Video Gamers Podcast - Indie Next Fest Frenzy: The Hidden Gems And Hype of 2025’s Biggest Indie Showcase - Gaming Podcast

Episode Date: October 23, 2025

Gaming hosts Josh, Ryan, and Ace are diving headfirst into this year’s Indie Next Fest, exploring the wild, creative world of indie gaming at its best. From atmospheric horror experiments to cozy hits and chaotic roguelike surprises, we’re breaking down the standout video games that stole the show — and the ones that maybe missed the mark. Is this new wave of indies pushing the boundaries of gaming, or are we starting to see the same ideas recycled under a fresh coat of pixel art? We’ll cover what caught our attention, what deserves more hype, and which video games might just be the next breakout success story. Don’t miss this celebration of creativity, chaos, and everything indie in gaming — only on the Video Gamers Podcast!   Thanks to our MYTHIC Supporters: Redletter, Disratory, Ol’ Jake, Gaius, Jigglepuf, Phelps and NorwegianGreaser   Thanks to our Legendary Supporters: HypnoticPyro and PeopleWonder   Connect with the show: Support us on Patreon: ⁠patreon.com/videogamerspod⁠ Join our Gaming Community: https://discord.gg/WraYzbpx Follow us on Instagram:⁠ https://www.instagram.com/videogamerspod/⁠  Follow us on X:⁠ https://twitter.com/VideoGamersPod⁠  Subscribe to us on YouTube:⁠ ⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@VideoGamersPod?sub_confirmation=1⁠    Visit us on the web:⁠https://videogamerspod.com/⁠   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When you're with Amex Platinum, you get access to exclusive dining experiences and an annual travel credit. So the best tapas in town might be in a new town altogether. That's the powerful backing of Amex. Terms and conditions apply. Learn more at Amex.ca. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. A new era of fitness is here.

Introducing the new Peloton Cross Training Tread Plus, powered by Peloton IQ, built for breakthroughs with personalized workout plans, real-time insights, and endless ways to move. Lift with confidence, while Peloton IQ counts reps, corrects form, and tracks your progress. Let yourself run, lift, flow, and go. Explore the new Peloton cross-training tread plus at OnePelaton.C.A. Hello, fellow gamers, and welcome to the VideoGamers podcast. It's Steam Next Fest season again, and that special time of year where our backlog gets ever bigger and our hard drives fill to the brim with demo. today we're diving into some of the wildest indie demos the good the bad the insured but before that some introductions are in order i am your host ace and joining me the man who could have been forklift certified but instead chose to be a certified poser it's josh whoa whoa whoa okay number one i've never been certified to run a forklift

okay so let's just get that straight right now i can run a forklift you could have been if you joined me for the demo i was playing arc raiders ace doing doing the good word man the world is ending man 10 minutes of your time good work man and then battlefield six those points aren't going to cap themselves ace i had to recruit alexi to go through all of these yeah we're sorry thank you alexi thank you for your contribution

Yeah, Alexi, well, Alexia, thank you, Carter, something. And the guy who treats every Steam demo like it's a full-price game, because he ain't playing them anyway. It's right. Wait a second. I take no offense to that, because it's true. It's absolutely true. You punks didn't play a single one of these demos with me.

Okay, to be fair, Ace, you chose to do this during the weekend that was Arc Raiders, the second weekend of Battlefield 6. So I really feel like this is your fault. And you chose to spend six to eight hours playing Arc Raiders Strait. It was great. I was playing out like four in the morning. Do you regret any of it, Ryan? No, I do not.

I don't know. Okay, great. I'm glad we're all, you know. I'm sure you're going to tell us all about these demos. Oh, you're absolutely going to hear all about these demos. You're kidding me? Poor AIDS. You know, welcome in everyone.

Ryan and I are just running around shooting people. And Ace is like, guys. Are you going to play any of these demos and we're like, nope? No. It's like, I've got these multiplayer demos. I'd really like to, you know, check them out with someone to understand them. It's like, seen. We'll get to it.

