The Monster Mash! 2014 was a frightful game jam where monsters are our friends.

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The Monster Mash! 2014 was a game jam that I was really excited to play. The jam itself has amazingly beautiful graphics! The object of this jam was to make a game that showed our inner love for monsters by making them the protagonist of the games. For a bit of an added challenge, this game jam had “multipliers” which came in the form of beautiful shield graphics. These nine multipliers were not required to be in each game, but were funny and added a bit of challenge. I have had the chance to play all of these games and have picked a few of my favorite, in a random order below.

MM Racing 2014

MM Racing 2014 is a game that will make you smile. Surprisingly, this game is the developers first published game. Although it does not have a lot of game play, the game itself is entertaining to watch. The player has been invited to an annual race, narrated by a cute but slightly robotic voice with subtitles so one can understand. Running in the race are 8 cute and well drawn monsters. Each time I have played this game, I have gotten different monsters. Plain ghosts, to skeleton horses, to giant salamanders, and even an anibus. The narrator gives the player a funny yet short description of each monster before the player is to place a bet on who will win. Then, the player gets to watch and continue reading the funny narration. This game literally put a smile on my face. I love it.

Duke’s Domo

Duke’s Domo has the player playing a character named Duke who is domovoi. He has an issue with a child whose birthday happens to be today. So, Duke must scare the child at his party as much as possible without getting noticed by any of the parents at the party. Duke can find and read letters from the six year old boy, Wally. These talk about Wally’s upcoming birthday and his excitement as well as a friend who lives in the basement. Duke is able to light fires to the parents if behind them and scare the children at the party. Check out this awesome story.

Arctic Escape

Arctic Escape is a cute game with a monster made of fire. This monster lives in the Arctic, however, which is quite the problem. This game is strangely addicting! The player must get to a flag at the end of the level, as fast as possible, and with as little deaths as possible. Along the way, the player will melt the ice around him or herself. As the ice melts, a fuel bar will lower. Once the fuel bar empties, the player has to restart the level or start back at a checkpoint, a fire, if it has been lite. There are also many little coals that the player can collect to gain more fuel! I really loved the graphics of this game, as well as the music.

Monster Tower

Monster Tower is another super cute monster game. The graphics are white, with added color, and super well done. The player plays as a monster with antlers, whom is catching other cute monsters to build a sort of tower off of himself. The player can control where the first monster is moving too, as well as the tilt of the monster tower. If the player fails to catch a monster, it ends up falling onto the ground and being in the way. Once the tower is knocked over the game is over.

Devil’s Night

Devil’s Night is also another game with great graphics. The player plays as a monster that is being hunted by men with moustaches. The monster needs to ram into these men wielding guns to kill them off and protect their eggs. However, when these flying monster’s lives get low, the monster is able to eat an egg from one of the three nests that are being guarded. The monster can also eat apples out of a tree to gain more lives. This game is super challenging, but very fun.

Those were all of my favorite games, but there were so many awesome games in this jam! Check them all out here.

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