Polcarstva is a short flash game by Russian developer Denis Stepkin. I'm not quite sure how to describe it, except to say that it portrays the surreal adventures of a diminutive crowd of intrepid, bus-riding explorers. Polcarstva is over in about 5 or 10 minutes, but it's surprising and intriguing while it lasts.

Polcarstva is in may ways reminiscent of Samorost, though its puzzles are less sophisticated and its imagery is a bit more bizarre. Like Passage, The Graveyard, and You Have to Burn the Rope, it's yet another independent effort that blurs the distinctions between games and art.

Because some of Polcarstva's puzzles are a bit counterintuitive, I've included a walkthrough after the break. I should also mention that, depending on your employer, it may be slightly unsafe for work due to a very brief and artsy depiction of nudity.

If you'd like to suggest a browser-based game for Act Casual, send a link and description to contact@gamerswithjobs.com

Fancy Pants Adventure features a stick figure protagonist whose pants, to be honest, are not all that fancy. And while Mr. Fancy Pants is adventurous, to be sure, today's Act Casual selection is not an adventure game. It's a two-dimensional platformer.

Fancy Pants Adventure lifts its game mechanics and design sensibilities from Mario and Sonic, so expect lots of leaping, sliding, springboarding, and looping acrobatics. It's a beautifully animated game, and unlike most browser-based platformers its controls are precise, fluid, and fun. The series' second release, World 2 (wherein you rescue a tasty frozen treat from a giant purple rabbit), is more polished and varied than World 1 but both are worth a look.

Use left and right arrows to move, "S" to jump, the down arrow key to duck/roll, and the up arrow key to open doors. The space bar pauses the game and "M" toggles music. Hit "Read more" below for some screenshots.

If you'd like to recommend a browser-based game for Act Casual, send a link and a description to contact@gamerswithjobs.com.

Although Ether Cannon is yet another take on the Asteroids game type, you'll find that it doesn't play by its ancestor's rules. First of all, there's no avoiding collisions. Keep a close eye on your shields, which drop with each successive impact but recharge immediately. And run for it, because Ether Cannon's enemies and obstacles don't languidly drift through space. They come straight for you, looping and circling in hot pursuit.

You'll spend much of your time fleeing across the game's free-scrolling cosmos, assisted by a simple radar screen. Enemies drop upgrade points, which you can use at the end of each level to boost the power of your shields, engine, or turret. The controls, like every other aspect of Ether Cannon, are simple and straightforward: WASD for movement, and mouse and mouse button for targeting. M will mute the cool soundtrack and sound effects.

If nothing else, check out Ether Cannon for its screen-shaking concussion effects. You'll think someone installed a rumble pack in your monitor. I recommend widescreen mode, though the framerate may bog down on some PCs. For screenshots, click "read more" below.

If you'd like to suggest a free browser-based game for Act Casual, send a link and description to contact@gamerswithjobs.com.

Starting from the caveman period and progressing through the ages to what looks suspiciously like a tank from Halo, Age of War is the essence of the never ending conflict. The brutality of man against man, throwing lives into the meat grinder until both sides have forgotten what they're fighting for. You start on one side while the computer holds the line on the other. Each base spits out new troops and gains more money and experience as the death toll rises. There's no tactical maneuvering here, your men simply stomp toward the enemy until they die or the person they're facing does. If they can reach the other base, they'll start hacking at that too.

First nation to destroy the other's base wins the game. You have access to a super weapon that has a cool down period before it can be used again. Nothing like a rain of flaming arrows to take the spring out of their steps.

I don't play many strategy games nowadays, real-time, turn-based, or otherwise. After long days at the office I'm typically unwilling to commit myself to any activity that demands more than near-comatose, reflexive twitching. I consider it one of my greatest failings as a gamer.

I'm currently playing Ikariam, a browser-based empire building game that looks and plays a bit like Civilization lite, to assuage my guilt. Ikariam puts you in control of a single town on a tiny island and tasks you with familiar resource gathering, construction, and research activities that eventually enable you to trade, pillage, colonize, and the like with other island-dwellers that inhabit the same world. Ikariam runs round-the-clock in real-time, slowly drip-feeding you resources and new options. Managing your miniature empire doesn't take more than 5 or 10 minutes every few hours, so it's an ideal short-term, web-based cure for office ennui.

Unsurprisingly, the free-to-play Ikariam offers "plus" options that give paying players clear advantages in terms of trading and resource gathering. I haven't felt the need to plunk down cash money to accelerate the pace of my own civilization, and whether I'll start complaining about the player imbalances such systems create remains to be seen. I'm very early in the game, so I've yet to engage in serious trading or send bands of henchmen to pillage my neighbors' settlements. Regardless, I'm still hooked by Ikariam's charming presentation and simple, stripped-down mechanics. My only complaint so far is that I can't automate all of my workers' activities from a single screen. Given the game's simplicity, though, it's a minor gripe.