Welcome in, everyone. I did watch the trailers, though, is. Did you? Oh, gold star for you. Yeah, see, thanks, man. But it's, uh, it's my favorite time of year, guys. It's when the indie devs really get to show their stuff and put out like a, you know, a short demo of whatever build they're currently have,

their alpha, their beta, whatever it is. And we get to check out, you know, try before you buy, which I always love to do. Yeah. And I'm really glad I will say that I got to play these demos because honestly, the trailers didn't do a lot of them justice for how I actually felt about them after I got to experience them. But we're going to start off with Crashout Crew,

which comes from one half of Josh's favorite devs, the peak devs of AgroCrab. this is yeah i knew it was coming which means i'll probably like it for 20 minutes i'm sure i love this game for like 20 minutes ace what are you talking about okay well this is an overcooked style game where you are forklift operators working in a warehouse but it has like unique things that can happen in the setting and environment that throw a wrench into everything also you can't crash into things too many times or you lose complete control of your forklift and go crazy. So I have seen this game before, Ace.

I feel like we talked about this at some point or maybe just, you know, on the side, you were like, hey, guys, this crash out crew game looks, looks fun. I know I've seen this game before. Like, and I do think it looks fun. It very much reminds me of overcooked and the like chaos of like yelling at your friends and you're trying to do a bunch of things. I watched the trailer Actually there was a couple trailers

So I actually watched a few of these And they talk about Oh no I crashed out So it's like but when you lose control Are you out? Does it just you lose control for a little while No you just lose control Okay

And then you come back yeah Like your controls get reversed You're driving uncontrollably towards your friends And if you crash into them They lose control And it becomes a whole nightmare I love it But the thing I really found unique about it

Is like overcooked It's just you have set levels set progression, you finish the level in a certain time without ruining enough dishes, you get gold stars. This game did have progression in the way of upgrades you could get in between the stages. Upgrades, you say? So like, progression?

Yeah, upgrades. For Josh? Yeah. Also, the proximity chat was hilarious. Proxy chat is like always good. Like, what is a game that is not good in? You know, like it's always a good addition to any game. But yeah, it's basically overcooked with forklifts and explosives

And is this game going to make you hate your friends, Ace? Because Overecooked can kind of really make you hate people. And so I'm very curious if Crashout Crew does the same. I think it's got enough different from it that you won't hate your friends as much as overcooked. Because it's a little easier to manage, in my opinion, at least from the few levels I got to play. Because it's just a demo. Yeah, it's just a demo right now. But definitely worth it.

I think this game actually looks like a lot of fun. It looks well done. the developers have a proven track record of, you know, making something fun for at least a short little while with Peek. I will say this. I have to voice my pet peeve

because we talked about this on our Grumpy Gamer's episode, but when your trailer includes people telling you how much fun they're having in voice chat in the game, that really bothers me. And this trailer was absolutely like, oh, good, they just crashed out.

Look, I'm spinning right now. We've got to go over here to deliver this and I'm sorry whoever the lady is whose voice that was but I'm just watching this trailer and I'm like oh here we go again here I would like you never do that voice again never do that voice again please yeah you guys are laughing because you know it's true because that's all I heard in this trailer was this lady just talking about how much fun she's having I'm pretty sure that voice is their social media man I'm sorry lady you seem wonderful And I'm glad you were having a good time with your game. But it's just a weird pet peeve of mine when it comes to gaming. But no, I do think this game looks fun, dude. It really, it does look like it's one of those just good times with your friends.

My wife just texted me and she's like, are you okay in there? What is happening? Who's in there with you? She literally just said, please don't ever do that voice again. Yes. I knew I loved her. Yes. Oh, that's great.

Oh, okay. Oh, what are you, Ryan? What did you think about it overall? I think overall it looks fun. It's a lot of these style kind of, you know, we call them friend slops or whatever name you want to use for it to where you just hop in with friends and have a crazy good time where you're laughing, joke, and enjoy the gameplay. Not too stressful, not too crazy. It looks good. It looks exactly like that stereotypical, you know, if it's 10, 15 bucks, you can hop in, spend a month or three.

weeks or two weeks, you know, with your friends, have fun, and then move on to something else. So, you know, it's, it's definitely of that type. And I think it would be great for what it is, for sure. Yeah. I'll absolutely be picking up just because this is a kind of game I can bring to, you know, people who don't play games and play it with them. Because it's a party game. Yeah. That's what it is. It's a party game. And I will just, I will say I will never, ever play with anyone that sounded like Josh just sounded like. Don't watch the trailer then, Ryan. Don't I watch the trailer. Oh, I watch the trailer.

