One of the things we made sure to do at E3 this year was to spend a significant amount of time with the IndieCade folks. Then we sat on that info long enough for some of these games to get picked up, have a successful release, come out with sequels, spawn movies, novels, comic books, become part of the general pop culture bloodstream, and then fade into nostalgia, and for that we apologize. Actually, I'll apologize, I did it.

But in all seriousness, a lot of the more fun and innovative stuff we saw at E3 wasn't actually being churned out by big studios and publishers, but being worked on by small groups with tiny budgets and just a love of gaming. Read on to find out all about the IndieCade games that we saw on display, and why you'll want to be playing them now.

The annual Penny Arcade Expo has quickly evolved from being simply a gathering of video game enthusiasts to becoming one of our most anticipated gaming conferences each year. We never know what we're going to see there first hand, from fresh rhymes to Metroid attacks, and this year's event, taking place from August 29-31, looks to up the ante with a showcase of independent games called PAX 10.

Event organizers are currently seeking indie talent to show off during the event, and devs can submit their creations online for consideration from now until May 7, after which a panel of 50 "industry experts," including PA's own Gabe and Tycho, will decide which ten submissions represent the crème of the crop based on gameplay and that all important "fun factor." The home-grown games will each be shown as part of the event's PAX 10 exhibit, and attendees will be able to vote on which one tickles their fancy, with the one garnering the most votes being lifted up following the expo on the Penny Arcade website as the Audience Choice Award winner. But with just a touch over two months remaining, time is running short -- if you're a would-be developer you've already wasted precious minutes reading this post! Get cracking!

With the news that the 70 percent royalties cut for independent developers of Xbox Live Arcade titles had been cut in half, the indie gaming community was irrevocably up in arms, with some XBLA devs even threatening to switch platforms. However, the reasoning behind the cut is not as cut-and-dry as "M$ jus wants moar money" -- according to a recent GameSetWatch report, a number of factors led to the royalty shrinkage.

Bit Blot, the indie studio behind Aquaria, recently posted a short development feature about underwater fauna players will find in its upcoming exploration game. After all, what's the point of swimming around if there's nothing to try and bite you? Expect a battery of crustaceans to give chase under the sea, including a giant crab or two, as well as the not-so-friendly sea dragon. Players will also be able to ride seahorses as shown above.

Early in Aquaria's development, we were promised a thriving ecosystem of underwater creatures to interact with in the game. This is just an early taste. The team drew inspiration from the strange critters that swim Earth's seas. A thread on Bit Blot's forums is packed with images of strange and surreal animals.

According to a recent forum post, Nifflas, the creator of Knytt and Within a Deep Forest, may release the expansion to his upcoming Knytt Stories for free. At first Nifflas was considering releasing the pack for a modest fee, but after considering the extra work required to charge players (not to mention the fact that the taxman will take notice if he turns a reasonable profit), he's now leaning toward releasing it for free or as donationware.

Knytt Stories continues the atmospheric, exploration-based gameplay that Knytt brought to our attention, though this time there are more areas to discover and a few power-ups to find. Both the game and the editor have already been announced as free. Look for Knytt Stories at the end of August.

Kyle Gabler, founder of the Experimental Gameplay Project and indie game studio 2D Boy, recently posted a few stats from his side project, Human Brain Cloud. The online "game" shows you a word or phrase and all you have to do is type in the first thing that comes to mind. The answers players give are amassed into a huge network of connected blobs viewable from the website. Nearly 800,000 associations have been submitted so far, connecting over 100,000 unique words and phrases.

What's the most commonly submitted word? "Sex", of course. The second most common is "me", while the third is "money". Good to know the collective consciousness of the human race has its priorities straight. Human Brain Cloud lets you sit and submit as many associations as you want, and we spent more time than we'd like to admit adding our two cents to the project.

[Via Independent Gaming]

Slapping. The fighting style of choice for people wearing mittens, women, small children, and now, gamers. Rose & Camellia is a Japanese-made Flash game where you play a woman named Reiko who married into a noble family only to have her husband die shortly afterwards. The women of the house don't respect her, so its your job to slap some good old fashioned sense into them.

Fights are turn-based and you only have a few seconds to act. When it's your turn, click the "attack" button and swipe the mouse in an arc to slap the other woman. When she's on the offensive, click "evade" and make a mirrored arc to avoid the attack. Successfully dodge and you're ready for a counter-slap!

While E3's Kentia Hall may be long gone, the small Independent Game Summit area of the Barker Hangar made sure the little guy wasn't completely ignored. One of the most interesting games from the summit this year was an unassuming little 2D platform-puzzler featuring a guy in a business suit.

