I'd love to give a shout-out to Broken Roads, an upcoming Australian indie RPG set in the post-apocalyptic Outback. There's a demo out on Steam and it looks fantastic, like a cross between Disco Elysium and Wasteland. I'm not affiliated with the project, I just want to bring some attention to the cool stuff my fellow Australian indie devs are working on.
I am very much hoping Shanti gets a different ending in the remake. I know it's a small thing, but she was the first person in the series I wanted to save actively...and also darn near the last. That world is full of some very nasty people.
@@SageofStars Same on both counts; that said, I'm not sure Spiderweb has the resources to do anything too drastic- then again, Geneforge doesn't seem too technically complex, so who knows?
Geneforge is the only media that really scratches the bio-thaumaturgy itch that Pirates of Darkwater instilled in me at a young age. Also Skald has some real Gold Box vibes.
Ah the tale of the 13 Jewels of Rule, and Ren, the Prince of Octopon, sent on a quest with a magic compass to find them...shame that series never finished.
@@molliethomas2585 It was one of those things that came out of a creative mind, with a lot of good plot hooks. Sadly, networks don't always like those, since they tend to appeal to a particular demographic.
Gold box games from SSI is an apt comparison for Skald. It also has graphical elements reminiscent of Ultima 5. An old school game for us old school gamers.
Great list as always! A game I really wanna put on your radar is Moonring, which has been released just a bit over a month ago. In a year with so many great RPGs, Moonring immediately jumped into my best of the year list. It is an old-school RPG, paying homage to Ultima IV, but it elegantly streamlines all the UI & control without losing depth. Also it's made by one of Fable's devs. And it's FREE, too!
I'm going to quickly correct you because I'm a pedantic know-it-all jerkwad: the expression is "put on your radar." Since radar is the detector, you'd want your suggestion to be picked up by it
Love that you’re giving attention to spiderweb software. I’ve had some of the most immersive fun exploring in Crystal Souls. You wouldn’t think it could be immersive from the graphical style but the overworld map is so much fun to explore. The writing isn’t bad either for such a small team!
Oh wow thank you so much for remembering Skald Mortim❤ I've followed your content for a long time so it's super fun to see you covering my own game :-)
Really hoping skald sticks with the 2023 release because the writing in that demo was some of the best shit ive ever experienced in my life, but if it takes longer im not gonna be too cut up. Game is gonna be fantastic.
Have you seen Lunacid? It just hit 1.0 on halloween and the solo dev of Lunacid was contracted to help with the combat of Dread Delusion! Its a pretty good game, I’m playing it myself right now and thoroughly enjoying it.
I didn't know we were so close to the Geneforge 2 remake release. This is the last 'stand alone' game of the set, as the final three games tell the narrative of the 'Great Eastern Rebellion'. They parse the factions down to just Shaper and Rebel, with the third game being the opening shots of the war, the fourth being the only game in the set to really put you in the shoes of a rebel from the start(Though like how you can go from shaper to rebel in the other games, you can go from rebel to shaper), and of course the fifth game is the epic finale. Mind, even with that, they feel complete in and of themselves, save maybe the fifth game, which hits the ground running expecting you to know what's going on from the start. Mind, they're also connected by two minor character. Greta and Alwan, an Agent and Guardian, two of the three 'base' Shaper classes you can recruit in the third game, and are major characters in games four and five, with Alwan in particular going from just starting out Shaper(Even if they're other classes everyone in the faction is a Shaper), to one of the Council Members over the course of the three games. Interestingly, the games have only 'stations of canon' endings, as you find the endings never quite match up with the next game entirely. Some of this is that the war is brutal, and things are simply not as directly connected, as your adventures all take place in certain areas, for as much as they affect things well beyond those. More interesting part? There's a good argument to be made that the 'canon' ending of game 3 is the game over screen, as some of the things you do in the end game would have had a big effect, but none of them seem to have happened.
No titles have stood out to me yet. I think my main focus will be catching up on my backlog. Who knows, maybe I'll finally 100% one of them. Onward to 300k. All glory to the algorithm.
