Are you a puzzle fan, a button-masher, or an action freak? If so, you should definitely take a look at the commercial games in the Software Center. Unlike their free counterparts, they often provide professional looking graphics and more unusual game concepts. Purchasing them through Software Center has the advantage that all dependencies are resolved for you. Some games are even exclusive to Software Center, which currently applies to all the ones presented here: Broken Sword: Director's Cut, Capsized, Dear Esther, Edge, Gravi, Hotline Miami, Motorbike, and RC Mini Racers. These games cover a variety of genres and cost no more than US$ 10 apiece.

Broken Sword: Director's Cut

George Stobbart is enjoying his vacation in Paris at a quaint cafe when a clown darts in and out, and a massive bomb blast suddenly bursts the place apart. The result is a completely devastated cafe and one dead man. Because the police subsequently goes about their work incompetently, George takes matters into his own hands, with help from journalist Nicole Collard, who senses a big scoop (Figure 1).

Figure 1: At the beginning of Broken Sword: Director's Cut, protagonists Nico and George are reacting to the bomb blast in the Paris cafe. During conversations, the player chooses the appropriate topic by clicking an icon.

Why the clown stormed into the cafe and what role the Knights Templar play is revealed during the course of Broken Sword gameplay. The first version was released in 1996 for Windows. In the Software Center, the Revolution company is selling an overhauled Director's Cut that includes additional scenes. Among other changes, the player can now confer with Nico to find out just what happened before the explosion (Figure 2).

Figure 2: The Director's Cut version starts before the explosion in the cafe with Nico's coverage of a murder. Here Nico is investigating a broken window pane.

You can easily manipulate the two heroes with the mouse pointer through a lovingly drawn scene. Clicking an object provides or removes it from the character. The player has to solve numerous puzzles which, in turn, gradually drive the background story.

Broken Sword is one of the best known and most popular adventure games of all times. The Director's Cut graphics are still attractive, albeit extremely small or badly fuzzy on current monitors depending on the window size. The consistently logical puzzles and extremely suspenseful background story easily make up for it. By the way, if you already have the old Windows version, you can use ScummVM [1] to bring it to life and save yourself the US$ 5 for the Director's Cut version.

Capsized

In the game Capsized, a spaceship is about to crash land; but, at the last second, some of the crew eject through escape capsules onto a densely forested planet. From there, the player takes control of the astronaut of Rescue Capsule 3. In the search for the other crew members, the player can have characters jumping and running through wonderfully drawn two-dimensional landscapes.

Many hostile creatures confront the crew. The astronaut initially can defend himself only with a simple pistol, albeit it with an unlimited supply of ammunition. Later, a kind of plasma rope can be used to swing across chasms (Figure 3) or pull boulders from cave entrances (Figure 4). Speaking of caves, some are illuminated only by the hero's flashlight, which can make orientation difficult. Throughout the game, the astronaut can pick up numerous other weapons, including a plasma cannon and a machine gun. Unlike standard weapons, however, they need constant ammunition changes, which the hero has to find and laboriously collect. Other useful items accompany the weapons, such as shields and jet packs, which the hero can use to fly through the air, provided the fuel for it was previously found.

Figure 3: Capsized: To get across the chasm …

Figure 4: … simply pull the boulder over with the plasma rope.

In the course of the game, special arcade modes appear. In these modes, you have to get along without weapons or fight approaching opponents. A multiplayer mode lets two players on the same screen try to eliminate one another.

Capsized is an action-packed jump-and-run game with huge, intricate levels, which are, however, often borrowed from other games. Developers Jesse McGibney and Lee Vermeulen create extremely detailed landscapes (Figure 5). Because of some particularly difficult to master sections, the US$ 10 game is aimed more at experienced or unflappable platform acrobats who enjoy exploring alien planets.

Figure 5: Capsize impresses with it huge, detailed landscapes, where enemies often lurk unseen. Can you distinguish the heroes from the natives?

