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Independent Games
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List

Independent Games Festival (IGF) was founded in 1998 to promote independent video game developers, and innovation in video games. It cultivates innovation and artistry in all forms of interactive media. This aims to uncover how games are rich, diverse, artistic, and culturally significant.

It chooses games in a series of categories: Grand Prize, Innovation, Visual Art, Audio, Design, Technical Excellence, Best Mobile Game and Audience Award. This list highlights the games that were nominated and/or won.

This list includes 132 games from the last 24 years, with 3,783 likes. They come from a range of different genres and play-styles and are all good games if you want to play innovative indie games .

List Details

PEGI Ratings: PEGI 3 to PEGI 18
ESRB Ratings: ESRB EVERYONE to ESRB MATURE 17+
Australian Ratings: G to R 18+
Genres: Action, Adventure, Battle, Brain Game, Collecting, Communication, Creative, Fighting, Narrative, Physically Active, Platform, Point-and-Click, Puzzle, Race, Rhythm, Role-Play, Sequencing, Shooting, Simulation, Sports, Stealth, Strategy, Traversal and World Building
Total Likes: 3,783

Related Lists

We have other Award Winners lists of games:

A Short Hike

Release Date: 05/04/2019, updated in 2021

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, PS5, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Open World, Pixels and Weather

A Short Hike is an adventure traversal game where you play the penguin-like character Claire, who needs to climb a mountain in a beautiful national park to receive an important phone call. Presented in cute pixel graphics, the game invites you to...

Teardown

Release Date: 29/10/2020, updated in 2023

Out Now: PC, PS5 and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person

Teardown is a strategic game where you plan and execute a heist in fully destructible environments. Your objective is to claim the key cards that are hidden around the map. However taking one triggers the alarm, giving you only sixty seconds before...

Stardew Valley

Release Date: 26/02/2016, updated in 2018

Out Now: Amazon Fire, Android, Mac, PC, PS Vita, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Day and Night, Grid, Open World and Pixels

Stardew Valley looks like a farming simulator. That’s partly what it is, but you also develop relationships with the other townsfolk and delve deep into the mines. Its quirky labyrinthine attention to detail is inviting for young players to try their...

TowerFall Ascension

Release Date: 25/06/2013, updated in 2017

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS Vita, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Pixels

TowerFall Ascension is a running, jumping and archery game where each player selects a pixelated knight and fights to eliminate opponents by shooting them with arrows or jumping on their heads. Play is about quick reactions and second-guessing what your...

Everything

Release Date: 21/03/2017, updated in 2019

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4 and Switch

Skill Rating: 3+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Open World

Everything is an unusual game that simulates a world where you can become any object. It sounds strange and not much fun, but the enjoyment is in discovering how small or how big a thing you can become. From tiny atoms to whole planets and everything in...

Night in the Woods

Release Date: 10/01/2017, updated in 2017

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Hand-Made

Night in the Woods is a narrative adventure which follows college dropout Mae Borowski returning home to the crumbling former mining town of Possum Springs. But the place is different now her friends have grown and changed. There’s something...

Cuphead

Release Date: 29/09/2017, updated in 2019

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On, Cartoon and Hand-Made

Cuphead is a running, jumping and shooting game that looks like an old Mickey Mouse cartoon. You play on your own or with someone else and work across the screen, jumping gaps, shooting enemies and avoiding projectiles.

Mini Metro

Release Date: 06/01/2015

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and iOS

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead and Grid

Mini Metro is a sequencing strategy game where you create an ordered, efficient underground train system. It sounds like hard work, but the simple Tube-map visuals, calm music, and streamlined interactions make this relaxing, like sudoku. Dip your toe...

Chicory: A Colorful Tale

Release Date: 10/06/2021, updated in 2021

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Hand-Made

Chicory: A Colorful Tale is an adventure where you play an everyday dog thrust into the role of wielding a magic brush. The world starts black and white but you colour it in with your paintbrush to solve puzzles and help your animal friends. It looks...

Don't Starve

Release Date: 23/04/2013, updated in 2017

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, PS Vita, PS3, PS4, Switch, Wii U, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Blocks, Day and Night, Hand-Made and Open World

Don't Starve is an open-world survival game where it’s the environment and enemies, rather than other players, that you have to work with. You need to find and develop food, weapons and shelter to survive. It’s enjoyable because it’s hard, so...

