The Vale is very much an experience, and it’s one I found interesting, even if it felt a little frustrating at times. The truth is, there just aren’t many games like this, and The Vale’s innovative take on accessible gameplay made it worth overlooking its flaws. It’s not perfect, but it’s interesting, and I’ll choose that over perfect every time.

If you’re into fresh, new puzzle games that offer a decent challenge, Vectronom is really a no-brainer. It’s super cheap, too. Buy it.

It’s a grueling but exhilarating journey that confronts what we probably know all along: that the pain of living through countless deaths and tragedies is ultimately what binds us together in life.

If you’ve been itching for something suitable to return to after waiting for a new, addictive strategy RPG in the past, you absolutely must get your hands on Chucklefish’s latest. Despite its strict adherence to classic mechanics, it’s a brilliant overall package that has just about everything you could want out of a spiritual successor to your favorite tactical RPG. It’s perfect for on-the-go play on Switch and feels right at home on PC. If you’re not convinced yet, we’re not sure you’re a true strategy RPG fan anyway.

Overall, Sakuna: of Rice and Ruin is a delight. The two halves of the game, which might soon get stale if they were standalone, complement each other perfectly. Both farming and fighting remain interesting due to the game’s pacing and the steady stream of new abilities and equipment it rewards you with. It’s clear from the attention to detail how much love the two-person team of Edelweiss has poured into this title. Every ingredient, meal or skill has a well-written description; every system has more depth than you initially expect. Not only can you pet the dog, but you can also pick it up and carry it around. This world is one I want to learn more about and spend more time in. In fact, now this review is done, I’m probably going to get right back to playing. I saw ducks in the trailer; I want to unlock ducks.

30XX is haaaaaaaaaaaard. It’s so damn punishing, but it’s also a wonderfully inventive roguelike that takes everything that makes Mega Man great and goes “what if you died more and the progression was different?” It’s an important question, and the answer to that used to be 20XX, but 30XX is better in every single way. Please play this game if you want a cool co-op platformer that will also crush you and your dreams. You’ll enjoy it, I promise.

ISLANDERS is great, especially for the extremely low price tag. At times it may feel a little simplistic, but I can see this being a great title to come back to whenever you have a few minutes to spare.

A Plague Tale: Innocence left me awestruck. This gothic adventure seemingly came out of nowhere and eviscerated my expectations like rats on flesh. I loved its refreshing approach to difficulty, and the story made me truly care about its characters – and I don’t even like children. Looking for another grim story of survival to tide you over until The Last of Us 2? Lack of zombies aside, A Plague Tale: Innocence is it.

Yuppie Psycho gives us a glimpse into the neo-corporate future depicted in science fiction films like Robocop and The Matrix, where normal people try to navigate the corporate dystopian workspaces they’ve found themselves in. It’s a highly polished look at what we once imagined as the reality of the corporatised future, and still could be. It’s entertaining and engaging with its poke at modern life and the flimsy social systems we cling to. It argues that you are not defined by your job – and, on occasion, that’s something everyone needs to hear.

It’s a wonderfully charming and enticing experience that I will quite happily keep playing again and again. There are loads of secrets to be found, plenty more upgrades to unlock, and lots of monsters to yeet into the sea. It’s fun, but it’s not a perfect experience. The issue with the multiplayer and lacklustre story detract from the stellar gameplay, but I’m definitely a lot more positive on Rogue Heroes than I am negative.

In the last few years it’s become a running gag within indie circles that Metroidvania and soulslike games are the go-to genres to build your game around. Unfortunately, Grime wears that on its shoulder with pride, instead of doing anything remotely interesting. In essence, it’s the software equivalent of saying ‘only fans of the soulikes genre will enjoy this’.

The Swamps of Corsus is a must-buy for any fans of Remnant: From The Ashes, and the new survival mode will be a huge draw to anybody that wanted just a little bit more roguelike in their third-person Soulslike. It’s a lot of fun, and it’s not too pricey either, which is always a nice bonus.

Although I didn’t connect with most of Irony Curtain’s writing and references, I can see how someone would. If anything, the point-and-click puzzling style is good enough here to warrant a try.

This is an adventure that’ll likely charm your pants off with its low-fi aesthetic. There are genuine laughs to be had here too, thanks to the slapstick dialogue. My only criticism is that the very light ‘puzzles’ are completed in a chain reaction, in that once you’ve done one it solves the next, and so on. I’d have enjoyed just a little more brainteasing, even if the detective work isn’t supposed to be the star of the show.

