The Best Upcoming Indie Games of 2026
It’s refreshing to be able to create a list of the most anticipated indie games and not have to include Silksong, because it finally came out. However, Team Cherry have already stated in an interview with Bloomberg that they have big ideas and we know that the big ideas with Hollow Knight became Silksong
“We’ve got a plan. Admittedly, some of the plans for that stuff are kind of ambitious as well, but hopefully we can achieve some of it”
However, the Silksong sequel or DLC isn’t real just yet, so for now let’s take a look at the “Top 26 Most Anticipated Indie Games of 2026”.
Top 26 Most Anticipated Indie Games of 2026
Before going into the list, it’s important to discuss some caveats or set some rules. To begin with, the term indie casts a very large net, as it could refer to one person or it could refer to a studio that is around 100 people, but aren't owned by any parent company. Our personal favourite type of indie is what we would call the premium indie title or as it’s recently been coined, the TRIPLE I.
To the best of our knowledge, all of the games on this list will be created by studios that are technically independent. However, a lot of these games have secured publishing deals, which doesn’t make the studio or game any less independent. It just means that the studio was able to secure funding to keep people employed, complete development and hopefully get to continue doing what they love.
This list is being created during summer of 2025, which means that there is a lot of the year left and a lot of uncertainty. We tried to rank them in order, but this is only based on current information as dates are subject to change as some of these games might still come out in 2025 and a few are likely to slip into 2027.
Here some quick fun stats about this list. It features five Metroidvanias, but three of them are very untraditional. One survival game, two cozy looking life sims, which is unusual for us, but they both have dark secrets lurking underneath. One Deckbuilder that should appeal to people who don’t like the genre. Two games that are described as souls-likes, but both have unique twists on the genre. Two Hazelight inspired pure co-op adventures. One first person shooter. One game with zombies. One tactical turn based RPG. One game completely made by hand in the real world first. At least six games with horror elements or darker themes. Two games that have done successful kickstarters. Most importantly this list features 25 original IP and only one sequel, which highlights the power and creativity of Indies, no matter how you classify it.
With all that out of the way, let’s take a look at our Top 26 Most Anticipated Indie Games of 2026 starting with #26.
The LIST OF INDIE GAMES YOU NEED TO PLAY IN 2026
#26 - TIDES OF TOMORROW
I might not be interested in Tides of Tomorrow for the reasons that the developers probably want. The extremely unique aspect of Tides of Tomorrow is that it uses an asynchronous multiplayer system that takes the gameplay from a friend or a streamer to shape your experience. However, for those who don’t want to wait for a friend to finish or follow a streamer, there is also an offline mode that takes a couple different custom developer play-throughs to provide you with the same experience.
How the system works is that at pivotal moments in the story, you get to see what the person before you did and how it played out, which can help give you an edge, as you could possibly learn that someone is lying or is dangerous.
While this concept sounds really interesting, I am equally as interested in the plot of Tides of Tomorrow. There has been a great flood and now the planet is basically Water World, which is a concept that i’m surpised hasn’t been done already. In addition to that, with all of the plastic in the ocean that is a real world problem, people have become ill with plastemia and are in now in search of a cure before it’s too late.
I also love the vibrancy and Unqiue art direction for Tides of Tomorrow, which is being developed by Digixart, who made the critically acclaimed Road 96 in 2021, which was lauded for its interactive story elements, which it sounds like the studio will double down on for Tides of Tomorrow.
#25- LONG GONE
The best zombie games are the ones that aren’t actually about zombies. That’s why Long Gone is the most interesting and best looking game about zombies since The Last of Us because, it really isn’t about the zombies, it’s about the stories within this world. Long Gone doesn’t even feature combat, instead each zombie encounter is a puzzle where you need to utilize the environment around you.
You take on the role of a survivor, who has gotten separated from his group and finds himself in this village where his goal is to find batteries for his walkie-talkie to get back in touch with the rest of the team. In between these zombie puzzles, you will progress through the linear story driven adventure where you will try to uncover the truth by piecing things together from the items people left behind. Long Gone is inspired by The Last of Us, Gone Home and Another World.
Hillfort Games are documenting the entire journey on YouTube, Twitch and Patreon and if you watch any of the Devlogs, you will see how passionate, talented and vulnerable Vin, the solo developer is. If just a fraction of this gets transferred to the final product, Long Gone will be an absolute treat. Part of the journey was trying to find some funding or a publisher and in the summer of 2025, Outersloth was announced as the publishing partner for Long Gone. Outersloth is the company that Innersloth started after the insane success of Among Us, which has been leveraged to help other smaller indie devs.
#24 - PVKK
In PVKK, you are in charge of a giant planetary defence cannon, in what feels like a natural evolution of Missile Command from 1980. On a day to day basis, you remain in your cozy bunker and handle the satisfying minutiae of flipping switches, pushing buttons, rotating dials and pulling levers to fend off the planet from invasion.