The Alto Collection

Release Date: 19/02/2015, updated in 2018

Out Now: Android, Apple TV, Mac, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 4+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On, Day and Night and Weather

The Alto Collection is a series of games including Alto's Odyssey and Alto's Adventure. Both are action traversal games where you explore beautiful mountains, dunes and canyons on a snowboarding journey full of serenity and secrets. All you have to...

Knights And Bikes!

Release Date: 26/08/2019, updated in 2020

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Hand-Made

Knights And Bikes! is a hand-painted adventure in a fictional late-eighties British Isles. You work together as Nessa and Demelza who explore its coast on bikes to find treasure, mystery and trouble. There’s fighting with frisbees, water balloons,...

Outer Wilds

Release Date: 11/12/2018, updated in 2023

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person, Day and Night and Open World

Outer Wilds is an exploration space mystery about a solar system trapped in an endless time loop. After 20 minutes of game time, you must start again – but each time brings a new opportunity to learn how you ended up on the planet and solve the...

Celeste

Release Date: 23/01/2018, updated in 2023

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Pixels

Celeste is a platform game that requires players to use jumping and climbing moves to ascend an increasingly challenging two-dimensional mountain. You play Madeline, who is haunted by self-doubt at the scale of the task at hand. She presses on but is...

Lonely Mountains Downhill

Release Date: 22/10/2019

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Cartoon and Open World

Lonely Mountains Downhill is a racing game where you traverse a mountain on a bike. Make your way through thick forests, narrow trails and wild rivers. Race, jump, slide and try not to crash all the way from the peak to the valley. You choose your route...

Kingdom

Kingdom (Series)

Release Date: 21/10/2015

Out Now: Amazon Fire, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On, Day and Night and Pixels

Kingdom is a retro-look strategy game where you must defend your town from the nightly attack of zombies as you develop your technology and civilisation day by day. But unlike other tower-defence games – where you set up defences and fend off waves of...

Wilmot's Warehouse

Release Date: 29/08/2019

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On

Wilmot's Warehouse is a game for people who like to organise things. You are in charge of a warehouse and must manage 100s of items of stock. Identical square boxes are labelled with rudimentary icons. On your own or with another player, you must...

The Gardens Between

Release Date: 20/09/2018

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

The Gardens Between is a puzzle game set in dreamlike island gardens where you play as best friends Arina and Frendt. You work around the island levels collecting balls of light in your lantern, manipulating time to solve puzzles and remove obstacles...

80 Days

Release Date: 31/07/2014, updated in 2019

Out Now: Amazon Fire, Android, Mac, PC, Switch and iOS

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead and Day and Night

80 Days is a travel and culture discovery game set in 1872, where decisions about your journey around the world impact the course of the story and characters. You play be deciding where to go next and talking to the people you meet to find the right...

That Dragon, Cancer

Release Date: 12/01/2016, updated in 2016

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC and iOS

Skill Rating: 14+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person

That Dragon, Cancer is a game about a family with a young son who has terminal brain cancer. It sounds off-putting and morbid but this living biography invites you to join the family and find hope, faith and love in the face of an insurmountable...

Baba is You

Release Date: 13/03/2019

Out Now: Mac, PC and Switch

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Pixels

Baba is You requires some lateral thinking. Each level is controlled by rules written on the screen, such as ‘Lava is Hot’, ‘Wall is Stop’ and ‘Flag is Move’. By moving the words around with your pixelated character, you subvert the...

Spelunky 2

Release Date: 29/09/2020

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Pixels

Spelunky 2 is, like the classic Spelunky, a running and jumping game where you explore mysterious caves on the moon looking for your missing parents. On your journey, you will find unique environments, treasure, and people to join you as you delve...

Untitled Goose Game

Release Date: 03/10/2019

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 5+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Cartoon

Untitled Goose game is a tongue-in-cheek puzzle game where you play a dastardly goose intent on ruining the day of the inhabitants of a sleepy English village. Play involves working out the right order of interactions and distractions to let you steal...

