First Looks// Post-PAX Impressions: Redshift, Sentinels of the Multiverse, Skyling and Sneaky Sneaky

Skyling: Garden Defence by Mighty Studios

One of the fantastic things about indie games is how they are able to dive into long since forgotten game mechanics, bring them back, dust them off and sprinkle them with a mountain of 21st century video game development. I say this as Skyling: Garden Defence is a perfect example of this.

It takes the core attributes of Q*Bert and Crystal Castles and slaps them into the colourful world of Skyling. But rather than making them punishingly difficult as was the case with arcade games of old, Skyling: Garden Defence affords the player with some abilities to take on the foes that they face with the deft use of sleeping cats. (Now there's a sentence I'm unlikely to ever write again...)

Skyling: Garden Defence has the player take on the role of a little girl called Bloom who is charged with defending a garden that has been overrun with monsters and critters.

Bloom can repair damaged parts of the garden by simply walking over them. She can also take out some creatures while they are unaware and hurl them at others to expunge them. The sleeping cats mentioned earlier can block off areas from monsters, preventing them from causing damage to parts of the garden the player has repaired.

Having played Skyling: Garden Defence for a while now I can't help but be drawn into the world Mighty Studios has created. It's presented in 16-bit-like sprites, but their frames of animation are far greater than any SNES/Megadrive/Amiga/[insert 16 bit platform of choice here] could ever muster. The contrasting colours of brown, green and bright blue sky along with the humour that is sprinkled throughout Skyling: Garden Defence make it a real joy to play.

Skyling: Garden Defence is out now on PC, iOS and Android devices.


Sneaky Sneaky by Naiad Entertainment

Stealth games. Some put them in the same place as escort missions or even quicktime events. Many can empathise with this way of thinking, especially when considering how dreadful Thief turned out to be. So what makes Sneaky Sneaky a game worthy of anyone's attention? Well, granted, it is a stealth game, but it's a semi-turn-based stealth game.

Now before you run off declaring Sneaky Sneaky to be an act of heresy, hear me out on this. In Sneaky Sneaky you play a rogue who is trapped in a forest and the player must sneak, run and occasionally fight their way out. Each area in the game is a static map through which the player must make their way.

These are split up into a grid that is used to determine the range of perception of enemy creatures. Once a player enters an area that has enemies in it, the play style alters into a semi-turn based system, with the player being able to carry out three actions per turn. If they are clever they can manoeuvre themselves into a position that allows them to carry out a sneak attack. This reduces the target's health to zero as they have no means to defend themselves. There are also items to collect such as gems for points, and additional weapons that can be added to the player's arsenal.

From the short time I had with Sneaky Sneaky I found it to be a an excellent take on the much maligned stealth genre, mainly because of how ridiculously unfair they can be. Sneaky Sneaky takes the concept of detection avoidance and makes it a puzzle and not a tortuous attempt to figure out how dumb/smart the AI is. Wrapping that into a beautifully set of visuals that are not too dissimilar to Zelda titles on the 3DS, Sneaky Sneaky is definitely a game to watch once it arrives sometime later this year for PC, Mac and iOS iPad 2 and above.