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This is a cute little love story where a boy bunny tries to woo the girl bunny he loves. There's one racy dance scene by the Pirate Bunny (who has a thing for the hero). But it's all cute and quite fun. I think the game mechanics are all understandable by a kid.

http://jayisgames.com/archives/2009/07/bunni_how_we_first_met.php

"I mean, the concept is so great, but all we get are "You are the hero fighting the evil wizard" style books."

Try 'Violet' by Jeremy Freese.

You're a grad student working on your dissertation, but have been stuck for months. You have only 1000 words left to write. Your Ausralian girlfriend Violet, who provide the narrative voice, has threatened to leave you if you don't finish today.

It's a one-room game. The only 'evil wizard' you need to defeat is your own tendency to procrastinate.

I tried magic pen and its first level was extremely similar to the first one they show in Crayon Physics' trailor.

Game: http://magic.pen.fizzlebot.com/

Review: http://jayisgames.com/archives/2008/04/magic_pen.php

I wonder if Alejandro Guillen could go to courts over this...

By focusing only on commercial game releases, I think the article completely misses the point. Free puzzle games thrive - if you check regularly any "flash" game site such as Jay is games, you will see that puzzle and adventure games are a legion, and are amongst the most played and popular. Heck, they even have a "room escape" day where they list every Crimson Room clone that has surfaced during the week.
So, maybe you cannot make money anymore by developping an adventure game. However, that does not mean that the genre is dead, far from it.

There's a flash game called Airline Security that simulates to incredible detail the capricious rules of the TSA..

Just wanted to share the love.

Leaving the biggest imprint on me are the works of Polish graphic novelist Mateusz Skutnik. Skutnik is the author of the Submachine series of games, each of which finds you escaping from an elaborate, explorable puzzle box. Captivity is a familiar theme in this genre of games, known as escape the room games in the point-and-click world. This gameplay style evolved from Robyn and Rand Miller's 1993 classic Myst, which shaped the game industry as much as SimCity and Doom.

The Submachine games could all be described as immersive labyrinths. In each of these first-person sleuthers, the player must navigate through a series of abandoned research facilities and ruins in hopes of finding a means to freedom. Stranded without instructions, maps or context, the story forms via notes and transmissions picked up along the way. The Submachines demand an eye for pattern recognition, and the intricacy of some of the puzzles can be quite maddening. Adding to the ambiance is an eerie score and impressive sound design. There are a number of recurring motifs including typewriters, radios and pipelines that visually unite the games. Be warned, these puzzle boxes are habit-forming.

Gimme Friction Baby!
1st place in the Casual Gameplay Design #3 (yes, it's as prestigious as it sounds)

Great site with daily game reviews
http://www.jayisgames.com/

Warbears
http://www.warbears.com/

Bloxorz
http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/games/bloxorz

Eyezmaze
http://www.eyezmaze.com/

Hapland
http://www.foon.co.uk/farcade/hapland/

I have two-year old twins, so when I'm on the PC they insist on sitting on my lap, mashing the keyboard and moving the mouse around. Try playing an RPG or an FPS with all that going on; I tried doing that once (Baldur's Gate 2, I think) and they wound up erasing a couple of my saved games. Much teeth-gnashing there, but I couldn't blame the kids--it's all on me.

It's a nice bonding experience with them, though, so now I just click on the Disney Channel site and let them have a go. Either that or I fire up Bookworm Adventures--they like the toon-ish graphics. I'm hoping they pick up some new words as well.

There are so many freeware and shareware games that have been released online by independent developers and programming hobbyists.

The Independent Games Festival is a good start. And to make things easier, there are a many sites and blogs that review indie games and make recommendations: the2bears and Shoot the Core cover shoot-em ups/STGs; Jay is Games handles flash and casual games; and TIGSource (for which I'm an editor), Independent Gaming, and Game Tunnel cover all genres of games. You can expect to find some overlapping, but they each have plenty to search through.

In short, it's anything you want it to be. A blog is really nothing else than just a way of organizing and publishing web content; only a bit more structured than a "traditional" personal website. I use mine (not going to link it here) to post short fiction and essays to entertain my friends. But there are many other uses besides this. You can do this, for instance. Or this. Or even this or this. As you can see, there's quite a lot of ways you can use a blog.