Overcooked! All You Can Eat

Release Date: 07/08/2018, updated in 2018

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead and Grid

Overcooked! All You Can Eat is part of a series of collaborative cooking games for up to 4 players. You must keep talking to other players to coordinate the various elements of the dishes. It starts simply enough but soon gets more complicated as you...

Oxenfree

Release Date: 14/01/2016, updated in 2016

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

Oxenfree is an adventure game where a teenagers’ beach party spirals into a supernatural story. You guide the outcome with your choices as the well-written dialogue reveals characters coming to terms with family breakdown, death of a sibling, blame...

There Is No Game

Release Date: 06/10/2020

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, Switch and iOS

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead and Pixels

There Is No Game is a comedic adventure with a strange twist. From the outset, the game’s narrator insists that there is no game to play. As you inevitably ignore his instruction you go on a journey through silly and unexpected video game universes.

Inside

Release Date: 29/06/2016, updated in 2018

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 14+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On

Inside is from the same developer as Limbo. As such, you play another boy in a dark dream-light and horrific world. Here though, it's more modern-day and realistic.

Shady Part of Me

Release Date: 10/12/2020

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Components: 2D Side-On and Hand-Made

Shady Part of Me is a narrative platform game where you play as a young girl and her shadow. You help her overcome emotional struggles by solving 2D and 3D puzzles. The game world is based within the young girl's dreams. The young girl is afraid of the...

Mutazione

Release Date: 23/09/2019

Out Now: Mac, PS4 and iOS

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Day and Night

Mutazione is a narrative adventure game where you play as a 15-year-old girl visiting her grandfather on a faraway island inhabited by friendly but mutated villagers. By finding seeds, tending to gardens and talking to people, you uncover a tightly knit...

The Stanley Parable

Release Date: 31/07/2011, updated in 2022

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Components: 3D First-Person

The Stanley Parable is an interactive drama with no combat or action to speak of apart from walking around and interacting with everyday objects. You guide a silent protagonist, Stanley, while a discouraging narration plays in your ear. As you discover...

Just Shapes & Beats

Release Date: 21/06/2018

Out Now: PC, PS4, Stadia and Switch

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Pixels

Just Shapes & Beats is a two player rhythm game where you dodge bullets in time with the music. As well as this unusual premise, play extends the novelty as you have to both avoid the various shapes and move to the Beats. It’s a new spin on the shoot...

Castle Crashers

Release Date: 08/09/2015, updated in 2019

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS3, PS4, Switch, Xbox 360 and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead and Hand-Made

Castle Crashers is a cartoon looking fighting game, like Golden Axe, The Simpsons or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade games, set in a medieval universe where a dark wizard steals a mystical gem and captures four princesses. Four knights are charged...

Gorogoa

Release Date: 14/12/2017, updated in 2018

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On, Grid and Hand-Made

Gorogoa is a puzzle game where you rearrange and resize tiles to make a singular picture. It appears to be simple, but to solve the puzzles you need to play close attention to how they interrelate. This Matryoshka Russian-Doll puzzle combines with...

Dicey Dungeons

Release Date: 13/08/2019, updated in 2020

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, Switch, Xbox One, Xbox X|S and iOS

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On, Cards and Dice

Dicey Dungeons is a video game adventure where you build a deck of cards to represent characters, attacks and weapons. Here the novelty is that these cards combine with dice rolls to determine who wins battles.

Do Not Feed the Monkeys

Release Date: 23/10/2018

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Components: 2D Side-On

Do Not Feed the Monkeys is an adventure game where you sit at a computer and spy on live video feeds of various events and characters. Your job is to gather information about "the monkeys" while also looking after your character's health and apartment...

Eastward

Release Date: 16/09/2021

Out Now: PC, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Components: 2D Overhead, Blocks and Pixels

Eastward is an adventure game about a miner who meets a young girl in a secret facility. Together you explore the decaying cities and discover the truth about her origins and what’s behind the creatures who are destroying everything. The narrative is...

This War Of Mine

Release Date: 14/11/2014, updated in 2016

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One, Xbox X|S and iOS

Skill Rating: 13+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Day and Night

This War Of Mine is a narrative strategy game inspired by the 1992–96 Siege of Sarajevo, this is a war game where you play the civilian trying to survive during the fighting. You face tough decisions on how to spend time and resources each day to...

