You know the drill. Go to Indie Royale in the next three days, buy cheap rad games, support poor struggling game developers. Then keep going back for more because their service is great. Here’s my look at the most recent bundle of six games from five genres:

Cognition Episode 1: The Hangman

Well-written adventure game “thriller” with a cool visual style, written by a King’s Quest devotee. This was the game from the Debut Bundle that got the most attention and space. You play as a detective with an understated psychic intuition as she hunts for the depraved serial killer who murdered her brother three years ago. The main character is a three-dimensional one with more than just typical personality quirks. Erica Reed is a hot-headed but vulnerable human being who wants to conduct peace and bring justice to the wronged, but circumstances are often forced out of her control, leaving her in a frustrated limbo where she is powerless to find the closure she seeks. That’s a great setup for a detective and for an adventure game’s plot.

Unfortunately, the rest of the cast is comprised of bland stock characters that fail to live up to the high standards set by Erica, though I did enjoy the “gettin’ too old for this shit” senior cop partner. There are also some bits that stretch credulity and (as always with adventure games) some baffling puzzles that draw me out of the experience. But the final product is a good though not excellent story, and one to be commended. This series has a lot of potential; I might even pick up the sequel.

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