Favorite indie games of 2014

[LocoColt04]

Hey guys, now that we're a month into 2015, I thought it would be good to open up some discussion regarding our favorite indie titles of the year behind us. Many of these games have been cheap, cheaper, or even temporarily free, and I was hoping to get some insight into your preferences!

For myself, at least one of the games at the top of this list had to be Transistor. Between the art, the story, and the instantly appealing gameplay, Red's journey to find her voice is quite phenomenal. Absolutely worth playing!

[SuperSabin]

I'm going to be very honest and say that the indie game of the year for me back in 2014 is Super Amazing Wagon Adventure Turbo. There is so much fun to be had with this game and it is a parody of the Oregon Trail. The events are randomized so it will be different every time you play it through. Not only that there is plenty of humor throughout the game, it gave me some good laughs during my adventures throughout the game.

[Incognitus]

For me, it's a game called Banished. Shining Rock Software is perhaps an indie developer in the most literal sense, since it's a one-man show. One guy calls all the shots and does all of the coding, artwork and music himself (sidenote: the music is catchy and fits the atmosphere of the game perfectly). Banished is a fantastic indie game. It popped up on my recommended YouTube videos feed when I was cycling through some Let's Play videos. I decided to give it a shot after it went on sale during the Steam summer sale last year. It retails for $20, but it's currently available on Steam now for a cool $5.99.* (as of February 25, 2015)

Normally I'm not a fan of playing city builder games like SimCity, but this one caught my eye and I wasn't disappointed. The game is wonderfully simplistic. You build houses to house people; work buildings to give them jobs; storage buildings to give them places to store supplies; schools to educate your populace to make them more efficient; roads to connect them. There's no real end-game to it. Once you build a thriving civilization, it works like a well-oiled machine. Nothing short of a plague or natural disaster can really derail your city---and you can turn off some of those in the options if you are just beginning and don't want your progress ruined.

Give Banished a try if you like the genre, or when it's cheap on Steam if you aren't.

*sale price subject to change at any time

[hTop]

I struggle to remember any indies except for Shovel Knight last year. Just started playing the recent Shantae on the 3DS as well. So far, very good. It's almost like there are too many 2D platformers nowadays....