Dear Esther

For US$ 10, the developer of The Chinese Room sets the player on a deserted island, completely alone and with no memory, where he must try to make sense of his surroundings. The player keeps running into tumble-down houses, rusty shipwrecks, strange graffitis, and other legacies of former inhabitants (Figure 6). Occasionally, a narrator emerges who reads letters from a woman named Esther and diary entries of vanished inhabitants. The narrator pops up every time the player reaches a particular site on the island. The messages seem totally random, and, to get the complete story, you must traverse the island a number of times.

Figure 6: Dear Esther: Caves contain strange glowing wall graffiti.

Dear Esther alternates between game and artwork. Although the 3D graphics and controls resemble a horror action game, there are neither enemies nor an explicit goal to pursue. The player just roams through a particularly depressing landscape gradually picking up clues about the island and its inhabitants (Figure 7). The graphics may not be up to today's standards, but they effectively present a bizarre atmosphere. Together with the bit-by-bit story line, they keep the player's attention. And then there's that mysterious blinking transmission tower in the distance…

Figure 7: In Dear Esther, you wander over a deserted island, most of the time along the coast, as shown here.

The ambiguous ending after an hour's walk through the game might disappoint some players, but Dear Esther is better understood as a piece of interactive art than as a typical game.

Edge

In Edge, the player rolls a cube through a 3D landscape of white blocks. The aim is to get your colored block through 28 levels, with numerous obstacles in the way (Figure 8). Loose plates break away under the cube, and blocks move in all directions or morph into different shapes. Each level has small flashing cubes that are hard to get, but open up a collection of bonus levels.

Figure 8: In Edge, you need to collect small colored cubes and roll them to a target.

While playing, you can tilt your own cube over the edge of a block, which either folds up or plunges down. With a little skill, you can balance the block on the edge, and you often need to. If the cube accidentally rolls over the edge of the landscape, the game simply moves your blocks back to the botched spot. However, Edge stops the time required to pass through the level. For the balancing act on the edge, the game kindly deducts some time again (Figure 9). If you're particularly fast, you get an award and access to bonus levels.

Figure 9: Edge: Balancing on an edge wins you valuable time.

Edge is a clever blend of puzzle and skill that will cost you only US$ 6. You quickly want to get to the next level. The difficulty increases at just the right pace, and new game elements and obstacles make the game interesting. The timing motivates you to rediscover levels you've already been on. The sparse graphics have their own charm, although the tinny retro music can be nerve-grating after a while.

Gravi

Whereas Edge has a cube coursing through the different levels, the Gravi player must navigate a one-eyed blue energy ball through various alien traps (Figure 10). Among the deadly obstacles are flames, spikes, rollers, and lava. The player cannot jump as in other jump-and-run games; instead, he has a kind of magnetic lasso. A mouse click propels a small plasma ball that draws the blue energy ball along. In this way, you can lurch your way over precipices and falls and reach higher playing levels.

Figure 10: Gravi: The blue energy ball on the wall to the right pulls the one-eyed Gravi along.

Players navigate the small ball through 40 levels with difficulty increasing fairly quickly. To pass the later levels, you must control the gravitational lasso well and often fire it quickly in succession. Graphically, the US$ 8 Gravi has little to offer. You roll through a barren industrial plant that has the same old blocks. Regardless, Gravi is an entertaining skill test for the casual gamer.

Hotline Miami

Although Hotline Miami at first glance looks like a harmless arcade game from the early 1990s, it's a brutal and very violent action game for adults. The player takes on the role of a nameless contract killer (Figure 11) working in Miami in 1989. His contract assignments are a relentless mayhem of brutal beatings and bloody murders (Figure 12). Each hit from an enemy is deadly: As soon as the protagonist dies, you have to start the whole section over again. Consequently, it's important to plan your way through the levels carefully; stealth is advised. The anti-hero can arm himself with up to 35 different weapons, from a lead pipe to a pump-action shotgun. The latter unfortunately is rather noisy and attracts patrolling enemies.

