Indie Game Bucket List

Race down a track generated from your own MP3s; 2008's Steam surprise.

Lay hexagonal tiles into a landscape; the cosiest strategy game.

A scientist wakes on an alien world; one man's Metroid.

Wario Land at 200 miles an hour, drawn like a 1990s cartoon; the 2023 indie.

Four panels you rearrange like a comic to tell a story; one artist, seven years.

Every pixel simulated and wands that can be edited; the roguelike that kills you with your own spell.

Push the rules around to change what wins; the purest puzzle game.

Dark Souls in 2D on an island; Ska Studios.

Poker hands as a roguelike deck-builder with jokers; the 2024 indie that ate everyone's time.

A colony sim where the AI storyteller sends raids and a plague of squirrels; the story generator.

A luchador Metroidvania in a Day of the Dead Mexico; DrinkBox.

Walk, survive thirty minutes, watch the screen fill with numbers; the three-dollar phenomenon.

Four archers, one arrow each; the best local multiplayer game of its decade.

A Metroidvania of Andalusian Catholic horror; the Penitent One.

Place cards on a loop your hero walks automatically; Four Quarters' retro roguelike.

One-hit kills, slow motion and a samurai on drugs; Askiisoft's neon.

A 3D roguelike where the difficulty rises with the clock; four-player chaos.

An arcade cabinet programmed by the devil; the meta-game before Inscryption.

Fencing tug-of-war in pixels; one hit, one death, run for the worm.

A dating sim that is not a dating sim; the free horror that fooled everyone.

Ron Gilbert's return to the pixel point-and-click, with two agents and a murder.

A blob in a labyrinth of secrets within secrets; the 2024 Metroidvania of hidden layers.

The deepest simulation in games, now with graphics; losing is fun.

A card game in a cabin with a man you cannot see, and then the game changes; Daniel Mullins.

A robot solves puzzles in Greek ruins while a voice asks what it is; Croteam's philosophy.

Perspective is size: a small chess piece becomes a giant when you walk back.

A corporate explorer on a sarcastic alien world; Typhoon's comedy Metroid.

A bird climbs a mountain to get phone signal; ninety minutes of kindness.

A boy in a dream world and a truth in the real one; the RPG Maker horror that became a cult.

Run a cult by day and a roguelike dungeon by night; cute and sinister.