Indies for the weekend

They Watch

This is one of those that is very short but needs to be replayed several times for the player to get the complete picture of what is happening. The premise for this is that a woman named Jessica, who has been away for a while is returning home again, but once back realizes that all is not as it seems and it's up to you to figure out what is going on. The player is tasked with various objectives throughout the game to progress, but to get the different endings the player will need to do or not do these objectives in a certain order. This forces the player to remember what they did in previous playthroughs to get various endings. For a game this short, I was impressed by the number of cutscenes that the game presented. Every ending for example has a cutscene. This is I think quite an achievement considering that there are games out there that are far more ambitious and yet, when completing them, leave you with an unsatisfactory black screen and a few lines of text. Even after playing it through several times and getting all the six possible endings I'm still not quite sure what it was all about. To me, the endings seemed disjointed for the most part making it unclear what is going on. I do however have a theory but I'm not going to give it away here as this might affect others' perception of what is happening. Feel free to hit me up if you try the game and let me know what you think was happening.
Game Link
Game Link

We are broken

This game could only exist as an indie game. Without a doubt I don't see how this would ever fly in the AAA market. Not to say that the game isn't any good, rather on the contrary but more because of the tone and setting. This is yet another one of those depressing ones that make you think, maybe a bit too much about certain things in life that you would rather not think about daily or at all for that matter. Especially not if you've booted up a game to play. Yet it brings those thoughts to the fore because of the subject matter at hand. The premise is basically that the human species is not at the top of the food chain anymore and vampires have taken over the world. You and two other members of the human resistance have been captured and are being interrogated so that you can reveal the position of the rest of the resistance. You will take on the role of three different individuals, each with their motives, strengths, and weaknesses and your main objective is to resist the interrogators. The atmosphere in this one is dark, thick, and heavy. Even though there aren't any voiceovers and all dialog is through text, the background sounds and music are more than enough to make anyone feel uncomfortable. The dialog is what steals the show, as some of it will make the hairs on your neck stand up. It's quite a feat to be able to conjure so much unease and discomfort just by text and some sound effects and it will leave you with a wanting of more. This one succeeds with far less on so many levels where many more ambitious horror titles fail.
Game Link
Game Link