I first came across the independent video game Madris around this time last year; it was an entry in the “A Game By Its Cover” video game development competition. Madris is a puzzle game designed by Gary Dahl that is essentially a combination of architecture, “The Sims,” and some game called “Tetris” (**wink-wink, nudge-nudge**).  The goal of the player is to take each block (which is either a room or a corridor), and to arrange them on the screen. Some of the room blocks will have people inside of them, so the main objective is to arrange the rooms and/or corridors so that the occupants can get to the proper room that will serve their immediate need (for example, the watercloset, a.k.a., the loo, a.k.a., the throne room, a.k.a., the commode, a.k.a., well, you get the idea).

Every time a character enters one of the room blocks that was indicated by their thought bubble, all interconnecting room blocks linked to that character’s destination are removed from the thought bubble as well. You can use the down arrow key to make a room/corridor block reach the bottom part of the screen faster (a’la “Tetris”), and keeping the down button depressed after said block is placed will then speed up the walking animation of the occupant.

Go ahead and check out Madris by clicking here (Windows, 9.34MB), downloading it, and give it a whirl.  You’ll be playing the “A Game By Its Cover” competition build of the game.  Enjoy!