The Consolidated Freeware, Shareware & Independent Games Thread

Mount&Blade is a medieval single-player open-ended action role-playing video game for Windows developed by Turkish company TaleWorlds, and published by Paradox Interactive. Its retail version was released on September 16, 2008 in North America, and three days later in Europe. The game originated as an independent project of Armagan Yavuz, founder of TaleWorlds, and his wife, Ipek Yavuz. Prior to its retail release, beta versions of the game have been published on the developer's website.

Mount&Blade is an action oriented role-playing game with emphasis on mounted combat. Unlike most other titles of the genre, the game contains no fantasy elements. It does not restrict the player to a certain storyline, but instead presents a sandbox medieval realm named Calradia, in which the player is given the ability to either join one of the five available battling factions, assume the role of an outlaw, or take a neutral side.

Reception on Mount&Blade has been overall positive. Reviewers praised the game for its innovative combat mechanics, complex character skill system, and large modding community, but also criticized it for its repetitive quests, dialogs, and locations, as well as low graphics quality.

[...]

Mount&Blade is a single-player, action oriented role-playing game without any fantasy elements, which takes place in a medieval land named Calradia. The game features a sandbox gameplay style, in which there is no storyline present. The player is able to join one of the five battling factions, fight as a mercenary, assume the role of an outlaw, or take a neutral side.

At the start of the game the player is offered a set of options to customize the character. After selecting the desired gender, a series of questions about the character's past are given, which would determine his or her initial attributes. The facial features are also customizable through a system similar to the one found in games like The Sims 2 or The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.

Traveling to other locations, or interacting with other parties is done by point-and-clicking the desired destination. Upon encountering enemy parties, the player can try to avoid a conflict, or can engage in a battle with them. In Mount&Blade each battle is attributed a renown value, according to the number and power of the members of each party. Based on his renown, the player can be offered vassalage by the leaders of one of the five factions. By becoming a vassal, the player is given control over a certain fief, which he or she can manage and collect taxes from.

By solving quests or defeating opponents the player is awarded experience points, which can used to improve attributes, skills, and weapon proficiencies to further develop the character. Mount&Blade makes use of derived statistics, meaning that attributes dictate the maximum level of a skill derived from that attribute. For example "leadership" skill, which indicates the number of members a party can hold, cannot be raised higher than one third of its base attribute, "charisma". Weapon proficiencies can also be improved over time by inflicting damage on other opponents.

Allegiance is a multiplayer online game providing a mix of real-time strategy and player piloted space combat gameplay. Initially developed by Microsoft Research, the game was later released under a shared source license in 2002 and is now maintained and developed by volunteers.

The story in which the game is set takes place circa 2150, shortly after the destruction of Earth by an asteroid. This cataclysm forced the remnants of humanity to the stars to seek new land and resources and humanity fractures into four main factions:

- The militaristic Iron Coalition, descendants of a United Nations-sanctioned peacekeeping force.
- GigaCorp, a transplanetary corporation bent on controlling all natural resources.
- Belters, a motley collection of traders, freedom fighters and pirates.
- and the Bios, a mysterious off shoot of genetically engineered humans with their own agenda for "normies".

In the midst of the following civil war the human factions discover the alien Rixian Unity who are seeking to "enlighten" heathen races such as humans.

Faster-than-light travel is accomplished through the use of "Alephs", wormholes that lead to different parts of the galaxy, with the origins of the Alephs remaining a mystery. Much of the conflict in the post-apocalyptic Allegiance universe is driven by factional desire to control and mine Helium-3 for use as a fuel for nuclear fusion.

Allegiance was first released for multiplayer on the Microsoft Zone under the name Allegiance Zone. This was a paid subscription service but free play was available on the Free Zone (which had fewer features). The game never achieved commercial success however, selling a mere 29000 units in the first year of release and the official servers closed in 2002. During its brief retail life Allegiance had drawn a dedicated following that continued to play beyond Microsoft's discontinuation of support for Allegiance. Players created their own utilities to enable them to connect to LAN-hosted game servers and continued to play.

Further developments made by the fans since Allegiance was released as shared source have rendered the retail version unusable online - however a working version is available free of cost at freeallegiance.org.

Starscape is a 2D space combat shoot 'em up game developed by Moonpod games and published in 2003 as shareware. The plot provides a framework for the action: The player is the sole remaining fighter pilot on the space station Aegis after its warp drive is influenced by aliens, ripping it into another dimension. The objective is naturally to survive and to return.

Most of the game time is spent in a top-down view as the player's ship fights off attackers and collects resources from asteroids and from some of the destroyed enemy vessels. The setting is divided into areas of varying sizes, and the fighter can freely maneuver in one but not cross the boundaries.