This concept alone would be enough for a decent game, but it’s everything else that has me intrigued. In between missions you maintain and improve your living quarters, which are adjacent to the command center. Adding complexity and layers to the gameplay is the fact that you are in the middle of an autocratic regime and your choices will carry weight. You will slowly unravel the what’s really going on and discover puzzles around the bunker that will lead you to the truth.
PVKK is being developed by the team behind the critically acclaimed Dome Keeper. It’s also being published by Kepler Interactive, who have been quietly building up a fantastic publishing resume with titles like Sifu, Windblown, Bionic Bay and the recently released Clair Obscur Expedition 33. This all bodes well for the likelihood that PVKK will be another feather in the cap of Kepler.
#23 - AT FATE’S END
Thunder Lotus Games is a small studio from Montreal that came from small beginnings in 2014 when the studio launched a kickstarter to fund their first game, Jotun. The campaign was able to raise over 64k, which was beyond the expectations of the studio. Jotun would go on to sell over a million copies. The studio would continue to leverage the success of one title to the next moving from Sundered, which reached it’s kickstarter goal in the first day, Spiritfarer, which secured a publishing deal with Kowloon Nights and put the studio on the map after the immense critical success with nominations at many different awards and solid commercial success with sales of over a million on this title as well.
At Fate’s End is taking what the studio learned from Spiritfarer with its rich emotional narrative blended with gameplay and trying to build upon that in new ways. The result is a more action forward game with an equally intense story about how family falls apart and how they can get back together. Unlike 33 Immortals, which is in parallel development and is very multiplayer focused, At Fate’s End will see Thunder Lotus return to a purely single player experience.
At Fate’s End began development right after Spiritfarer ended. At Fate’s End is a 2D action adventure where your skill tree is your family tree. Each sibling you defeat or reconcile with will greatly affect your experience. Collect Seven Swords of power that will expand your arsenal of abilities, but words are just as important in battle At Fate’s End features tactical dialogue, as well as narrative puzzles for you to solve.
33 Immortals is a really fun game with plenty of unique ideas, but for most people At Fate’s End will be the return to form for Thunder Lotus that they are looking for.
#22 - DEATH HOWL
When the term soulslike comes to mind you think of dark and oppressive worlds that are full of death and decay, an isolated protagonist tremendous odds as they push forward on their quest facing grotesque and ungodly creatures. In terms of mechanics, there’s the combat that requires patience, a bonfire system to restore health, but also for enemies to respawn. There are souls that can be lost, but also play an integral role in the ability to upgrade the protagonist. This allows you to even the odds with enough determination.
With the exception of real time combat, Death Howl tweaks a few things to fit these into deck-builder. Instead of using souls to augment your strength or intellect, you craft new cards from many different categories. You could also argue that in place of stamina, Death Howl gives you action points in battle to use your wits and decide when to attack and when to defend as patience and timing is a crucial element of the genre.
In Death Howl, you play as a mother who, after a ritual has been transported to the spirit realm in a desperate search of her recently deceased son. Exploration takes place from an almost iso-metric perspective with Diablo style controls as you click where you want to move, but the combat takes place on a grid with a turn based system that requires a tactical approach. The world is deeply atmopspheric, the art style has a beautiful minimalist approach, the score is haunting, the gameplay is challenging and the UI is intuitive.
Combining the terms deck-building and souls-like seems like a stretch, but after playing Death Howl, it makes perfect sense and feels wholly unique. The demo does an incredible job of establishing the universe, gives a feel for the majority of the mechanics, and teases what lies ahead including the many biomes that await you in this journey through the spirit realm.
#21- TENJUTSU
Deepnight games only have one title on their portfolio and it’s a short 2D game about firefighting your way into a mysterious government facility to uncover what lies behind this inferno and you also had to rescue cats. It began in a game jam, was created in 48 hours and was designed with the creators three year old son in mind who loves firefighters. The game is only a few bucks, only takes a handful of hours and I highly recommend playing Nuclear Blaze if you haven’t yet.
But why should you be excited for their follow up Tenjutsu? To put it simply, Deepnight Games is Sebastien Benard, who just happens to be the creator of Dead Cells, who eventually left Motion Twin to start his own studio. Nuclear Blaze had the incredible game feel that Dead Cells had, which was the litmus test that proved how talented Benard was. It is obvious that game feel is his specialty.
Clearly Benard loves the pressure of Game Jams and the creativity that comes from creating something within limits.
