The Download Munkey : Tracking the Treasure Down …

© ThinkGeek, Inc

Discovered this collection of plushies which comprises some of the most deadly mankillers in the world (except man himself, of course) with the likes of ebola, tuberculosis (below) and the infamous bubonic plague which killed 75 million people during the 14th century, from the awesome selection of geeky wonders in the ThinkGeek catalog (above – look for page 18 under the Mad Science section).

© Giantmicrobes, Inc

These three micro-organisms or microbes are just a small part of a series of cute stuffed toys modelled after micro-sized critters both harmful and the not so harmful – I sure wouldn’t file Saccharomyces Cerevisiae / Baker’s Yeast under “Lethal” Blown up a million times into plushies 5 to 7 inches long (or wide) from the miniscule micro-organism/cell in real-life, it’s no wonder these toys are affectionately referred to as GIANTmicrobes (duh). If size does matter, you’ll be glad that some are also available as 15 to 20 inches GIGANTICmicrobes

GIANTmicrobes aren’t just frivolous little novelties since each comes with a picture and essential facts about their tiny counterpart – you could always justify these purchases as educational stuff

© Giantmicrobes, Inc

My favourite is the bacteria E. Coli (above) which can cause a nasty bout of food poisoning in humans and resembles the Mars People that come in near the end of Metal Slug 2

Mars People : as appears on Neo Geo Battle Coliseum and illustrated by Eisuke Ogura

Now if you’re in Singapore and thinking of purchasing these lovable toys like me, note that Thinkgeek does not ship to Singapore unless you use services like Borderlinx or comGateway which provide free US shipping addresses. Alternatively, you could always make your purchase from the official GIANTmicrobes online store but be warned that shipping to Singapore will cost a hefty minimum of 25 USD.

If you just have to have one, local online store ICONceptz does have limited range of GIANTmicrobes for sale but at least delivery is free

Check out GIANTmicrobes at the official site or at ThinkGeek (and while you’re there, don’t forget to download the catalog – it’s chockful of geeky goodness )

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Cytoplasm – A Game of Cellular Domination
Games Workshop 2009 Collector’s Guides
Corgi Diecast Catalogues
A List of Downloadable Firearm Catalogs for 2009
2008 Military/LE Firearms PDF Catalogs

Introducing Peggle : World of Warcraft Edition, a little freebie I found at the official World of Warcraft goodies page while looking for a HD version of Mr T’s old WoW commercial featuring his custom Night Elf Mohawk. (What? You don’t know Mr T?) While I’m not a fan of World of Warcraft, but hey, a free game is a free game

Popcap’s Peggle : World of Warcraft Edition is essentially a free sampler of their original best-selling Peggle comprising 2 stages of five colourful World of Warcraft themed levels each. Resembling pachinko or “Japanese pinball”, the player has to eliminate all orange pieces by play by shooting at them directly or indirectly (duh )

It differs from pinball in the sense that that are no flippers which greatly simplifies gameplay since it’s a game intended for casual gamers but apart from that, it’s loaded with lots of blinking lights, whizzy sound effects and insane scores in the hundreds of thosuands, just like being at a pinball table.

Despite its apparent simplicity, it’s oddly addictive since most of the later levels require more than a fair bit of logic and puzzle-solving skills – you can’t just mindlessly shoot and hope to clear the level with pure luck – just see this strategy page for Peggle. As for replayability, there’s really little incentive in replaying levels after you’ve completed them unless you’re aiming to bust the high scores table. There is however the Challenge mode to boost the longevity factor although it’s mainly aimed for the masters or hardcore fanatics.

If you like Peggle : World of Warcraft Edition, there’s always the original Peggle with 55 levels and playable on a mind-boggling array of platforms – PC, Mac, Nintendo DS, iPod Touch, iPhone, mobile phones, online and even as a free 12 level World of Warcraft addon.

Download Peggle : World of Warcraft Edition.

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Filler (Puzzle Game)

Just played through the demo of IO Interactive’s Mini Ninjas – an enjoyable but rather short little romp through a cartoonishly rendered medieval Japan. You control a party of three different Ninjas (more in the full game) and can switch between them at will – little Hiro who can possess nearby animals and then sneak past enemy guards, Futo a big brawny fellow with more than a passing resemblance to Mr Incredible from Pixar’s The Incredibles and Suzume whom I haven’t figured out her specialty yet.