While in essence quite simple, the addition of the space station enriches gameplay considerably. The Aegis is present in all non-boss battles and while it's quite durable, its destruction loses the game. Docking with it is necessary to unload resources, perform repairs on either the ship or the station and to travel between areas. In addition to the aforementioned repairs, the Aegis can spend acquired resources on both researching and constructing new tools and weaponry, which require allotments of the station's limited manpower that in turn can be increased by finding and rescuing rare survivors in the action sequences. The player also designs the fighters, balancing attack and defense with power, maneuverability, available size and costs. The station can maintain up to three craft, though only one can be flown at a time. Over time, the Aegis can be outfitted with turrets and a cannon, while the fighters go from - essentially - airtight bathtubs to pocket battleships.
Starscape also features a plotless skirmish mode and a difficulty level where save games are automatically updated to reflect the loss of ships. Though the asteroid mining has been criticized as too tedious and time-consuming, the battle sequences and graphics have received praise.

Mutant is third person 3D shooter. The main hero is able to use several special abilities where most significant one is presence of two more hands that are placed in two hollows in his jacket directly under the arms. Mutant can hold different guns in different hands and he can fire to different targets at once. The player can control one of the hands or several hands at once while they aim to common target. Other hands are automatically seeking space around Mutant for any enemy.

Atlantica Online is a 3D massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) being developed by NDOORS Corporation. The international English version, available worldwide, is distributed by the US subsidiary company NDOORS Interactive, Inc. A closed beta version was made available to FilePlanet subscribers on July 15, 2008. The first phase of the open beta ended on July 28, 2008; the start of the second phase began on August 7, 2008. On October 30, 2008 at 11a.m. PDT, Atlantica Online ended its beta period and began its official run at 6p.m. PDT on October 30, 2008. The Chinese company The9 has obtained exclusive rights for distributing and operating Atlantica Online in China.

The game is set in an alternate history Earth, with the game map consisting of large parts of the northern hemisphere. The setting is fantasy-themed with elements of steampunk.

The game features a persistent world populated by player-generated characters and NPCs. At character creation, a player selects one of seven basic classes and can then customize the character's appearance. There are no races to choose from; only humans are available. The character's class decides what armor that character can wear and what weapons and skills that character can use in battle.

Players do not fight with the starting character alone; as each character levels up, it can acquire player-controlled mercenaries. During the mandatory tutorial section at the beginning of the game, a player chooses his/her first two mercenaries; as the character gains levels, it can control more mercenaries, up to the maximum of eight, which makes for a party of maximum size nine. Players can store additional mercenaries in mercenary rooms.

All characters can, in addition to their battle skills, pursue a number of different crafting abilities.

The game design puts strong emphasis on the concept of guilds. Guilds can control the various towns on the game map. Strong guilds can found nations and wage war on one another.

Battle in Atlantica Online is rather unusual for the genre as it is turn-based. Representations of hostile parties wander around the landscape; if a player touches such a representation, his/her party and the enemy party are transferred to a separate battlefield similar in fashion to battles in the Final Fantasy series and remain there until the battle is resolved.

The Legend of Mir 3 (Korean: 미르의 전설 3) is a sprite based isometric 3-D massively multiplayer online role-playing game, developed by Wemade Entertainment. It is a sequel to the massively multiplayer game The Legend of Mir 2.

The game remains largely unchanged from the previous version, with the exception of the graphics being upgraded from 8-bit to 16-bit. There is also improved player customization, far larger maps, and a revamped quest system.

Like its predecessor The Legend of Mir 2, The Legend of Mir 3 is hugely popular in China and South Korea. It has been certified by the Guinness Book of Records for having 750,000 subscribers online simultaneously.

Characters

Warrior

The warrior is a straight forward basic class. Warrior uses 'DC' [Damage Class(melee attack)] to kill the enemy. They have high HP (health points), high AC ("Armour Class" Defense from melee attacks) and have very little MP (Mana points) and low MR (Magic Resistance).

Wizard

The Wizard can be a bit tricky at first. They use magic attacks such as "Frozen Earth" or "Ice Blades". They use 'MC' [Magic Charm (Ranged Magic)]. They have a wide variety of elements to choose from and use on their opponents or monsters. Elemental weaknesses are key to wizards. They have AoE(Area Of Effect) attacks as well as mass attacks. Wizards have low HP (hit points), Extremely high MP (Mana points), High MR (Magic Resistance) but low AC (Melee Defense).

