This game is also a one-switch game, meaning you play it with only a single button, so even those with severe physical limitations can participate.

Skee ball is by James E. Ward.

Hit it.

Space Fighter is a simple side scrolling ASCII based shoot-em-up. While the author tries to discourage would be fighter pilots with his warning of bugs the game is solid enough to play right now and simple enough to pick up without much fanfare. There is really no reason not to try this game out. At the same time there’s little more that can be said about it.

Space Fighter was written by James E. Ward.

Input Revolution borrows a popular mechanic that should be familiar to most people and doesn’t add many bells and whistles. Hit the right key as the indicated key reaches the indicated point and score. Miss and… you miss. Miss too many times and you won’t go on to the next level.

Input Revolution works but it’s admittedly pretty rough. Think you can do better? Source code is right there.

Input Revolution is written by James E. Ward.

So to prepare for those future decisions this program allows you to practice against a computer opponent. 5 computer opponents in fact. Win all 5 rounds an you can declare yourself the champion. Each of the 5 rounds the opponents act differently. Knowing how they act could give you an edge. Maybe.

If the standard “rock/paper/scissors” combination is too tame for you all you need to do is edit the rps.txt file that the game reads for it’s pictures and make your own challenges. Make sure the data file is 18 lines, each 6 line block starts with the name of the symbol, the next 5 lines are the symbol, no more than 12 characters wide. Then the next 6 lines will be the symbol that beats it.

RPS was made by James E. Ward.

How about skiing without leaving your desk? Just type in this short program and you?re ready to race for the bottom of the slopes. Use the arrow keys to move. Try to collect flags to increase your score. Each mountain is taller than the last, and stepper too so you go faster.

Downhill is written by James E. Ward.

So with a sword of death hanging over your head you decide to do the one thing you can to save your life. You decide to switch deities and pay respects to the one force in the heavens that may or may not grant you the right to live: Arnie the Random Number God. But the RNG is notoriously unpredictable and pleasing him will involve deciphering cryptic clues as to the tasks you can perform to amuse him and improve your standing with him, all while fighting your way through a dungeon to recover the Stone of Chaos on the bottom most level and restore it to its altar on the top most level. Along the way you could be completely randomly effected by one of the RNG?s completely random whims. These effects could be good or bad.

If luck is on your side you may find yourself at a point where winning becomes inevitable. If not? well you?re no worse off.

Stone of Chaos: the True God packs a surprising amount of complexity into a simple game. The way that it takes advantage of the small fiddling of variables that any game designer will tell you could eat up an entire development cycle as an integral part of the gameplay makes no two games the same, in their own way.

If you?re having trouble deciphering the meaning of the messages at the beginning of the game this handy guide should help:
“You feel like killing only a couple people right now” – You should kill exactly 2 random souls before leaving the current level.
“7 souls will fall.” – Kill exactly 7 random souls and leave the level.
“HURRY UP!!!” – Finish the current level in 100 turns or less.
“Slooooowwww doooowwwwnnn” – Don’t leave the level before 200 turns are up.
“You feel like a hippy” – Kill nothing. If you succeed you will gain a level.
“You think genocide mite be a fun thing to do”- You gain a small bonus and a tiny bit of HP for each enemy you kill.
“This water tastes strange” – If you drink any potions, the amount of potions on farther levels will be halved and if not it will be doubled.
“I’m thirsty” – If you drink all the potions on this level you will receive more on further levels if you don’t drink them all you will get less.
“Someone is partying behind you” – Just go back the way you came.
“DAMN” “A COP!” “RUN!!” – There is only one enemy, but his touch is instant death. Similar to the game ?Get Out!!?

Along the way these random events could befall you:
“You are pulled in a nonexistent direction” – Teleport to a different level depending on how much the RN God likes you.
“The RN God touches you.” – You are damaged or healed depending on how much Arnie likes you.
“Somebody gets stronger.” – Between 1 and 5 characters on the level (you included) gain a level. (This can be deadly on “Get Out!!” levels if the RNG hates you.)
“Arnie is bored with you.” – The RNG starts liking you less.
“You amuse the Random Number God” – The RNG starts liking you more.
“Barfff… ugggh” – You lose a level.
“A hot wind passes through here” – Everybody on the level takes some damage.
“Beer crosses your mind” – The amount of potions on each level is changed depending on how much the Random Number God Favors you.
“You feel a very soothing wind” – Everybody on the level receives some HP.
“Time seems to be distorted” – Your Speed changes depending on the Random Number Generator’s level of pleasure towards you.
“Your eyes feel weird.” – How far you can see is changed.
“The dead arise” – All dead monsters on the level come back to life.

If you need help in the game press the ??? key.

Stones of Chaos: The True God is a 7 Day Roguelike written by James E. Ward. The version listed here has been modified from the original 7DRL version.

Download (Source / RGRD / RogueBasin)

Guest Reviewer Eben Howard (aka Deej) (http://adoxographist.livejournal.com/)

The premise of this 7DRL is that you have pissed of your god so badly that your only hope it to start worshiping a completely random god.

When you first start the game it says that the only thing your have to do for the random god is bring a stone of chaos to his alter, but as befits his random nature the god will demand something different (and random) of you each level. You may be asked to kill only a certain number of enemies, or all of them, or none of them. You may be asked to drink all of the potions on the level. You may be asked to run for your life from a super powerful enemy.

The game has the feel of a well made rogue-like. The controls are mostly what would be expected and the difficulty of enemies being represented simply by the character used to display them makes combat encounters easy to jump into.

The graphical layout is old school RL style, but it doesn’t need to be fancy for this game to accomplish its goal. In fact the simple style really gives the feeling that you’re playing one of the first RLs that you always suspected were more about randomness than skill.

I enjoyed this game thoroughly, partly because the randomness makes it interesting and partly because it’s short enough you aren’t upset when you die a random death.

A word from Joe of Cymons Games

James E. Ward created the previous Cymon’s Games game Get Out, which in many ways was a precursor to this game. True God and it’s code will also be a Cymon’s Games game in the future.

I highly recommend you familiarize yourself with this game’s roguebasin entry, as it will give you a grip on some of the random quests in the game. Even with that “help” I haven’t manage to get much past level 3 in this game yet.

Download (Source / RGRD / RogueBasin)

Read more reviews from the 2009 7DRL challenge

Commie Invaders is written by James E. Ward.

You have stolen the famous Rogue Diamond from the national museum, and hidden it cunningly about your person. But with the roof entrance you arrived through now out of reach, you have to escape through the museum itself. There are ten floors with stairs (>) on each level, but you have to retrieve the security keycard (!) to unseal each exit.

The guards may pose a problem, but as the world’s greatest thief that shouldn’t be a challenge.

Move using the number pad. You can move in any of 8 directions or press the ’5′ key to hold still for a moment. The cop moves predictably and can be trapped but will attempt to go around any obsticles in his path. To disable the cops ability to dodge obsticles you can press ‘X’ on the main menu to change the cops behavior.

Get out is written by James E. Ward.