Happy New Year! 2018 may not have been a great year, but it was a great year for games and another year of fantastic indie games packed full of creativity and fun surprises. We’ve hand picked some of our favourites and given them awards to celebrate their diversity. Hope you like them as much as we do and hope you have a great 2019!
Winner: Desktop Love Story – Pass love notes between files on your desktop to make them fall in love!
Runner Ups: The Topologies of Zelda, The Writer is Anxious
Winner: A Wonderful Day For Fishing – beware what you eat in this bizarre Lovecraftian fishing game!
Runner Ups: Detective Horis: Episode 1, The Confraternity of Toast, With Extra Seasoning
Shark Simulator – The GTA of physics based shark simulators!
Runner Ups: Kaiju Super Datetech, With Extra Seasoning
Winner: Northbury Grove: King’s Comfort – When the psycho spots you and the music kicks in you may need a change of underwear!
Runner Ups: Northbury Grove, Don’t Get Caught
Winner: The Doll Shop – It’s not often that a game truly makes you fear for someone elses safety above your own.
Runner Ups: Northbury Grove: King’s Comfort, Beherit
Best Fan Game
Winner: Return of the Tentacle: Prologue – So authentic that it could easily be an official release.
Runner Ups: Super Mario 64 Odyssey, Project Lambda
Best Puzzle Game
Winner: Cube Escape: Paradox Chapter 1 – A horror adventure that’s packed full of creative puzzle design
Runner Ups: Return of the Tentacle: Prologue, Location Withheld
Winner: The Zium Garden – A massive virtual art gallery full of fascinating works of digital art
Runner Ups: The Doll Shop, Intertwined, LACURA
Winner: Goodnight Meowmie – A surprisingly powerful little adventure where you care for your cat in a house full of monsters.
Runner Ups: Snow Cones: Episode 2, Marie’s Room
Winner: The Alpha Device – A mature Arthur C. Clarke-esque Sci-Fi narrative experience with impecable production values
Runner Ups: The Writer is Anxious, Alice’s 1997, The Doll Shop
Winner: The Doll Shop – Beautiful artwork and a deeply unsettling dread-filled narrative. It’s not often that a game truly makes you fear for someone elses safety above your own!