10 great indie games to check out!

So, the Steam Next Fest this February was pretty stellar. I got to play a bunch of demos and I really had a blast with a plethora of them… but then I didn’t have time to actually write about it… or rather, I wrote about it but wasn’t too happy yet, so I worked some more on it, and then spent a lot of time studying for university exams, and now, we’re here!

Today I wanna talk about said plethora of demos that really made my day when I first played them, or at least ten of those because I would never end up publishing anything if I talked about all the amazing games coming out this year… I gotta limit myself to my top 10, I guess, and then maybe I’ll write some more about others soon.

Anyhow, here are my highlights!

BeatSlayer

What do you get if you take Hades and mash it together with rhythm-based gameplay, a dystopian setting, and lots and lots of robots? Well, apparently, you get something incredibly fun and challenging like BeatSlayer by ByteRockers’ Games.

Set in a dystopian 90s-inspired post-wall Berlin, a villain named Dietrich has manipulated the populace to become mindless drones. Now, it’s upon you to step into the shoes of the crafty tinkerer and badass music lover Mia to not just defeat Dietrich but also free your brother Toni from Dietrich’s clutches!

To do that, you battle hordes of robots using your trusty axe (and many other weapons in the full release), hacking and slashing at those literal metalheads in tune with the beat.

Staying on the beat is incredibly important as it amplifies your damage and can grant you various bonuses depending on your build.

But if you’re bad at that type of thing, fear not, for the game is plenty challenging even with the rhythm-assist mode enabled which essentially removes the rhythm-based component. Other than that, the game also features a metronome and light cues in case you want to play the intended way but in a more accessible manner.

With all that said, where BeatSlayer truly shines is the fluidity of the combat and the way that the real-time action is weaved into the rhythm-based nature of the game.

Chaining a well-timed dash into a kick to slam enemies into other enemies, stunning them in the process, to then unleash a variety of slashes onto them, all in sync with the beat, feels really, really, really nice.

I had an amazing time with this demo. I love the combat a lot. I love how you can find bonus effects for your different attacks that synergize pretty well with each other, and I adore the cast of characters that give you little bits and pieces of lore in between runs.

BeatSlayer is set to release on April 4th this year, so definitely wishlist it right now if you’re a fan of action-roguelikes!

Arco

Arco has been on my radar for ages now, so I was chuffed to bits to see that the game got a demo on Steam this time around. It’s an amazing title by Franek, Fayer, Bibiki and Max Cahill.

Back to the game, though, Arco is an incredibly interesting take on turn-based combat with simultaneous turns playing out and you have to anticipate enemy actions as you play out your moves, magic, attacks, dodges and abilities!

Enter the breathtakingly beautiful world of Arco where your decisions shape the story. Said story revolves around characters from various tribes that find a common enemy in the Red Company gang who are killing the land and its people.

As you embark on your journey, you explore lush forests, sweeping plains, and scorching deserts, head into dungeons, make deals with demons, forge friendships… and you can even go fishing!

The simultaneous turn-based combat system is incredibly diverse, in my opinion, and I find it to be simple to pick up but hard to master. There is beauty in finding the right time to aim your shot and snipe your enemy, pick up ammo, and do it again all over.

But the game doesn’t just give you the time of day to plan out your next moves and as such, it throws in ghosts and otherworldy beings that come at you even in the planning stages.

The sound design, art, and gameplay, the environmental storytelling and the world that combines fantasy and Western-esque tropes and environments… I fell in love with it, and I highly recommend checking out the game for yourself. It’s set to release at some point this year, and I’m incredibly excited!

Balatro

If I were to talk about how much time I spent playing each demo, I would carefully omit my six hours of Balatro game time. Look, I don’t have a problem. I can quit at any time… but I keep coming back to Balatro.

PlayThunk’s Balatro is a poker-based roguelike deck builder where you utilize illegal poker hands, game-changing jokers, all sorts of celestial and tarot cards, and other fascinating mechanics to beat the stakes that are stacked against you.