Glad to see you covering skald! I ran into this game last year and played through the prologue and really liked what they did. Another similar game that you might like, Moonring. It was created solely by a single person, a veteran game designer who previously worked on fable. The game is a ultima style game with some really cool unique art. I'd love to hear what you think of it mortym!
I’m really excited for Skald, I found the writing very compelling. Also, you should check out the Devine Frequency demo. It’s an immersive-sim made in the Doom Engine.
Don't forget kingsvein, the newest game from the developer of voidspire tactics and horizon's gate, either coming out late this year or early next year
Not Indie RPGs but the two most hype rpgs for me are the remake of Star Ocean 2 that just released and the new Dragon Quest Monsters game releasing December 1st.
The Star Ocean remake looks really good! I haven't played a jrpg in forever, but I'll more than likely give that a spin down the road some time. Always enjoyed the Star Ocean games.
Haha, I was gonna say Geneforge looks just like Avadon: Black Fortress, but then you reveal it's the same developer. Avadon was great, might give that one a check.
Iron Oath is pretty fun, playing it now. Not as deep as Battle Brothers but it's still good fun if you enjoy mercenary band games. Already have all the others on my radar, just waiting for 1.0 releases.
This font, that so many games use, really bugs me. For example Last Train Home, Blood West in the inventory UI, Wartales is another recent example I can think of off the top of my head. What's the big deal, you might say. Well, of course it's not high on the list of priorities, but I think it plays an important part in making a ton of games look like they came out of the same (imaginary) "Make your own video game" app. It robs them of their character. Contrast this to Pathfinder, which is like diving inside of a pen and paper handbook. I know, the budgets. I'm just illustrating the point that even the fonts matter, and one can take more care in that area even on a small budget. And it's not like only some indie games suffer from this problem. Most major AAA games look like shit in that regard as well.
There's a random indie action rpg I stumbled on called Krystala, set to come out next year, but due to the tiny studio you never know. It's fantasy world, with the twist being that a khajiit-like people are the main race instead of humans.
Thanks for mentioning The Iron Oath, haven't heard about it before. I really wanted to give Wartales or Battle Brothers, but didn't because first one lacked real campaign and seconds looking weird. The Iron Oath looks great, has proper campaign - so it's going to the top of my wishlist!
The Iron Oath's "campaign" is very short but spread out to pad out game time. After the first few, clear objectives that you can actually complete, it becomes a set of triggered events, of which you have no clue what the triggers are (I suspect it's in-game time), with the objectives intentionally vague. For example, the game literally tells you to wait for a story character to do something, in-game months pass, a short conversation happens with said story character, then the game tells you to wait again. Or you're given an objective to strengthen your mercs, which is fine, but upon reaching the required levels you're again left waiting for the story to progress, months pass, 1 generic fight happens, then it tells you to wait again. Without this bullshit it feels like an 8 hour game, and most of it is repetitive grinding and dealing with mechanics that are designed to waste your time. On the good side the art is top-notch IMO as are the animations, the music is decent, the character/skill system isn't bad, the combat is on the shallow side but enjoyable enough. On the bad the towns/cities are all the same, enemy variety is lacking, dungeons are all the same, quest variety is lacking. It has potential but it severely lacks content.
I just bought a great turn based tactical rogue-lite, it's called Aetheris and the art is surreal, just so good, and I heard NOTHING of it, just found it searching on Steam.
Wizardry just got a release, sort of a remaster, but it is wayyyy over priced. Sands of Auroa is pretty cool, but still needs a few tweaks, fun action/rpg and urban Strife according to their last update in Aug is still set to releae by the end of the yr. Played the demo a while back and it was fun.
Man i loved Battlebrothers it s one of the few games i bought. (Kingmaker and Nwn 2 being a few of the others, haven t had money yet for WotR) but for me pixel art is a terrible turndown. I mean mechanics seem amazing and the feel of the game as well but i d have prefered badly hand drawn sprites to pixel art.
not a new game, came out in 2016. Bastard Bonds, tactic RPG with unique battle system, and very wide array of character creator all in pixel graphics. Play as a prisoner whether or not they are guilty of their own crime is up to you. After a questionaire you are given an ally one of many to help in its quite difficult combat recruiting more allies to your cause again if good, evil or neutral about it. On Steam for $11 usd, good amount of replay value and few endings too.