On his sophomore game at Deepnight Games, Benard changes perspective and puts the player into the shoes of a Yakuza looking for revenge. As you dismantle the Yakuza, you also loosen its grip on the city, which breathes new life with shops and restaurants popping up. This will add hidden shortcuts to future runs and will also allow you to unlock new weapons, and moves. Clearly, I wasn’t the only one who played Nuclear Blaze as Devolver Digital snagged publishing rights Tenjutsu, which bodes well.
TOP 20 INDIE GAMES OF 2026
#20 - BLIGHTED
If Drinkbox Studios, the team behind Guacamelee and Nobody Saves the World are making a new game, it will immediately get my attention, but this is especially true if they are returning to the metroidvania genre with a new perspective and fresh ideas. The Toronto based studio is known for their quirky ideas and Blighted is no different.
The premise revolves around an ancient culture that would bury their dead with seeds in their brains because they had great knowledge, which would then grow into a tree that would bear fruit and the knowledge would be passed from generation to generation to those that eat the fruit from the tree. I haven’t even gotten to the weird part yet. The evil Sorcisto decided that he would cut out the middle man and just go straight to eating the brains of the living making him the most powerful and robbing everyone else of knowledge. To somehow make matters worse, Sorcisto has also infected the world with a deadly blight.
However, one of the most interesting aspects of Blighted is that you can either choose to embrace the blight, which makes you more powerful, but also increases the challenge. It also has this psychedelic, western aesthetic, but still rooted in a Drinkbox style. The game will be available in solo or co-op and I was fortunate enough to play with the devs at Summer Game Fest in local co-op and it was an absolute blast.
#19 - GRAVE SEASONS
Recent Nintendo Directs and Indie Showcases are overflowing with farming sims or cozy games after the wild success of games like Stardew Valley proved that there is a huge market for this genre, and that it can also be approached by smaller indie devs. I am not the target market for life sims or cozy farming sims, which is why a lot of these showcases of recent memory don’t fully resonate with me.
Titles like Stardew Valley never captured my attention, but I do like horror and combining a cozy farming sim with horror elements is something that intrigues me. It intrigued me enough to want to check out Grave Seasons, which is being developed by Pefect Garbage and is being published by Blumhouse Games, which will be one of their first titles published since they started in 2023. The big twist is that someone in the town is a supernatural serial killer.
After managing to escape from jail, you try to start a new life where no one knows you or will ever find you. You try to blend in, farm your land and mind your business. Unfortunately, a severed hand winds up in your crops. You need to befriend the people of the town to try and find out who the killer is. Everything you do, or don't, will play a major role in how the story unfolds.
Grave Seasons is another game that I was fortune enough to get the chance to play at Summer Game Fest Play Days and while I only got to play 30 minutes, it left me very intrigued and wanting more.
#18 - VALOR MORTIS
Valor Mortis is an interesting proposition. It’s a first person Souls-like set in the Naploleanic era about a solider who rises from death, wields otherworldly powers, and must solve a supernatural conspiracy that is interwoven with historical reality. There is a mysterious substance spreading across the lands that is corrupting loyal soldiers, just like you once were.
The other two reasons that Valor Mortis is intriguing is because it’s being developed by One More Level, the studio behind Ghostrunner and is being published by the newly formed Lyrical Games. Lyrical Games is composed of former members of Private Division, Devolver Digital and Humble Games and their missions statement is promising “We are not building a live service, a billion dollar empire. We are not chasing quarterly earnings. We back exceptional games”
When you combine this mission statement with the work experience of Lyrical, this being the first game that the company signed, the developers and the premise of Valor Mortis, there is plenty of reasons to be optimistic.
Valor Mortis features a very visceral style, which shouldn’t come as a surprise to those familiar with Ghost Runner and I might be wrong, but Valor Mortis could also be the first ever, first person souls-like. To those that got the chance to go hands-on at Gamescom spoke very highly of their time and how well the game worked in first person.
#17 - PRELUDE: DARK PAIN
Prelude: Dark Pain is a turn based, tactical RPG, but if you wanted the elevator pitch it would be Darkest Dungeon meets Final Fantasy Tactics. Prelude Dark Pain is set in a dark fantasy world and you are at the core of humanities last hope against evil. You play as Soren, a lowly blacksmith, who will lead an uprising against the Order of the Ashen Crusade.
On your quest, you will form a party from over 20 playable heroes that feature 2 different talent branches and a pool of 25 skills allowing you to create the exact type of squad that you desire. These heroes range from your typical RPG classes including DPS, Support, Assassin and many others.
During your quest, you will have to make tough choices that will not only affect the narrative, but what heroes will be able to join your cause. With the lack of a publisher, QUICKFIRE Games launched a Kickstarter in the summer of 2025 to aid in development. The goal was to collect 40k to continue development, but with the help of over 3000 backers, they were able to secure almost 320 percent of their initial target and raised over 120k.
