I'm interested in hearing about games that exist off the main map of gaming: games that I can't buy from any of the common storefronts and games that aren't easily playable through an emulator.

Examples of things I'm interested in hearing about:

• Long-forgotten abandonware
• Homebrew games for consoles
• Romhacks
• Legally dubious fan-games
• Total conversion mods
• ARGs
• Web games (not ones on sites like Kongregate/GameJolt though)
• Independently distributed games (that you can't get through, say, itch.io)
• Games for systems that aren't currently emulatable
• Games that have been removed from distribution
• Games with servers or content that are no longer operational
• Anything else you think fits the question, really

Tell me about the game(s) you know of and what makes them noteworthy.

Everyone always refers to the coming of Eurogames a long time back, but I'm wondering about modern games. Where have they come? Where will they go? I'd say the art has gotten better, more eye-catching, but I'm more ambivalent about very recent (last five years) game mechanics.

https://twitter.com/TychoBolt/status/1182541355337289728?s=20

Found this on twitter, user TychoBolt compiled this list. There's a lot of information on many topics, as well as a ton of links to tools that aid in level design, narrative and more.

He also compiled this 122-paged guide on level design; full of tips and tricks for designing levels. I've looked through it for a bit and found quite a lot of interesting information, so I'd reckon this is a valuable asset to anyone developing/designing games.
https://twitter.com/TychoBolt/status/1272578494543904771?s=20

PDF available here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fAlf2MwEFTwePwzbP3try1H0aYa9kpVBHPBkyIq-caY/preview?pru=AAABcufoPRw*FOD948Ah7NzrIiGTixO_PQ

The Bundle

itch.io's Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality is a collection of indie media content offered up as a fundraiser for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund and Community Bail Fund. The minimum purchase is $5 which gains you access to 1637 items from 1304 different creators. The bundle has raised over $5 million dollars so far and is a genuinely incredible show of support and solidarity from the gaming community for the Black Lives Matter movement.

Here is the previous Tildes topic about it, here is a subreddit for it, and here is a community spreadsheet cataloging its contents.

The Content

The bundle is primarily video games, but it also has tabletop games, game assets, books, music, and tools. It is an intimidatingly large amount of content, and much attention has been called to some of the collection's highlights and standout titles: 1 2 3 4 (if you find other lists, let me know and I'll link them here).

I'm thinking it would be neat for us on Tildes to explore and highlight some of its less well-known content. The people who have made their creations available in this bundle have done so generously and in support of a great cause, so this is a way that we can show some appreciation for them by bringing some attention to their work. It is also possible to re-purchase games that you already own on itch.io and add tips to that purchase, so you can also monetarily support any devs you choose should you feel inclined to do so.

The Event

Using whatever selection methods or criteria you like, dive into an item/multiple items from the bundle and then report back here about it. There is a handy website that lets you filter the whole set of items, and it also has a very useful "pick a game" button that selects a game at random from the batch.

However you choose something, let us know what you've chosen, what it was, what your experience was like with it, and whether or not you recommend it. Format your entries however you like but please Bold the Titles of Items so people can scan the thread more easily!

Feel free to submit multiple entries to the topic as you explore the bundle. I'm thinking that with a few of us doing this over a couple of days, we can cover a lot of ground and surface some interesting and easily overlooked content.

Our Selections

I'll keep a table of the highly recommended things we surface here. To select something to be included here, mention in your writeup that it qualifies for "Tildes' Choice" status, and I'll add it to the list!