Best Deal Stop

Fisher-Diver is a strange game, honestly. You're not a person, you're a little Death Star, or maybe a transparent olive. But you come from a long line of strong Death Olives, and you're trying to live up to the family tradition. You've brought your boat into the ocean to be a fisherman, and uphold the legacy of your grandfather.

That squiggle to your left is a fish, with a meaty center and protective geometric spines. Your goal is to dive into the water, to swim, to hunt the fish and fill your storage bar. Stay under too long and you run out of oxygen, and you start to black out. If you can't make it to the air in time... well, not every Death Olive is cut out for fishing. Some of them have nightmares about the day ahead.

But the fascinating part about Fisher-Diver is how you have to face what it takes to kill a living creature for your own survival. The squiggle fish bleed and squirm, and a poor shot means it's harder to finish them off as they run. If you've ever gone fishing, you know just how gross it can get, and that's something "realistic" fishing games often choose to ignore. These fish aren't clean Space Invaders who vanish with a pop. In this game, you're invading their quiet world.

Now, let's be clear, the game never seems to be judging you. It makes it clear this is your livelihood by demanding you pay for your fishing licenses and your upgrades, and you can't even make Day Two if you just swim politely then leave. Just like a real fisherman, you've got to do what you need to do while still respecting the sea. After a while you start to feel like a Hemingway hero, living up to your family name while trying to master a trade... maybe at the cost of your life.

Just like real fishing, you can run in and brute force everything and end up with scraps, or you can learn the subtle shots that leave you more meat, and more money. You can get just enough, or go for bigger game in the depths. You can take what's easy until it's gone, or you can reason out a balanced strategy that's more sustainable. It's up to you!

If red pixels make you nervous, this isn't the game for you. But if you can handle that life sometimes holds hands with death, Fisher-Diver is a well-made game that plays fair.

Ever wondered what it would be like to play miniature golf inside that Sesame Street Pinball machine? Today Wonderputt's gonna answer the question for you.

The course of Wonderputt unfolds as you play. You'll see a UFO capture cows as they eat an empty field, or skiers appear after a heavy snow. And you are going to hate that snow, friends. We're talking worse than a windmill level. But persevere, because eventually you'll unlock the hidden bad guy fortress, and that's totally worth it.

The pars tend to be pretty high, and the game forgives a lot because, hey, it's about fun! So even when you're swearing at the lilypads (you'll see) it won't be the kind of swearing that makes you quit. Instead, it'll be the kind of swearing that makes you finish, then go back a second time, and guess what? You'll have a small new mission waiting! There's just too much cool stuff going on in Wonderputt, and you won't want to stop until you see everything the game has to offer. And don't forget to show off your scores in the comments! You never know who might be watching...

Soda (and its close cousin, junk food) and video games have a long, not-so-proud history together. The stereotypical gaming geek image is one of a chubby nerd slowly fusing into his couch or desk chair, staring intently at the screen while surrounded by pizza boxes, cups of instant ramen, and empty soda cans or bottles. After all, what better source of energy for the sedentary is there than sugary, caffeinated beverages? Soda, energy drinks, and junk food are synonymous with gamer fuel, but now the good folks behind Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 want to change the whole dynamic and power the game itself with hydrogenated oils and processed sugar.

Specifically, they're running a promotion called "Rank Up XP" that will allow you, the unskilled, noob-tubing moron that everyone abuses in voice chat, to purchase Pepsi products in order to win blocks of time in which you'll earn double the XP. What's the big deal, when game makers already require you to spend extra cash in order to get things like "ALL the levels" or "the one decent gun in the whole damn FPS?" It skews the balance of power in an already heavily-skewed game and all but kills the appeal for anyone outside the MW3 Fanboy base...

As the linked article explains, XP is the in-game currency for Modern Warfare 3. You earn it by killing your enemies and unlocking achievements like lengthy killstreaks, creative kills, and even running a long enough distance. You then exchange that XP for stuff like new weapons, upgrades for your weapons, and special items to help you deal even more death on the battlefield.

