Indie games have become more important than ever before, especially in the climate of game development that we are in because of COVID-19. While I enjoy big AAA titles or first party titles from Sony or Microsoft, indie games are where you will get more variety in gameplay, art style, and story. One of the best shows from E3 2021 and Summer Game Fest in June was Day of the Devs, which is run by Double Fine and iam8bit. It was a great showcase of an array of indie games. I decided to go back and re-watch this event to pick a few games talked about that stuck out to me. This is not me saying which games are better or a ranked list, but ones that jumped out with either a unique art style, interesting gameplay or just a vibe that spoke to me. Just like with movies, video games need independent developers to help push the medium in a different direction
Toem: A Photo Adventure (2021) - Something We Made
This game is the debut of developers “Something We Made”. It is a calm, peaceful looking adventure game where you are an amateur photographer in search of a natural phenomenon called Toem. To do this, you have to earn bus fare from town to town and help each place you visit along the way. This seems like such a relaxing game that will give a great creative outlet.
Garden Story (Summer 2021) - Picogram
If you wanted Stardew Valley with more Zelda: Link To The Past gameplay and action, then it seems that Garden Story might be for you. The game follows the story of a village guardian who is a Concord Grape. You will end up doing the random job around town, explore, and other RPG events.
Soup Pot (2021) - Chikon Club
Soup Pot has that same game/anime esthetic where the food in it will look better than I could ever do in real life. According to Chikon Club, players will have access to hundreds of different regional recipes. It seems like a very good chill and lo-fi game, where there are no fail states. It really seems to take the feeling of home cooking to heart.
Vokabulantis (TBA) - Wired Fly Stop Motion, Kong Orange, Morten Sondergaard This stuck out as probably the most unique thing shown, especially when they went into the process of the stop-motion they are doing. It is a game completely made with claymation with a 2D/3D esthetic. It is still far off from coming out, but with the hand made sets and use of scanning in the real-life models, it will be an interesting piece of art when it eventually does release.
The Wandering Village (Q4 2021 - Early Access) - Stray Fawn Studio
It is a city builder/sim game that takes place on the back of a big moving turtle. It seems to be a mixture of classic sim style gameplay with a little Last Guardian style relationship with a big animal sprinkled on top. The art style is very striking and the differences between the 2D hand-drawn on top of the turtle and the 3D world that the big turtle is in is a fantastic contrast of one another.
Death’s Door (July 20th, 2021) - Acid Nerve
The game that I am probably most excited to play that came out of Day of the Devs is Death’s Door. You play as crow who works as a grim reaper out to collect souls of monsters in a very Tim Burton like world. The combat gameplay seems very much like Supergiant’s Bastion. The art style and enemy designs seem incredibly inspired.
Loot River (TBA) - straka.studio From developer straka.studio, Loot River is a quickly paced action game, that seems like it has rouge-like elements to it. The most interesting thing from what they showed at Day of the Devs is the combat. Using the wooden bridges to split enemies up and traverse through the world, making the combat super open to what you want to do as a player. The visual element of the water and the physics that come along with it look incredible. There were tons of great independent games shown during Day of the Devs, but these few really stuck out at me. I also wanted to shoutout the production of Day of the Devs as a whole and if you want to watch the whole show Gamespot's Youtube video is linked below. If felt really well put together, with great graphics and had a relaxed identity. Games are something that should be fun and for us to be excited about, not to get angry about.
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