OStatic

Life can't be all work, all the time. You need to make room for some fun and games. When you're ready to kick back, kill some aliens, or riff on a guitar, here are some really fun open source video games to check out.

Hedgewars - In this game, you control an army of hedgehogs bent on destroying all the other hedgehogs in your opponent's army. They get around via parachutes, ropes, or UFOs and have a huge trove of weapons at their disposal to off the enemy. Each play is timed so you don't overthink your next move, so just get out there and blow 'em up.

?In case you missed any of our roundups of free, open source applications, platforms and tools, here are some of our most popular collections:

10 Open Source Ways to Improve Your Online Video Mojo

6 Ways to Get Much More Out of GIMP

8 Free, Open Source Tools for a Better Digital Music Experience

Over 45 Free, Essential Open Source Resources

10 Free Resources for Splashy Graphics and Slick Photos

Open Source Media Center Apps Are Growing Up

16 Free Tutorials for Top Open Source Applications

5 Resources for Digging Into Linux

OStatic's Firefox Superguide

Late last year I broke down and picked up Rock Band for the resident game console, a Nintendo Wii. From this statement, astute readers can safely make the assumption that neither I, nor other members of my household, are big into gaming. I am, however, better with balance boards and nunchuks than I am any musical instrument, be it a stylized controller or the real deal.

Given the humbling experience Rock Band (continues) to be for me, I wasn't exactly eager to try out the open source rhythm game, Frets on Fire. However, the open source aspect and the advantages that brings to the game's genre, the Guitar Hero-esque focus on one instrument, and the project being chosen as SourceForge's March Project of the Month, I figured my ego might benefit from a slight bruising.

My fingertips aren't raw, but this confirms I won't be joining a band, real or virtual, any time soon. Frets on Fire on an easy setting makes me long for the simplicity of kernel recompiles and the soft whir of a rebooting system.

Last month, I took a brief tour of the pre-release Songbird music player. Songbird is a cross-platform media player based on Mozilla code. This week, the Songbird project released the finalized 1.0 version of the player.

The pre-release versions of Songbird featured iPod support, Last.fm scrobbling, SHOUTcast radio, plugin extensions, and a localized concert discovery service. The 1.0 release adds one more feature to its default list -- MashTape -- and turns an ambitious eye toward the future.