It feels like a year has passed since Summer Game Fest wrapped up at the beginning of June, but somehow it’s only been a month. Getting to see so many friends I normally only get to see in person once or twice a year is always one of the biggest highs of these events, but Play Days had no shortage of good games to light up my eyes and electrify my fingers. With games like Metaphor: ReFantazio solidifying itself as one of my most anticipated of the year, and Monster Hunter Wilds continuing to look as incredible as the next installment in the series can be I didn’t want to overlook some of the smaller experiences that build up so much of what SGF is. So before the year chugs along I wanted to take a quick moment to highlight three of my favorite indie games I had the chance to go hands-on with in Los Angeles.
Fear The Spotlight
If you listen to the show or follow us at all you know that horror anything typically never enters my entertainment cycle– unless it’s for a charity stream or Todd makes us watch something for the PTC Movie Club. So when Blumhouse took the stage at the SGF Showcase to reveal their initiative to give horror game creators the backing to do what they do, I applauded the idea and loved seeing this type of investment into the genre assuming I would never sit down to play any of these games. That was until I was nudged by the PR rep handling Fear The Spotlight appointments to come by and check it out vowing this was a good entry level horror game. They weren’t wrong.
Fear The Spotlight is a third-person horror game reminiscent of mid 90’s PlayStation or N64 games that I still have occasional nightmares about– but not in a jump scare I need to play with the lights on sort of way, more of it’s visual presentation and vibe. A vibe that they nail with aplomb. Setting itself off from the start with an eeriness you would expect from two high school students creeping around their school in a dark and seemingly vacant building. Solving puzzles and moving around with fixed camera angles and chunky polygons, Fear The Spotlight seems like it has the potential to be a cult hit and possibly even manage to grab people like me interested in seeing where the story goes, because not knowing where that hallway path the demo leads you down ends is something I am still pondering since I left that demo station.
Hyper Light Breaker
Returning to the universe of Hyper Light Drifter is something I’ve been eagerly looking forward to, so much so that I made sure to revisit Drifter earlier this year before heading out to Los Angeles to play the next game set in that world– Hyper Light Breaker. Although these two games share worlds and some overall theming, Breaker is a 3D co-op action RPG roguelite as opposed to the top down pixelated original Zelda-esque adventure game Drifter. Assuming the role of a Breaker, you and up to two friends can scour procedurally generated biomes wiping out enemies, hunting down bosses, and acquiring loot to level up and create better builds in order to conquer the world around you, the Overgrowth.
In the demo build of this soon to be Early Access adventure on Steam, I was able to choose between a few different Breakers but it was no question that I’d be choosing the hulking tanooki character before setting off into the Cursed Outpost. This outpost serves as Hyper Light Breaker‘s hub world in-between runs where you can interact with NPCs to uncover some world building but also purchase new weapons and gadgets as well as upgrade your character. The goal of each run is to defeat enough mini-bosses to retrieve keys to reach the final boss of the biome, and doing that with the limited amount of deaths you are allowed. If you exceed the amount of chances on a run, the biome will get destroyed and portions of your equipment and loot will turn into currency or be lost depending on which items they are. This economy functions as a way to continue to build up in-between runs so that even if you are struggling to complete a biome you can still become stronger or start off stronger on the next one. This type of loop that doesn’t abandon all progress is my preferred type of rogue gameplay as you still feel like you’re progressing even in defeat, while also not completely done with a run until you have exhausted your set number of lives.
Each time I returned to the hub after a death felt more calculated– and I more confident– as I would choose the weapons and gear that benefited my up close and aggressive playstyle. With combat and traversal that felt fluid, once I locked down the parry technique I was zipping between enemy encounters and baiting out attacks to punish foes, seeking out hidden areas and gearing up for my final chance at taking down the boss in the demo, Exus, after he engulfed me in flames and other flurries of attacks on previous attempts. On my final life on my run at Play Days I thought I had the Exus boss fight downloaded and as his health bar reached centimeters we double K.O.’d and the run was over. A bittersweet end to my time with Hyper Light Breaker at SGF, but left an unsatiated appetite I am still drooling over as I patiently wait for my next chance at seeking crowns in the Overgrowth.
If you’re searching for the next big rouglite Hyper Light Breaker might be just the thing to add to your wishlist. A vibrant world to explore, solid combat with weapon and gadget variety that already seemed to have depth and options to suite multiple playstyles. Hyper Light Breaker‘s potential has me grinning and excited to mess around with alternate builds in the future, hone my skills in combat, and being able to do all of that with some buds.
Arranger: A Role-Puzzling Adventure
The moment I saw Arranger: A Role-Puzzling Adventure I knew it was something I had to keep my eye on, so when the opportunity to check it out in Los Angeles arose it was one of the first games I added to my calendar. I truly enjoy good puzzle games and although not every puzzle game has to reinvent the genre in order for me to shoot a glance at it, when there’s an interesting hook or mechanic I make sure to keep an eye on it.
Arranger is unique in that essentially the whole world is your little puzzle box. Interconnected pathways where you move around to rearrange the world around you is a simple enough concept that opens up in intuitive and thoughtful ways. Layered over a wonderful soundtrack and beautifully drawn world, it’s a recipe for something special that I can’t wait to fully devour later this month. The demo scales up in puzzle difficulty as you progress showing how the puzzle structure can continue to challenge your process, using edges of paths to push an object onto the other side or even maneuvering an object from another area into a place where you are stuck. The boss encounter in the demo was where my puzzle prowess was put to task in figuring out how to manipulate the world in order to outsmart the enemies movements. My hope is the clever puzzler continues to showcase incremental additions to the already stellar puzzle structure and keep my brain juices flowing throughout the adventure.
My time with Arranger at Summer Game Fest came equipped with an audience as friend of PTC, Luis, enjoyed his time with the game so much so that he wanted to watch my experience with it. Admittedly, many folks, at least prior to our time with it, did not finish the demo’s boss without assistance and Luis was the first to do so. So he was hoping he could watch as the throne remained unscathed and although no one can take being the first away, I did eventually join him in the ranks of those who vanquished the more challenging aspects of the demo. Walking away with a smile on my face and an eagerness to see how Arranger: A Role-Puzzling Adventure continues to shift its way through those crevices of my brain and maybe see if Jemma’s story finds a path through my heart.
For more thoughts on these and other games we played at Summer Game Fest check out this.
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