Welcome to the inaugural entry in a new ongoing feature series highlighting gaming’s best independent titles. If music and movies can have their “indie” titles be cutting edge and hip, why can’t games? The advent of digital distribution and micro transactions in the gaming industry has allowed more independent developers a shot at producing quality titles without a huge budget. While you may or may not have heard of the titles featured in these spotlights, rest assured that they come wholly recommended and are solid purchases for your gaming library.
Undertow is a new Xbox Live Arcade game from Chair Entertainment available for purchase today for 800 MS points ($10). The developer is best known for employing many of the driving forces behind the 2005 adventure game Advent Rising. They are also involved with Ender’s Game author, Orson Scott Card, in developing games based on the author’s Empire universe.
The game is essentially a 2d Battlefield 1942 that plays like Geometry Wars. Players use the left thumbstick to move their character and the right thumbstick to shoot in 8 directions. In addition, players can drop depth charges (read: grenades) with the left trigger and dash with the right trigger. Each team starts off with a certain amount of “tickets” with the goal being to deplete the other team’s ticket total. To accomplish this, teams vie for the control of several “bases” on the map. The more bases your team controls, the faster the opposing ticket count will decrease.