Discover Indie Games

I've recently got into playing this game called holodrive, a fun free-to-play (but not pay2win) game to kill some time, or get really serious about. Holodrive is a platformer/shooter where you are put into small arenas in teams and fight it out in various game modes. The thing that makes the game unique is the Overwatch lootbox like customisation options, allowing you to acquire hats, jetpacks, and new guns. The thing that makes the game really fun is its simplicity, allowing you to pick it up very easily. Your arsenal is made up of 6 types of weapons that you can pick up around the map, such as beam weapons, which bounce off walls, and launcher weapons, which are affected by gravity. However, the exact weapon can be changed by finding new ones when you level up. And don't forget the crazy power-ups you can get in-game.  The matchmaking is very fast for an early access game, although games are a little empty once you're in. One of my favourite game mode is a football-l...

This very clever game is probably one of the best simulations ever made. You may think that you can't run a prison with the same pressures as a business or city building game, since the prisoners don't pay to be held in jail. However, this game's pressures are in keeping your inmates from rioting by keeping them happy... and well guarded. Money is made depending on the number of prisoners in the form of government grants, and you also get a bonus whenever you accept new inmates. In my prison, I'm just struggling to keep 124 men fed enough, and housed, but housing is solved when my inmates start to murder each other. In this game you can design your own cells, choose the luxuries your prisoners enjoy, the guards that are posted, the time allotted for work and play and you generally have a huge amount of control in this great game, which is complete with a nice interface and simple art. This has to be my favourite simulation game, probably just after the tropic series....

A hilarious couch game for up to 4 players. In this game you and up to 3 friends on the same computer will strive to get the most points by stacking huge, unstable towers, knocking them down, throwing blocks at each other and stealing each other's points income. At the start of the game, a few loose blocks fall from the sky, you have to pick them up and start building towers, the taller the tower, the more points per second. However, the points are given to the person who put the last block on, so you have to try and constantly steal other people's towers until they final come crashing to the ground. You can also throw blocks and dash around to knock towers down, and the existence of blocks that double a tower's income really spices up the game. Pretty graphics, lovely soundtrack, and great gameplay combine to form one of the best couch games you can get. Plus, it's Free on Steam.

Victor Ran is an action RPG focused on gameplay rather than customisation. While class and character customisation is very limited, the gameplay requires skill and is intense. Cut scenes and character interaction are well co-ordinated with beautiful highly detailed  graphics. For those who like extra side content, a bestiary and journal can be found in the menus with plenty of extra lore on the game. Unlike more tactical RPGs like path of exile, the combat is engaging and fun, adding jumps, dodge rolls and plenty of abilities to spice up fights. Various weapons can be found which not only affect basic attacks, but also decide your abilities and passives as well, allowing many different play styles within a class. I personally like the slow, but hugely damaging and stunning attacks and abilities of the Warhammer, but faster weapons such as the rapier are available too. I would heartily recommend this game, but it would be a good idea to wait for a sale, during which it would n...

In this great indie game, many different genres are mixed together to make a stunning, intuitive game. The aim of the game is to get to the surface of a planet through a sci-fi dungeon. You make a team of a wide selection of characters at the start (You can find new ones as you progress) which you can level up to gain new skills and abilities. As you explore the dungeon you must build your economy in the dungeon rooms to get science for permanent upgrades, food for character progression, industry for making new buildings (such as economy buildings and defensive structures) and dust for powering rooms to stop monster spawns. This sounds a little complicated, but, with a great tutorial and intuitive controls, it's actually very simple. Once you have found the exit from a floor you must go back to the start of that floor and carry your energy crystal to the exit to power the lift to the next floor, while wave after wave of enemies come out of non-powered rooms to attack. Every time ...

Klei Entertainment's Don't Starve together is a stand alone expansion identical to the original Don't Starve but with multiplayer enabled. In this hard-core, extremely difficult survival game, you must fight insanity, monsters and starvation to try and survive on a deserted Island. This game is open world and contains a huge amount of content. The whole game is Han drawn which gives it a very nice look and feel to it. This game IS very hard, and unlike most survival games, you mainly just have to focus on surviving, rather than building up huge bases for P2P. You can play a variety of different characters each with their own pros and cons and special abilities, which allows each attempt to survive to be different from the last. With only up to 6 people in a game, this isn't really designed as an MMO. The game on Steam even comes with a free copy for a friend.

Although not exactly an indie game, I think this game needs tons more publicity. Everyone's tried a CCG before (Collectible Card Game), but have you played one where every card affects a chessboard like arena, where strategy is much more important than lucky card draws. This game is very similar to hearthstone, but with strategy and good thinking needed to win games and minimal luck. Every turn you can swap out cards from your hand so that it is easier to get your deck's (amazing no doubt) combos onto the board, so that you can destroy your enemies easily, and many mechanics such as taunt cards from hearthstone being implemented onto a turn based board intuitively. Overall, the only thing limiting this game is the number of cards available, but this will increase as time goes on.