QUICKFIRE hope to release three free DLC’s post launch, including one that features a Blasphemous collaboration with The Game Kitchen, who are also located in Spain. On the Kickstarter page, the list of inspirations range from the obvious Darkest Dungeon, Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Ogre to ones you might not expect including World of Warcraft, Dark Souls and League of Legends.
Prelude Dark Pain is being developed by QUICKFIRE Games, who are located in Spain and were founded in 2020. The bulk of development began with just two people, however the studio has grown slightly to around a dozen currently. Early Access is scheduled for Spring 2026 with a full release aiming for Summer of 2027.
#16 - DENSHATTACK
Denshattack is probably the oddest game on this list as it combines trains, Tony Hawk and anime.
When I first saw the trailer, I was pretty sure that it had something to do with Jet Set Radio Future, which it doesn't, but the devs have listed the series as a big source of inspiration. You play as a train in a transformed Japan as you ollie, kick flip and grind your way through some of the most recognizable places including Osasko, Tokyo, Hokkaido and more as you try to defeat the evil Miraido corporation.
In addition to platforming your way through these locations as a train, you will build up your reputation with gangs to form new allies and transform your train to the ultimate corporation killing machine. In between you and your end goal lies a flurry of enemies and bosses including giant mechs, moving castles, mechanical worms and an army of trains who want to put an end to you.
The world of Denshattack is insanely bright, vibrant and will take you across over 50 different levels. Due to a climate crisis the rich have been protected by an air-purifying dome, and the rest a left to survive in the barren wastelands. In addition to the extreme visuals, the audio will also be an assault on your senses as Tee Lopes will be the lead composer known for his great work on games like Sonic Mania, Streets of Rage 4 and TMNT: Shredders Revenge.
TOP 15 INDIE GAMES of 2025
#15 - ILL
Ill is the first project from Mundfish Powerhouse. After the success of Atomic Heart, which has been able to reach over 10 million players, Mundfish started a new program to help smaller studios with ambitious and creative visions. In addition to providing financial support, Mundfish is also offering creative and operational support that they have learned. Ill is a debut title from Team Clout, who are composed of a little over 30 people who mostly have background in horror working on film series like It and V/H/S to name a few.
Ill is a first-person action survival horror game that takes place in a huge research fort. What immediately jumps out with ill is the realism, which is in large part due to the incredible lighting system, the realistic physics and one of the most visceral dismemberment systems we have ever seen.
According to the Steam description “ILL pushes the limits of the genre with gory realism: grotesque monsters can be maimed and mercilessly torn to pieces. Shredded flesh, exposed bones, and eviscerated carcasses will make an unprecedented impression and shock you to your core” When you combine this extreme violence with the binaural audio system, dynamic enemy behaviour, and realistic physics, ILL has the chance to seep into your subconscious.
There were a few guns shown in the trailer and they both looked very different and this is purposeful as the developers are aiming for distinct weight and feel of each weapon. In addition, you will have to navigate weapon defects, as well as modify and upgrade them.
Finally, in keeping in line with tradition of the survival horror, ILL will feature strategic inventory management with the devs saying that “your ability to create an item could determine the outcome of the battle”
#14 - OUT OF WORDS
I love games that use real stop motion animation and I also love games that feature Hazelight style co-op where there is no option to play solo and you need to work together. What if you combined those two loves? The result would be Out of Words from Kong Orange and WIREDFLY, two studios that combine to a total of about 30 people.
Out of Words is about Kurt and Karla and their quest to save their relationship. They have somehow been transported to the realm of Vokabulantis and have lost their voices. The game is pure co-op and will require great communication or words. In what has become the norm for the co-op platformer, you will need to solve physics defying puzzles throughout your journey that will take you from ancient catacombs to Nounberg where clay skyscrapers go as far as the eye can see.
Out of Words was one of the three games that Epic Publishing brought to Summer Game Fest Play Days. Although, I was unable to secure a time slot to go hands on with it, based on my time with the other two games Epic brought, End of Abyss and Infinitesimals, Out of Words is going to be an incredible adventure.
It also features an incredibly adorable sidekick that looks like a stingray and behaves like a dog that people are almost guaranteed to fall in love with. Also if you want to see a bunch of behind the scenes on how the whole thing is created, it's all being documented on their YouTube channel with a very interesting look behind the curtain with a few videos per month.
#13 - SLEEP AWAKE
In 2023, Blumhouse Games was formed with the intention of creating great interactive horror experiences using the same blueprint that they use for their film division. That blueprint involves smaller budgets on indie teams who have unique ideas. As of now, Blumhouse has only published one game, which was Fear The Spotlight, a title that was actually on sale before Blumhouse grabbed the publishing rights. Fear The Spotlight was taken down, improved and re-released to a more positive critical and commercial reception.