I will uninstall immediately if they sound like you. That's for dang sure. Moving on to something that isn't a party game or a friend slop game, ledger bound, which is a tactical RPG where you play as a insurance adjuster. An insurance adjuster of all people. They made this game for me. I was an insurance adjuster.

I know, right? I literally was an insurance adjuster for 16. that was his job for sure self-insert i love fantasy tactical role-playing games like i it's got matt mercer in it the dude the voice cast in this game is all the voice cast is statable by the way so ryan your pet peeve of no voice actors an indie game used voice actors yeah i think this game looks fantastic ace this is the one game where i'm like i need to play this demo yeah you definitely should why didn't you tell me about this ahead of time ace i would have played this if you would

have been like Josh there's some demos I think you should try for this indie episode you should look up ledger bound I would have totally been in ace I'm honestly a little disappointed that you didn't tell me about this game ahead of time Ace just looks like a disappointed dad right now

he's just like well I'm disappointing I sent you this game probably like three months ago and told you to wish list it no you did not I'm checking our I did I sent you a link to this game at some point and I was like hey check this game. I'm searching DMs.

Oh. I think it's in our Instagram DMs. Wait a minute. You did send me this game. Anyway, Ace, this game looks incredible. Okay? It looks awesome.

I love me a good tactical RPG with, you know, a good bit of humor from this one. I love the humor. It's actually really well written and really funny. And the whole concept of being an insurance adjuster who has to prove that the

you know, totally powerful party that killed by the big bad got killed by the big bad guy were just idiots and that there was like a way to beat them so you don't have to pay out their insurance clause is hilarious to me now i i can't imagine what about you right because it's turn based combat so my guess is ryan has zero interest in this game i would say i do have zero interest but i do like the premise i like i like things that are unique or different that add kind of some other uh angle to a game such as this because obviously I mean money's has all this time too

so there was always people lending money and and this is I think it's cool I think it's very cool and unique it's not my style but I'm sure a vast amount of people will love it. It looks like it plays well it looks like it's designed well and there's a comedic humor

to it so yeah I think I think it's really neat it's just not my style I'm very eager to get the full version I'll say I will say this I'm actually going to try the demo on this because I am Very, very curious. This game screams like they knew what they were doing. The humor is incredible.

The whole premise, Ace, you kind of touched on it. The whole premise is you're an insurance adjuster that has to deny the claims, the life insurance claims, for these heroes that die in combat. And so you have this whole scheme of how you're going to come about denying their insurance claims, which is kind of funny in itself. They have an incredible cast of voice actors. I mean, Matt Mercer and some of the, like, it, dude, everything about this game looks like they absolutely went into this knowing that exactly what they wanted to create. They pulled it off. I love the art style. The tactical combat actually looks really, really well done.

There's progression for these characters. There's a wide cast of characters. I know this is an indie game, but it like actually doesn't look or seem like an indie game because there's so much polish and like just cleverness to it. Yeah. It really does look incredible. So this is one that I'm actually, I'm actually wish listing and I'm going to play the demo on this one. And there's a guy with a bag of rats voiced by Todd Habercorn,

so I'm sold. The bag of rats, I started, I really started chuckling to myself when it was like a bag of rats. And I was like, this is why Ace brought this. This is why this game's included in here. The only reason.

Oh, yeah, the narrator's like, and a bag of rats. All right. We've gone to Beetle ball, which probably looks a little familiar to you, Josh. This is in the kind of like, this is Rocket League with bugs. You play as different bugs that have different abilities. You can kick, oh, boy, the faces you're making right now.

You kick the ball into the goal. You can block it with giant dirt. You can fly around your opponents. You're being really quiet. You're scaring me. Look, you guys know Rocket League is one of my favorite games. I have 1,700 plus hours in Rocket League. I absolutely love that game to death.

