Kicking off today’s spotlight is ‘Perspective’, a student game made by Pohung Chen and Jason Meisel of the DigiPen Institute of Technology. The two students consider it to be an experimental platformer/puzzler, and after a few minutes playing around inside the wacky world of blue and orange boxes you can see why.

The game is true to its namesake, as the distinguishing feature here is the ability to manipulate the perspective of the camera which, if done correctly, creates new paths for your 2D sprite hero to traverse the sea of hazards. Players can switch on the fly to take control of either the sprite hero or the camera, and switching from sprite to camera will pause time for the little boy in blue, which opens many different ways to solve a puzzle. At first what seems to be a typical platformer, soon evolves into a deep mixture of logic and abstract thought if you ever want to reach of the end of some levels.

‘Perspective’ is free to download from the DigiPen website, and is a testament to how game development doesn’t need to have AAA budgets to produce something unique and fun to play.

Next on the tickbox of Indie goodness is Chucklefish game’s work-in-progress title ‘Starbound’. Terraria fans will feel at home here in this Sci-Fi take on the 2D world exploration game, but there are a few features planned that carry the game beyond its spiritual successor, including a storyline for the player to follow and access to an entire galaxy full of worlds to explore.

From what information has been released so far, we know the player narrowly escapes an unknown attack on their home-world, sending them hurtling through space until they happen upon an abandoned space station, which they are tasked with repairing and using to explore the stars in search of the big bad guys who destroyed their planet. From here players can choose to explore the stars to their hearts content or follow the games quests and learn more about what happened and why.

“So, what’s so exciting about this game?” and the answer is quite simple. It’s all in the details! ‘Starbound’ is truly starting to shine through the shadow of its predecessors as more and more bits of information are being revealed to fans by the development team. There are truly too many to list here, but the current features that I’m excited for include procedurally generated planets, 6 unique races with their own lore and culture, full co-op multiplayer, a physics engine that allows you to slide and move more freely across the game world, and finally my personal favourite, being able to capture aliens found on new planets and beam them back to your ship to research them, or even train them to become companions. The list of features currently confirmed can go on for some time, and with the game still in development, these are subject to change at any time. If you want to see the full list, click here.

Below is a tech demo released by project lead Finn ‘Tiy’ Brice, which shows off some of the house building options available for your base of operations, and I think you would join me in saying that the monkey posters alone are enough for any self respecting gamer to crave this game.

‘Starbound’ has yet to receive any official launch date, with the game currently running in closed beta there’s no telling when the game will fall from the sky, but it won’t stop me watching out for it.

And thats it from me folks, but be sure to join me next week for another Indie spotlight. Before i return to wearing my SNES shirt and hating music everyone now likes, spare a thought for the poor indie game, and know that bigger, isn't always better. (but don't start liking them, or i will have to start hating them.)