Sleep Awake is a first person physchological horror title set in the near future where people are disappearing in their sleep. For the people that remain, the only hope is reckless experiments to remain awake. You have to survive what is left of humanity to be able to find out why everything is happening. Sleep Awake fuses together FMV with a psychedelic art style, which is sure fully immerse you in this world as you won’t be able to separate reality from hallucinations, which is something that happens during insomnia.
Sleep Awake is being developed by Eyes Out, a studio that was co-founded in 2019 by Cory Davis, who is most known for his work on Spec Ops: The Line where he served as lead designer and director. The other co-founder is Robin Finck who has served as the guitarist of Nine Inch Nails for most of the years since 1994.
Considering it will be the first game from Eyes Out and likely the first game to be published by Blumhouse Games that wasn’t basically finished when it was signed like Fear The Spotlight, there is high expectations riding on Sleep Awake. One reason to be optimistic is because Sleep Awake was chosen as one of the selections for the Tribeca Festival, who have a history of cherry picking some incredible upcoming titles. Blue Prince in 2024 was one of their official selections.
#12 - CROWSWORN
With Hollow Knight: Silksong finally out of the way, all of the attention shifts to what metroidvania will be the next big thing, which is a lot of pressure. Crowsworn is not trying to hide its inspirations. On their Kickstarter page the description read “Explore a grim fantasy world inhabited by men and monsters alike in this action-packed Metroidvania inspired by Hollow Knight, Bloodborne, and Devil May Cry! Crowsworn is a hand-drawn Metroidvania with a strong design emphasis on explorative platforming, immersive combat, and compelling storytelling”
Another reason Crowsworn sounds exciting is because two of their achieved stretch goals on Kickstarter were to add voice acting for the main character, some NPC’s and some bosses. The other stretch goal was to feature fully animated cinematic cutscenes, which were outsourced to a studio with expertise in the field and will be akin to the trailer cinematics. Both of these features are not only going to make Crowsworn feel much more like a premium game as opposed to the indie that it is, but it will also breathe life into the world and hopefully make it even more immersive.
We had the privilege of playing the media and backers demo, which feels clean and highly polished. Drawing from their Bloodborne inspiration, every single enemy is challenging. They react different every time and it’s just as easy to be overwhelmed very quickly from low level mobs. If you don’t know, everything in the demo was content that didn’t make the final game, which makes you wonder how good the game will be if this wasn't good enough.
What Mongoose Rodeo did to create the demo was take all of the cut content and create some newly designed areas to create something that felt like a more cohesive experience. The easier thing to do was just to stitch these rooms together and release it, but that wasn’t good enough. There are two things to take away from reading between the lines of the demo release. The first is that the standards of Mongoose Rodeo are extremely high as they didnt want to release a disjointed demo experience. Furthermore, the demo felt incredible and its easy to forget this is the level of quality that didn’t make the final product. Both of these bode very well for the full release of Crowsworn.
#11 - RECUR
I love platformers, 2D ones have a soft spot in my heart, especially ones that break the mold in some way, shape or form. Some bring narrative like Celeste, others bring atmosphere like INSIDE and some bring unique puzzle mechanics like Braid. Recur looks to blend a lot of these elements together, but it’s the time manipulation mechanic that is truly attention grabbing.
Unlike Braid, where you control time with buttons, time is based around your movement in Recur. Move forward or to the right of the screen and time passes normally, but go backwards or to the left of the screen and time reverses. It seems like such a simple concept, but one that is likely deceptively difficult to design around.
In Recur, you play as a postman who has discovered the ability to turn back the clock, which would be interesting on any normal day, but this all happens at the edge of the apocalypse and the fate of humanity lies in your hands. In addition to the mechanics, Recur also features an appealing look with a cel shaded inspired art style and the promise of an engaging story as you try to discover why the world is ending.
The concept was already something big brained, but at Gamescom, the team had clocks that sat on the table in the real world, that moved forwards and backwards in sync with the game. This might seem insignificant, but if this is the effort they have for something outside of the game, I can’t wait to experience what’s in the game.
TOP 10 INDIE GAMES COMING IN 2026
#10 - BLACKFROST: THE LONG DARK 2
I always wanted to get into The Long Dark, but I missed the boat in 2014 and before you knew it, there were constant updates and DLC’s, which constantly increased the barrier to entry. Hinterland will be taking the decade of experience they have with The Long Dark and applying that to BLACKFROST. The Long Dark was a single player experience that pitted you against mother nature. There was a variety of ways to play including the episodic stories that would take the average player about 30 hours, there was just standard survival sandbox mode with more than 50 sq km, and there were challenge modes that would take about 1-3 hours per.
