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For an indie company Dontnod seem to have no fear about branching into a whole variety of genres. They started out with a cyberpunk action-adventure (Remember Me), moved on to a time-warping narrative driven game about a bunch of teenage girls (Life is Strange), and are now working a serious, character focused RPG about vampires in old England (Vampyr).
If that wasn't already broad enough, their recently revealed Dontnod 11 studio is now working on Battlecrew Space Pirates, a competitive online shooter with plenty of cheesy humor and Awesomenauts inspired action. Since the whole thing is a bit off the rails, perhaps it would be best if you just look at the announcement video:
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Its not often that Early Access games pique my interest, but We Happy Few has such a strong premise that I can't help but get intrigued. To put it simply, the action is set in a retro-futuristic 1960's city of Wellington Wells, a city completely ravaged by war and starvation, whose inhabitants live in a drug-fueled state of happiness in order to escape the misery of the real world... or perhaps there is something more going on?
Since the whole concept is hard to explain through a single paragraph, here's the recently posted gameplay trailer to really give you an idea of what We Happy Few looks like, and more importantly, what its all about:
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With Obduction, Myst's true spiritual successor, delayed from its July release all the way to August 24th due to the need for further bug fixing, there is currently a bit of a vacuum when it comes to puzzle-adventures.
This is where The Eyes of Ara, a newly released adventure with some truly devious puzzles, comes in to play as it offers almost exactly the same type of experience as Myst, and this includes the frequent moments of bewilderment when you encounter some of the more... obscure puzzles. If you're wondering what all of this looks like in terms of gameplay, here's an extended trailer showcasing just that:
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Starbound, an extraterrestrial sandbox adventure, has been in development for 5 years now, and even though there were many missteps along the way I'm happy to say its long journey has finally reached its conclusion with an official release.
In order to summarize all of the updates and changes made over the years, the folks at Chucklefish recently posted a 5-minute long trailer showcasing pretty much everything you can do in Starbound, from the story-focused campaign to the various boss battles. Have a look:
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Pony Island, despite featuring a name that belongs mostly to the strange parts of the Internet, was a pretty damn compelling little game, so I'm happy to tell you that Daniel Mullins, the solo developer behind it, is currently working on a brand new game.
The Hex is on first glance your standard Agatha Christie murder mystery where a bunch of people are stuck in a tavern with a murderer during a raging storm, though the twist is that each of the characters is a parody of various gaming genres. You've got The Spacemarine, The Sorceress, The Platformer, The Fighter, The Apocalypse Survivor and The First Person Perspective, and by exploring their memories you will need to try and uncover the murderer... or perhaps even darker secrets!
Since the whole premise behind The Hex is completely and utterly bizarre, here's the announcement trailer to hopefully give you an idea of what to expect:
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Zoetrope Interactive, the folks behind the Darkness Within series, have announced that they are working on a brand new horror-adventure by the name of Conarium. If you're like me and you're now stuck wondering what that word even means, its apparently used to describe a pine-cone shaped gland that produces Melatonin, a hormone that helps regulate sleep.
While I'm not sure if little description is relevant to the game itself, I can tell you that Conarium will follow the story of Frank Gilman, an antropologist from the Miskatonic University who attempted to pass beyond the limits of human consciences by using a device called, you guessed it, the Conarium. The details on what exactly happened when the device was activated are left up to the players to discover, but there are some heavy hints pointing towards the fact that you may have been killed and then returned... subtly changed.
Here's the official list of features and a couple of images to hopefully give you an idea of what to expect from Conarium once it finally releases in Q1 2017:
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Necropolis is a third-person action roguelike that features a challenging combat system, a giant dungeon to delve, and most excitingly, the ability to roam around with up to three other friends. While you won't see this mentioned on any of the official descriptions, Necropolis is inspired by Dark Souls in many ways, so expect to do a lot of dodging around, parrying, and getting slammed face first into the ground when you fail to do just that.
If you're wondering what Necropolis looks like, and more importantly what's it all about, here's a surprisingly funky official trailer:
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Its funny how the world works sometimes. Even though Shadow of the Colossus still gets showered with praise, 10 years after its initial release, not a single studio has taken it upon themselves to create an adventure with the same scope and grandeur.
Thankfully, there is a bit of hope on the horizon as Prey for the Gods, a rather stylish indie game about exploring an unknown land and crawling all over large enemies, has recently landed on Kickstarter. Here's the trailer to give you an idea of what Prey for the Gods is all about:
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While games based around exploration often get criticized for their lack of "true" gameplay, I find the genre to be quite fascinating as the lack of combat requires the developers to get clever with both the storytelling and the visual design.
A good example of this would be the recently announced exploration/adventure game, The First Tree, which offers up a rather intriguing premise and some striking visuals to go along with it. Here's the trailer to hopefully give you an idea of what I'm blabbering about:
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[Update #2]: Six years after its launch, the boss-battling action game Furi is getting a brand new character!
[Update]: The team behind Furi is now working on Haven - a relationship focused RPG adventure.
Furi is an extremely challenging boss fighter that will have you face off, one on one, against a wide assortment of enemies. Rather than simply mash your buttons and hope for the best, you will need to dodge enemy attacks, seek out openings, and punish your foes when the opportunity presents itself. I hesitate to compare it to Dark Souls, mostly because the gameplay differs so greatly, but both games embody the same sort of ideals and the focus on "challenging but fair" combat.
It launched a couple of days ago on Steam, but unfortunately it doesn't seem to be getting the sort of recognition it should, and that is a massive shame given that I find it to be quite fantastic. Since words alone usually aren't enough, here's the launch trailer to hopefully give you an idea of what Furi's all about: