What happens when you mix one part Gears of War, two parts Team Fortress 2, and one part Left 4 Dead together with a sprinkling of Wild West? Why, Lead & Gold, of course. Fatshark’s flagship product is now available for pre-order discount for PC users, though console players will have to wait a bit longer. In addition, if you pre-order now, you’ll get beta access to the game!

Lead & Gold is a unique third person shooter set in the Wild West, with four classes to choose from, all bringing unique benefits to the team. The Blaster, The Deputy, The Gunslinger, and The Trapper all work together so you have a demolitions expert, a scout, a bread and butter shooter, and a sniper, practically guaranteeing you won’t get tired of any style of play.

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This week is absolutely rife with indie news, and this little bit is really drool-worthy, believe me. Until now, indie games that have any chance of making it in the main stream have to be featured on Steam, Impulse, or some other digital distribution platform for gamers to indulge. Generally speaking it’s been a sweet deal for indies, the only problem is being unable to control content.

ModDB.com hopes to remedy this problem by introducing Desura, the first digital distribution platform designed solely for indie games and the gamers who love them. Right now it’s unclear if Desura will feature a client like Steam or Impulse, or if it will be a website only ordeal like Direct2Drive, but I think it’s safe to say indie gamers and their developers should be pretty excited.

Why you ask? Hit the jump for more features and why you should be as excited about Desura as I am.

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The independent game market has exploded over the last few years, largely due to more accessible means of distribution, such as Xbox LIVE and the Playstation Network. In fact, many of the games developed for these platforms owe their huge success to the exposure garnered from their IGF wins.

Even still, the Independent Games Festival goes significantly unnoticed by the gaming community at large, despite numbers continually growing for the San Francisco based event. In fact, this year’s IGF is the largest to date and with good reason: the entries for this year are simply amazing in design, concept, and execution.

If you haven’t been following the nominations and news that have peppered gaming websites since this January, read on to learn more about the five finalists that will likely be gracing your console of choice soon enough.

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As the IGF looms closer, more and more details are being revealed about the finalists. Today, The EA Partners initiative announced that they’ll be publishing two indie games, both from successful developers. The first is Klei Entertainment’s Shank, and the second is Hothead Games’ Deathspank. Shank is a current IGF finalist in the Visual Art Excellence category.

Both games will be making their way to the Xbox LIVE Arcade and the Playstation Network, with Shank also making its debut on the PC. It’s not surprising that EA wanted to pick up these great games, as Klei Entertainment’s flagship title, Eets! was highly successful on both the PC and the Xbox LIVE arcade.
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It’s shaping up to be an exciting year for indie games as the Independent Games Festival grows closer. Today added to that excitement when indie developer Playdead announced that their flagship title, Limbo, would be coming to the Xbox LIVE Arcade this summer. The announcement was made by Playdead’s CEO Dino Patti.

Limbo is a current IGF finalist, competing in both the Technical Excellent and Visual art categories. In addition, a playable version of the game will be presented to GDC attendees, so if you’re lucky enough to be heading to San Francisco, you’ll get a sneak peek at this great game.

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This is potentially exciting stuff. A group of the biggest names in independent development have banded together to create the Indie Fund – a theoretical honey pot for fledgling independent developers to dip into to get their own projects off the ground.

Given the huge amount of independent games that never see the light of day because of the unwillingness of publishers to take a risk, or the lack of capital for the developer to go it alone, this could be a great leap forward for the whole Indie scene.

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The finalists for the Independent Games Festival D2D Vision Award have been announced, and sponsor Direct2Drive is giving you something to get excited about by offering previous IGF finalists in a package together for a mere $29.95. The Indie Bundle features a wide variety of indie games from many different genres, many of them considered cult classics.

This is the third iteration of the Indie Bundle and features such classics as Gish, The Maw, World of Goo, and Machinarium. It’s a great collection of indie games that does a great job of displaying just what indie game developers have to offer. For a complete list of games, hit the jump.
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Xbox indie fans have something to rejoice about today, as Team Meat, the team of developers responsible for Super Meat Boy told IGN that the game would be released on the Xbox Live Arcade in addition to its release on the Wii.

Super Meat Boy has been in development for about six months now and since it was announced, it was thought the title would be a WiiWare exclusive, something many hardcore platform gamers lamented. However, with today’s announcement, Team Meat has opened their game to a much broader audience which can only be good for Meat Boy.

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I’ve been sitting on this news a while, wondering if any of the other major outlets would jump on it. It’s about a new game. The name?

Dudebro, My Sh*t Is F*cked Up So I Got To Shoot/Slice You II: It’s Straight-Up Dawg Time.

Let that name sink in a moment. Ready? Let’s continue.

Dubebro II is the freshman project by Grimoire Assembly Forge, a collection of a hundred or so NeoGAF volunteers who have come together to turn an in-joke into an actual game. The story behind its inception is the stuff of Internet legends; if you want all the details, I suggest sifting through the game’s wiki at your leisure.

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There’s nothing like getting something for a great price, and this Valentine’s Day, you can pick up a set of great indie games for only $20. The Indie Love Bundle is a collaboration between indie game developers to bring their best titles to the masses on this day of love, for pretty damn cheap.

Titles include And Yet It Moves, Auditorium, Aztaka, Eufloria, and Machinarium. If purchases separately, all five titles would cost you over $85, so its really a no brainer, especially if you love indie games.

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If you’re a 360 gamer who was looking forward to Trine, it looks like you’ll have to get your fix on the PC or PS3 platforms. The high detailed 2D puzzle-platformer was scheduled to be released last year, but that date has come and gone and the XBLA has seen neither hide nor hair of Trine. Joel Kinnunen of Frozenbyte recently stated on the company forums, “It’s out of our hands but most likely will not happen. Sorry. (We probably won’t comment on this any further.)”

One has to wonder with a statement like that, just why the game won’t be released on 360. If the game was developed enough to be released, perhaps licensing issues or other problems prevented the release. Joystiq contacted Microsoft for a statement, but it seems they’ve refused to shed any light on the cancellation as well.
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