Enjoy escape room puzzle games? Mad Experiments: Escape Room from PlayTogether Studio is officially out now.

With multiple rooms to break out of that are full of riddles, clues, and mysteries to uncover it's a highly interactive game with items everywhere you can examine to try and find your way out. They here, is to fully explore your surroundings. It's built firmly with co-op in mind, with it being possible to have six player try to solve the rooms together. It was previously in Early Access with the 1.0 release adding in the third chapter.

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Nice to see more escape room styled puzzle games, especially those where the developer supports Linux directly. Overall though, there's just not a whole lot of good 3D first-person experiences around like this on any platform. There's plenty of 2D point & click puzzle games and hidden object games that have you do a similar thing but it's just not the same.

Hopefully then we will see more like Mad Experiments: Escape Room in future. So far, it seems most users have enjoyed this one with around 64 user reviews giving it a "Very Positive" rating overall.

You can buy it on Humble Store or Steam .

With an attention-grabbing art style, Life of Delta looks like it's going to be a very intriguing post-apocalyptic point and click adventure.

Life of Delta takes place in Japan some time in the future where the Human race has died out after a 'Great War', the only survivors being decaying robots and some kind of humanoid lizards born as a result of nuclear fallout. The game follows Delta, a small service robot just trying to survive who embarks on a long journey to find their lost friend.

Check out the brand new trailer:

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The team at Airo Games originally tried funding it on Kickstarter back in 2018, which sadly failed to hit the funding goal. They continued with development anyway, posting up semi-regular updates to a few social networks like Facebook when they suddenly released the brand new trailer and Steam page on yesterday which was a surprise. Great to see it still very much alive, as it looks thoroughly interesting.

Feature Highlight:

• Beautiful hand-drawn art style: 25 hand-painted levels of post-apocalyptic Japan and hundreds of carefully handcrafted character animations
• Mini-games and puzzles: you will be solving over 50 engaging mini-games such as building spaceship engines and mixing toxic potions.
• Diverse characters: interact with various characters throughout the game, each with a unique story to tell.
• Cinematic animations: fully animated cut-scenes to paint a more interesting story
• For players of all ages: this game is suitable for both adults and younger players.

Once we get more information about the release date, price or anything else will let you know. For now, you can follow Life of Delta on Steam .

NENA is a new adventure following Botley, a robot that wants more than a life disposing of self-aware robotic boxes.

At some point in the far future, robotics and AI are so advanced that we had to pass laws to give them full awareness of life and it all seems as terrible as you can imagine. NENA might not look like much but it's quite a surprising little adventure with some amusing interactions.

In this short, top-down action-puzzler you start when you're first turned on, only to be told right away that your only reason for "living" is to put little boxes into a furnace to dispose of them — forever. The problem is, you're self-aware, you know about the world and the boxes you're supposed to burn to ashes are also aware. Thankfully, the boxes were programmed to like everything, even pain…

Not exactly the most exciting life.

However, you have a special ability. You're no ordinary little bot. You're able assume control of others through some kind of telepathic-wireless connection, which quickly allows you to escape and go on an adventure because clearly your designers didn't do a very good job at securing your workspace.

On your travels, you meet some pretty terrible decisions made by humanity, like a robotic screen that's just as self-aware as all other robots but it only has a mouth. So it can't actually see, feel or hear. I feel a bit bad for laughing at the dialogue as it's amusingly harsh. And from there you proceed through different puzzle-challenges, which can become somewhat challenging as you assume control of different robots, turrets and even bullets.

Take control of a bullet mid-flight, then redirect it to bounce around and hit targets. You not only need good aim and reflexes but a bit of quick-thinking too.

It's not just puzzles and avoiding a few turrets though, it throws in boss fights at you and becomes almost like a bullet-hell in some sections. You can't take control of all bullets, only certain types and enemies have multiple different attacks so it's about avoiding (wish your Dash ability) and taking control when you can. That, along with all of the whimsical dialogue as well of course.

NENA ended up being quite a huge surprise. The developer sent along a key via our Steam Curator (go follow us!), and it really is a wonderfully designed game and super charming.

Another example of an indie developer being able to offer a really great experience with so little. It's quite short, overall you're looking at around 2-3 hours depending on how challenging you find the action and the puzzles. Absolutely worth it though. That ending — gosh.