I haven't played it in a really long time, honestly. But when I look at a game that is just trying to be Rocket League, I mean, Rocket League's free. It's free to play. Like, in what world would I play Beatle ball over playing Rocket League? Well, each beetle has unique abilities that they can pull off. Josh, you didn't think of the Beatles. Think of the Beatles, Josh.

Because poor Ace thinks I'm pooping on this. See, that's a Dung Beetle reference because they're Dung Beatles. There is a Deng Pooopin on this game. But I actually, Ace, you'd be proud of me. I did a little bit of research on this game. And I looked into it a little bit further. And I actually am kind of intrigued because they talked about how there are different classes in this game. And there's a wide variety of Beatles that you can be that all have different powers and abilities.

and some of them combo together really well so that you can actually play with friends and have these neat little combos and all of a sudden this game becomes this kind of like fun tactical Rocket League clone that I actually think might work guys I think this game might work

and that makes me feel really weird man but I kind of got to give them credit and then because I search that on the internet now it's they're in my like my ex feed and stuff like that. And I'm kind of digging these people, man. I'm not going to lie. So this one,

yeah. The game is a blast to play with a friend, by the way. I kind of figure it would be, man. So it was a joy. Ryan, what do you think on this one,

man? Because I know it's easy to just go like, okay, this looks stupid, but I think there actually might be a fun game under this. I agree with you, dude.

I think having the ability to have, you know, characters with different abilities to where you have like a heavy tank or like maybe you're goalie or, or somebody who can kind of manage that area, and a faster, smaller bug that can zip around and being able to pair up

and try to have that unique nature of combining the two to make a good team. And then always playing with your friend is always going to be a good time. So I think there is something here. I do like it. To me, I just keep thinking of grounded two. Like, it's like a, it would be like a little split side-off game

and grounded two, you know, to where you like you go play that. but um no i think this looks cool i i know i know myself i know that if i played this i would have an absolute blast because that's just me if i'm playing online with friends and i'm doing something goofy and fun i'll all have a good time if that's what you want to do i i guarantee this game would probably uh suit those needs for you yeah i'm excited for this one i think it's got potential and i'd like to see it uh gets all its you know things smoothed out and release to a good audience reception but we'll see i You know, you never know.

I will say this, too. I did see a post from the devs on X where they were kind of picking on themselves with a bug that they found in the game where they're like, if these two Beatles combine, like the ball just goes rocketing off into space. And they were like, I like when devs don't take themselves too seriously. And it's like, hey, part of this is like the process and the journey along the way and like the funny things that happen in the process. So yeah, I like I said, initially I was like I was really down on this.

But then the more I looked into it, the more I was like, I think there's actually. probably a lot of fun to be had here. Wait, bro, there's, there's a lot of bugs in the game. Yeah, there's a lot of bugs, man. I don't know. Gosh. All right. I fell for the oldest.

I fell for the oldest joke in the book, man. You did. The oldest video game joke. All right. We'll be right back after this quick break. All right. We are back. It is time to move on from.

beetle bowl to cyber oh it's ace's favorite game I'm doing this game rat time baby rats rats rats rats rats rats rats be honest with us how many times do you go to

steam search and just type in the word rats rats at least once a week just to see just to see at least he's honest I would never ever if he said none I was going to be like you're a dirty liar Listen, this is a really, really fun one.

It was a roguelike survival horror game where you're a rat that's placed into this maze and you have to collect 10 pieces of cheese and extract. However, the maze is filled. This is a rat extraction game. While you guys were raiding it in Arc Raiders, I was playing cyber rats, baby. joining us.

This is why he's like to play my own extraction game, guys. I was saying, however, the maze is filled to the brim with traps and deadly, like, explosives, fire, spikes, and they release these cyborg rats that hunt you to the ends of the earth. But you're able to upgrade the attributes of your rats to be able to hear the cyborg rats through the walls, see the traps more easily while you're trying to sneak around, as well as other things, like smell where the cheese is,

so you don't have to go searching as much. It was a really well-thought-out and interesting roguelike, I will say. Dude, this is a gory game. Oh, it's nasty. This is a gory game, dude. If you love rats, I'm beginning to think Ace might actually dislike rats, because if you think about- If you love rats, this is a hard game to play.