One of the core ideas behind Braid, according to creator Jonathan Blow, is that the players time is more precious than his life. Indeed, any time your portly, suit-clad avatar dies, you can simply rewind the action a la Prince of Persia to go back to a safer portion of the level. Unlike PoP, though, there's no limit to the length or availability of your rewinds in Braid, meaning the only thing you lose if you make a mistake is a little bit of time spent rewinding.

Homestar Runner's fictional game development studio, Videlectrix (who also created Peasant's Quest and Thy Dungeonman 3: Behold Thy Graphics!), have just released another treasure of gaming hilarity: Where's an Egg?. The gameplay is reminiscent of old adventure titles and has you visiting a number of locations talking to people and hunting for the egg. The catch is that you only have 999 seconds to find it. Oh, and did we mention you have a gun? Yup, loaded with three bullets you can use to shoot anyone you like. Bring on the adventuring!

Paul Eres recently published a short preview of the upcoming indie game Knytt Stories. The feature walks through a few of the major points of the game, comparing it with the previous Knytt release and the creator's other major game, Within a Deep Forest. Half a dozen new screenshots were also unveiled, shown in the gallery below. Paul's most interesting quote comes from his blog announcement of the preview: "... the more I play the best independent games, the more I don't want to play mainstream games ever again.".

This game along with Aquaria could go in our book as two of the best releases of 2007. Look for Knytt Stories on August 30.

Planned for release in 2001, Affinix Software was ready to put the final touches on Infinity, a role playing title for the Game Boy Color. Unfortunately publishers were already looking ahead to the Game Boy Advance and all the pretty pictures it could display. Infinity was never released, Affinix was eventually dissolved, and the game was left to sit on its creators' hard drives for years. But a Lost Levels forum member unearthed a video of the game in action (watch it after the jump) and suddenly Infinity finds itself the recipient of some well-deserved attention.

In early February a news post on the Affinix website mentioned the possible release of an Infinity ROM. We contacted project leader Justin Karneges to get an updated status on the game. According to him, Infinity is very close to being complete and just needs a few story points linked together, spells filled in, and a final boss programmed. In addition to himself, one more team member is needed to tie up the loose ends, everything else is ready to roll. You can even download the full soundtrack from composer Eric Hache's website. As for the ROM: "There's no need to talk us into releasing a ROM. If we had a finished game, it would be released.".

Infinity could be a breathtaking game, or it could turn out to be a dud. We won't know until we get to play it, and we're itching to take her for a spin. If you need us, we'll be consulting our astrologers to make sure the stars are in perfect alignment to get this game into the wild.

[Via Insert Credit]

Tale of Tales, an indie studio founded by artists Auriea Harvey and Michaël Samyn, will be showing several of its works-in-progress over the next few weeks in three separate venues around the world. The studio's oldest game (currently on hold), 8, is a dreamy single player title based on the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale. It will be presented at E3, while the MMOG The Endless Forest will be shown in Spain. Starting August 8 visitors to Mexico City's Museo Tamayo will be treated to older works from Harvey and Samyn.

Currently, Tale of Tales is hard at work on The Path, an experimental single player horror game inspired by Little Red Ridinghood. You take the role of six characters, each representing Little Red Ridinghood at a different age, and explore hidden emotions surrounding the process of growing up. The game dares to ask "What happens in the dark woods when a girl meets a wolf for the very first time?"

We'll guess it involves a lot of screaming.

After the indie platformer N was announced for Xbox Live Arcade, PSP, and DS (known as N+), a level design competition was launched to tap the collective creativity of the N community. Special versions of the N editor (Ned) were released and levels are specific to each platform, meaning even the biggest N fans would, in theory, have to buy all three versions of N+ to play every single level. Over 80 new levels were chosen from the submissions, and each one is listed with a full screenshot on the SUBLiME web page.

And for those of us too cheap/lazy to wait for and buy N+, the original N is still available for free, complete with editor and hundreds of custom levels to play.

Austrian developer Bplus announced today it has the official "ok" from Nintendo to release a game on the upcoming Wii Ware download service. Plättchen Twist 'n' Paint, a "puzzle shooter", has been designed specifically for the Wii and its motion-sensitive waggle wand. No release date or other details were mentioned, of course, but don't be surprised if Min-E3 brings a few juicy Wii Ware tidbits our way.

Then again, knowing Nintendo and its love of secrecy, don't be surprised if it doesn't, either.

[Via Nintendo Wii Fanboy]

A German gaming magazine recently revealed the student project De Blob would make its way to the Wii courtesy of THQ. Today the official announcement was released pegging a February/March 2008 release date for the title along with the surprising bit of news: De Blob will also be released for the DS. This time around you'll paint the town trying to restore color that an evil corporation drained from the buildings and scenery. The PC demo is available as a free download to give you a taste of the wackiness to come.