Click "Read More" to check out some screenshots. If you feel like jumping in, keep in mind that there are two English versions: one via the UK at ikariam.org, and the US version, at ikariam.com. They're both running the exact same build, although the UK version has more open servers.

The Science Museum at London's Crystal Palace is by all accounts a pretty cool place. Among other things, it appears to have one of the wicked-damned-cool hands-on kids exhibits along the lines of San Francisco's Exploratorium. You know the kind of place - the one's built for grownups with grownup money but labeled "kids" to make all of us feel better about how freaking cool magnets are.

The museum website includes a fabulous little gem - LaunchBall. Launchball is one in a long line of games inspired by The Incredible Machine, itself inspired by the insanity of Rube Goldberg's cartoons. The objective is familiar to any fan of physics games - get the ball from point A to point B using limited tools.

What makes LaunchBall so good isn't the premise, but the execution. Launchball gives the player tools with reasoning - heat conducts through some materials but not others. Water can freeze and boil. Wind powers turbines and electricity flows through conduits or Tesla coils. Each tool and its application is explained the way you'd expect from a science museum. I've already re-learned a few things I'd forgotten since College. The graphics are done with the minimalism and polish of a game from introversion, and the puzzle design is clever and inspired. The game won best-in-show at this years South by Southwest interactive competition. A worthy use of a long lunch break.

Questionaut is a small educational game by Amanita Design commissioned by the BBC. The questions cover basic subjects like language, math, and science. (Once again, the British school system endangers its young charges by neglecting to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts.) Because the questions are aimed at eleven year olds, few of them will provide much challenge for the extra clever Goodjers, unless they, like me, get tripped up by this one:

"Why is putting one plant in a fridge and another on a windowsill not a fair test of how temperature affects the growth of plants?"

Inside all of us resides a gamer logic finely honed after years of playing everything from Pong to Geometry Wars. Grid16 aims to engage that gamer instinct with a quick succession of mini-games that require just your arrow keys and gamer reflexes. You'll have mere seconds to recognize the pattern of a game before you're shunted off to the next one. As you progress, the games will come at you faster and faster until you can't keep up anymore.

Once it's all over, you'll get a rundown of what kind of games you were best and which ones you need to work on more. It's fast, furious and quick to run through so give it a shot!

Thanks to Eoin for suggesting Grid16. If you'd like to suggest a game for Act Casual, send us a link at contact@gamerswithjobs.com.

This week's Act Casual pick is Grow Cube, a simple exercise in clicking on things and watching the results. Place ten objects on a cube, one at a time, and watch each item grow into an interconnected system. Certain objects affect others, allowing them to level up, and some objects fall apart if they grow too much. The goal is to find the one sequence which allows all objects to grow to their full potential. At the end, the game lists the final level of each object, and which ones are maxed out.

By testing several approaches and jotting down a few notes, I was able to max out about half the objects, which creates a pleasant little cubical world, with people, forests, and lakes. I assume that a cleverer Creator could place everything properly, which would truly be the best of all possible cubes.

Grow Cube and Eyezmaze's Grow series are a moderately challenging mix of puzzle solving and gardening. Usually, the object order follows some logical progression, but the only way to find it is through trial and error. It helps to idly experiment for a while before finally pulling out the pad and paper. Alternatively, just keep playing around with the cube, to create a variety of tiny worlds, each slightly different.

Thanks to Judge_Digger for suggesting Grow Cube. If you'd like to suggest a game for Act Casual, send us a link at contact@gamerswithjobs.com.

Areas has 72 levels, all designed around one simple goal: shrink away the circles that slowly fill up the screen before they suffocate your tiny ship. In that regard, it's hardly more complex than Asteroids. But don't let the simplicity fool you. Areas is a smart, surprising little game.

Buttons are overrated. It's the design philosophy behind Areas' control scheme, which employs nothing but mouse movements. To move, pull the aiming cursor away from your ship. If you want to shoot (and you'll need to do a lot of shooting), draw the cursor in close, and your ship will begin firing as it decelerates. Clicking will get you nowhere, even in the game's menus. It's a little odd at first, but it'll grow on you.

With its basic black-and white color scheme and simple line art, Areas seems a little dull at first. Stick with it. Several levels in, destroyed circles start dropping a series of very cool power-ups. They show up as mysterious circular symbols, and it often takes some experimentation to figure out what they do, and how you'll need to use them to succeed.

Areas' only sound is an eerie, looping soundtrack. It's wonderfully evocative, but if it starts to get tiresome (or you need to play quietly), just hover your aiming cursor over your ship. After a couple of seconds, a pause screen will appear, complete with volume controls.

Thanks to LobsterMobster for suggesting Areas. If you'd like to suggest a game for Act Casual, send a link and description to contact@gamerswithjobs.com