Every rat game that Ace has brought up includes rats dying. The rats died over and over and over. Right? You're fighting. but you die a lot. And then we get cyber rats where this is just poor rats

just getting eviscerated, mulated, obliterated. The funny thing is there's this aggressive AI that's watching you the whole time and anytime a different rat dies that's not you,

she's just like, rat has been terminated. You're just like, oh no, another one. I was like, where? Now, is this a multiplayer game or this is a single player? I believe this is a single player

at least currently, I don't know if they're planning on taking it multiplayer or not, but it is a fun, like, horror maze game, if you like those kind of games. Okay. I actually think this game looks pretty good, Ace. I had to troll you about the little rat premise on this one, but, like, the presentation on this game is pretty good, but, like, what are you actually, so you're trying to just escape the maze? You're trying to gather 10 pieces of cheese and escape the maze.

Okay, so you're a greedy rat, number one, because most rats would be happy with one piece of cheese. So you are a greedy. The gate does not open until you get the 10 pieces of cheese. The computer won't let you out. Now, is it like if I'm careful, I can avoid all these traps? Is it just going to be, you just, bro, you just got, you hit a trap you didn't know was there kind of thing.

Like if you, yeah, if you have low, like, senses in sight, you're not going to see the traps and sometimes you'll just walk over them. But if you, the higher you have them, the more of a red aura is around them and you know to avoid them. But they also don't just get you instantly just because you stepped on them. You have a chance to react and sprint away. Oh, that's kind of cool.

Because you have a sprint as well. Yeah, it's really cool, honestly. It was really well thought out, and I was very impressed. Ryan's losing it, man. Like, I will say this. He does not like the rat game. The cyber rat was creepy. There's zombie rats in this game.

Like, you know, at one point, you can see your rib cage hanging out. And I was like, what is going on with? This is a dark rat game, man. So who the heck came up with this? lab rats. This is the rat upgrades, bro. Yeah. There are rat upgrades.

I know. That's what they are. I know. You upgrade their genetics. That's ridiculous. Oh, my gosh. Dude. Oh, Ace, you cracked me out, brother.

This is... You're not going to be able to give us a penny because you can't stop laughing. It's a game about rats. I just... I thought, like, okay, like, you know, like, Ace has been on this rats thing for a long time. Like, how many games could we possibly get about rats? And Ace is, I don't know what kind of, yeah, look, he's got his rat shirt off. The, the viewers, people watching the video, Ace has a shirt that says, I love rats.

I don't understand why there's, why is there so many games about rats? Like, I don't know, man, we see ourselves in them, I guess. I've never looked at a rat and gone, hmm. that looks like me you know I'm going to make a video game about that thing that animal oh man that's crazy no I do think

I'll joke in aside I do think this does look kind of cool I think there is an awesome progression feature feature to it and where you can kind of channel your energy to gather everything

you need to try to get out of that zone does kind of kind of put the, put the brakes on you and you got to really have the pressure to get out of there before you get, I don't know, rats floated or whatever would happen. Rats floated. Yeah, I don't know. There's just a lot of gore and blood and guts. You invented that rats.

Don't let PETA see this game because PETA's going to have something to say about these poor rats. I don't know. They may be, maybe they made this game. That's the, who knows. All right. Storebound. And now I know the looks of this is. Lethal Slop, right?

That's the first thing you thought when you saw this. It is not a lethal style game. It is more of a... I played this, all right? It is more of a escape room style game where you and three buddies are now locked inside a IKEA, essentially, and you need to solve these puzzles

to find your way outside the IKEA. So we're in hell, basically, is what you're saying. You are in hell. Okay, because anybody has ever been IKEA knows, you know. I'm going to get them meatballs. No meatballs during clothes, Ryan. Oh, no. It is hell.