Figure 11: Hotline Miami: The serial killer gets contracts by cryptic phone messages.

Figure 12: Hotline Miami gives points for especially brutal murders and isn't stingy with pixelized blood.

In the course of the game, you're continually given animal masks, one of which the protagonist puts on before each hit. Each mask gives the contract killer special abilities or even changes his environment (Figure 13). Thus, you can don the rabbit mask to run faster or wear the pig's mask to pick up more weapons. The game gives points for every kill and especially for the approach taken. More weapons become available with more points.

Figure 13: Hotline Miami: Before every hit, you must select an animal mask to provide you with particular abilities.

The game only partially reveals who's behind all this murderous activity. A suspenseful story unfolds primarily through interspersed cartoon-like scenes. The story changes depending on what you do. Depending on the choices you make, you'll see one of two alternative endings. The difficulty level of this US$ 10 game is extremely high, and you usually have to repeat each section several times. Hotline Miami glorifies power and murder, but it's so surreal that it's almost a satire. The background story in the second part provides food for thought.

Motorbike

In typical motocross games, an off-road motorcycle speeds over bumps, the Motorbike game, however, adds a few more amusing obstacles along the way. These include freight containers and beer barrels to jump over, as well as the rusty loops of a roller coaster to engage in (Figure 14). It even has exploding mines and platforms that can be reached only by backward somersaults. The goal is to race the course in the shortest time possible. Motorbike has a total of 80 courses, with rapidly increasing difficulty. If that's not enough, you can create your own challenges with the built-in editor (Figure 15).

Figure 14: Motorbike: You need a good head start to get over the barrels.

Figure 15: In Motorbike's course editor, you first draw the course's height profile, then supply obstacles along the way..

Even with the game's respectable 3D graphics, the player sees the action exclusively from the side. With a keystroke, you can set the camera on an angle. Different landscapes provide visual variety, including a canyon or icy mountains. Control is limited to four arrow keys that you use to accelerate, brake, and make the rider lean forward or back. Because the laws of physics apply, every shift in weight affects how the machine behaves.

For US$ 5, Motorbike provides a challenging skill game whose course editor can involve hours of planning and tinkering. If you want to check it out first, the homepage provides a trial version [2]. The makers of the other games described don't provide this option.

RC Mini Racers

The developer Decane promises motorsport in miniature: In RC Mini Racers the player races through the streets and gardens of an American suburb in a small, remote controlled car (Figures 16). To get to the finish as fast as possible, you can blast opponents' cars with rockets and mines or drag them away with a turbo booster. These tools are limited, so you need to consider carefully when to employ them. Apart from the classic race of five rounds there are also sprints that simply require speed.

Figure 16: In RC Mini Racers, you need to pass the checkpoints in absolutely the right order. The green arrow at the bottom left shows the way to the next checkpoint.

Players need to pay for courses and cars, earning the money by victories, bumpings and targeted removal or destruction of adversaries. The fastest course times and victories get bonus points. In the workshop (pimp shop), the player can change tires and upgrade his vehicle.

RC Mini Racers is outdated visually. You can clearly see that the game was originally developed by Decane for smartphones. Because of its lack of variety the game won't motivate in the long run, even the pimp shop won't help. Nevertheless, RC Mini Racers provides fast, uncomplicated, and fun racing for its US$ 5 price tag. The four different difficulty levels provide even beginners a good chance.

Conclusion

Players will find some diamonds in the rough in the Software Center. However, some of the titles will keep you glued to the screen for hours or even days. The Software Center has something for everybody: Adventure fans will be happy with Broken Sword and Dear Esther, jump-and-run nuts will enjoy Capsized and Gravi, puzzle fans can grab Edge, and motorsports fans can race with Motorbike or RC Mini Racers. l