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Our most anticipated indie games of 2021Horaszdóttir is the original Miss Independent
Horaszdóttir is the original Miss Independent
Oh thank goodness, reader. It is almost over. We feel the influence of the mighty Horaszdóttir receding. This is it: the last time this year that we must submit to her will, and receive her prophecy of the games yet to come. One last time for this winter, she draws turkeys from her eternal flock to auger the future from their innards. She comes closer, her breath hot and foul upon our ears, and whispers with a smile (oh! Her bloodstained teeth!) a final word: indie.
We are aware that Horaszdóttir may be simplistically squashing in a lot of disparate games and developers under one unhelpful banner with this one, but look, they wouldn’t fit easily into other categories, and frankly Horaszdóttir has a lot on her plate what with tending to a huge flock of angry birds.
Oddworld: Soulstorm
Oddworld: Soulstorm The Game Awards TrailerWatch on YouTube
Oddworld: Soulstorm The Game Awards Trailer
Ollie:It’s hard to overstate how excited I get when someone says “Oddworld”. Abe’s Oddysee and Abe’s Exoddus were my childhood. I am utterly incapable of looking at Oddworld: Soulstorm objectively. So just bear that in mind.
Wytchwood
As the witch (or possibly wytch) you’re up to various witchy deeds, which end up requiring you to solve lots of puzzles in the local area. You need the hair of the dog, but the dog in question belongs to a woodsman and is a bit rowdy, so to quiet it down you need a spell. Maybe the ingredients include feathers, so you’ll need a snare to catch a bird when it lands. And so on and so forth, in a fun little chain. I know, notionally, the witch is meant to be, I dunno, bad? But she seems pretty chill. I am Team Witch.
Eastward
Katharine:Eastward was on my big exciting games list last year, but alas, delays have pushed back its release yet again. Here’s hoping Pixpil’s sumptuous 16-bit era-style adventure game emerges again this year, because golly, I just want to soak in all those gorgeous pixel sprites until the end of time.
It’s a bit like Studio Ghibli meets The Legend Of Zelda, only here you’re playing a big shaggy, beardy bloke who fights with a frying pan instead of a pointy-eared elf chap with a big sword. The beardy bloke is a miner called John, who discovers a strange girl called Sam with magical powers in a secret underground facility. Together, they make their escape, and it looks like you’ll be spending a lot of your time traversing the game’s beautifully detailed environments as you search for answers about Sam’s past, as well as trying to stop an evil miasma from devouring what’s left of this handsome post-apocalypse. I cannot wait.
Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion
She Dreams Elsewhere
Alice Bee:That description is not all there is to She Dreams Elsewhere; it also looks great, too. Thalia has anxiety, and somehow wakes up in a sort of surreal, nightmare version of her waking world. The art, and limited colour palette, are absolutely striking - as is the deft writing describing Thalia’s experience and relationships with her friends. I didn’t entirely gel with the combat in the section of the demo that I played, but I’m keen to see if I can get to grips with it over the full game, especially because I want to see what happens to Thalia. Definitely one to watch.
SkateBird
James:In SkateBird, you’re a skateboarding bird. In tiny little environments you pull off sick kickflips and pop shuvits (leave me alone, I don’t skate), grinding on book spines and using staplers as ramps. Described as “a game about trying your best”, I’m intrigued to see how it manages this. It’s all well and good getting sick combos and mega points, but I’m far from a skate game veteran, so I’m hoping the birdies won’t punish me for my incompetence.
A Space For The Unbound
Katharine:I loved, loved,lovedthe chill slice-of-life vibes of A Space For The Unbound’s free prologue demo when I played it last year, and I’ve been quietly looking forward to it ever since. Set in rural Indonesia in the late 90s, this narrative-driven adventure game follows the story of a young boy named Atma and his young friend Nirmala. It’s classic coming of age stuff, with the added twist of Atma being able to ‘space-dive’ into the minds of others to find out exactly what makes them tick. That’s not the only supernatural thing Atma will have to face on his journey, though, as there’s also something more sinister at work that threatens to destroy the entire world. It looks like heavy stuff, but the good news is that there are plenty of pettable cats to nuzzle up with in between its big cosmic apocalypse moments, and that’s something I’m 100% here for. If that sounds like your kind of thing, you can trythe prologue for freeright now.
Backbone
Weird West
Colm:From the people who brought youPreyandDishonored, this action-RPG hangs its occult-soaked 10-gallon hat on immersive sim ideas. In this twisted, fantasticalRed Dead Redemption, you’re able to tackle objectives however you like, and characters will react to what you do. You can be the cowboy you want to be. And then the pigman. And then the werewolf.
It’s as simple as this: cowboys are cool, but cowboys in a stylish, contorted world full of monsters sounds even cooler. Fingers crossed WolfEye delivers.
