Da, Comrade? Vat can we help you with? Oh, you haf your new orders? Glorious! Praise to Mother Russia in all her visdom! We heard you will be gettink new weapons to assist in your fight for one of the Amerikanski corporations. While we do not applaud you working for capitalist dogs, we do not question to visdom of the Motherland. So, in celebration of your new orders and weapons, we will give you this document. It details how to acquire your new armaments. Do not misuse it or distribute it to the enemies of Mother Russia, or we will be forced to inform the KGB of your treasonous actions! You may view parts one, two, and three of our guide as well.

Da, Comrade? Vat can we help you with? Oh, you haf your new orders? Glorious! Praise to Mother Russia in all her visdom! We heard you will be gettink new weapons to assist in your fight for one of the Amerikanski corporations. While we do not applaud you working for capitalist dogs, we do not question to visdom of the Motherland. So, in celebration of your new orders and weapons, we will give you this document. It details how to acquire your new armaments. Do not misuse it or distribute it to the enemies of Mother Russia, or we will be forced to inform the KGB of your treasonous actions! You may view parts one and two of our guide as well.

Welcome to a new weekly column here on Big Download! Independent Minds aims to take various aspects of indie gaming and present them to you each week. From game round-ups to design elements to interviews with prominent members of the scene, it's an exploration of what makes indie gaming great as well as what makes someone an indie. The very first topic of conversation is something that, given the failure of Eternity's Child and the success of Braid, has been on a lot of minds: criticism. How do you respond to people tearing apart your most beloved works?

Da, Comrade? Vat can we help you with? Oh, you haf your new orders? Glorious! Praise to Mother Russia in all her visdom! We heard you will be gettink new weapons to assist in your fight for one of the Amerikanski corporations. While we do not applaud you working for capitalist dogs, we do not question to visdom of the Motherland. So, in celebration of your new orders and weapons, we will give you this document. It details how to acquire your new armaments. Do not misuse it or distribute it to the enemies of Mother Russia, or we will be forced to inform the KGB of your treasonous actions! You may view part one of our guide as well.

For those folks looking for an excuse to make games with the best of them, here's your chance! TIGSource and Flashbang Studios (the guys behind the incredibly fun Raptor Safari) have teamed up for a fusion of indie development and community down in Phoenix, Arizona. Dubbed the TIGJam, it's a game jam for you to work on your latest game in development, either alone or with someone else. With food, drink, and one of the best communities around, it's going to be a huge blast for all involved! Sleep is entirely optional.

Da, Comrade? Vat can we help you with? Oh, you haf your new orders? Glorious! Praise to Mother Russia in all her visdom! We heard you will be gettink new weapons to assist in your fight for one of the Amerikanski corporations. While we do not applaud you working for capitalist dogs, we do not question to visdom of the Motherland. So, in celebration of your new orders and weapons, we will give you this document. It details how to acquire your new armaments. Do not misuse it or distribute it to the enemies of Mother Russia, or we will be forced to inform the KGB of your treasonous actions!

We here at Big Download obviously love Cave Story. A lot. It is then, with great pleasure, that we found out about a Cave Story hack being offered called Hack9. It's in Japanese, but you can figure out the game itself pretty easily. The only downside is unless you are fluent in Japanese, you'll have no clue about the story. It plays almost exactly like Cave Story but with a significantly darker tone. You are killing soldiers and destroying tanks and helicopters, lending it a much more military flair. All in all, if you're looking for a fun platformer, it's definitely worth a try, even if you can't understand it.

[Via IndieGames]

Sometimes you just have to match your wits against a human opponent. They are so unpredictable and capricious that matching yourself against one is much more difficult than taking on a computer player. Solar Chiefs is very much along these lines. A multiplayer browser game, you must control the firing arcs and movement path of a floating space island. The only thing is that there are other human players doing the exact same thing. With an easy-to-learn interface, the aforementioned multiplayer focus, and some very fun gameplay, it's a great browser game to waste some time on.