(I realize how lame all of that explaining sounds, but I have to cover it for the five or six people who might not play shooters, so they can understand why any of this matters.)

For me personally, Call of Duty games have been unplayable since the original Modern Warfare anyway. I have a job (which you'd think someone would figure out means I have disposable income and should be catered to, but I digress). I'm married. I have a household to contribute to, which means I don't have the time it takes to earn Prestige (I still don't know what this is) and unlock the invincible mini-gun or whatever, and as a consumer now responsible for my expenses I also don't have the money to plunk down $60 for a game and then spend another $100 over the next two years on "updates" that just unlock the rest of the crap on the disc I already bought.

I don't buy games like Call of Duty new, because after the marketing orgy subsides there's an inevitable glut of returned copies for sale at much lower prices. But not buying in on the first day means I'm subjected to the deviant whims of all the teenagers who have been inexplicably playing this thing for hundreds of hours in the month since its release. I don't get to explore the game and learn its intricacies online, because 11 kids have already figured out every hiding spot, every glitch, and every way to cheat the system imaginable to pad their all important "Kill/Death Ratio." I still play MW2 occasionally, and I'm proud if I can hit 10 kills in a match; the top performers routinely land in the high-20s or 30s.

"But wait," you might say, "then this idea is perfect for you! It'll allow you to catch up by giving you the Double XP, thereby cutting the advantage!" Let me ask you something: who's more likely to give in to the marketing and buy a Mountain Dew for the potential reward of more XP in a video game? The 29-year-old with the aforementioned job, wife, and house, or the teenager who already dedicates their every waking moment to pwning noobs?

All this will do is widen the talent gulf in online play, making it completely unapproachable for new gamers. They'll start to look elsewhere for games they can enjoy, and if you're looking to GROW a business, you want new customers. You can only make so much money gouging your (admittedly fervent) current customer base with add-ons, DLC, and the like.

But what do you think? Is the promotion a good way to entice new gamers? Is it harmless and I'm overreacting? Or is it the reason you won't be buying the latest COD?

Flickr photos (in order) Game Chair at Xlan2011 by Thom Cochrane,This is NOT Real by jason.lengstorf used under a Creative Commons License.

Jewelanche looks pretty easy on the surface. Just connect the dots, and make gems vanish.

Of course, like all games with one sentence of rules, each level will be faster than the last, and you'll eventually die in frustration. But at least the concept is easy to grasp. By drawing the mouse over matching colors, you'll create a magical reaction that will make the gems disappear. Each group you remove will add points to that ouroboros over there on the right. Fill him up, the level's done. And then you get prizes!

Between levels you'll be offered a chance to buy power-ups, and sometimes the sky gods will throw you a Pandora's Box. What's inside might be good, or it might be bad, and clicking a bad box at the wrong time might suddenly clutter your once-empty screen...

…so be careful when you click. The gems drop Tetris-style, and it can be hard to keep up with them as the game goes on. Don't stress, though, you're really just grouping colors, so it won't take THAT much thought to survive. Perfect for a late Friday cooldown, right? So get going! And don't forget to drop us some screenshots, we want to see how far you'll get.

There was a time when the playground was sacred. As long as kids weren't chanting FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT the teachers would stand over in the corner and ignore all the stupid playground games. Want to throw a kickball at someone's head? Sure! Want to go down the slide face-first? Builds character! Want to to a 360 on the swings? Why, that's the Nobel Prize of childhood! So it hurt us so much to find that Pogo Swing seems to completely prevent that over-the-top swing from happening. Or maybe we just quit too soon. Can you show us how it's done?

Of course, the rules of the game say Pogo Swing is about launching your kid forward, not up. Use the arrows keys to go left and right and make that swing, er, swing.

The farther you go, the more money you'll make, and the more upgrades you can buy. Like, say the pogo stick in the title. Once you get THAT, you can enjoy the really interesting part of the game, and you can start hopping your way down the yard.

