New Indie Games in 2020: January List

LOST WORDS: BEYOND THE PAGE

Lost Words: Beyond the Page is a beautiful indie game set in a fantasy world that narrates a girl's adventures written by Rhianna Pratchett, a daughter of the well-known writer Terry Pratchett. The girl's journey intertwines with watercolor snippets from her diary; by interacting with the words, the player will be able to affect the surroundings, solve puzzles, and submerge in the heroine's thoughts and emotions. The game has been developed by Mark Backler and the team of Sketchbook Games since 2013 and already won multiple awards. Judging by the effort and love of the creators put into their work, Lost Words definitely looks like something worth exploring.

BEFORE WE LEAVE

Before We Leave is a city-building strategy with no fights and usual world-conquering but steady development of a civilization that starts from basic harvesting skills and evolves to adventurous space travelers. The game gives you a chance to build your own cozy corner in the universe and enjoy the peaceful process of growing and advancing it across the solar system. Yet, the player is forced to attend to it mindfully as the colonies are sometimes challenged by the outside conditions and entities in the form of intergalactic whales. They can't be fought but with a bit of carefulness, the planets can be protected.

If you're interested in participating in the Closed Alpha test, visit Balancing Monkey Games website and join their discord.

INKULINATI

Inkulinati is a comical turn-based strategy set on the pages of a Medieval manuscript. The mechanics look pretty standard: you manage several warriors with different characteristics and fight whatever the opponent throws at you. The art style is what makes this game special: hand-drawn whimsical animal warriors, ink splashes instead of blood, an unexpected realistic hand of the manuscript writer that crashes your enemies - everything seems to fuse into one hilarious long-forgotten adventure.

To keep an eye on the game development and the date of release, visit Yaza Games website and follow them on social media.

BLOODROOTS

Bloodroots is an action game with tons of fun and violence that looks rather like an endless fight with mad combos, a lot of blood, and insane melee weapons. A sword or a hammer, a scythe or a hatchet, a ladder or a carrot - you name it, the game has it. Use whatever you can find in the world around you and make it deadly, then throw it away and move to another tool at hand. By the way, the game does have a storyline: you'll play as Mr. Wolf who has been mysteriously betrayed and seeks revenge in the world of the Weird West. But even if there were no story at all, Paper Cult could have got away with it easily - when the fighting is such a fabulous mess, who pays attention to the story?

LUNA THE SHADOW DUST

To finish this list on a peaceful note, let us tell you about LUNA The Shadow Dust. This is a point-and-click puzzle adventure with spectacular fully hand-animated visuals that tells us an entangled story of a boy and his strange companion. With the real world left behind, you'll travel across unknown dream-like lands to the top of a tower in search of the lost memories and maybe something else. As if to strengthen these vague happenings, the story is told with no words, but the vivid imagery and orchestral music seem to be more than enough to express what the developers wanted to say.

The game is planned to be released on February 13 and is available for pre-order. Visit Lantern Studio website for more information.