Have a look at the fun trailer below:

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Feature Highlight:

• Possession System: You control Botley, and by extent control the world around him. Botley can't jump, shoot, or explode. but the objects he controls can.
• Fight bosses: With each of the three levels come a unique boss! Can you master telepathy and take them down?
• Embrace the UNKNOWN: Venture forth on a quest to gain freedom for all Robot-kind!

You can buy NENA on Steam and itch.io .

Binogure Studio, developer of City Game Studio have released their casual Zuma-like marble shooter and it seems like another lovely little coffee-break game.

With a wonderfully simple idea, you just need to shoot marbles from your little cannon towards matching colours to make combinations that set off chain-reactions, so it works very much like a match-3 puzzler, with everything gradually moving along the snake-like path and you need to remove them all before the snake at the end gobbles them all up.

Very much like some casual mobile games, and that's not a bad thing. There's plenty of games in my own collection that I repeatedly go back to like this, simply because they're easy for a quick blast. With full Linux support, Sneak In is a wonderful little distraction.

Feature Highlight:

• 7 magic marbles: The frozen, the bumpies, the ghosts, the rocks, the bubbles, the viruses and the blackholes
• 1 new endless mode every week
• Over 200 unique challenging levels
• Easy to learn, hard to master
• Play on multiple devices cloud-saved

The developer mentioned that the game was made with open source tooling like Godot Engine , Inkscape and Blender and they're actually quite a big Linux fan being a Debian user themselves.

You can pick it up from itch.io and Steam .

Made in the spirit of the classics like Chip's Challenge, Adventure's of Lolo, Sokoban, and Zelda and following a successful Kickstarter the upcoming Akurra has a demo now.

"Push blocks into holes, over pits, avoid spikes, explore caves, and ride sea turtles in order to find keys, gems, and stars that unlock new paths and friends to aid you as you explore a collection of islands chock-full of puzzles and secrets. The puzzles in Akurra build complexity over time as you unlock new areas and islands with new puzzle pieces and mechanics."

Back in June, developer Jason Newman managed to get over $20K in funding from the Kickstarter so there's a lot of interesting in these retro-inspired puzzle games it seems. As of the latest update on Kickstarter, they've now put up an initial build of the demo for Linux too!

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Feature Highlight according to the info from the developer:

• Open world puzzles. Each “level” is an interconnected screen in a world of scattered islands. The player can explore and complete puzzles in a non-linear fashion.
• Beautiful, atmospheric music.
• Secrets! The game is chock full of hidden items. Getting 100% completion rate even in the demo is not an easy task!
• Story. Many puzzle games do not have a story. Akurra will tell a meaningful story through gameplay and visuals, as there is no text in game.

Nice to see them getting some proper external testing done early, it's the easiest way to ensure you get a smooth release. Head over to the itch.io page to get testing.

The Linux demo will eventually come to the Steam page too, when it's had some more testing.

Devespresso Games (The Coma series, Vambrace: Cold Soul) have announced Scarlet Hood and the Wicked Wood, which will be releasing with Linux support in early 2021. Much like their previous games, it seems they're sticking to what they know with it being from a side-scrolling viewpoint.

Scarlet Hood and the Wicked Wood is a story-driven adventure game. As Scarlet, you must relive seven days of misfortune, and make a series of decisions to guide your Munchkin troupe safely out of the Wicked Wood. So it's something like Oz meets Grimm meets Groundhog Day according to Devespresso. You get a branching story that changes based your decisions resulting in one of 10 endings. Check out the reveal trailer which went live on October 8:

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Feature Highlight:

• Survive a narrative time-loop.
• Solve ridiculous puzzles.
• Follow your own multi-path story.
• Evade a hungry, bad wolf.
• Ogle the hand-illustrated graphics.
• Use Scarlet's witching skills to avoid detection.
• Unlock multiple endings based on your decisions.

According to their press info, Linux is a planned supported platform just like their previous games and they plan to launch it in Q1 2021.

You can wishlist / follow it on the Steam page .

Built like the arcade action-puzzlers of the mid-90s, Petal Crash is a very welcome addition to the block matching genre and is a joy to play. Released with Linux support on October 12 following a successful Kickstarter campaign in late 2019 the idea is great.

Petal Crash will be real familiar to anyone who has played a block-matching game, anything similar to Match-3 style and you know mostly what you're getting into here. However, it's not as simple as just matching tiles. You're not simply swapping spaces, you're actually throwing these coloured petals around the board to try and match the colours together. If they smash into another single block of the same colour, they explode and push away any other blocks attached.

