puzzle filled dungeon to grab a treasure. Somewhat like I Don't Even Game, figuring out what to do in each stage is sometimes the only challenge. Once you know all the tricks, it'll take you only a few minutes, and even your first play-through probably won't take you longer than 10, unless you get really stuck.

The hermit's son has been kidnapped by demons! Are you a good enough king to rescue him? And, while you're at it, could you do something about that advancing purple wall of doom? And, also, could you tell the peasants to knock it off with all the portentous statements concerning the upcoming apocalypse? Sigh... It seems that a monarch's work is never done. Though by the end of KingStory, the new adventure platformer from KintoGames, you'll at least have a pretty sweet crown on your head. That makes it all worthwhile.

When you introduce a small and somewhat cute little green blob that has the power to take over people's bodies into your planetary conflict, expect things to get a little... squishy. Infestor is a new puzzle platformer featuring tight, responsive controls and clever, bite-sized levels, so crawl in the skull of someone with a computer and give it a play.

You've got your eye on the world... just the one, in this case, since you're a little blue cyclopean alien. But that's all about to change in this clever puzzle platformer; when your ship crashes on Earth and parts go missing, you'll need to hijack the sight of various characters in order to manipulate your surroundings and ultimately find your way back home. Repetition mars the execution, but Proxy By Sight is still a neat concept that deserves a look.

In this platform adventure game that spans multiple dimensions, help the robotic hero complete his quest and return home. Anyone who's played the classic SNES game Earthbound will feel right at home with TransDimensional. There's a certain air of irreverent weirdness about the proceedings that makes TransDimensional feel like something special. At around 20 minutes long, it doesn't require much of a time investment and fans of platformers are bound to have a good time hopping between dimensions.

Developed for Something Awful's GameDev VI Challenge, the retro metroidvania platformer Psychopomps puts you in the shoes of Anubis, who has overslept. In his absence, his fellow soul ushers have gone missing and evil spirits have grown powerful. Explore your environment and shoot down your enemies as you rescue your friends and right the matter of directing souls.

Do you ever think about death? Not just about dying, but about everything connected to it... the emotions, the concepts, the way people from all over the world look at it in vastly different ways? The End from Preloaded and Channel 4 is a bizarre puzzle platforming adventure through a series of realms that ask questions designed to make you think about life and what comes after.

How far are you willing to go for someone who doesn't even seem to know you're there? In this short, atmospheric artsy platformer, scour a grim world looking for bits of colour to return to a loved one, even at the cost of losing yourself in the process. Originally featured in a Link Dump Friday article, Grey's simple, repetitive gameplay may not win everyone over, but for others the changing environment and wordless message may deliver an intensely personal experience.

To make a good platformer, you don't need new ideas. You just need to make fun of platformers. Lee-Lee's Quest is more of a platformer doing it at the expense of the genre. In fact, start it in style. When the game starts and Lee-Lee awaits your movement commands, just hold back and do nothing. He's got a few things to say.

Several years in the making, the darkly atmospheric (and strangely realistic) platform game LIMBO has finally migrated from console download to the PC ecosphere.Crafted by Danish studio Playdead, LIMBO drops you in a shadowy world filled with dangers, immensely difficult puzzles, and more ways to die than you would really want to count. It's an incredibly stylistic and engaging game, one that just about any player can pick up and enjoy from beginning to end.

In Soul Tax, a new possession puzzle platformer from Jarod Long, the story centers on these two facts of... death. See, you're a ghost who's been haunting this extremely complex office complex, and one day the grim reaper shows up and lets you know that you owe tax on all the time you spent being an ethereal spirit. And how are you going to pay these taxes? Easy. Defenestration and pixellated murder.

You may have always wanted your own set of wings, and TwofoldSecret is going to grant them to you as you help their protagonist take to the sky in his crumbling, surreal dreamworld. In this explorative platformer, search the ruins of a dreamland for items of significance and discover the significance between his surroundings and what lies within them.

Mr. Runner looks so sleek, there's no reason why he shouldn't run quickly. You have three worlds with over a dozen levels each in which to jump, slide, float through the air and die and die and die. Whether you're searching for the five chests hidden in each world or racing to the finish to unlock the next level, you're bound to have 'a few' deaths while figuring out how to get to the end.

Muse Quest is an entry in the Project Eden Music Game Contest that combines platforming elements with unique musical gameplay. In it, you are a character that can control the behavior of other potato-like characters by playing different songs acquired across ten levels. With its cooperative elements, a stark graphical appearance and some nifty music, Muse Quest stands out from standard platformers.

Twenty years after nuclear confrontation wiped out the planet known as Earth, Cosmonaut Laika receives a distress bark from the ruined surface. Armed with your trusty swap-gun, a rainbow shooting device that lets you switch places with pieces of the world around you, you land upon the planet to locate your companions. Every dog has its day, and today is the day you... Escape from the Puppy Death Factory! Brought to you by Arthur Lee and the fine people at Adult Swim. A fun, if deceptively challenging, puzzle platformer.

