Ah, Indie games. No longer limited to niche community circles on the far reaches of the Intertubes, Indie games are practically mainstream these days. With the coming of megahits such as Minecraft and Super Meat Boy, the Indie game community is garnering ever more steam. To celebrate this, an impressive collection of Indie games have been nominated to contend at the 2011 IndieCade Festival. In all, thirty-six of the 446 submissions will face off to try and snatch up the ten awards (plus a Jury Award).
In short, IndieCade is a professional conference held in Los Angeles that focuses on the independently developed video game industry. It is open to the public, and features games of all genres from around the world. Along with the awards festival, IndieCade allows attendees a great opportunity to network, learn, and see what developers are doing with hands-on interactivity. Every one of the 36 finalist games will be set up for attendees to try in person, offering a great chance to see and compare what is trending in games right now. This exhibit will be available on Saturday and Sunday, October 8th and 9th, 2011. For any gamers in the L.A. area, this is definitely worth checking out.
Fez bizarrely mixes 3D with 2D platforming.
Taking a look at the list of game finalists, I could see that there was definitely a wide range of diversity. Everything from educational to casual, creative to internet-trendy can be seen. One game that caught my eye was Fez. It’s a sort of platformer that mixes 3D and 2D environments in a bizarre but creative way: you can rotate the perspective 90° to view the 3D world, but interact with it on a 2D plane. As you explore the game, there are no enemies and no penalty for death. As a “peaceful” game, I’m very intrigued by it and will be checking it out sometime.
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