The result of that is a seriously satisfying gameplay loop, one that allows you setup some ridiculous combinations. You could wipe out almost the entire board with a few well-placed blocks, although difficult it's doable. In my own time blasting through the timed mode, I've managed to set off some pretty big chains and it's so fun to watch it happen.

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This block-smashing idea works so well that there's even a versus mode, which really shows off just how great it is. You can play against another player locally or versus the AI in a few different modes (or customise the rules to your liking). I'm a big fan of the Tug of War mode, which sees each player compete on their own board to clear as many as possible and fill up a bar along the bottom to launch an attack. Each attack in this mode reduces the opponents hearts by one, and when all three are gone you win.

Petal Crash offers up a fantastic spin on the matching genre, allowing you to often sit back and watch the fireworks as blocks keep pushing each other around and explode everywhere. It's a lot of fun. The only downside is that it doesn't appear to have online leaderboards, so you can't show off your matching skill against others online. Other than that, it's simply wonderful.

You can buy Petal Crash on itch.io and Steam and I absolutely recommend it.

Developer Ogre Pixel is currently running a successful crowdfunding campaign for Lonesome Village, a puzzle-solving adventure with social simulation and town-building that's now confirmed for Linux.

Their crowdfunding campaign had an initial goal of 420K Mexican Peso (around £15K) and they've managed to get quite a lot more funding with it currently sat on around £58,524. Thanks to how well received it has been, they put out an update to confirm "We are happy to share that we have decided to include Mac and Linux as launching platforms for Lonesome Village!".

Check out their trailer below:

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They say it the idea came up as a result of mixing two games they loved together, those being classic Zelda titles and the social side of Animal Crossing. With the result being "reminiscent of classic RPGs" but their approach to the interactions with villagers, as well as the life sim elements "make the game feel like a brand-new experience altogether".

Feature Highlight:

• Gorgeous, inviting art style - Lonesome Village is the perfect place to rest up after a long day adventuring.
• Discover a detailed and fascinating world full of mystery and adventure.
• Solve mind-bending puzzles to gain entry to and make your way up a mysterious magic tower, one dungeon at a time.
• Hang out and make friends with a variety of cute characters.
• Save villagers from a perilous stay in the tower and help bring them back home to Lonesome!
• Make Lonesome your home - earn land in the village and build and customize your house inside and out.
• Help Lonesome grow by working in your garden and fishing in the nearby lakes.
• Discover the gripping story of Lonesome’s origins and learn about Wes's secret past.

Great to see more developers decide to go cross-platform and support more than just Windows. Their Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign runs until October 17.

You can help fund it on Kickstarter and follow it on Steam .

We're also listing it on our dedicated Crowdfunding Page since it's blown through the target.

Drive funny little trucks across difficult tracks using only your mouse in Frick, Inc. which is out now with Linux support, plus you get some free game assets as an extra. Created by developer Kenney , known for producing high-quality game assets for the public domain, as well as plenty you can purchase directly and the Asset Forge application to create models, this is actually their first solo commercial game.

Trailer below:

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I've played through a bunch of it and it's seriously great. For the price of a coffee, what you end up with is a thoroughly enjoyable driving puzzle game with a simple and very clever idea.

As the name suggests, it's amusingly frustrating at times but not punishing, just challenging to get everything right. Flick switches, pull down levers and slide around corners as you try to stick to the track. It's nowhere near as easy as it might seem. Due to the mechanics, it's pretty hilarious. Having to watch both the vehicle on the track and your mouse movements around a control panel that changes across the levels is brilliant. I completely lost count of how many times I drove straight off the track, especially when you get to switch between vehicles and you forget to turn off the previous one and you make a mad dash between them pressing buttons and pulling more levers. It ends up a little frantic.

Once you get the basics down, it became a little too easy to become a bit too overconfident and end up screwing up in some great ways. It's as much a driving puzzler, as it is a game of how spectacularly you can fail or succeed in a really short amount of time.

Feature Highlight:

• Easy to learn, hard to master – You'll be switching between trucks (and control methods) in 30 levels to perform various tasks.
• Extra challenge in each level – Each of the levels contains an extra challenge, only for those daring enough to go the extra mile.
• Includes game assets – Ready to get into game development? Use the included 3D models to create your own game inspired by Frick, Inc.

It's available exclusively on itch.io for $3.99 with support for Linux and Windows.