The latest (second) game from Limbo developers Playdead games is finally here. Inside initially seems like more Limbo; a puzzle platformer. A mysterious, unsettling story told wordlessly, featuring a young boy exploring a spooky environment. If you’re looking for more Limbo you’ll find it here, but Inside quickly begins surprising you with new ideas and beautiful animation. Over its 4-5 hour run time it moves swiftly from pleasant re-exploration of good ideas to an astonishing achievement and perhaps the best game of 2016.

Inside is available on Steam for Windows and on Xbox One for $19.99. (Expect ports to other platforms eventually.)

Inside – official site
The Short Game episode 57 – Limbo

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash

This week we discussed Wheels of Aurelia by developers Santa Ragione. Though technically still in beta, Wheels of Aurelia is a complete experience that expertly blends a driving game with a focus on characters through the use of a interactive fiction. As their website says, “Based on your choices – and the places you’ll decide to visit – you may end up in car chases, illegal street races, or in tense debates that will make you wonder who your travel companions really are.”

Each play session takes 10-20 minutes and can be played on Windows, Mac, and Linux. It is available for $4.99 on itch.io. We highly recommend this game for someone looking for a truly unique and extraordinary experience centered around something ordinary we have all done before: having a great conversation while driving.

Links for this episode:

• Gamasutra – Interactive fiction meets arcade racer: Designing Wheels of Aurelia
• Pic of the Wheels of Aurelia cabinet at Fantarcade
• Desert Bus (The Game)
• Full Throttle – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Laura Nash – @laurajnash
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane
• Nate Heininger – @natestl

Can it really be two years since our last board game special?! This week we’re rounding up the board and card games we’ve been enjoying when not playing short video games. Join us as we talk about that other gaming hobby!

Games and links mentioned on this episode:

• The 2015 Good Gift Games – The Morning News
• Marrying Mr. Darcy – the Card Game – Home
• Actualol – YouTube
• Shut Up & Sit Down – YouTube
• Patchwork Board Game
• Sushi Go! – The Pick and Pass Card Game
• Lost Cities – The Card Game
• Morels
• Mr. Jack Pocket
• Twilight Struggle Deluxe Edition
• Cheapass Games Kill Doctor Lucky: Deluxe 19.5th Anniversary Edition
• Fish Cook | Cheapass Games
• Hanabi Card Game
• Galaxy Trucker
• Galaxy Trucker Digital
• King of Tokyo | IELLO
• Roborally
• Evolution – North Star Games
• Search form | УКРПОШТА
• Betrayal At House On The Hill – 2nd Edition
• Slash: Romance Without Boundaries
• Concept Board Game
• Cash N Guns Second Edition
• Spree! | Board Game | BoardGameGeek
• Villa Paletti

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane

As we did in 2014 and 2015, we’ve checked out this year’s Apple Design Award winning games, and we’re back to talk about what they say about iOS as a gaming platform today and in the years to come.

This year’s winners:

• Chameleon Run
• Lara Croft GO
• INKS

Student Winners:

• Linum
• Dividr

Also mentioned on this episode:

• Shadowmatic
• Crossy Road – Endless Arcade Hopper
• Does not Commute
• Downwell
• The Executive | TouchArcade
• 55: Spider: Rite of the Shrouded Moon – The Short Game
• Neko Atsume: Kitty Collector
• Clash Royale
• The Beggar’s Ride | TouchArcade
• Flappy Golf
• 42: Pinball! – Physical and Simulated Pinball Games – The Short Game
• Tomb of the Mask
• Love You to Bits: a point-and-click cosmic quest.

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash

Expand is an innovative, difficult to classify game about navigating a circular maze that shifts and expands in response to your movement. It’s a really special experience and we highly recommend it.

Expand is available for Mac, PC, and Linux on Itch.io and on Steam for $6, or $10 with the soundtrack. You’ll want that soundtrack, it’s great. Expect it to take about 4 hours to complete.

Links for this episode:

• Expand – Official Site
• Assault Android Cactus
• Christan’s blog – Indie Game Enthusiast
• Thomas Was Alone
• VVVVVV
• Super Hexagon
• Expand – Soundtrack | Christopher Larkin
• Apple Design Awards – Apple Developer
• Triennale Game Collection on the App Store
• 78: Superhot – The Short Game
• Leap Day on the App Store

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash

This week we’re talking about Human Resource Machine from The Tomorrow Corporation. The makers of Short Game favorites Little Inferno and World of Goo have returned last year with a game that is completely different from either of those. It’s a puzzle game in which you use basic programming to solve simple math problems, but we swear it’s more fun that that might make it sound! If you missed Human Resource Machine, now is a great time to give it a second look since it just received a terrific iOS port.