Before I played Balatro, I didn’t know a thing about Poker but by checking out the “Run Info” panel at any time during the run, you can familiarize yourself with the types of hands there are, from Flushes and Straights to different pairs, a Full House and even Flush Straights or Straight Flushes or whatever they called.

As you may be able to tell, I still don’t know a thing about Poker – but I do know a lot about Balatro, which is all that matters. Don’t let it scare you. It’s pretty easy to learn and hard to master and the way the game communicates hands before you play them is incredibly beginner-friendly and accessible.

Either way, you set out on a run to beat Balatro and you’re offered different binds that can be played to earn cash – or you can skip them for interesting rewards. The choice is all yours!

By saving up, you can accumulate interest on your cash to then spend in shops after each played Blind… and you’ll want to spend a bunch here because the game-changing Jokers will definitely help you out in your runs.

From adding multipliers to specific hands, suits or ranks to triggering increased chip amounts based on varying conditions or even generating further value based on Jokers that feed on other Jokers or ones that modify your hand directly or indirectly, Balatro has a lot to offer in terms of roguelike variety and incredibly mindboggling combos and synergies.

I love this game and you should definitely check out the full release right now. Yup, it’s already out. And yes, I’ve been playing a lot of it already.

Emberward

ReficGames’ Emberward is yet another roguelike-deckbuilder but it has a really interesting twist to it: It’s a tower defense game!

I love those, honestly, and I always did, so I just had to check out the demo for Emberward! I’m a fan, frankly, of that combination.

Emberward does something interesting with the TD genre where you place down Tetris-like blocks to elongate and change the path enemies take. Before each wave, you draw a set of cards with said blocks that you can then put your towers on top of.

Aside from that, the game features a variety of towers, each with different stats, costs and elemental affinities. Some stun enemies or apply a damage over time effect whereas others will slow enemies or just deal a lot of damage.

Before each run, you can choose one of three starting sets, and as you continue, you collect different towers, and relics that further change your run, and you select paths to take towards big boss battles!

These bosses look really interesting to me. Not only does the game throw fast, tanky or special enemies, some of which can disable towers or split into more enemies upon death, at you but it also has these behemoths at the end of each stage that will slowly but surely move towards your fire source – your nexus so to speak.

As such, it’s upon you to find cool synergies, make smart choices and really plan ahead when it comes to placing blocks and figuring out the best placement for your turrets. I can’t wait to play the full release once Emberward comes out in Q2 of 2024!

Lightyear Frontier

Taking a break from roguelikes, I wanted to embark on something more chill and comfortable – and I really found something great here in the form of Frame Break’s and Amplifier Studios’ Lightyear Frontier.

This one is a peaceful open-world farming adventure set on a planet on the far edge of the galaxy! The most interesting part about it, perhaps, is the fact that you pilot a mech with up to three other friends, farming alien crops, building up your homestead, decorating the lands and exploring the untamed wilderness of the world.

The initial impressions I had with the game were that it’s incredibly beautiful. You land in a dark and lush forest venturing out to finally catch a glimpse of this game’s beauty as you make your way towards your trusty mech that is just waiting for you to reassemble it.

Using this mech, you can mine resources, chop wood, gather materials… and then you can use those materials to build a barn, some fields and a plethora of appliances that help you craft advanced resources.

My personal highlight though was the way that the gameplay handles you as a player and as a mech pilot. Inside the mech, you truly get immersed as you peek out of the cockpit and go at your different tasks, from watering crops to building up structures.

But as a player, you’re also smaller and when your mech cannot go any further, you can step out of it and head into all those nooks and crannies that are too tight for your robotic suit… and you are rewarded with resources and alien artefacts just waiting for you to scan them.

Aside from that, though, I really enjoyed exploring the world, feeding the local fauna, and decorating the world with fences, flowers, trees, hedges, and all the flamboyant stuff I need in a game like this.

Lightyear Frontier is set to release in Early Access on March 19th this year! Definitely keep an eye out for this one!

Realm of Ink

Leap Studio’s and Maple Leaf Studio’s ink-style action roguelite, Realm of Ink, is coming soon to Steam and I frankly can’t wait much longer for it to release.

