This Week's Waste of Time

Costume? Check. Spooky atmosphere? Check. Unicycle? Check.

School may have started, but it's still too damn hot to be nostalgic for summer antics past. Luckily the experimental game makers at Vectorpark have cooked up something that will help you get nostalgic for all of Austin's largely nonexistent seasons in the comfort of your own (hopefully) cool home.

Video games are not largely know for their warmth. There are cute games and significantly more not-so-cute games, but more often than not they deal in war-torn landscapes, the coldness of space, or imaginary worlds with very solid boundaries. There are exceptions, the most important one right now is This Week's Waste of Time, Seasons With Thomas.

The game's creators at Vectorpark have a very clear design outlook. I've already gushed about their entry into the Independent Games Festival, Windosill. Their latest creation puts you your character on a unicycle and dumps you in a world that welcomes you in until you're ready to move onto the next "level." I use quotes because there are no set goals or achievements to unlock. Just travel to the right at your own pace.

Vectorpark includes obvious signifiers of warmth – projector sounds and visual pops and hisses give the game the feel of a remembered vacation – but the real warmness comes courtesy of the way things within the game interact with one another. Considering that all the player can do is place the cursor where Thomas should be, it's impressive that any feeling can be conveyed. Objects bend, peel, buzz, grow, and pop with a weight and resistance that belies the design's clean lines.

There's really no winning or losing, just exploring. So, in that way, we're all winners ... or losers. You decide. I've decided I'm a winner in case you care.

Click here to play Seasons With Thomas.