In the words of the studio BLACKFROST “refines every aspect of the original”. The big change is the addition of co-op, which is great to offer people more ways to play, but does risk ruining the atmosphere of surviving in the wilderness alone. BLACKFROST takes place about a year after the events of the first game, with people starting to emerge meaning that there will be a lot of NPC’s and settlements that will drastically change how you approach the game as you decide how much you want to interact with these people.
In addition to the vast wilderness of the first, BLACKFROST will include some dense urban areas that are full of new opportunities, but also plenty of new threats. One of the big changes mechanically to the sequel is the will to live system that adds an element of psychological will power to the already complex systems as you learn to manage your doubts, fears and anxiety.
#9 - FELT THAT BOXING
I’ve said it before and i’ll say it again: we need a new Punch-Out!! Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out!! released in 1987 for the NES, which eventually became just Punch-Out!! after the three year licensing deal ended with Mike Tyson and is one of the greatest Nintendo games of all time. Yet somehow, it only received two sequels. The first was Super Punch-Out!! for the SNES, which was developed by Nintendo in 1994 for the Super Nintendo and the next was fifteen years later on the Wii. The last entry in the series was created by Next Level Games in 2009, which was simply titled Punch-Out!!. Despite critical acclaim, sales were relatively low for a Nintendo title, selling just over a million units.
Felt That Boxing was probably the strangest thing from Summer Game Fest as it combined Sesame Street with Punch-Out!!, two things that the world needs more of.
You play as unlikely hero Fuzz-E, who must step into the shoes of his father, who was a boxing legend. A greedy developer is threatening to bulldoze the puppet orphanage and now he needs to win the tournament of a million punches to stop the puppet orphanage from being demolished. Felt That Boxing looks to go beyond a simple arcade boxer with loads of mini games in between matches, secret moves to unlock, a story mode that lasts 8-12 hours, and soundtrack by Flying Lotus that evolves as fights and training escalate.
Felt That Boxing is the Punch-Out!! I didn’t know I needed.
#8 - DISPATCH
The hope is that Dispatch will prove once and for all that the problem with Telltale games wasn’t the lack of talent, but it was just unfortunately mismanaged, which is slightly ironic since Dispatch is a game about management.
Dispatch is being developed and published by AdHoc Studio, a studio founded in 2018 from many of the talented people behind The Walking Dead, The Wolf Among Us and Tales from the Borderlands including Creative Directors and Writing Directors who banded together shortly after Telltale Games filed for bankruptcy and laid off 90% of its employees.
In addition to being smart with the size of the studio, which is only around 40 people compared to the 250 that Telltale had at their largest, Dispatch is also an original IP. This means that the studio can save loads of money not having to pay licensing fees, and instead invest that into other areas of Dispatch that would be more effective.
In Dispatch, you play as Mecha Man, a superhero who has lost his suit that was destroyed in a battle with his nemesis. Powerless, Mecha Man must now work at the superhero call center and dispatch superheroes across the city where they are needed. You will need to juggle office relationships, life or death decisions in the field, and rebuilding your mech suit to get revenge.
Not only do the visuals look like a high profile, high budget animated series from Netflix or Disney +, but the story sounds engaging and best of all the performances are anchored by a stacked voice cast, which is likely due to having resources not used up from licensing fees, Aaron Paul from Breaking Bad, Jeffrey Wright from American Fiction and Laura Bailey from The Last of Us 2 are just a few of the names that will be giving these superheroes personality.
Dispatch was also been named as one of the official selections for the Tribeca festival, who have a pretty keen eye for spotting great games. 2024 Selections including games like Neva, Thank Goodness You’re Here and Blue Prince.
#7 - REWILDERS: THE LOST SPRING
Rewilders is from the studio behind the Bafta award winning Endling: Extinction is Forever. In Rewilders: The Lost Spring, you fight to bring back ecosystems by battling mother natures enemies. Rewilders might look very cozy on the surface with its open-world exploration, but bubbling below is action roguelite gameplay with souls-like combat and metroidvania progression. Sticking with studio values, Rewilders is built around telling an emotional narrative.
Your main goal is to reclaim the world and restore it through rewilding and putting it back to how it was in the first place. This is done in such a satisfying manner as the world is dark and barren, but with your help turns vibrant and beautiful. During your exploration, as you reclaim biomes, the inhabitants will return. You will be able to find creatures, collect them and even evolve them. These creatures are native to the lands and provide plenty of benefits to the character such as active abilities and passive bonuses.
You will also slowly discover the interconnected world with new skills that you will acquire during your quest such as gliders, wall runs and grapples. When you die, you will have the ability to improve your base by growing plants and fruits which will upgrade your abilities and unlock permanent buffs.
Herobeat Studios are dedicated to developing new IP’s that address meaningingful topics. Their main goal is to raise awareness about social impact issues through the power of video games.
