Fantastic Arcade Games Announced

The Fantastic Arcade is back for another four days of indie gaming goodness. You have until Sept. 19 to prepare yourself for all the free fun out at the new Alamo Drafthouse Lakeline. Until then, it's time to familiarize yourself with the Spotlight games.

Before getting to that let me put minds at ease that the the usual panels and talks will return, as will the Gamemaking Frenzy (with an as yet unannounced theme). The tournaments also come back with new games from Pietro Righi Riva, Messof, and Ben Esposito.

Now here's that overview of the eight Spotlight games which will be housed in custom-made arcade cabinets and playable by all attendees.

Samurai Gunn
Beau Blyth's game made a cameo at last year’s Arcade with a tournament showing off its fast-paced multiplayer charms. You have a sword and a gun and must mow down the other three players. The line between anarchy and elegance in this game is very thin, which makes it all the more exciting. Check out last year's tournament for a taste of the action.

Wasteland Kings
Game developing duo Vlambeer has been busy since they visited the Fantastic Arcade last year. Since then, they've released the addictive Radical Fishing to iProducts and are currently putting the finishing touches on the retro aerial dog-fighting game, Luftrausers, that won over Fantastic Arcade attendees last year. This year they will premiere Wasteland Kings which is described as an action game with mutants fighting for the throne while mutating and discovering weapons. And somehow the game only lasts a few minutes.

Goblet Grotto
It looks like a typical 3-D adventure game, if that game read Alice in Wonderland and then dropped acid. Then threw up and dropped more acid. It looks kinda like that. We mean that in a good way.

Panoramical
Fernando Ramallo created this interactive A/V game with audio assistance from David Kanaga of Proteus fame.

QED
Little is known about this Stephen Ascher's breakdancing "simulator." Words used to describe it are bouncy, squishy, and kinesis. We love all of those things.

Starwhal
Starwahl is a multiplayer game that pits the titular beasts against one another in a duel. But controlling a Starwahl is not as easy as it looks (and it doesn't look very easy).

No Brakes Valet
Justin Smith returns to the arcade after taking home the grand prize for Enviro-Bear 2000 in the fest's inaugural run. And like that Enviro-Bear, No Brakes Valet has a sense of the absurd as players are tasked with parking cars in a lot with little actual control over the automobile. The game was recently released for the Ouya gaming system, in case you have one of those.

Towerfall
It's being called the "killer app" of the Ouya. This multiplayer game's object is to be the last players standing using your bow and arrow to slay opponents. Like Samurai Gunn it's fast paced action in tight quarters and gesticulating and yelling at the screen is pretty much unavoidable.