Yeah. No. Just beating on the shutters. Let me out. But it was a very tense survival horror style game where when the lights go out, two things happen. The employees in the store become enraged and dangerous to be around. and this stalker like employee comes out who walks on all fours and carries a freaking lamp

which I don't know what that's all about and another thing happens you have an insanity bar suddenly and the longer you sit in the dark the higher that insanity bar goes up and everything just starts to look like raw meat you get it's super weird and trippy

but why what's the meat what's the meat factor I don't know why Even your friends look like meat men. Really scary, Ryan. I guess. I'll be honest case. Look, this one did not do it for me at all because it looked like every other lethal slop game that I've ever seen. I totally get that.

And it's interesting that you say it's an escape room-ish kind of thing, but like, I don't know, man. You know, it was this was one where I'm just like this looks like every other game I have seen in this genre. You find the fuse, put it in the fuse box, you know, the monsters. It's even got kind of the same aesthetic to a degree as lethal company. And I was just like, bro, do we really need another one of these? So this one just didn't do it for me. I'll be honest. And it might just be fatigue from that genre where, you know, you've got content word.

That's fair. That's very fair. You've got headliners. You've got a repo. You've got all these games. They are all the same premise at this point. Okay. okay they're all the same premise but tell me one that's bad yeah they're all fun they are

they're all successful they're all fun so this one for me i i actually i actually thought this looked fun i actually thought this looked good i i i would almost guarantee that if we were to hop on and play uh like me and you ace like i would have a really good time playing this oh yeah we would have a great time trying to escape this idea no i i think this is just one of those games that you know um there's not a lot of pressure because you didn't pay $70 for it and you're going to go have some fun you you it's like everything else but it's new you know it's uh you know just a little different it's a different environment or different setting or world you know whatever it may be but it's that same kind of that comfort feeling

of just having a good time playing these style of games and i and i think there's something to that so that's why these do so well uh yeah dude i i thought it looked pretty good i would probably enjoy it. I know it's just like every other one, but to me, these are like, I just, I'm a multiplayer guy. I love getting on with people and hanging out and playing these games, just laughing and giggling and having a good time.

So this one actually looks pretty good for me. I need to start looking at these games like just a movie, right? Like, it's just I'm gonna, I'm gonna spend 20 bucks, and I'm going to go have a few hours of fun. And that's totally fair at that point because I guarantee this game won't be more than 20 bucks at most, you know, when

it releases. So, and if it is, Like I said, if it's $20 or less, like you said, fun with friends for a weekend, even if it's two, three nights. Dude, yeah. Just, you know, it makes it consistently worthwhile. Yeah, absolutely. And we can even stream it and make it even more worth our time. So it's like for us, I got even more value.

All right, I'm back in, boys. I'm back in. All right. Let's do it. But me, I specifically remember this, this game has a feature where you can ping your friends radio from wherever they are if it's on. So of course, well, I'm. by myself hiding in the dark,

Alexi pings me from across the store and the monsters turn. Okay, that's pretty good too. I'll go after you should control your friends at the same time. I'm doubly in now. That's extra. Yep. All right.

Last one here is desktop defender. This is as simplistic as a game gets. It is just a tower defense idle game that runs while you're doing other things. It's a game just to have a game. Okay. What the heck is? the point of this I don't even play

I watch this trailer I watch this trailer and the guy the dev who apparently I saw again I saw an X where it's like

apparently X is like feeding me all these indie games which I love don't get me wrong but it's like this dude shows off his his like email

that he got from Steam saying your game was one of the most popular like games from the Next Fest demos congratulations and I'm looking at this just going

What the heck, people? You don't even play it. You just sits in the corner of your screen. You do play it a bit. You upgrade your stuff because you're gathering money every time you kill anything. So you're upgrading your rate of fire. You're upgrading your damage. You're upgrading your type of gun.

