Slap city is the newest Platform Fighter (see Super Smash Bros., Brawlhalla, Icons, Rivals of Aether) to throw its hat into this increasingly pervasive genre. This game is an all-stars mashup of characters created by the company, Ludosity, makers of indie darlings such as Ittle Dew and Card City Nights. Even if you have never heard of these properties, I highly recommend Card City Nights on Steam or Mobile, the characters are lovingly realized with cartoonish 3D models. One of my favorites, and a fan favorite at that, is this beautiful specimen and my husband: Fishbunjin. 
The animations are very smooth, and often quite comical. For you fighting game fanatics, the developers are constantly tweaking knockback values and damage, perfecting hitboxes (which are already pretty damn good for a game in its first months of release), and adding new characters. The biggest gripe I can see for adopting this game at this point is the rather low character pool (as of writing there are 7 very unique and fun characters). Good news is that the price point sits at $4.99 on sale, or $6.99 otherwise, which makes for an excellent entry for even the stingiest consumer. The single player mode is slowly being expanded upon: for now, settle for the traditional arcade mode and a “break the crystals” minigame. Be warned: the later difficulties arm the CPU with virtually zero endlag on attacks and endlessly chaining normals and specials, which equates to you getting absolutely murdered within 10 seconds if you aren’t careful.
If you are a fan of super smash bros melee, the game engine and competitive focus definitely implies that Slap City wears Melee on its sleeve. All the insane techniques that are completely lost on casual fans are in this game, from l-canceling to wavedashing, so there is quite a bit of depth to be had when picking this game up. There isn’t too much in the way of teaching you the more advanced gameplay through a direct tutorial, although I would definitely recommend reading the information in the Library section of the Main Menu for some advanced tips at the very least. There are no items, but some of the stages can get extremely hectic (the pinball one is particularly insane: think an entire stage covered with the Bumpers from smash bros).
(Editors Note: There’s a Pinball Level…That sound you just heard…That was Indie Gamer Chick shrieking in excitement)
There is a healthy balance between enabling the wacky chaotic fun for the party game audience, and the high-stakes, Fox only, Final Destination environment that the fighting game community craves. In fact, tournament organizers are already getting their feet wet as this quickly growing fanbase is slowly but surely racking up those Twitch views. While couch multiplayer will likely take up the bulk of your time with Slap City, some of us are not fortunate enough to actually have friends. Well dry your tears: the online netcode is pretty damn solid if I do say so myself. Embracing this innovation from Smash 4, you can play upwards to 8 players on one map! You can create public and private lobbies set to team battle, free-for-all, (timed or stock), and even the Slap Ball gamemode. In Slap Ball, players team up to slap soccer balls into the opponent’s goal. Never before have you been able to vicariously live your favorite World Cup moments in such a derpy fashion!
If you are itching to play the new Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and really need that fix, you would be hard-pressed not to seriously consider Slap City. It doesn’t set your wallet back too far, and the developers have proved that they are more than capable of creating a competitive, yet wacky game for players new and old. Hopefully this will the first of many Indie Gamer Team seals of approval you see from me in the future!
Slap City: Steam
Developer: Ludosity
Price: $6.99
Review Copy was Purchased
A Kiss for the Petals: Maidens of Michael is an action Visual Novel game based on a budding romance between two high school girls. It’s a stand alone game in a series of games all dealing with the same topic but with different couples. This game is based on the coupling of Risa and Miya, about how their romance started and the problems they had along the way. The characters in this series of games, are all fairly unique granted a couple of them are by the book standard character archetypes. Not only are they unique but the couples all balance each other out really well in some way. That balance makes everyone that much more endearing for reasons I can’t quite explain. Risa and Miya are no different in this aspect and that really brings a super cute quality to the game.
A Kiss for the Petals: Maidens of Michael was developed by: Yurin Yurin and 
A review copy was provided by the publisher.
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The game had a lot of sci-fi talk as the game involved nanotechnology, AIs, cybernetics, and genetic modifications. It dealt with them as, oh these things exist, not everyone likes it, some people go a bit overboard, etc. It’s treated like it’s just part of life which is nice. There’s not a big deal made of it or a lot of information poured into the mechanics behind it as though it matters. Instead it’s just an everyday thing and I really like how that played out.
The Mind’s Eclipse was developed by: 
A review copy was provided by the publisher.