This one is an incredibly beautiful roguelike game where you try to break free from a “destiny” within the world of a book that dictates your every move. Rather than doing as the narrator says and killing the fox demon you’re pursuing, you forge your own path and head forward, unveiling the truth of your existence and challenging the constraints of fate.

With the beautifully crafted stages with the inky art direction this one already caught my eye… and with its fast-paced and action-heavy combat where you sling spells and weave heavy and light attacks into your combos, Realm of Ink captured my heart.

The game itself plays really, really well. I felt reminded of Hades (again) but the title takes a very different approach to power-ups and upgrades in that you are accompanied by a pet.

This pet takes a different shape once you acquire gems throughout your run and based on the elements of those gems, the pet gains passive and active abilities that you can use in combat.

One such combination allowed me to unleash a powerful wave, dealing increased damage based on how many cursed enemies I’ve killed using spells… and my attacks would apply said curses in a quick manner, weakening them in the process. I really had a blast with that run in particular.

More than that, there are also various relics you can find to improve your build further, difficult bosses with multiple stages, and bits and pieces of lore to piece together as you talk to NPCs and eat good food.

Roguelike fans are eating well this year with so many interesting titles coming out, and since there is no release date just yet, I’d highly recommend giving this one a wishlist and trying out the demo for yourself!

Trash of the Titans

From Thayer and Back Again comes Trash of the Titans, a turn-based fantasy tactics game with trash animals that are incredibly adorable and require your command to protect their valuable trash against those pesky rats.

Defend trash from those invaders, eat it to upgrade your team, and think your way through the various turn-based tactical RPG levels that really felt challenging, even to me, despite my great experiences in the genre.

I really felt reminded of Final Fantasy Tactics with this one – and I love that game, so that’s a big plus in my book.

You command a band of four very diverse characters: A racoon, a badger, a possum and a skunk. These each have a class that lets them wield powerful abilities, interesting passives and very fantasy-like attacks that tie in oddly well with the “East vs West” side dialogues.

I had to chuckle when I got reminded of West Side Story during my time with the demo. I’m not even sure why but the opening dialogue invoked those memories inside me.

We don’t have the Jets or the Sharks here… but we do have a rather tanky badger that can knock enemies away while our racoon snipes enemies from afar and our possum will pick off whoever doesn’t make it. Personally, I then would also use our skunk mage as support for either more powerful attacks or for the sake of support, providing poison clouds and shields.

I’ve really enjoyed my time with this demo and I can’t wait for it to come out soon this year! The demo is still available. It has roguelike elements, too, meaning there is a lot of replayability, and it’s just a very cute but surprisingly deep game for any strategy lovers out there!

Helskate

Look, I never was good at Tony Hawk when I was younger… but I played a lot of it a fair while ago on the original XBOX, and it was amazing. I had no clue how it worked but just skating around and crashing my character into a wall was pure joy for young Magi.

With all that stuff said, Phantom Coast’s Helskate is a skateboarding action roguelite.

Grind, perform tricks, and chain combos to power up your attacks to slay the monsters of Vertheim. Combine unique weapons and gear to suit your playstyle as you fight, die, and upgrade your abilities to come back to this labyrinth over and over again!

So, at its core, this is a skating game. The whole areas, all the levels, the whole world and even enemies are created in a very Tony Hawk-like manner… and that’s really cool. It feels really refreshing to see a modern skating game that doesn’t just copy and paste the formula. Helskate innovates!

It keeps classics like wild combos, manuals, grinding, kickflips and melons… but then you also have to fight and watch out for enemies and complete completely optional and very specific challenge trials but ever-so-rewarding.

On top of that, you have a great punk soundtrack, fantastical enemy designs, combat that ties in with the skating, and just a lot of fun.

So, if you’re a fan of skating games (I liked Tony Hawk a lot but loved Jet Set Radio more, personally, and I liked this title, so do with that what you will), go check out Helskate, it’s really unique and incredibly challenging.

It just released the other day, so you can play it right away if you fancy a very stylish roguelike!