But you don't do anything. It just sits there in the corner of your screen. It makes you feel it. Because number go up. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to automate a calculator where it just sits there and does math in the corner of your screen. for you and occasionally you have to click like I think the next number is going to be

higher or lower or something like that like this is bonkers to me man and listen I'm super happy for the dev again I like I'm not I just don't this is what my brain cannot comprehend because why would you want to play a game that you don't play like it's almost like

you're just running a graphic like put on a YouTube video and then minimize the window real small and put it in the corner of your screen that's the same thing like listen josh there's eight billion people in the world like some people are going to like this type of thing i guess but you're not playing it you're not playing a game it's like kind of playing it people love it man it's crazy dude i'm with you man i'm with you you're not playing it you're not

doing anything what's the point but man idol tower defense people people sure sure love it they love to see they like that uh almost like a passive income they like passive like passive like passive development in their game so they they see that they're advancing oh i made more money uh i'm gonna upgrade this and they don't have to worry about it as they're you know crunching numbers on their you know excel or whatever they're doing you know for who knows what but yeah it's yeah i i don't personally get it it it blows my mind that anyone would waste their time with something like this but if you're just sitting there and just throw it in the corner i get i get why people would maybe do Put a video on, man.

Play some music. They could do both. It's not like this is going to take a lot of bandwidth, dude. Yeah, you just leave it on? Look, I get it. Like, my brain just does, this does not compute in my old man brain, apparently, to where I was kind of curious, like, where you guys are going to land with this one, but you kind of, why do you want a game that you don't interact with?

It's not a game at that point, man. Like, somebody interact with a little bit. Make it make sense. all right moving on to just our honorable mentions real quick he's like moving on I can't make it make sense moving on moving on before you hurt the devs feelings and he hurt further

dude this dev is going to make some money and I'm very happy for the dev on this but also he's going to make a lot of money we need to make a game we need to make a game where you don't have to play it okay and it's just stuff that moves around in the corner of somebody's desktop and we'll be rich let's do it

that's like three games you and Ryan have agreed to make a game we agreed to make a lethal like you've agreed to make a child war game and now this you know all right that's it we're gonna make a we're making a we're making a game that you don't have to play vgp development studios yeah yeah no fun yeah no fun yeah no fun studios you I think you play the demo for this next one I'm about to bring up Josh is God breakers I did indeed this one I was watching this I'm like wait a minute I play this game I saw you in the in the bottom corner, I was like, oh, he actually

checked this one out at some point. I did, yeah. But in the simplest terms, this is a, you know, action roguelike with like combos, heavy light, uh, absorb enemy abilities and throw out a massive attack sometimes. The boss for this one kicked my butt. I'll tell you

that. He's tough. Yeah. This game is hard. I, I played this. The, the, the, the main angle on this one is that you can attack enemies, you get them low and then you can like absorb their power. even like trash mobs and stuff and then you only get to activate that power once before you lose it but it does add some that it's it's weird because it's like in a way it's almost like

Pokemon where it's like I want to see what this thing can do so let me like try to absorb its power and then use it against something so that kind of sense of discovery is kind of cool it is it is well done it is also very kind of just routine in regards to like the combat and stuff like that like it wasn't bad but it wasn't great i think the angle that they're going is a neat angle but i don't know if it was enough to like sell me on this game either it looks great but it also just felt very overwhelming trying to start start it and get into it they just throw a lot at you really fast and you just kind of lose what you're doing yeah it all looks the same and it's like it looks like to me it looked like uh uh and i haven't played the demo

but it looked like a confusing like risk of rain like it yeah it had the color spectrum of that, like maybe not the same total graphical effects. Risk of rain with more like a Hades art or, uh, yeah, I'm just like the vibe of it, like the look of it reminded me of that, but it just um, yeah, I don't know.

The attacks look crazy. Some of the worlds look pretty unique and stuff like that, but yeah, I haven't, I haven't played it like you guys have, but um, yeah, I mean, it looks, okay. It's, that's kind of the, my takeaway is it was like, it's okay. Like, I'm sure

that people will find it fun. And that's okay. It'll find its audience. Right. Yeah. That's the thing is it's okay. Yeah. And then finally, Lort, which to the best of my ability to describe this game to you,

it is one of those vampire survivor risk of rain Diablo likes with raid bosses and all sorts of nonsense all the time. I, man, I'm not trying to sound negative here, but this, I'm getting it. to be like what sets this game apart than every other game in this genre you know it's just click button smash things numbers pop up on the screen i like we talk about innovation and you have to have something unique in your game and if you don't then you just become part of the masses of that genre and again with lord i kind of feel like that's the case um where it's like what is your unique angle in your game like what is it that sets you apart because if if the answer is nothing

then like why should I pick your game over the other thousand games that I could play that look exactly like this game, dude? It's the humor for this one. Is it humor? Yeah, but that doesn't come through in the trailer, which is the problem for me. No, it doesn't.

