What do we mean by Indie? We mean Independent, games that won't be appearing on your local GameStop's shelf anytime soon, but are still incredible in their own ways. Each and every one of these games is the result of a small team (sometimes just one person!) working at their craft until the finished product shines like gold.
- Flipflop aka Stephen Hmiel
If you want more, a good place to start is at the homepage for the annual Independent Games Festival, www.igf.com.
And if you want some more options go to arcadeprehacks.com to play pre-hacked games.
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Aquaria (Windows): http://www.bit-blot.com/aquaria/
Aquaria (Mac): http://www.ambrosiasw.com/games/aquaria/
Quite possibly Flipflop's favorite game of all time, Aquaria is a massive ocean world, teeming with life and filled with ancient secrets. Join Naija, a lone underwater dweller in search of her family, as she explores the depths of Aquaria. She'll travel from hidden caves, shrouded in darkness, to beautiful, sunlit oases, all lovingly handcrafted by its two creators. Winner of the grand prize in the 2007 IGF. Also available for Mac.
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World of Goo: (download at) http://2dboy.com/games.php
Winner of the overall grand prize at the 2008 IGF, World of Goo is a physics based puzzle / construction game. The millions of Goo Balls who live in the beautiful World of Goo don't know that they are in a game, or that they are extremely delicious. Available for PC, Mac, and Wii.
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Star Guard: (download at) http://vacuumflowers.com/star_guard/star_guard.html
Guide the spaceman through the castle and defeat the wizard. A nominee for Best Design at the 2010 IGF.
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You Have to Burn the Rope: http://www.youhavetoburntherope.net/
You have to burn the rope!
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Dreamside Maroon: (download at) http://sites.google.com/site/dreamsidemaroongame/Home
Dreamside Maroon is an exploration game that lets the player grow a vine to the moon. Along the way there are sights to see, lamps to light, and fireflies to collect. Experience freedom of movement and travel. Grow the vine in interesting shapes and colors. Nominee for the Student award at the 2010 IGF.
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Cave Story: (download at) http://www.miraigamer.net/cavestory/downloads_1.php
Cave Story, or Doukutsu Monogatari, is a Japanese freeware PC side-scrolling platformer game developed by Studio Pixel. The game was designed over the course of five years BY A SINGLE PERSON, and while it has never won an official award, it is still recognized as a pinnacle of design.
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Auditorium: http://www.playauditorium.com/
Auditorium is about the process of discovery and play. There are no right or wrong answers; there are many ways to solve every puzzle. To get started, turn up your sound and fill up the first audio container! We hope you enjoy playing in our Auditorium!
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Fractal: http://www.playfractal.com/
At the surface, it is a mere puzzle game, but as you dig deeper, untold dimensions of expression unfold. Intuitive but complex, challenging but not harsh, Fractal is a truly engaging experience.
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Continuity: http://continuitygame.com/
Continuity is a flash platform/puzzle game. Players must navigate mazes by controlling the character and the structure of the world itself. The game features 32 levels with varying difficulty.
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Closure: http://closuregame.com/closure.php
Closure is a puzzle platformer in which the parts of the world in blackness don't exist physically. Everything in light exists and everything in darkness is the void. You can carry around orbs of light which both brighten the world, and define it.
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Machinarium: http://machinarium.net/demo/
Machinarium is award-winning independent puzzle / adventure game developed by the makers of popular web-games Samorost and Samorost2. A little robot who's been thrown out to the scrap yard behind the city must return and confront the Black Cap Brotherhood and save his robot-girl friend.
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Daniel Benmergui 3-Pack:
Today I Die: http://ludomancy.com/games/today.html
I Wish I Were the Moon: http://www.kongregate.com/games/danielben/i-wish-i-were-the-moon
Storyteller: http://www.ludomancy.com/games/StoryTeller.html
Three very short, very interesting examples of storytelling in games.
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Beat Boost: http://seanmonahan.org/beatboost/
From a contest for games based on chiptune-style music, Beat Boost is about jumping into the right color fields--and perform front flips--without hitting the floor. Result: high scores. Each level is a visual representation of the track being played.
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Audiosurf: http://audio-surf.com/
Audiosurf is a music-adapting puzzle racer where you use your own music to create your own experience. The shape, the speed, and the mood of each ride is determined by the song you choose. Winner of several awards at the IGF.
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Portal, the Flash version: http://portal.wecreatestuff.com/
This game started as a Flash project by Hen Mazolski and Ido Tal, back when Valve first announced their exciting new game. They just couldn't wait to play the game, and decided to make their own version of it as a side project. Little did we know, it turned out to be a very fun game to play even in 2D, and they decided to send it out to the world. This is the result.
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I Want to Be the Guy: http://kayin.pyoko.org/iwbtg/downloads.php
I Wanna Be The Guy: The Movie: The Game is a sardonic loveletter to the halcyon days of early American videogaming, packaged as a nail-rippingly difficult platform adventure. Players fill the role of The Kid, a youthful, vaguely Megaman-esque protagonist on a quest to become The Guy. This inscrutable plot, however, is just a vehicle for a wide variety of inventive, well-designed and frustrating jump-and-shoot challenges that pay homage to many of the games you loved as a child. The ever-fragile Kid explodes in a shower of red pixels at the slightest brush from the game's many obstacles, from traditional spikes and bottomless pits to more unconventional killers, such as plantlife and puzzle pieces.
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N: http://www.addictinggames.com/ngame.html
Golden cubes await capture as you guide your ninja-like icon through treacherous territory. Watch out for mines, lasers, and heat-seeking missiles!
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Cortex Command: http://www.datarealms.com/games.php
In Cortex Command, you play as a prospector and explorer in a time where complete cybernetics and whole-body amputations are common practice. Your severed brain is able to control many different types of bodies remotely from its underground bunker: clones, robots, spaceships, defensive turrets, and so on.
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Don't Look Back: http://www.kongregate.com/games/TerryCavanagh/dont-look-back
"Don't Look Back" is a challenging action-platformer in a minimalist style.
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Flow: http://intihuatani.usc.edu/cloud/flowing/
Flow involves guiding various creatures in a watery environment. The player is tasked with helping their creature eat, fight other creatures for food and dominance, evolve, and ultimately reach the bottom of the sea by eating a micro-organism that causes the creature to "dive deeper". Each type of creature behaves a bit differently and is endowed with a special ability (for example, the ability to boost their speed).
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Bubble Tanks: http://armorgames.com/play/58/bubble-tanks
You are a bubble tank fighting other bubble tanks and collecting bubbles, all within an even larger bubblefield. Nothing but clean, wholesome, bubble fun.
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Levelup: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/519030
A similar game to Cave Story, at the end of each day you lose all of your experience. However, you keep all of your powerups, so you are still able to storm through this pixel-art challenge.
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Shift: http://armorgames.com/play/751/shift
Is the floor the roof? Is the roof the floor? And whats with that in game timer?
Find the answers to all the above questions and more in this original puzzle platformer!
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Special thanks to Stephen and Asher (aka Flipflop and Shade) from iD Tech Lake Forest
