FreeCiv

From the Developers
Freeciv is a Free and Open Source empire-building strategy game inspired by the history of human civilization. The game commences in prehistory and your mission is to lead your tribe from the stone age to the space age...

My Comments
Remember Civilization? Well it's back...in Pog form! I mean Mac form!
If you don't remember Civilization, well, you mustn't be a computer geek, and that's OK. But it'll take you a while to learn how to play FreeCiv, so check out some of the tutorials here. Just don't expect any cute girls to be impressed with your new found empire-building prowess. Trust me. They won't be. I know.

Was that a Simpsons reference? When did that stop being funny, 1997? Give me the download!

Neverball

From the Developers
Tilt the floor to roll a ball through an obstacle course before time runs out. Neverball is part puzzle game, part action game, and entirely a test of skill.

My Comments
I was excited to play this as it reminded me of the totally awesome Marble Mania for Wii, and my favourite ever freeware game, I've Got Some Balls (Which doesn't have a mac version. Booooo!).

Unfortunately you need a gamepad or joystick to really get into Neverball because playing with the mouse is nigh-on impossible. Either that or I just don't have good mouse controlling skills.

Oh, sure, like it's me who's got the problem. Whatever.

Stop the whining and give me the download!

Planeshift

From the Developers
PlaneShift is a Role Playing Game immersed into a 3D virtual fantasy world which is FULLY FREE to play. Fully free means you will have no surprises of premium content which will limit your gameplay or unbalance the game. There are no limitations in skills, ranks, abilities, items you can gain with your free account. There are no time limits or additional constraints. Other similar games just advertize the "free" concept to sell you premium accounts. We don't. Servers and bandwidth will be donated by sponsors.

Today you can explore the virtual world, interact with other players or with server controlled creatures, fight monsters, cast spells, solve quests and puzzles, improve your character, gain magical items and more.

Our virtual world is persistent, and this means you can connect to it at any hour of the day and you will always find players and NPCs wandering our realms. You will be able to disconnect and reconnect again as many times as you like because your character is stored on the server, so you will never have to worry about saving the game. A player can start from humble beginnings and advance to greatness in whatever path they may choose.

My Comments
While still under development, PlaneShift is a free, playable MMORPG that has some amazing looking environments and is getting constantly updated. This is one for the kids who like immersing themselves in an "experience" rather than just a "game". Or something.

Players are required to act in character throughout the game, only knowing what your character would know and talking in the manner your character would talk. It's a bit silly if you ask me. But if being someone else for a few hours a day is your cup of tea, PlaneShift is one to take a look at.

I hate the real world! Where do I sign?

Tremulous

From the Developers
Tremulous is a free, open source game that blends a team based FPS with elements of an RTS. Players can choose from 2 unique races, aliens and humans. Players on both teams are able to build working structures in-game like an RTS. These structures provide many functions, the most important being spawning. The designated builders must ensure there are spawn structures or other players will not be able to rejoin the game after death. Other structures provide automated base defense (to some degree), healing functions and much more...

Player advancement is different depending on which team you are on. As a human, players are rewarded with credits for each alien kill. These credits may be used to purchase new weapons and upgrades from the "Armoury". The alien team advances quite differently. Upon killing a human foe, the alien is able to evolve into a new class. The more kills gained the more powerful the classes available.

The overall objective behind Tremulous is to eliminate the opposing team. This is achieved by not only killing the opposing players but also removing their ability to respawn by destroying their spawn structures.

My Comments
Imagine Team Fortress Classic meeting Alien VS. Predator and you've got an inkling as to what this game is like. The Aliens have a few cool moves like walking on walls, but the way you'll have to move run about as super-fast speeds gets a bit disorienting, and having mostly melee attacks takes some of the fun out of the game. If it's an FPS, I want to shoot things, dammit!

The best thing about Tremulous is that (at least in Australia) there are plenty of people online to play against most of the time. Though I do wish they'd all switch to playing Nexuiz.

Oh one more thing, the Mac version of the game isn't official like the Linux and Windows releases, but I've yet to experience any bugs with it so you should be OK.

Aliens don't scare me, give me the download!

Brain Workshop

From the Developers
Brain Workshop is a free open-source version of the Dual N-Back mental exercise.

What if a simple mental exercise could improve your memory and intelligence?

A recent study published in PNAS, an important scientific journal, shows that a particular memory task called Dual N-Back actually improves working memory (short term memory) and fluid intelligence. This finding is important because fluid intelligence was previously thought to be unchangeable. The game involves remembering a sequence of spoken letters and a sequence of positions of a square at the same time.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that the dual n-back task also enhances focus and attention and may help improve the symptoms of ADHD/ADD.

In addition to its ability to closely replicate the conditions of the original study by Jaeggi et al. (2008), Brain Workshop includes optional extended game modes such as Triple N-Back and Arithmetic N-Back. It also includes features such as statistics tracking, graphs and easy configurability.

My Comments
While this is a "small game", that is if it's even a game at all, I thought I'd put it on the site because it can totally make you smarter. At least according to an important scientific study. There were probably guys in lab coats looking at the program through microscopes and everything.

So check it out, maybe it'll undo the damage from all the other computer games you've played when you should have been studying.

Computers haven't changed me at all! On that note, can i haz downlaod?