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Welcome back to a semi-regular feature here at GameCritics.com: TouchTalk. While this series was inspired by one of my old features, the Bargain Basement, I've got an all-new focus for an all-new phase in gaming. Rather than highlighting discounted gems in the used section of a retail shop, I'll be reviewing downloadable mobile games and apps that you might want to check out… and maybe some that you'll want to avoid.

The Extra Credits guys tackle how gamers can affect political change. They even get a game-playing Congressman—didn't know any actually existed—to offer some advice.

Last year's Seattle Indie Expo proved that the Pacific Northwest is a hotbed of up-and-coming games development talent, and if anyone needed further proof, then this year's SIX drove the point home.

Welcome to the first installment of a brand-new semi-regular feature here at GameCritics.com: TouchTalk. While this series was inspired by one of my old features, the Bargain Basement, I've got an all-new focus for an all-new phase in gaming. Rather than highlighting discounted gems in the used section of a retail shop, I'll be reviewing downloadable mobile games and apps that you might want to check out… and maybe some that you'll want to avoid.

Hiroshi Yamauchi (former President of Nintendo of Japan) once famously said that "gamers like to sit alone at home playing dark, depressing games?" Yamauchi was criticizing the industry and even gamers at the time for embracing dark, gritty, CGI-heavy, and mature-oriented games over the more cheerful, family-oriented titles. He felt that it was making games less inclusive and too much like movies. But his words were largely dismissed as the ravings of an old exec upset that fewer people were buying games on his platform. Extra Credits is taking a similar tack, only it makes a better argument than Yamauchi.

The guys at Extra Credits look at something that you've probably never heard about: we are running out of bandwidth. All of those videos of cats being adorable and marathon sessions of Angry Birds and Call of Duty are taxing the current bandwidth sources leaving us in need of more sources or risk running out in a couple of years. It may not seem applicable to gamers, but just watch the video and you'll see that this could be an issue especially with newer game consoles and game-playing media devices coming online at about the same time.

As soon as I saw the Ouya, I knew that for better or worse, I needed to know more. In the media whirlwind that followed over the next few days, I managed to pitch a few questions to Ouya CEO Julie Uhrman. Here's what Julie had to say.

Hocus Pocus. Presto-Chango. Alaka-SHAM.

HIGH Thematically coherent and smoothly animated presentation.

LOW Gameplay that feels like the player is in a drowning tank with no way of escape.

WTF Two modes disguised as four with slight rule tweaks.

My oldest son's summer vacation is over soon, just a couple of days left, but he managed to finish a few games while he was here. The second game he finished was Street Fighter X Tekken. Although it's not really a traditional game that you can "finish" in the sense that you've completed all quests or rescued the people in need, we went through the game with all available story-based pairs, so I'm calling that done.

A console start-up could be set to become a new cornerstone of the home gaming arena thanks to a wildly successful Kickstarter project launched yesterday.