#6 - NEVERWAY
Neverway is co-created by the pixel artist of Celeste and considering that EXOK are now defunct, this is more prescient than ever. The score is also being composed by Disasterpiece who created one of best soundtracks of the last decade with Hyper Light Drifter. They have also done the soundtracks for It Follows and Fez. However, what has me truly interested is that Neverway is kind of capturing the spirt of The Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past with the main character jumping between reality and the Neverway as it’s described as a nightmarish, life-sim RPG.
Neverway is physchological horror about a girl named Fiona who quits her dead end job and decides to move to Montgomery Island for a fresh start by buying a farm away from all of the distractions of reality. However, not all is well as you need to stop the horrors of the Neverway from bleeding into reality in a concept that feels reminiscent of Stranger Things.
The intent from the developers was to create a bold juxtaposition by blending wholesome and horror, which they feel create moments that are a lot more intense that resonate stronger.
Like most life sim RPG’s there will be plenty of farming, which i’m not typically the right audience for, but it also doesn’t appear to be the focal point of the game and will be enjoyable in smaller doses. There will also be a big social aspect as you can meet, become friends and even romance dozens of people with each bond unlocking buffs and abilities to use in the Neverway.
Circling back to the similarities of A Link To The Past, Neverway features a top down perspective with a 16 bit-esque art style, fast paced combat, exploration, upgrades and most importantly the traveling of two different worlds.
TOP 5 INDIE GAME COMING IN 2026
#5 - INFINITESIMALS
Infinitesimals was one of the most pleasant surprises of Summer Game Fest Play Days for myself. I saw the trailer like most of you during the Summer Game Fest show, and Infintesimals looked great. Some people even said it looked like Grounded, but here’s the thing: Infinitesimals started nearly a decade before Grounded and best of all, it’s not a survival game. It’s a narrative focused third person immersive sim drawing heavy inspiration from 90’s classics like Deus Ex and Thief as well as movies like Star Wars and Predator.
You play as Captain Awkney Relinrake, the leader of an elite alien squadron. After a catastrophic crash, Captain Awkney and the rest of the squadron have become stranded on an alien planet, which happens to be Earth. Even worse is that the entire squadron has become separated and you must find the missing members of your squad.
Captain Awkney is smaller than your average protagonist at around the size of a grasshopper and must navigate his way through a world filled with treacherous terrain, local wildlife and deadly machines. What’s immediately interesting is that Infinitesimals is set on Earth, but it’s very unclear what time period. In addition to the trying to piece back together the mystery of Planet Earth, you are trying to find the rest of your squadron and uncover the mystery of the colony that you were supposed to join that has vanished as mechanical sentinels known as the Hunter Gatherers appear to have completely taken over. You must reunite with your squad to rebuild and rise up against the hunter gatherers.
As for Captain Awkney, Infinitesimals doesn’t feature any hard class upgrade paths. James hopes that players will “mix and match”. There will be stealth gear and stealth equipment, but there will also be assault equipment. “what defines your character is how you play and the gear you equip”.
Infinitesimals isn’t an open world game, but like Deus Ex and Thief, games that heavily influenced development, there are huge curated sandboxes that James referred to as “large hubs”. In these areas you are free to explore and investigate what sparks your interest. Cubit wants to encourage and reward player curiosity.
#4 - ROCKBEASTS
What makes Indies more interesting than your average game is that the potential for a brand new experience unlike anything you have ever played before is not only possible, it’s probable. In ROCKBEATS, you play as a manager in this story driven RPG where you try to take a rock band from nobody's to stardom in the MTV era. ROCKBEASTS is a dark comedy penned by the same author who wrote The Witcher 3, Cyberpunk 2077 and the upcoming vampire title: The Blood of Dawnwalker.
As a manager constantly looking for talent, you’re almost at the end of your rope after listening to the tortoise trio To Shell and Back. You wonder what happened to your career, but then you think about the support band before with the Ostrich on vocals, the deer on guitar, bass on bass, and the rabbit on drums. You think that this band is a little rough around the edges, but with enough help and direction from you, they could be something huge.
It doesn’t sound easy as you will need to navigate tough decisions during the Grunge Era such a big ones from the venues you play, set lists and labels you sign with down to the smaller decisions including how to get a meal and a working amp. ROCKBEASTS is a constant balancing act of health, hype, mood and focus of the band as well as the bank account. If this whole premise wasn’t unique enough, the whole world is animals
While most of the game is the managament sim aspect, it also looks like playing well at gigs is equally as important to spread word of mouth with gameplay that looks to incorporate music rhythm gameplay that’s reminiscent of Rock Band and Guitar Hero with scrolling button prompts.
