The Blog of Tom

It’s not brilliant, but I find Crossword a good diversion now and again. No clues are given - you just fill in letters where you think they fit. It passes five minutes or so.

LRB · Michael Wood: At the Movies

Absolutely bonkers Japanese slapping game with an unusual vein of domestic melodrama. Enjoy.

Direct link:
http://nigoro.jp/game/rosecamellia/rosecamellia.php

Just a quick nod to the (relatively) new comic shop in Finsbury Park, Fantastic Realm. If you’re in the area, they’re just by Wells Terrace. They also have a nice website.

The new issue of Mustard is out now and features a long interview with Graham Linehan as well as other bits of silliness. I always find it a bit weird when black and white publications make the transition to colour (Pete Bagge’s Hate was never quite the same after the transition) so it’ll be interesting to see if Mustard retains its pep. Anyway, this issue is definitely worth picking up, if only for the Linehan interview and the comic strip which imagines the Elephant Man as a Victorian superhero.

Direct link:
www.mustardweb.org

I always seem to quite like games written by students, as what they lack in spit and polish is generally made up for by innovative gameplay. Polarity typifies this trend, being a nice little magnetism-based platformer that isn’t amazingly challenging, but passes the time in a pleasant enough way. It probably won’t last more than 20 minutes or so, but that’s what you want on a friday isn’t it?

Direct download link: (Windows only)
http://polarity.en.softonic.com/download

It’s been a few years since I read Stephen Poole’s interesting (if a little pretentious) book about videogames, but given that he’s now giving it away as an e-book, it seems churlish not to mention Trigger Happy