Taoist

The Taoist is a support class. Similar to a priest, the taoist can heal and bless. Healing is one very important aspect of the game. Taoists throw talismans and poison. They focus on two key elements, Holy and Dark. They can summon pets such as the 'shinsu' or 'bone familiar'. Taoists can resurrect the dead, a very useful skill. Taoists are considered the hardest and most complex class to level up and boss hunt with. Taoists use 'SC' (Soul Charm), which is a balance between magic and melee attack. Still ranged the taoist can use 'SC' to increase the amount of damage and skill use. Taoists have Balanced MP (Mana points) + HP (hit points)as well as Balance MR (Magic Resistance) + AC (melee Defense). Unlike in the legend of mir 2, Taoists are a lot more powerful thanks to more useful magic and a greater durability. for example they can make themselves totally invisible using a skill at level 43. This helps them to evade monsters easily, or launch surprise attacks in the Wall wars ( guild war system < battle for a walled town/city).

Assassin

A new class which was introduced in 2008 on the Korean version of Legend of Mir3. The Assassin class will also be avaible on the Global Server when it launches on 23rd April 2009.

Free stuff!Grand Theft Auto 2:

http://www.rockstargames.com/classics/index.html

Downloading this as I type What a game this was/is. My favourite non-sports related game ever

I should probably point out that your link doesn't work, for some reason. But if you remove the .html it does

Little Fighter 2 is a popular freeware PC fighting game for Windows and is the sequel to the game Little Fighter (LF1). Little Fighter 2 was created by Marti Wong and Starsky Wong in 1999, and released in a long series of updates.

The game supports up to 4 human players on one computer and a total of 8 characters using online play or computer-controlled opponents. Characters are controlled using the keyboard or a gamepad. All keys can be set via a configuration menu.

The game has a commercially-released sequel, Little Fighter Online. In 2009, in celebration of Little Fighter 2's tenth anniversary, Version 2.0 was released. The update fixed minor bugs and added a gameplay recording feature and a new stage called 'Survival'.

In LF2, characters can be moved by pressing the respective up, down, left, and right keys. The defend, jump, and attack buttons are used to make the character perform an action. Attacking another character causes him or her to lose HP (health points), represented by a red bar on the heads-up display. Each character also has special attacks that can be activated by pressing a certain combination of keys. Most of these special attacks take up MP (mana points), represented by a blue bar on the heads-up display.

Items may occasionally fall into the screen to assist players. Occasionally, a bottle of beer or milk may drop down from above, which can be drunk to restore health and/or mana (milk restores mainly HP, and a little amount of MP, whereas beer only restores MP). Once a bottle of beer or milk is finished, your character drops it and the empty bottle breaks and disappears. There are also a variety of weapons that can be used in combat. These include knives, baseballs, baseball bats, hoes, crates, boomerangs, and boulders. All weapons take damage in combat and will eventually break.

Game Modes

1. VS Mode allows human and computer players to fight each other in a setting of the player's choice.

2. Stage Mode, like in many classic beat-'em-up action games, allows the players to fight their way through five stages, with bosses here and there. You can choose your stage and difficulty at startup.

3. Championship Mode sets up a tournament bracket to determine a winner. You can choose to fight individually, or with a human or computer partner.

4. Battle Mode is a team-based mode involving two sides commanding mass customizable armies of computer players.

5. Demo Mode creates random teams of computer-controlled players, creating a zero-player game.

Difficulty can be set to Easy, Normal, and Difficult for all modes except demo. Additionally, "CRAZY!" mode can be unlocked when the player types in a secret code on the select player screen. The code can be used in VS and Stage Mode. There is also a small online game feature which enables you to connect and experience any of the modes listed above with another person via IP address (public IP), using port 12345. This only allows connection to one other computer.

Version 2.0 added Playback Recording, a new mode that allows for playback of recorded gameplay. It also added Survival Stage, a new independent stage in Stage Mode, in which players fight their way through unlimited groups of opponents until all of them die.

The Legend of Princess is a 2D platformer created by the developer of Chalk and the Noitu Love series, where players get to step into the shoes of a tunic-wearing hero on a quest to rescue a kidnapped princess. As with most of Joakim's releases, there are plenty of memorable boss encounters to be had here.

Note that the game has only one playable level, although arcade veterans could technically replay the entire adventure at a higher difficulty setting by choosing a different set of starting equipment with each new try. Also, the chances of getting a rare blue or red gem increases if you defeat more enemies and avoid getting hurt too frequently.

Rigs of Rods ("RoR") is a now open source, previously freeware, multi-simulation game which uses soft-body physics.

