IndieSider - indie video game developers interviews

Warlock’s Tower is a 2D puzzle game with a retro Game Boy aesthetic. Tim the mailman must scale the wizard’s tower, but each step he takes costs him a hit point. Players must carefully plot their course through each room to overcome such obstacles as zombies, slimes, barriers, conveyor belts, and more. Warlock’s Tower is developed by Midipixel, a Brazilian studio consisting of Ygor Sp...

Induction is a time-bending puzzle game from Bryan Gale. A veteran of such AAA studios as Electronic Arts, Gale’s first indie game employs temporal mechanics to create time loops. The only way to pull levers and cross bridges is if a player can be in two places at once — as long as they don’t cause temporal anomalies. The geometric art style is complemented by a soundtrack from Tim Sh...

Owlboy is a 2D adventure-platformer — a Metroidvania — developed by D-Pad Studio and recently released for Windows. Otus, the main character, is the titular hero with the power of flight, but without the power of speech. Can he and his friends come together to save his besieged floating hometown? And can an indie game that’s been in development for nine years achieve success?

Beholder puts you in charge of an apartment building in a totalitarian state. As a public servant, you are tasked to spy on your tenants and report any suspicious activities or ideological subversions to the authorities… whatever the consequences. Will you do what’s best for your family? Or will you risk your life to save others?

Beholder is developed by...

Pankapu is a family-friendly episodic platformer. The land of Omnia is being invaded by Nightmares, so Iketomi, the god of dreams, creates Pankapu, an avatar charged with bringing hope back to the realm. Only by discovering the three Aegis — Bravery, Ardor, and Faith — will Pankapu master the abilities needed to access all of the land and save his friends.

Pan...

Four Sided Fantasy is a puzzle-platformer for Steam and PlayStation 4. As with most platformers, the screen scrolls side-to-side and up-and-down — but with the push of a button, players can toggle the scrolling and make the screen wrap, where one side connects to the opposite side. Using this power, players can navigate puzzles and access new areas through the game’s many seasons.

The Warlock of Firetop Mountain is a visual gamebook — a cross between choose your own adventure and tactical RPG. As your adventure in this classic dungeon crawler, you’ll be presented with paths and choices. The character you choose determines your narrative as you encounter orcs, goblins, dwarves, dragons, and more.

In this interview, I speak with Tin Man G...

Lifeless Planet is a narrative puzzle-platformer for Steam, Xbox One, and PlayStation 4. A astronaut has been sent to what’s supposed to be a verdant, unpopulated world — but his arrival reveals a barren wasteland populated by Cold War-era Russians. How did they get here, and what happened to the lush planet NASA had detected?

In this episode, I speak with Dav...

Stage of Development is a video documentary series featuring the human stories of Chicago’s indie game developers. Produced by Russ Pitts of Flying Saucer Media, Stage of Development goes behind the scenes with Bit Bash, Young Horses (Octodad: Dadliest Catch), William Chyr (Manifold Garden), Culture Shock Games (We Are Chicago), and The Men Who Wear Many Hats (Organ Trail: Director’s Cut; M...

Chime Sharp is a 2016 sequel to the 2010 puzzle game Chime. In this puzzle game, players rotate and place pentomino blocks onto an open grid, trying to form perfect quadrangles (squares and rectangles). As the the timer counts down, a beatline moves across the level, clearing completed quads and triggering musical tones that complement the techno soundtrack.

I spoke with ...

Perchang is an iOS puzzle game that’s been described as a cross between Lemmings, Marble Madness, and Lunar Lander. Manipulate moving parts in each level’s Rube Goldberg machine to get the marbles into their goals. Color-coded flippers, fans, magnets, and more are at your disposal — but all the red parts are activated together, as are all the blue parts. Group the parts by assigning t...

Lumo is an isometric puzzle-platformer in the style of Solstice, Equinox, or Head Over Heels. With modern design sensibilities, a fantastic design aesthetic, uncomplicated controls, a quirky sense of humor, and plenty of secrets and allusions, Lumo is a fun and original revival of a genre that’s lain fallow for nearly a decade. It’s the debut game from Triple Eh?, founded by Gareth Noyce, a...