The world's best counterfeit games

A big part of gaming culture went missing a while ago. Back in the '90s, professional, studio-developed games were only one part of the bigger picture. Thanks to lower development cost and the proliferation of capable home gaming computers like the Commodore 64 and Amiga, anyone with a bit of knowledge could get a game made and distributed, amongst their mates at least. The homebrew scene was huge, and top-notch games spewed out of bedrooms worldwide.Some even got picked up by big-name publishers and went stratospheric. See Worms as your example of that.

But as the industry went mega-budget, that sort of thing died down. Thankfully though, it’s now beginning to see a resurgence as the internet provides us with all manner of simple development tools and unlimited distribution. Thus, gamers are making games again, and a lot of them are taking their favourite franchises as inspiration. Completely unlicensed and unendorsed by the people in charge, remakes and new sequels are popping up all over the ‘net, and while a lot of them are obviously as fun as herpes, some of them are excellent. These are some of those excellent ones, our current favourite pick of the internet’s guerilla games.

Halo Zero

Ever wondered what Halo would have been like had it been released in 1992? No, us neither, but it probably would have been something like this. This side-scrolling little beauty set before the first game is essentially Halo: SNES Edition, but don't let its dimensional limitations put you off. While it's arguably a little simple in terms of gameplay, it's slickly made and plays beautifully, thanks to some intuitive and well-implimented keyboard and mouse control. And well, just look at it. As old school 2D graphics go, it's more than just a little drool-worthy.

Get hold of it here at the developer's personal site.