For those that must get their high fantasy strategy fix, there's Battle for Middle-earth. For those that can't play that, either because of system requirements, setting, or they just plain don't like it, there's another option. Epic War is a new browser strategy game. It's more of an arcade strategy game, not a traditional one, and that's fine by us. Send out your units, upgrade them, use spells, and wield a gigantic crossbow try and take down the Dark Lord's tower. Simple but fun strategy stuff. Winning is very much dependent on using all of these in conjunction.

Welcome to Freeware Friday, a weekly column showcasing excellent games that you can play free of charge!

Following in the theme of last week's Battle for Wesnoth, this week I have another game which can be considered an absolute must-play. It's the spiritual successor to the classic Hack and Rogue, and it's one of the deepest, most engaging RPGs of all time. Best of all, it can be played anywhere as long as the computer you are on has a telnet connection. The game in question in Nethack, and if you haven't played it, you are depriving yourself of one of the best experiences in gamings.

Jesse Venbrux, that ever enigmatic peddler of experimental games, has gone a much gentler route on his latest endeavor. Well, gentler in the sense that it's not experimental. Dubbed Torque, it's slightly different than your standard fare arena shooter, which means that it is hard. But that's fine with us. You spin and fire uncontrollably, and by holding down Z you can focus fire in one direction. That's it. Featuring hypnotic graphics, simple gameplay, and excellent controls, it's a great entry into a crowded genre, definitely worth a play for any fan of classic arcade gameplay. There is an online leaderboard as well as several modes to plumb the depths of.

[Via IndieGames]

Some games incorporate such simplistic gameplay and aesthetics that they become addicting classics in an instant. coign of vantage is one of those games. An extremely simple puzzle game, you must rotate a clouds of 3D pixels to form a 2D image. You do this by moving your moves to any side, which rotates the image to that side. It's an excellent casual game and a great example of how a simple mechanic can be so engaging. There's also several tricks you begin to learn to speed up your time, which is awesome. A game with that sort of complexity is always welcome.

[Via TIGSource]

There's two sorts of adventure games. There's the kind popularized by King's Quest and the like, which are the hard, unforgiving games with great stories. The kind where puzzles twist your mind into impossible knots. Then there's the kind popularized by the LucasArts games of yore, with strange puzzles, but great humor and far more forgiving gameplay. The Vacuum falls into the second category. A retro-styled adventure game, you play the husband of a couple traveling across space in a cargo ship. There are several endings depending on your actions during the game.

[Via IndieGames]

There's nothing like some fun physics gameplay. Combined with playing it through your browser, you have a recipe for lots of procrastination at work. Ragdoll Cannon 2, a flash game on Armor Games, has addicting physics gameplay by the truckload. Controlling only a cannon that shoots ragdolls, you must hit a target, either by shooting your man deftly through obstacles or by moving said obstacles out of the way with bodies and then hitting the target. It's very relaxed and simple, which is great for a browser game, and as you can access it anywhere, it's doubly awesome.

[Via IndieGames]

We have to admit, this is probably the silliest unlock we've seen so far. The final unlock revealed as a part of the Heavy update is none other than a sandwich. This is no ordinary sandwich, though. This sandwich is filled with such nutritional delights, such savory meats, that it heals a full 120 health upon consuming. You have to stand still for 4 seconds while eating, though, and you make vigorous consumption sounds when eating, drawing enemies like a picnic draws ants. Overall, it's a humorous and altogether useful addition to the game. Oh, and for those who want a little bit of comedy, scroll down and watch the "Meet the Sandvich" video for some extra hilarity.

If you want to try out the wild and wacky Sandvick in the game you can do so now as Valve has just updated the shooter with all of the updates previously revealed including two new weapons, new achievements for the Heavy class, a new Payload map and the new Arena gameplay mode with five new maps.

Download the "Meet the Sandvich" HD Trailer (10 MB)