2010 was a reckoning. It was a year that saw the gaming market explode with a bevy of independently produced titles. In forgotten scenes reminiscent of the "bedroom programming" days of the late-'80s/early-'90s, talented coders from around the world bombarded PC and console stores with a slew of excellent, home-grown video games, reigniting a fire in the indie development scene that burns brightly to this day.
The decade began with the arrival of legendary titles such as PlayDead's Limbo, Terry Cavanagh's VVVVVV, Rodain Joubert's Desktop Dungeons, oh, and a little block-building jaunt by the name of Minecraft... what happened to this latter release we'll never know. But perhaps no one title is more closely associated with the modern-day indie game boom than Team Meat's tough-as-nails platformer, Super Meat Boy.
As chronicled in 2012 documentary Indie Game: The Movie, Super Meat Boy was a labor of love for two friends - Edmund McMillen and Tommy Refenes - who worked tirelessly to create a twitchy, complex, and wryly comic adventure, embracing the skill-based gameplay and relentless difficulty of games' past. Super Meat Boy launched to much-deserved success, shifting over a million copies in its first two years of release. More importantly, it inspired a generation of wannabe developers - establishing the belief that in the big bucks world of modern gaming there was definitely still room for "the little guy".
And now, over a decade later, Team Meat (now sans Ed McMillen) has returned with long-awaited sequel Super Meat Boy Forever. So take a deep breath and prepare to get those finger cramps all over again. It has taken some years but - finally - the Buzz is Back.