ROCKBEASTS features over 100 characters that you will meet on your rise to stardom that will present very real choices and shape the narrative that will determine the fate of the band. The game is fully voice acted including Iggy Pop as well as 17 completely original tracks for you to play that were created just for ROCKBEASTS
#3 - STAGE FRIGHT
When Stage Fright was first revealed at The Game Awards in December 2024, the UK studio leaned into the fact that most people likely don't know them by name, but they for sure know their games. However, when I saw the logo for Ghost Town Games, I instantly got excited. Ghost Town is the small team behind the Overcooked series, you know the super fun, and casual co-op cooking game that has the power to ruin relationships.
Jokes aside, Overcooked created a market that didn’t exist and since its release in 2017, people have been trying to duplicate the magic with co-op games that are casual, but also secretly hardcore. Games like Good Job, Moving Out and more have tried, but Overcooked is still the best. An extremely simple premise with minimal controls that is easy to pickup with a requirement for great communication.
I would have been extremely happy with another Overcooked sequel, as I still regularly play it to this day, but I couldn’t be happier that Ghost Town doesn’t want to be boxed in as a studio that can only make Overcooked and wants to try something new.
In their new game Stage Fright, Ghost Town is still leaning into what they do best, which is to innovate in the co-op space, but this time from a different perspective. Stage Fright is a coming of age story about Drew, Blake and Charlie who are trying to unravel some type of mystery. The spotlight will be on Ghost Town to prove if they can write a captivating narrative as the story in Overcooked was less than engaging.
Stage Fright immediately conjures up comparisons to Hazelight, the makers of It Takes Two and Split Fiction, who have made a name for themselves and Ghost Town Games will have their work cut out as people will inevitably draw comparisons. Very little is known about the plot of the game at the moment, but I cant wait to learn more.
#2 - THE ETERNAL LIFE OF GOLDMAN
The Eternal Life of Goldman was already pretty high on my list of most anticipated games, but after their last trailer titled “can fairy tales hurt?” was revealed, my anticipation has moved to another level. The trailer features a voice over of a mother talking to her child, and whether or not this will be part of or including in the final game, it features some sharp writing and incredible voice acting, which bodes extremely well for the final product. This provides a level of confidence that the game will have much more depth than just the stunning frame-by-frame hand drawn animation.
The Eternal Life of Goldman is being developed by Cyprus based Studio weappy, who are best known for their series “This is the Police” To create an uncompromising 2D, they went back to the roots of the genre to draw, color and animate every single frame using classic techniques. As a result, The Eternal Life of Goldman grabs your eye like few games have the power to do. You might not know whats different, but you are clearly aware that something is.
You play as Goldman, an explorer in the later stages of his life, not unlike Indiana Jones. With the help of his trusty and modifiable cane, Goldman needs to travel deep into the vast archipelago and defeat a mysterious deity.
Goldman also looks to avoid a lot of the trappings of the 2D platformer. There are metroidvania elements, but they don’t want you to be backtracking or lost after you get a new ability. There are precision platfomrer elements, but they don’t need to you become a well oiled machine, as improvisation and ingenuity should lead to success as well. It has a deep story with complex characters, but it doesn’t want to bog down the gameplay. The goal is to create an adventure that will not only take your breath away, but will also break your heart.
#1 - END OF ABYSS
End of Abyss is an atmospheric top down twin stick horror metroidvania that looks like it was created from the likes of playdead or Tarsier Studios, and there is good reason for that. End of Abyss is being developed by Section 9 Interactive, a small indie studio founded by the former founders of Tarsier Studios including tech leads, art leads and creative directors
End of Abyss is deeply inspired by the early NES classics The Legend of Zelda and Metroid, two games that strongly embrace the less is more approach. Worlds that were vast, full of mystery, danger and begged to be explored. The focus was on exploration, non linearity and atmosphere. There was something so intriguing about never knowing whats around the next corner and that is echoed in End of Abyss.
The list of inspiration for End of Abyss is long and extends far outside of gaming. Anime like Akira, Ghost in The Shell, as well as movies like The Thing, but most prominent inspiration is easily Ridley Scott’s 1979 horror film Alien. In End of Abyss you play as a female protagonist, but also just like the crew of the Nostromo who followed a distress signal in the deep reaches of space that fated most of the people aboard, End of Abyss follows a similar structure by investigating a distress signal that says “to the one that hears this, we are waiting for you”
Although investigating distress signals has become a sci fi trope, that’s because the device works perfectly as it taps into the core of humanity and our innate desire to help. The alien inspiration carries forward with an environmental design that feels very retro futuristic.
End of Abyss was easily the best thing I played at Summer Game Fest with its dark, atmospheric tone, paired with unique perspective and twin stick controls. End of Abyss felt as much like survival horror, as it did twin stick shooter as it did a metroidvania, which ultimately meant that it felt like nothing I have experienced before and why it’s my most anticipated game of 2026.
