Paper Sorcerer: a sketchy first-person RPG set inside the pages of a book

Anyone remember books? Wikipedia tells me that they were a sort of primitive version of ebooks, printed on dead tree matter that you had to hold open in front of your face like some sort of caveperson. Thank heavens times have moved on since then - except for the hero of Paper Sorcerer , that is. It's a first-person, turn-based indie RPG with one hell of a striking visual style - you can play the demo in your browser right here .

(You can also download said demo, if you prefer.) What is Paper Sorcerer, then? It's essentially Wizardry/Might & Magic/That Sort of Thing, but with a stark sketchy aesthetic reminiscent of the underrated DS RPG The Dark Spire (I'm also reminded of the similarly monochromatic Betrayer ). Colourlessness aside, it's a well-written and deep-enough party-based RPG, on the evidence of the demo at least.

You're a sorcerer trapped inside the pages of a book (hence the black-and-white-and-yellow visual style), tasked with regaining your powers, and presumably mounting some sort of imaginative escape. Paper Sorcerer was successfully funded on Kickstarter over a year ago ; it's sailed past its projected release date of August 2012 and then some, but the game appears to be quite close to completion at last.

(Many thanks to Indie Statik )

Tom loves exploring in games, whether it’s going the wrong way in a platformer or burgling an apartment in Deus Ex. His favourite game worlds—Stalker, Dark Souls, Thief—have an atmosphere you could wallop with a blackjack. He enjoys horror, adventure, puzzle games and RPGs, and played the Japanese version of Final Fantasy VIII with a translated script he printed off from the internet. Tom has been writing about free games for PC Gamer since 2012. If he were packing for a desert island, he’d take his giant Columbo boxset and a laptop stuffed with PuzzleScript games.