While it’s nothing particularly innovative or challenging, Mini Ninjas is surprisingly immersive and engaging – I have played the demo over and over for more than five times, mainly trying to find all the secret areas and hunt down every single artifact.

Maybe it’s the goofy character design and animation, or the silly cutscenes or simply the lightheartedness of the game or even its soothing music which keeps me playing on and on.

Watching the exaggerated motion of the enemy samurai goose-step with armor clinking as they patrol along paths in the bamboo forest or chitter “Ninja Ninja” incessantly like insects as they swarm towards you, never gets old for me

Different types of enemy samurai ensure that a little more than simple button-mashing is required if you’re going for the brute force approach. As with IO Interactive’s Hitman series and with ninjas in general, the preferred way is to rely on stealth and use force only when necessary – sneaking past enemy patrols by creeping around in tall grass is a viable option even for big bad Futo although you’re always welcome to cut the enemy at your own discretion.

More devious gamers will be delighted to find that there are more fancy tricks at your disposal for every situation. You can sprinkle caltrops as a gift for pursuing samurai when you’re feeling nasty or you can always switch to Hiro and use his Spirit Form spell to sneak past enemy strongpoints as a harmless chicken to avoid shedding blood (especially your own ).

I guess Mini Ninjas won’t last long judging from the length and linearity of the demo but it’s a blast while it lasts (hey, it rhymes )

Download the demo and other goodies (click on the Castle to download wallpapers) at the official Mini Ninjas website.

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Shinobido Imashime Opening Movie
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Originally caught these Rocket Riot wallpapers off THQ UK but the links there were broken

Rocket Riot is a side scrolling action game from Dutch games studio Codeglue and features a cute and rather unique art style. Apparently, it’s also the first Dutch developed game to be sold at Xbox Live Arcade (XBLA) too

© Codeglue / THQ

Download these wallpapers from Codeglue’s official blog for Rocket Riot.

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Mars TD is a grim 8 bit preview of the future when we establish a colony on the red planet. If you thought the octopi-like Martians of Metal Slug 2 were the creations of wildly imaginative (or possibly insane) game designers, you’re absolutely wrong – Mars TD designer Taro knows farbetter that they are real and dangerous lifeforms native to Mars and they eat human colonies there for breakfast.

Walking octopi from Metal Slug aside, Mars does have a variety of weird fauna from spinning heads that eerily resemble Crash Bandicoot’s and even the catlike Qoo from the similarly named range of drinks from Cola-Cola.

These hostile Martians will appear and attempt to ravage the colony unless we humans start building towers to defend ourselves – that’s right, it’s another tower defense game again but Mars TD has a couple of neat gimmicks that sets it apart from other games of the genre.

The attributes of each tower from top to bottom : Level, Exp, Attack Strength, Attack Speed and Unknown (sorry!). The buttons from top to bottom are : Upgrade, Move and Sell

When a tower blows an alien to bits, it gains both experience and credits – I guess it’s probably the gunners in it who gain experience since the concept of inanimate towers gaining exp on their own is rather freaky With sufficient experience, towers will automatically level up on their own. Towers with more experience are also cheaper to upgrade than untrained towers – especially the more advanced towers (I have seen a total of five different types as of writing)

Towers with yellow, orange and red arrows are progressively cheaper to upgrade

There’s also an ability to switch the positions of towers which is free between stages but will cost you when you move them around during each stage. Walls can be built if you need to move a tower to an unoccupied spot, which is a handy tactic when you have insufficient credits to build actual towers but want to implement a more in-depth defensive strategy by shifting them around.

At the end of the day, it’s still tower defense but it’s tactically challenging (read : super hard) and addictive as hell. The 8 bit feel is a plus in my book too – huge pixels, garish colours, bleepy soundtrack and outlandish critters complete the surrealistic effect Mars TD has on the senses.

Play Mars TD at mogera.jp. (there’s also a review at JayIsGames where I saw this).

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Retro Tactical Warfare in Nectaris for Windows
OpenTyrian – The Best DOS Shoot’em Up – Now for Windows XP/Vista and Other OSes
The Last Stand & The Endless Zombie Rampage & Crimsonland