This isn’t a critique of the best games at IndieCade, the festival already handed out their awards. This is simply an article about the games we enjoyed the most. Are these the best games IndieCade had to offer? Maybe, maybe not. But they’re just a few of the ones that were most memorable to us. They’re games that we thoroughly enjoyed and that we’d love to play again. 

We’ll start with the game were you can remove a cat’s butt and replace it with an eyeball. Cat Sorter VR was one of the great surprises of IndieCade. The games premise is simple. A series of cats make their way down a conveyor belt. Some of them are normal, some of them have missing appendages or body parts replaced with wings or some other oddity. Your job is to make sure all the parts are right and then send the cats on their way via a suction tube, a basketball hoop or a field goal.

Whether we were playing around and making feline abominations or taking the game seriously, it ran flawlessly, looked great and was tons of fun. Cat Sorter VR is available on Steam now and may be coming to other platforms soon.

Next up on the docket is another cat game. This one was the most multiplayer fun we had all weekend, unless you count the giant game of Exploding Kittens that we played, and won.

Starcats is a simple enough game. It involves up to four cats in spacesuits trying to escape a beautifully designed planet. Before escaping, there are a series of generators that have to be activated. The developers sum up the game nicely by saying “Starcats is a party game where cooperation is a strategy, not a requirement.” For us, cooperation was never an option. We treated the game as more of a MOBA than anything else. We threw rocks, haunted each other as ghost cats and force one another into lava pits. Needless to say, the game was a blast.

Starcats is expected to make it’s debut sometime later this year or early next.

Conarium is an adventure horror game that visually reminds us a lot of the BioShock series. The game is described by its developers as Lovecraftian and if you’re familiar with the author, you can probably see why. The games visuals and audio combine to create an eerily rhythmic atmosphere. We were provided with noise canceling headphones, but the crowded room and inevitable background noises were still a distraction. The game was enjoyable and engaging as it was, but we imagine at night in a quiet and empty room would be the best way to enjoy Conarium. 

Conarium is available now on Steam and is expected to debut on consoles next year. 

The big surprise of IndieCade came to us in the form of a card game. Hypothetically Fun wasn’t exactly on display. It’s creator, Liam Nguyen, was roaming the festival floor showing off his game to whoever he could. We got a chance to play a few rounds of the Apples To Apples-esque game and it was surprisingly great. The game dives deeper than it’s contemporary counterparts—Apples To Apples, Cards Against Humanity, etc—and it isn’t so two dimensional. It gives the players greater control of how they want it to be played. We chose to go the raunchy route, but we could have just as easily played it in a more sophisticated manner and had just as much fun. 

Hypothetically Fun is the perect evolution of the tried and true party card game and it’s available now on Amazon.  

These last few games we’re going to go through a bit quicker. There Might Be Ponds was a charming game about a little girl who is traveling through a beautiful garden, solving puzzles along the way. We only got a chance to play a small part of the game, but what we saw was terrific. The game was visually unique and its mechanics were flawless. It felt light and airy, aptly capturing what it feels like to take an easygoing stroll through a garden. 

The Incredible Playable Show was something like a cross between a game show and a video game. Created and hosted by developer Alistair Aitcheson, the show was an interactive good time. We laughed almost from start to finish, all the while playing a video game as a collective. It was a unique and memorable experience and something that could have potential on an even grander stage. 

Detention is an atmospheric horror game created by Taiwan’s Red Candle Games. It’s a smooth and immersive experience that takes a look at Taiwanese and Chinese culture and mythology through the lens of a haunted school in besieged 1960s Taiwan. Detention is yet another game that would likely benefit from being played in a dark and quiet room. That being said, even in a festival setting this game had us on the edge of our seat. 

That’s it for our broad IndieCade coverage this year, but stay tuned as we take a closer look at a few of these games in the coming weeks. Plus, keep an eye on our Indie section as we feature interviews with some great indie developers and producers. 

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