Never Grave: The Witch and the Curse

Pocket Pair has been on a roll this year with their announcement of Craftopia leaving Early Access (probably), Palworld racking up huge numbers, their other game hopefully not existing eventually, and a new roguelike game coming out… NeverGrave is that new roguelike.

As you may be able to tell, I’m a fan of roguelikes, and NeverGrave felt really fun to play.

Here, you take control of a hat that possesses a witch’s corpse to find a way through a dungeon, I think? The story kinda eluded me, to be honest, but something happened and now we do the roguelike stuff in a procedurally generated dungeon, and when we die, we go to the surface where we rebuild a village.

Yes, this is a Roguelike with village reconstruction mechanics… and a possession mechanic… it’s sort of a platformer… and it felt in a lot of ways like Dead Cells. Not to mention that the colour palette seemed similar to Hollow Knight’s but that’s just the colours, I guess.

But taking inspiration is fine in this case. It’s a different game entirely. At times, I felt a little reminded of Dead Cells but only in good ways.

Combat itself is melee-focused with a magic system that functions based on mana that you recover via melee hits. Aside from that, there are stats you can improve, grimoires you can find (that create a build for you in this specific run), and some enemies can have useful combat abilities for you, too.

More than anything, I had fun with this game in a more chill manner compared to other titles in the genre but it didn’t bore me or anything. I’m pretty excited about this release, although I do hope that the translation gets worked on a bit more.

The game is set to release in Early Access in Q1 of 2024 but you can still play the demo on Steam right now if you’re interested!

Children of the Sun

Last but not least, this February featured also Children of the Sun, a title published by Devolver Digital and developed by René Rother. In this game, you’re on a deadly road trip into the darkness where you control a single bullet’s path and unleash a fury of vengeance on the sinister cult that ruined your life.

Children of the Sun could best be described as a puzzle-shooter. Take a little bit of SUPERHOT and a little bit of Sniper Elite and then mash it very closely into a very artsy and complex soup… and then you’re cooking. Really good. You’ll probably eat well, too.

Step into the shoes of a psychic with telekinetic powers and take revenge on a cult that hunts your “kind” for mysterious reasons. All you need is one bullet… In fact, you only have one shot at all of this, so do your best.

Children of the Sun lets you scout out all the enemies and then you shoot the bullet at said enemies. Once you hit them, you can then use your powers to redirect the shot and hit another enemy… and another… and another… and so on.

Later, you can also influence the path of the bullet mid-flight or if you have charged a special ability by hitting specific spots on different enemies, you can even briefly take control of your bullet in a much more free manner… It’s very deep, honestly!

I’ve had a blast trying to scout all the objects I can shoot, like gas tanks, ahead of time to then find a way to get around rocks blocking my bullet’s line of sight. One level had me dumbfounded for a good while until I realised that I had to hit the targets in a completely different order to achieve what I intended to achieve.

But once you complete a level, the fun doesn’t just end there. Similarly to Neon White, you’ll compete against the whole world in an attempt to find the fastest and most efficient route through the level. There are lots of time skips and possibilities and oh no, my head hurts.

I was seriously impressed with this title. I felt reminded of SUPERHOT and Sniper Elite and Deadbolt, some incredibly great games… and I’d urge you to play the demo yourself while it’s still available! You’re doing Steam wrong if you don’t do that right now.

Also, btw, on a completely unrelated note, I really wanted to link the Children of the Sun reveal trailer here because it looks glorious – and it also has amazing music… More specifically, “Where Did You Sleep Last Night” which was performed by Sleigh Bells. But then I figured it’d be weird to not have trailers for all the other games, so there we go. Lots of trailers!

It feels good to write about games again and I hope you enjoyed this highlights-post for the Steam Next Fest February 2024. There were lots of devs that reached out to me this time around and I got really overwhelmed, not to mention that we’re in the middle of exam season over here, and I’m just one person, ya know?

But hey, better late than never! The post is out. Hope I can get back into the groove this way.

This post was originally written by Dan Dicere from Indiecator.

If you see this article anywhere other than Indiecator.org then this article has been scraped. Please let me know about this via E-Mail.