Perhaps it's the fact that rock music has scared parents for decades, but rock and Halloween always seem to go particularly well together. This year is no exception, with lots of Halloween-themed tunes hitting the DLC airwaves.

Not all free games are nice, neat, and tidy. Some involve poop, others involve vomit, and a few involve snot. Bodily functions are a part of being human, and some indie game developers felt inclined to explore the grosser side of game design. We applaud them for their gall, as the results are hilarious, fun, and a little disturbing. A few of the scatological oriented selections in this month’s Free Bytes medley might make you throw up in your mouth a little bit, but we assure you it’s going to be worth it. Enjoy!

So many choices; so little time. Yes, this month has dumped another heap of enticing downloadable gaming goodness on our doorstep, and we’ve spent some time sifting through the bits and bytes to hand-pick some hot bite-sized game recommendations. Get ready to wrestle the wind, clean up rainbow barf, play some monster chess, and indulge in your puzzle addiction.

The thought of large, carnivorous sea beasts awaiting just beneath the waves tends to instill a sense of passing dread in many of us who prefer to stay on land, yet it’s not enough to stop scores of other braver souls to flock to the beaches for some sand and swimming on warm summer days. Indeed, sharks tend to get a bad rap, but the toothy protagonist in Miami Shark even makes Jaws look tame.

This is the kind of week we in the business call "rather big," with a huge Queen pack, a trio of Supremes classics, and the remainder of the Beatles' legendary Abbey Road LP hitting the DLC channels in the space of four days.

The word of the week is variety, bringing games about cute little pets, guns, cooking, wrestling, and more. There's enough here to put you on overload of whatever you seek -- everything from blood and gore to pink and disgustingly cute.

One of the best proven ways to keep children busy on a rainy day is to give them a bucket full of perler beads and a few pegboards. You’ll be surprised at how many hours they can spend creating their own patterns, and you’ll only have to step in during the last phase of the project, when the beads need to be ironed together to fuse them into a solid, permanent work of art. Chances are, however, that you’ll want to jump in and make your own video game-related patterns to turn into cool coasters, magnets and keychains. It’s extremely easy, since you can use any sprite from old video games and match each pixel with a bead.

When the passing scenery is so syrupy sweet and bubbly, it's challenging to avoid stopping for a moment or two to soak in the view. But sightseeing isn't on the itinerary for RunMan. This energetic little bouncing star has places to go and mileage to clock. For him, life is a race, and he wouldn't have it any other way. That works out just fine, since the thrill of bounding around, over, and under obstacle after obstacle at high-speed in countless hand-drawn levels is great indeed.

Every year I imagine that on Halloween I'll find myself at a huge party dressed in an impressively elaborate costume that's dazzling or repulsive or some disturbing combination between. And then every year I decide that a crazy costume will require either a massive time commitment on my part or put a gaping hole in my wallet. If you always mean to make a big statement at Halloween and then don't, perhaps you should go all out with your virtual you; it's much cheaper and a lot easier to do. Here are some of our game-themed favorites from the Avatar Marketplace.

Iowa State Links Gaming to ADD
Some professors at Iowa State University conducted a study that indicates a link between gaming and Attention Deficit Disorder. Their results suggest that games might decrease ability to show sustained attention and the researchers conclude that their study "can be contrasted with the beneficial effects of these games on other aspects of visual processing." Dr. Christopher Ferguson, a games researcher from Texas A&M; University has commented that the press release about the study is "misleading" in that it "implies that video games may cause ADD." His opinion is that the study did not use a valid clinical measure of ADD and that the findings were inconsistent, two issues that should have prevented the researchers from making the claims they did. The video game industry seems to be especially affected by biases from researchers who have both positive and negative opinions regarding video games, which too often affect the methods used and results of these studies.