Yeah, how are you going to sell that? But when I died in this game, it just said skill issue. So, like, it threw up the word skill issue on my screen. That's funny when a game trolls you. I agree with Josh on that. Like, I guess if you've, you know, kind of had more time

And then obviously ace, you know, the humor kind of aside. Like it's just, you have to have something to differentiate yourself from these other plain, foresty, green plains, worlds where you go and you attack guys and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, the same thing that we've seen a million times over, you know, what are you going to do differently, especially if you're an indie and you've got to stand out. Like, this one just didn't do it for me. But I guess, you know, if there is a cool comedic factor where the game trolls you, like, that's, that's pretty good if there's some humor throughout. But overall, like, from what I've seen, like, you know, it just didn't do too much for me. And as always, we recommend you check these things out on your own time and make your own opinions. Absolutely. You know, don't solely go off of everything.

We say, because we play a lot of games and we get a little bit of fatigue over certain genres and certain seeing certain things over and over again. This is tough for me, right? Because I'll be honest, like, there's probably, there's five games on this list of games that I'm actually curious about. And you guys are right at storebound. I was probably harsh on that one. So like storebound, you're right, is just going to be a fun time. Crash out crew, I could see being fun. Ledgerbound looks fantastic to me.

Oh, it's going to be great. Your cyber rat weird game actually looks kind of unique. And I can see that being fun. It does look kind of unique. Beetle ball, I could see actually being fun. if they can nail the combos in the different classes and the gameplay on that one. Storebound, good time.

Desktop Defender, bro, I don't know what the heck that even is. But like, that's the thing, right? Like, it's like some of these games stand out and then there are other games that absolutely do not stand out to me. And that's the problem, right? Is it's like you have to get your game to stand out. If you can do that, you'll at least get people's attention

at that point. And some of these games to me really do. stand out and then there's other ones where I just go, I feel bad, dude. Like, I know people are pouring their heart and souls into these games, but I just feel bad because it's like, I worry you're wasting your time, you know, or if it's a learning experience, that's one thing. If it's teaching you how to develop things, like, I get it. But if you are betting the farm that Lort is going to, like, be your future income and

stuff, like, I worry about that, dude, you know, at the same time. And we never want to see anybody fail. Like don't let anybody that's listening get that impression. Like we do not ever want to see a developer fail. But the nature of the industry is some people will. And we say it time and time again, find what makes your game unique to gamers because that is what will get you in front of gamers at the same time. Yeah.

Well, we're out of time now, boys. But those were the games we looked at. I will say, if any of these interests you at all, be sure to go. and wish list the game. Wish list. Yeah. The devs absolutely appreciate it. It does so much more than you think it does for them.

It really gives them, you know, that motivation. It lets them know that people want to see what they're making. All of these are, you know, top-notch games, even if they didn't speak to us directly, except maybe desktop defenders. It's a little whatever. Well, in the wishlist thing, too, like, it helps with funding. So, like, maybe they, you know, you get enough people to wish list, then you can get some extra funding to help you develop.

They can show that to their publishers and get extra fun. and really fine-tune everything to really kind of solidify what they're developing. So there is a good kind of aspect to the wish listing. So even if you're just a little bit interested or you just want to support these devs, always go on wish list because it really does do a lot, you know, for them. And if there was a next Fest demo out there I missed, be sure to put it down the comments. Yes, let us know. I'm sure I'll get time to look at it.

Even if the demo's not up, I could watch the trailer, of course. But, you know, I think that's it, gents. you know what a time for indies genuinely what a year what a year that's for sure i'm going to download the ledger bound demo after this like legitimately i really want to hear what you thought about it that's for sure but yeah i'll be sure to rate our podcast five stars leave us a review if you have not on apple podcast leave us a comment if you're on spotify unless no you're still there still listening i see you don't you click off yet just because i'm at outroing

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