Human Resource Machine is available for Mac, PC, and Linux for $9.99 and on iOS for $4.99. It’s also available on the Wii U, and it has been a part of a couple of Humble Bundles, so check your Steam library! Expect the game to take between 5 and 8 hours.

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane

This week we are exploring the insanely varied world of indie game marketplace itch.io. Each of our hosts spent $5 on itch and played two or three games from a variety of vibrant micro-indie creators.

If you’re not familiar with Itch.io, it’s most easily summed up as “bandcamp for video games.” Anyone can post their work on Itch and create a custom store page to tell their story. Creators set prices, from zero to whatever they like, and everything works as a “suggested donation” so you can pay whatever you like above the creator-set minimum. It’s a great place for developers to share and sell their work, especially for games that might be too niche to get through a system like Steam Greenlight. Itch also does a wonderful job of fostering a community by featuring a parade of interesting stuff on their homepage and twitter account.

We discuss a bunch of games this week. We have gathered them together into a collection that you can view on itch.

Mentioned on The Short Game: An Itch.io Collection

Played for this episode

• Animal Inspector by Tom Astle
• Ultra Hat Dimension by Eniko
• Robot Heist by anna anthropy
• Cuckoo Curling by chromacool
• Masques and Murder! by James Patton
• windowframe by Daniel Linssen
• Grimsfield by escooler
• Minirl by endigo9740
• Subterrarium by slimefriend
• Lieve Oma by Florian Veltman

Also mentioned:

• Overland by Finji
• Jenny LeClue by MOGRAFI
• ANATOMY by Kitty Horrorshow
• Crowtel by Sink
• Hot Date by George Batchelor
• Risky Bison by Captain Games
• Tick Tock Isle by Squiddershins
• (ASMR) Vin Diesel DMing a Game of D&D Just For You by merritt kopas
• Eczema Angel Orifice by Porpentine
• Bellular Hexatosis by neotenomie

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Laura Nash – @laurajnash
• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane

This week we played the infamously short game The Order: 1886. Can time (and bargain bin pricing) redeem this beautiful flop? The claws come out as out panel debates the good, the bad, and the artfully blurry of this Playstation exclusive third person shooter.

The Order is available physically or on PSN for $20 regular price, exclusively for PS4. Expect it to take between 7 and 10 hours to complete.

• The Order: 1886™ | PS4 Games | PlayStation
• The Order: 1886 for PlayStation 4 Reviews – Metacritic
• How long is The Order: 1886? – HLTB

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Laura Nash – @laurajnash
• Nate Heininger – @natestl
• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane

This week we’re talking about Warbits, the long awaited iPhone game that captures the feeling (and many of the specific mechanics) of the popular portable turn based strategy Advance Wars. We discuss what makes Warbits so addictive, how it draws inspiration from its predecessors, and how it stakes out its own territory. We also talk about some of our other favorite asynchronous multiplayer games.

Warbits is available on the iOS App Store for $3.99.

Long time Advance Wars fans Raygan and Shane have been getting crushed by Advance Wars newcomer Nate all week. If you want to do the same, start a game with hashtag #shortgame.

• Warbits official website
• @RiskyLab on Twitter
• Hero Academy | Robot Entertainment
• Carcassonne on the App Store
• Review: Reiner Knizia’s Samurai | iOS Board Games | BoardGameGeek
• Small World 2 on the App Store
• atebits – letterpress

Correction: Small World is only available for iPad, not both iPad and iPhone.

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame
See our list of upcoming games, and make suggestions..

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane
• Nate Heininger – @natestl

This week we discuss Telltale’s mystery/noire adventure set in the Fables comic book universe, The Wolf Among Us. Released episodically starting in October 2013, this was Telltale’s follow-up to The Walking Dead. Now that the game has been out for more than two years (and ported to no less than nine platforms including PC/Mac, consoles, and iOS) we revisit this great story that many people (including us) sadly skipped.

The Wolf Among Us consists of five episodes, each about 90 minutes in length. No spoiler break in this episode as we only discuss events occurring in the first episode.

Links for this episode:

• Marrying Mr. Darcy – the Card Game – Home
• International TableTop Day 2016 | Geek and Sundry
• Evolution | Board Game | BoardGameGeek
• Patchwork | Board Game | BoardGameGeek
• 1010! on the App Store
• The Short Game – 26a: The Walking Dead (w/ guest host Gary Butterfield) – The Short Game
• Warbits (Join us with hashtag #shortgame)

You can follow our show on Twitter at @_shortgame
See our list of upcoming games, and make suggestions..

Like the show? Support us by writing a review on iTunes!

Your hosts this week were:

• Raygan Kelly – @raygank
• Laura Nash – @laurajnash
• Shane Kelly – @8bitShane