THE STANLEY PARABLE

Stanley is just another nine-to-fiver living a stale life of crunching numbers and doing meaningless repetitive tasks at work, a man with no family to come home to . The sudden disappearance of all his colleagues leaves him alone in the building with just an eloquent inner voice at his side telling him what he should do. The voice is annoying, controlling , laughing at his condition, incredibly discerning and intelligent. The game is all about starting again and again, finding alternate ways to come to a meaningless end for Stanley, or sticking to a silly routine like playing the baby game and pushing a single red button for 4 hours without a single pause  until the game recognises you as a God and you come out victorious. How can you not like that? The game puts our tenacity, sense of identity, belonging, orientation, purpose, irony, obeying or disobeying our inner voice to a serious test, with an illusion of choice being the main ingredient of the game. THE STANLEY PARABLE laughs at life, games, the gaming industry, our use of time, rendering them all obsolete.

"Onward Stanley...to destiny. Wouldn't whenever we end up be our destination, even if there's no story there? Or to put it another way- is the story of no destination still a story?"

THE NEVERHOOD CHRONICLES

This game was  and still is a personal favourite from the 90s.Yes, it's a simple point-and-click adventure game with a linear structure and simple navigation throughout the imagined claymatian world. But what a magnificent world it is! Wooden and clay sets with abstract, yet easily identifiable architecture  of a highly artistic Demiurge aided by Terry Scott Taylor's  incredible genre-bending soundtrack invite you into a uniquely odd world. So many things I like about video games are featured here: superb stop-motion animation of the characters, awkward posture and coordination of Klaymen along with somewhat tedious walks he takes throughout the game, slapstick humour,silly full motion video cut scenes, puzzles that range from simple to abstract to silly, absense of inventory screens (I always disliked them in games) etc.
A cult classic that will be enjoyed even a hundred years from now!

A Foreword

Games should be works of art defying the existing genres, current markets and should constantly defy expectations of both the young and the seasoned. I see playability, graphical capabilities and many other aspects that seem superimportant to us nowadays as secondary to games being authentic pieces of multidisciplinary art.
I'm too old to be playing Mortal Combat 56456, Tekken 234826, Super Mario on Steroids Part 293847 or other rehashes flooding the gaming market. Give me a small indie game that has an interesting twist to it and I'm hooked. Nothing against smart big titles either.
Ygorrr