Best Of Indie Games: Eufloria, Home, Run Away!

[Every week, IndieGames.com: The Weblog co-editor Tim W. rounds up the week's top indie games and biggest news on the space from his sister 'state of indie' weblog.] This week on 'Best Of Indie Games', we take a look at some of the top independent PC Flash/downloadable titles released over this last week. The goodies in this edition include the release of IGF 2009 finalist Eufloria, an experimental game set in a retirement home, a role-playing game with black and white pencil art for graphics, a turn-based strategy game about pushing blocks, and an on-rails platformer that plays a bit like a mix of recent favorites Canabalt and RunMan: Race Around the World. Here's the highlights from the last seven days: Game Pick: 'Eufloria' (Alex May and Rudolf Kremers, commercial indie - demo available) "Eufloria, previously Dyson, is all about being an almighty conqueror. This kind of gameplay would normally involve tactics, planning and strategy on the player's part, yet the game turns out to be nothing like that whatsoever. Eufloria is a beautifully immersive world that many gamers will find themselves losing many hours to." Game Pick: 'Home' (Stephen Lavelle, freeware) "Home is increpare's experimental project in which you play as an elderly person in a retirement house, featuring basic life-simulation elements found in games like The Sims. The controls might feel awkward at first but you will understand the need for it soon enough. It doesn't take longer than a couple of minutes to play this game from start to end." Game Pick: 'ButaVX: Justice Fighter' (Nekomura Games, freeware) "ButaVX: Justice Fighter is a short role-playing game that features a likable line art look for the graphics and animation, although the adventure itself is an extremely short one and won't take longer than ten minutes to beat. The story is about a pig who loses his ball by accidentally kicking it through the window of a granny's house, so he sets out on a quest to retrieve it by running errands for villagers and searching for random encounters to be involved in." Game Pick: 'Crate Expectations' (Haiku Interactive, commercial indie - demo available) "Available via Xbox Live Indie Games, Crate Expectations sees players sliding crates around and placing ice blocks in an attempt to get their deliveries finished before everyone else. There's a bundle of bonuses to keep the game fresh too. Both local multiplayer and play via Xbox Live are included, with a drop-in/drop-out system in place, so players can hand control to a bot, or vice-versa." Game Pick: 'Run Away!' (Jon Keatley, commercial indie - demo available) "Run Away! is an 'on-rails platformer' in which you scramble over and under hedges, walls, gnomes, bananas and beehives to escape your pursuers who have decided to chase you for various reasons. Succeed and the love of Angry Girl may just be yours for the taking. This is great as a little something to rid that Sunday afternoon boredom."