The frontier town that is Steam’s Greenlight system is, shall we say, a flawed beauty, in much the way a cracked beer bottle is a flawed beauty. Lawless, in the way the pelt of a scruffy, flea-ridden alcoholic badger is lawless. (Yeah, sorry Gabe.) But there’s gold in them thar, and we’re here to pan it out for you. (Also, because we’re ardent fans of laughing while pointing at things that have fallen down, we’ll show you our favourite squibs.)

The limelight: Rivals of Aether

I very nearly didn't click on Rivals of Aether, because OMG look at that name. Rivals of Aether? Just no.

But I'm pretty glad I did click on it, because this little pixel-pushing arena fighter looks as sharp as something remarkably sharp. Taking an obvious lesson in fisticuffs from Nintendo's Super Smash Bros., Rivals is at core about knocking your opponent off a platform. Just like in real life.

If the trailer is anything to go by, Rivals seems to hit that arena-fighter sweet spot: tight, synaptic-snap action, varied level design that encourages situational tactics, and move-sets focused on depth and subtlety. One character can lay down a puddle (don't ask how, okay?) anywhere on a level, then fire off a teleportation attack that emerges from said puddle.

In addition to a story mode, it'll offer four-way multiplayer both locally and online so that you can make enemies of your friends.

Also, the characters all look like Pokémon. If that doesn't sell you on a fighting game, nothing will. Nothing.

This one's on my definitely-be-buying list.

The slimelight: Meat Machine

Picking the perfect game to stand as the figurehead for the generalised atrocity of Greenlight can be surprisingly tricky. It's not so much the sheer volume of lameness – it's the fact that these games are so uniformly lame that choosing a standout example is like trying to find a needle in a stack of used heroin hypodermics.

But today's choice was max easy: it's Meat Machine. (Actually styled MEAT MACHINE, because shouting.)

Isn't it a thing of beauty? Look at those Vaseline visuals. Listen to the grunting sounds emitted by the cannon fodder; finally I know what it must sound like to throw up while you hiccup.

Because I just couldn't write it better myself, here is the developer's synopsis: "The Meat Machine is a kick ♥♥♥ TV show. You play as the Meat Machine in which you must kill as many of the TV Contestants as you can within a 2 minute time period. The Contestants are all taken from prisions. Since the prisions are full we must thin them out slightly. And what better way than to have them executed on live TV making a great Saturday evening TV Show just after the Xfactor."

A heartening ideology to match a heartening game about murdering people for fun and profit.

In case you couldn't tell, this one's also on my definitely-be-buying list.

Disclaimz: unless otherwise specified, we haven't played these games, so kindly don't view these articles as outright recommendations to buy them.

Rogan types freelance words for IGN Africa, and types them very quietly. He’s terrified, you see, of the day when the ghosts of all the comma splices he's gunned down will come for him.