It’s just exhilarating to play, and despite sometimes being a little slow, is often a perfect game to settle into with some friends for a good night of raucous laughter, and the occasional guttural squeak of fear as a monster warps behind you or sends a swarm of locusts after you. It’s unlike most of what you can play out there, and it holds up just as well on consoles.

Ashen is one of the most approachable and well-accomplished Souls-likes we’ve seen to date. It offers a bewitching world to discover with a character all its own. It’s unfortunate that one of its best and most unique features, companions, isn’t in a very good state right now. I believe this’ll get fixed with time.

The game is not forgiving, but if you are in the market for an environmental puzzler and enjoy splashing limbs every which way, then it may just be for you. It really makes you feel like Spider-Man if spiderman was a cybernetic murderninja set on saving the last vestiges of humanity from the ravage of poor architectural design.

There’s a cheeky push and pull between stealthily making mischief and honking in someone’s face and waddling away gleefully. It’s safe to say that if you had a chuckle at Untitled Goose Game’s trailers, you’ll have several more enacting all the fowl play yourself.

Solving puzzles and exploring my way through the vast network of road signs within The Pedestrian’s fictionalised city I found to be a complete blast and an experience that I will likely revisit in future. I found that it managed to strike a solid balance with its difficulty and it constantly introduced new elements to help keep its novel concept from feeling one dimensional. I did encounter some minor issues with the audio and I wish chapters were present to revisit stages but this fortunately didn’t prevent it from being one of the first standout indies I have played in 2020.

Hunt: Showdown is a little bit DayZ, a little bit PUBG and a little bit Resident Evil. This initial release is strong, with plenty of room to expand. Eventually, new maps, weapons and enemy types will be needed to maintain interest. Hunt: Showdown may not technically be a battle royale game, but it shares enough of the genre’s DNA that I wouldn’t be surprised to see a battle pass in the near future.

It’s likely Wunderling will get lost in the endless noise that is the Switch (and Steam) store, which is a shame. Wunderling combines intentionally familiar elements in a charming and clever way and the presentation is clearly devoted to emulating the charm of the 16-bit era and it succeeds. The gameplay itself is clever, challenging, and fun, and there’s a commendably large variety of levels to keep players occupied for some time.

At its heart, Trials of Fire is a survival game in the way only roguelikes can be: where each battle, decision, and knock-on-effect can determine your demise further down the road. It’s also very tough as many encounters spawn a random number of enemies. Trials of Fire’s card system makes being outnumbered feel a little unfair at times too, as the opponent has more cards to work with, as well as more potential mana, more armor, and more movement to gain from discarding them. However, its smart mechanics, survival play, and deck-building make up for any criticisms I have leveled at it. I’ll definitely dive back in for another adventure before too long, though perhaps on a lower difficulty…

Rune Factory 4 Special has so many layers to it that you can’t help but be fascinated by its charm. The town has a tight-knit feel to it, where each character has a unique, delightful personality. The variety in your side quests and the depth of each system can enthral you for hours. And while its combat is perfectly flawed, it’s a decent change to the life sim formula that other games haven’t quite nailed.

Svoboda 1945: Liberation is a game which explores how looking back at the past means different things for different groups of people. It’s a story about the difference between those who benefit from the act of looking back, and those who are punished and aggrieved instead.

Hands down, it’s the best zoo management game available, so if that’s what you’re looking for then you’ve found it. I think there’s so much more to come for Planet Zoo though. This humble beginning will no doubt grow in something much greater supported by the community. I’d love to see things such as the option for water parks in the future and have no doubt there’ll be plenty of DLC coming over the next few years. As humans, we are infinitely fascinated by nature and it’s great to finally have a digital playground to explore that.

In its quest to remove everything that ties it to the bigger games it emulates, The Pathless does lose something in the process. Purifying spirits feels slightly too brief, with their spectacle being overshadowed by the simplicity with which they are dispatched, and the automatic nature of arrow trajectory during puzzles can often make them feel little more than perfunctory at their worst. Nevertheless, The Pathless still excels in spite of these failings, simply because it attempts to tackle the homogenous open-world design in a novel way. Its use of scale imbues the experience with all the grandiosity of a 60-hour title, but the lack of friction and purity of vision means that it accomplishes its epic conflict in a tenth of the time and in doing so manages to leave a real impact.

Thankfully, walking around The Terminal a lot is not required to see the main plot to its conclusion, which is the star of the game. So don’t let what is ultimately an inconvenience keep you away from Necrobarista. This is a visual novel worth your time, not that it’ll ask for much of it in the first place.

With Hand of Gilgamech, Image & Form have shown that SteamWorld is truly a genre chameleon, moulding itself nicely into a CCG RPG.