These days, Indies are really popping off IMO. Gems like Animal Well are coming out all the time. What are your favorites?
I’m a big fan of Pathologic 2. Had been aware of Pathologic for years but finally played the remake after learning of it from this Hbomberguy video.
Calling it survival horror doesn’t really communicate what the game is but it’s a start. It’s heavily dialog driven, and very deeply thought out. Reading the artbook I noticed references to internal contradictions as sources of tension and evolution, which was neat.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
Balatro and Vampire Survivors are natural picks because number goes up dopamine hits, but I gotta give a huge shoutout to Lunistice. 3D platformer with extremely tight controls, possibly the tightest I’ve experienced. I even got 100% achievements, which I never do, because it feels just that good to play.
Honorable mentions to House Flipper 2 and Powerwash Simulator for good games to relax while feeding that perfectionism itch.
I really enjoyed Sable, cool exploration game with a lovely artstyle and my favorite soundtrack in years.
Also really enjoy Balatro, Void Stranger, Norco, Last Call BBS, and Cloudpunk. (Really looking forward to Nivalis!)
Sable was a lovely little story
20th century food court from last call bbs was really good
Probably not favorite-favorite (many of those have already been mentioned), but Children of Morta needs some love. A solid action roguelike with a very well done narrative and great atmosphere.
Kor
SIGNALIS and SYNTHETIK/SYNTHETIK 2
Theres just something about isometric retrofuturist german games that have titles stylized with all caps y’know?
Love SIGNALIS, the anticommunist slant is cringe for sure, but the story and game itself are fantastic. I cried at the “true” ending, and it still pops into my head from time to time.
Will have to check out SYNTHETIK, thanks for the recs!
I went into SIGNALIS totally blind and expected it to turn out to be queerbaiting. That scene after the false ending literally made my jaw drop. Agreed on the anticommunist slant, but atleast its not totally obnoxious and mostly says “people shouldn’t be brutalized by the systems they inhabit” so I elected to reinterpret it as anticapitalist lol.
One little bit about SYNTHETIK: either game is a blast and SYNTHETIK 2 is finally in a state where it is as fleshed out, if not more so than its predecessor. S1 is remarkably lightweight and runs beautifully however S2 has some issues with Proton and I have to periodically restart the program to prevent it from crashing my whole-ass system (Linux Mint). SYNTHETIK 1 has a freeware version called SYNTHETIK: Arena which will let you check out the mechanics to see if you like them, Arena also supports CO-OP play much like the base game! (I really like SYNTHETIK c: )
Yep, since the Anticommunism isn’t portrayed as an inevitability with Communism and more as a possibility, I can logically justify enjoying the game better, haha.
Will keep that in mind for SYNTHETIK, thanks!
Enter the Gungeon, Atomic Crops, Hades, slay the spire, hardspace shipbreaker
Shrinking back into an infant upon realizing that spire only came out officially in 2019. Feels like it’s been around forever
Well it was in early access for like 2 years I want to say, so maybe that’s stretching the parameters of this post, but I’ve continued to play hours of it even now. One day I’ll get to ascension 20.
Love me some Noita. Falling Sands physics and coding-like wand building in a world far vaster than the provided path suggests. Difficult as fuck tho. Part of that might be my insistence on always making a wand with every explosive I find stuck in a single trigger which I inevitably misfire.
The Messenger/Sea of Stars and Hades
Ooblets. It is the game equivalent of a warm hug. Charming, polished, anti-capitalist.
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chants of senaar is decent entertainment for an afternoon
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balatro, number go up
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pizza tower, warioware clone but wilder
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yomi hustle, TAS fighting game. Its a fun thought experiment that quickly devolved into which character had the unpatched unblockable loop
+1 for Chants of Senaar. For anyone reading who hasn’t heard of it, it’s an isometric puzzle game based on linguistics. You control a person trying to climb this megastructure where each level has a different culture and language and so you have to figure out the various writing systems and syntaxes to find your way
I’m a pedantic nerd and just wanna correct you a lil. Pizza Tower is a clone of Wario Land, specifically Wario Land 4. Warioware is a different series based on very quick mini games.
Yomi hustle is really good! Or it used to be, like you said. There aren’t a lot of really good turn based multiplayer games and I wish there were. It’s the only kind of multiplayer I can stomach.
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CrossCode, Unsighted, Ultrakill, YOMI Hustle, Animall Well
Sunless Skies!
-HESUNTHESUNTHESUNTHESUNTHES-
I can’t be arsed to figure out which of these are “actually” indie or just seemingly lower budget, so:
- SIGNALIS - unmatched aesthetic & vibes, after finishing it the first time I kept thinking about it so went back for a second round on survivor/classic difficulty
- Pizza Tower - it’s just so peak
- Nidhogg - I think this came out more than five years ago but I finally played it this year. Even though it’s extremely basic and doesn’t have a real campaign it’s just so incredibly polished in its deceptively simple combat system that I kept coming back for more.
- Return of the Obra Dinn - spent a wonderful Sunday afternoon solving this one sitting at my kitchen table with my steam deck and giant ledger notebook
- Into the Breach - extremely fun, every single turn feels absolutely clutch; however you have to play basically perfectly in order to win so it is quite stressful
- Night in the Woods - explicitly leftist game, one of the few
- The Messenger - this one is really fun and has great music. My partner still remembers and talks about watching me play it.
- Katana Zero - it’s got that one hit kill/quick retry mechanic, excellent game. It’s the game that Hotline Miami wishes it was imo.
- Hyper Light Drifter - there are some massive unwarranted difficulty spikes but if you get around those this is a wonderful, beautiful game
Love SIGNALIS, the anticommunist slant is cringe for sure, but the story and game itself are fantastic. I cried at the “true” ending, and it still pops into my head from time to time.
Pizza Tower is definitely on the top of my list.
Thanks for the recs!
excited for the katana zero dlc to come out in 2043.
Hot take: The Messenger is a good version of Ninja Garden.