Rigs of Rods is based on a specific soft-body physics engine called Beam. Beam simulates a network of interconnected nodes (forming the chassis and the wheels) and gives the ability to simulate deformable objects. With this engine, trucks flex and deform as you ride the terrain, which can be based on real terrain elevation data. Crashing into walls or terrain can permanently deform a vehicle in a very realistic manner.

Rigs of Rods was initially created as an off-road truck simulator, but has developed into a versatile physics sandbox.

Prior to version 0.28, the game was limited to typical land vehicles with wheels, but plane and boat engines have been added since. All engines allow for a wide range of customization, leaving virtually no boundaries. Vehicles are built using vertices connected by beams. Vertices (or "nodes") are influenced by the stress on the beams that connect them. If a beam is too stressed, it will deform, thus altering the associated nodes position which ultimately alters the appearance and/or handling of a vehicle. Vehicle configurations are stored in plain text. Simple 2D skins can be made to wrap the vehicle, and can be supplemented with static mesh objects. Recent development has allowed for static meshes to be deformed according to a nodes/beam skeleton, much like the system in the game 1nsane. This system is known as Flexbody, was available in a patch for version .35 of the game but is now included in version .36.

Vehicles ride along terrains that are defined in a raw image file, such as the data found in digital elevation model which can be used to form a realistic surface. Terrains can be made using any other program that can generate a black and White RAW image format. This also means that maps can be made from any image.

As a sandbox, Rigs of Rods has no fundamental game play goal but newly added Lua support contributes to missions and game play interaction like the timing of checkpoints along a road or dragstrips. Recent multiplayer support has allowed up to 16 simultaneous users to interact on a playing field. Common activities include off-roading, racing, and casual playing. Many activities can be had on land, sea, or sky.

Clonk is a computer game developed by RedWolf Design. The game features a mix of the action, real-time strategy and platform game genres. The games of the series are traditionally released as Shareware; older versions have become available as Freeware. Using the integrated developer mode, experienced players are able to create their own modifications or "extensions" to the game.

In Clonk, the player controls small, humanoid beings - the so-called Clonks - within a two-dimensional, dynamically modifiable landscape using keyboard or mouse. Clonks interact with their surrounding landscape, animals, weather, buildings and objects. The game can be played alone or in multiplayer in split-screen or via local network or Internet. Four different keyboard settings, combined with the option of using a mouse or gamepad, result in allowing up to six players on one computer. The game goal depends on the scenario being played, varying between melees, in which players fight each other, strategical team siege scenarios and cooperative missions.

Several extensions are available for registered players:

Knights: Medieval object pack, in which knights fight each other with axes, swords and bows by foot or on horse. Castles can be built using a modular castle building system and some medieval economy branches are available.

Hazard: A futuristic pack, in which Clonks fight against aliens or other Clonks using a variety of weapons such as HM, Missiles, Sonic guns, Shrunk Gun, to more simplistic guns like Phasers. This pack was originally released for Clonk Planet and has been remade for Clonk Rage.

Far worlds: Three elaborate scenarios (deep sea, jungle and Arctic), in which the Clonks live in inhospitable areas, where mere survival is a challenge. Out of the three Arctic is the most challenging, requiring the Clonks to eat food regularly and be constantly mindful of the cold to avoid dying.

Golems: Clonkian magicians receive the ability to animate statues into Golems. Originally there was the Gold Golem, Rock Golem, and Snow Golem, each with their own different strengths, but later scenarios by players added a few more golems such as the Fire Golem.

Fantasy: Dragons, magic, adventures and more. This extension adds new spells to the current magic system.

Western: Cowboys, Indians and accessories. This object pack was originally created for a design contest, but has been developed into an official extension.

Additionally, many unofficial extensions have been created by players. One example is the modern military-combat extension called "First Aid Pack", which includes various weapons, vehicles, and scenarios in a modern-combat setting.

Warzone 2100 is a real-time strategy and real-time tactics hybrid computer game, developed by Pumpkin Studios and published by Eidos Interactive. It was originally released in 1999 for Microsoft Windows and PlayStation. On December 6, 2004 the source code and most of its data was released under the GNU General Public License, thereby making it a free game. On June 10, 2008 the license of the game was clarified, loosened and distribution of films and soundtrack was permitted.

In the late 21st century, the world's civilizations are wiped out by a series of nuclear strikes. While most of the survivors form scavenger bands to survive, one group of people, who refer to themselves as "The Project," seeks to rebuild civilization using pre-war technology.

The game begins with the Commander, the protagonist, sending teams to gather technology in Arizona that would help with reconstruction. While gathering said "artifacts," the Project fends off attacks from an organization called the New Paradigm, which is under the command of an organization called Nexus, which is actually one man responsible for the nuclear war. In the final campaign, the Project launches a full-scale assault on Nexus, destroying it and thus removing all significant, organized barriers to its reconstruction of the Earth.