We get you. You're too cool for regular platformers, right? They're so boring. So easy. Then why don't you bring your swagger on over to this tricky puzzle platformer and help one cool cat reach his goal. Can you make it to the exit? How about while only moving left? Without jumping? Within a time limit? You'll need quick reflexes, a cool head, and a dose of patience to proceed.

Who knew that a bunch of simians could create a game that depicts one of their number being cruelly experimented upon, forced to use a reality-bending helmet to manipulate his environment to avoid being killed? You'll just have to set aside a chunk of time to focus on this game. Get some infinite monkeys to do your other work. How do you think I manage to create such great reviews for JIG?

From the study halls of Digipen, whose alum include parts of the teams behind Portal and Portal 2, comes an epic tale of digging, rigging, and more digging. Sounds as exciting as bathwater, right? But I'll bet you a load of rare minerals that once you get started in Dig-N-Rig, you'll lose your evening. Maybe more!

An excellent metroidvania style puzzle platformer that's easy enough to jump straight in, but has a ton of hidden secrets for experts to find (especially if you want the best ending)... along with a few locked doors that just beg for further expansion. Legend of Kalevala has that perfect mix of old and new, alien and human, story and action.

Most shooters not physics-sy enough for you? Then fire up Ant Karlov's creative spin on the genre! Start with sprawling levels, mix in some highly destructible scenery, and sprinkle liberally with zombies, machines, skeletons, and explosive barrels, and you've got a recipe for success. (... success... tastes funny... )

Simple does not mean that there's any less action, it just means there's more bullets and less to think about. No grenades, one weapon at a time, simple weapon shop and upgrades, it all means nothing but twitchy shooting action, one hundred percent of the time. Some might call it shallow, but I'd call it pure.

It's a long way to the top, baby, and if you want to keep your job in Nitrome's latest action arcade platformer, you'll have to survive the Office of Doom! Make your way to the helicopters at the end of each level, running and jumping through floors stocked with all manner of traps, tricks, and hazards. It's just a fact of life, kids; if you want that promotion, you have to be willing to dodge a few zombies and let your resolution get downgraded once in a while.

About as epic as any game about snails can be, Snailiad will take hours from you, and you'll be glad to see them gone. It's action-packed and adventure-filled, completely unlike the lives of real snails, who mostly sit around hoping they don't become escargot.

Nerdook is back, and once again here to hybridize disparate game genres, this time as an entry for Ubisoft's Project Eden game contest. Jacob and the Magic Piano, a game which deftly combines platforming, music, and tower defense gameplay is the result. A starving artist's unknown Aunt has passed away, leaving him a cat, a chest of drawers, and a piano... a magic piano. Playing the piano releases the spirits resting within, but also the golden stars that are the key to accessing the possible riches of the chest. Can Jacob slay the spirits and save the stars? It's all up to the power of music!

Those of us adept at folding space-time (with or without the use of spice) are very familiar with the concept of moving chunks of the universe around so we can easily step from one area to another. For everyone else, there's Continuity 2: The Continuation, a sequel to the familiar Flash puzzle game Continuity. Combining a little bit of 2D platforming and a lot of sliding puzzle logic, Continuity 2 is a unique and challenging experience made better by the battery of almost 50 new levels packed into the iPhone's tiny little screen. It's all the space-time folding you could ever want, without the blue-in-blue eyes to show for it!

MaXploder is a brand new action exploration game from Ninjadoodle, creator of the ClickPLAY! series. The president needs your help rescuing some archaeologists who have become trapped in an ancient tomb. The catch is that you have to save them by yourself with only your whip-like wits, a generous jumping ability, and an infinite store of bombs!

What's more important... the truth or happiness? Sometimes you can't have both. In Thomas Brush's latest platformer adventure, you play a robot named Skinny, woken up from a pleasant dream by his Mama, who insists she's being terrorized by a little boy named Felix who only wants to steal from your friends and hurt the ones you love.

Once you pop you can't stop! Blocks, that is! Blast chains of coloured blocks in this simple, simply fun, and simply addictive action arcade game from Andrew Morrish! Coloured blocks fall from the screen and it's up to you to destroy them before they reach the top, while staying away from the spikes and racking up a high score in the process.

Robots, man. They're the worst. Always pulling you out of your workplace and forcing you to battle them in a series of psychedelic levels, blowing you up, killing your cows. It's ridiculous. Luckily, we have Deepak, representing the everyman in the daily struggle against robo-baddies. Deepak Fights Robots, from Run-Man: Race Around the World creator Tom Sennett, is loaded with mind-bending levels, quick arcade action, more colors than a rainbow drowning in a crayon factory.

Nitrome has done it again! We've guided the little blue piece of protoplasm test subject through two incredibly enjoyable series of experiments. Now, however, it (and you) faces its greatest opponent yet: a person sitting next to you at the keyboard! Yes, it's Green vs. Blue in Test Subject Arena

Goin Up is a new vertical-scrolling arcade platformer by Comix. Well... when I say "new", I guess I mean "recent" more than "novel". In truth, its gameplay feels more like a mish-mash remix of the mechanics of other releases than its own creation. However, what Goin Up lacks in innovation, it more than makes up for with style. After all, if I'm going to be steering my player-character into bombs to be propelled higher for the hundredth time, those bombs had better be darn pretty. And well... they are.