OMG! FTL ITFS! [View all]
If you have a spare ten bucks around, allow me to point you in the direction of a simple little game called FTL: Faster Than Light.
http://www.ftlgame.com/
That's their website. You can download the game through Steam for 9.99, and since I just bought it it's sure to be on sale soon.
It's pretty cool. You are a spaceship carrying a vital message through seven sectors, with the enemy always advancing behind you. You manage a crew and at least a dozen upgradeable ship systems, and if you don't manage them well, you die. The crew level up over time, and some aliens have specialties and, apparently, secret abilities (listed in the control menu, anyway). (Humans, declares the game, are common and uninteresting.)
Perhaps the most compelling aspect of it is that the game is in perpetual hardcore mode. There are no lives, no saves, and no second chances. For some reason that creates a real emotional roller coaster effect, with little triumphs and tragedies as you acquire a better weapon or lose an invaluable crew member to a treacherous new arrival. I have yet to beat the enemy flagship yet, after hours of really fun play.
Watch Day9 forget his day job and become lost--totally lost--in this game for hours, until his housemate tragically disturbs his chi:
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