The game is fully 3D, based on the iViS games and 3D graphics engine developed by Sam Kerbeck of Eidos. The terrain is mapped by a grid; vehicles tilt to meet hilly terrain, and projectiles can be realistically blocked by steep mountains. The camera is free-moving and can zoom in and out, rotate, and pan up or down while navigating the battlefield.

In the game, units of different factions are painted different colors. The New Paradigm,Nexus and The collectives are the enemies of the Project in the campaign, and they can be seen attacking Project forces as well as Scavengers; survivors of the nuclear fallout.

Units can all be customized according to: chassis (which, for example, takes weight and power into account); drive system (such as wheels or tracks); and mounted object (such as a weapon, or one of various support tools). Units can level up from ranks such as Rookie to Trained and Professional.

Mobile mortar weapons bombard Scavenger-occupied shacks from afar.
Warzone 2100 places an emphasis on sensors and radar to detect units and to coordinate ground attacks. Counter-battery sensors detect enemy artillery by sensing their projectiles and firing arcs and pinpointing their location to coordinate artillery strikes against enemy artillery. VTOL sensors work like basic sensors, only they coordinate VTOL attacks. VTOL counter-battery sensors coordinate VTOLs to find and destroy enemy batteries.

There is an emphasis on artillery: although many direct- and close-combat weapons and anti-air weapons can be researched and deployed, artillery is a staple of assault on enemy bases and outposts.While the technology tree is clearly defined and consistent, it never appears in-game and, therefore, the player can be left guessing as to what technology is next in the tree.

Technology can be acquired by gathering artifacts left behind by certain destroyed enemy structures or units. Researching is composed of largely small and incremental advancements over existing weapons, armor, and chassis types.

Videos frequently appear during gameplay. This gives a sense of urgency and keeps players from waiting very long to gather more resources for unit construction. However, in Away missions, the player must select a limited group of units to transport to a territory completely away from the original base.

All of the terrain throughout the campaign is essentially composed of three areas, with different sectors for Away missions and other such levels; upon progression, previous maps simply expand and the player's original bases from past levels are maintained. Also, its resource system is quite different from mainstream RTS games; Oil Derricks are established over specific, scarce locations which constantly provide a slow, fixed rate of income. Combined with a mission time limit, this resource method prevents players from simply waiting for long periods of time to amass surplus resources and ridiculously large armies.

the white chamber is Studio Trophis' first game. A point-and-click adventure game with a science-fiction horror setting.

The player controls a girl who awakens in a coffin in a darkened room. She has no memory of how she got there, and opens the windows to reveal that she is in fact in space. The player must solve the puzzles and move from room to room, piecing together what happened to the crew of the station.

The first release of the game was released for free download in 2005, and featured four endings depending on the player's choices during the game. It had no voice acting, but several animated sections, including an opening and ending. The inclusion of anime sequences meant the game was over 300mb to download. The size was one of the contributing factors to the fact that it was originally available exclusively through bittorrent. In an article for PCZone Richard Perrin stated that using bittorrent allowed them to reduce their bandwidth costs greatly. Though the game is now available for direct download from the Studio Trophis site.

The game has been updated multiple times and is now at version 1.7. It features the text in nine languages, English, Czech, French, German, Greek, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Russian and voice acting in either English or German.

English voice acting was provided by Kagome and Phillip Sacramento. German voice acting was provided by Jennifer Buschmeier and Thorsten Lechner.

The game was built using the Wintermute Engine, a middleware adventure game engine.

I play all of the following and they're excellent

Legend of Mir 3

I use to play Myth of Soma, I thought mir went down with game network, although i knew that Mir wasn't as bugged and more supported than Soma! Those were the days, what the leveling rate like, Soma was a hard slog!
How long have you been playing Mir for?

I really loved the community's on these mmorpg games, wow never could fill the void soma left! So I never got anywhere on that, guildwars I played once and never to be again.

Hey.

Been playing Mir since 2004 I think, never played Soma though. Mir 2 was my first MMO, then Mir 3, then WOW for about 4 years :/ Now i'm back with Mir!

Well yes, Game Network absolutely destroyed Mir towards the end. Shortly after they closed down their servers indefinitely on the 31st of March 2009, a friend informed me that BOTH Mir 2 and Mir 3 are being re-launched by two different companies.
short-run betas so far for it because there were a lot of lag issues and they kept changing things, then testing them in beta. Eventually they just relocated the entire server from Korea to the east coast of the USA where they have a branch or something. So the lag for European players, i'm told, has gone.