Lovers In A Dangerous Spacetime

Release Date: 19/09/2018

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Components: 2D Side-On and Pixels

Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime offers a space-survival challenge where you must collaborate to defend your circular spaceship. Each player needs to take on specific tasks to manage offensive or defensive duties.

Luna The Shadow Dust

Release Date: 13/10/2020, updated in 2020

Out Now: Mac, PC and Switch

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Hand-Made

Luna The Shadow Dust is an adventure game where you play two companions drawn together in a hand-animated world. Each part of the game is beautifully realised and presents a puzzle to solve.

Ultimate Chicken Horse

Release Date: 25/09/2018, updated in 2017

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Components: 2D Side-On, Cartoon and Hand-Made

Ultimate Chicken Horse is a running and jumping game where you play different farmyard animals trying to get to the end of the level. The twist is that it's you and your friends who build the levels as you play, placing deadly traps before trying to...

Curated lists:
Game genre:
Style of Play:
Components:

How long to play:
User-generated content:	No
Accessibility features:	Yes

Controls
Gamepad:
Mouse And Keyboard:
Touchscreen:
Motion:	Motion Aiming Motion Pointing Motion Tilting Motion Gesture Motion Camera
Remap Controls:
Button Combinations:	Holding Down Buttons Optional Rapid Repeated Pressing Optional No Simultaneous Buttons
Controller Vibration:
Sensitivity:

Getting Started
Onboarding Before Play:
Assistance Getting Starting:	Tutorials Practice Area View Control Mapping Assistance With Controls Reaction-Time Not Critical Low Pressure Adjust Speed No Jump Scares
Assistance For Progressing:	Guaranteed Progress With God Mode Bank Progress With Frequent Checkpoints Assisted Progress With Boosts Assisted Progress With Hints Assisted Recall for Characters Assisted Recall for Narrative and Dialogue Save Progress Anytime

Reading
Reading Level:
Text Visibility:	Large Clear Text High Contrast Text
Subtitles:
Captions:
Voice Acted:

Navigation
Clarity:
Head-Up Display:
Menu Navigation:

Visual
Contrast:
Interactive Elements:
Visual Distractions:
Audio Cues for Visual Events:
Narration for Visual Elements:
	Motion Sickness Friendly
Colour Options:
Play Without Sight:
Violence:

Audio
	Balance Audio Levels
Audio Events:
	Play Without Hearing

Communication
Player-to-Player Online Communication:
Online Communication Assistance:

Difficulty
Difficulty Options:	Simple and Full Version No Memorisation Advantage No Hidden Information No Deceit Advantage No Colour Advantage No Mathematics Advantage No Weighing Decisions

Getting Started
Assistance Getting Started:	Clear Manual Electronic Version of Manual Electronic Version of Manual for Screen Readers Getting Started Video Digital Version Reference Aid
Assistance Progressing:	Play Order Tokens (Or play order doesn’t change) Reaction-Time Not Critical Low Pressure Low Impact Catch Up Rule

Reading
Reading Level:
Necessary Text Visibility:	Large Clear Text on Board (Or no text required) Large Clear Text on Cards (Or no text required) High Contrast Text (Or no text required) QR Code For Text (Or no text required) Primary and Secondary Text Distinguishable (Or no text required) Information Orientation Clear Icons

Physical
Pieces:	Components are Distinguishable by Touch Components are Replaceable No Non-Standard Dice (Or No Dice) No Tiny Pieces No Paper Money No Sprawl
Cards:	Large Card Size Standard Card Shape Limited Hand Management No Excessive Card Shuffling No Right-Handed Advantage
Placement:	No Unbound Placement Player Components Not Shared No Fiddly Placement Easily Verbalised Actions

Visual
Printed Visibility:	Colour Blind Friendly Design Double-Coding Colour High Contrast Colours
Component Identifiability:	Outline Key Elements No Busy Backgrounds Easily Verbalised Game State No Close Inspection Disadvantage Playable Without Sight

Audio
Communication:	Audio Cues Mirrored Visually (Or no critical audio signals) No Pressured Reveals No Pressured Communication Playable Without Hearing

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