There's a lot of terrain out there between the rainbows and the mushrooms, so give us some screenshots if you make it farther than we did. We're curious too! And maybe next time someone will write a game that just lets us spin over the bar. Don't laugh, it still tears us apart. It would have changed EVERYTHING.

Why did you play Mario games? The jumping puzzles? The storyline? No, shut up, stop lying, you played it for the coins, we all did. Partly to kill turtles and partly to get coins. And how many times did your heart break when you had to leave a perfectly good and unfinished coinbox behind? Hundreds? Thousands? Well, today's a lucky day for you, because Coinbox Hero is your chance to make up for all that change your childhood left behind.

The Coinbox Hero is your character, and you'll keep him hitting the coinbox while that oompah band to the right cheers you on. When you feel like spending your coins, you can visit a little strip mall on the left, and there you can buy weapons, skill points and employees.

Once you get an assistant, life gets a little easier. You'll assign them to pound away at the box with a pipe wrench or whatever while you walk around picking up the coins. Then you'll take an early lunch. Just like a real small business owner, the money will just roll right in!

Coinbox Hero is not at all big on difficulty, but it is oddly fun. The more you level up, the more coins you start getting, and at some point you get access to a nuke and God only knows what happens then. Get your jump button finger ready, and maybe you can impress the tuba player. If you win his respect, you can tell people you actually accomplished something today.

Today we're going all peaceful with our game selection, so if you were hoping for a chance to shoot up some aliens, you'll have to look somewhere else. Today we're playing Deep and Blue, a puzzle-like game where you've got to make some old fashioned clicks to enjoy the story.

In Deep and Blue you're not really anything except the mouse. Think of yourself as the a guardian angel, a third-person guiding force in this happy whale's life. If you only care about winning, here are the rules: move obstacles so the whale can go to the left. But if you'd rather explore by clicking on everything, you'll have much more fun. Sort of like life, eh? EH?

For the most part, you're just helping strangers. Sometimes you'll annoy a fisherman but from a whale's perspective they aren't nice people anyway so that seems fair. You'll meet divers who want treasure, statues that have fallen apart, even a very special- well, let's not spoil it. Because as you figure out where to click you'll also get to enjoy a bit of a story about this whale's world, both good and bad. If you like some gentle drama now and then, you'll probably enjoy a quick pass through Deep and Blue. Just be sure to do something nice for someone IRL after. It's what Mr. Whale would do.

The lovable tyke of the Woot family is growing up - but not too fast. As Kids.Woot marks its second anniversary today, we invite you to step right up and try your chances at Sling-A-Monkey! This Flash game lets you - nay, demands that you fire our famous Woot screaming monkeys at moving targets. The monkeys may be virtual, the prizes may be imaginary, the glory may be an illusion - but the fun is very real. Happy birthday, Kids.Woot!

We all know a stupid amount of useless trivia, don't we? But imagine if Pokemon were instead named after elements of the periodic table. Or if the Justice League was based on principles of engineering. Imagine if all that tedious stuff could be hidden inside the things we consider fun. How smart would we be then? The answer is "pretty damn."

Which brings us to Molecularia. Molecularia is kinda built around teaching stuff through fun. You move the little atoms around the maze like in a puzzle game, but instead of just connecting train tracks or water pipes, you're building an actual molecule.

Yes, just like that. In the process of solving the puzzle, there's a good chance you'll pick up a tiny bit of chemistry too. Not enough to get a degree or anything, but how much chemistry do you know right now? Yeah, see? For most of you, this is a serious forward step. But don't worry, you won't know you're learning at all. And maybe this stuff will overwrite the part of your brain that knows all the stages of Squirtle.

You just recited them all, didn't you? See, that's what we're talking about. When are you ever going to use that in life?

How much do we need to explain on this one? The Lemmings are marching. You're controlling them. Get them to the exit by using their special skills. It's the game that ruled the early 90s in your browser, ready and willing to destroy your productivity for the day. Put on a little Color Me Badd, maybe grab a Crystal Pepsi, and then start enjoying this endless forward walk down Memory Lane.