By day, Out Fishing is a relaxing simulator where you cast your rod, catch fish, and skip stones, reminiscent of childhood getaways. You sell fish to earn money, upgrade gear, and build a camp as a fragile safe haven. At night, the lake and woods turn eerie, with strange visions, cryptic voices, and unsettling moments blurring memory and hallucination in a slow-burn horror story that unfolds at your pace.

Beyond fishing and resource management, you’ll upgrade tools, unlock new techniques, and use vehicles to explore deeper waters and eerie wilderness areas, though the woods feel hostile. A shotgun, introduced later with scarce ammo, offers a last-ditch defense, but the game emphasizes psychological horror and atmosphere over combat.

Still in early development, Out Fishing’s creepy premise will clearly draw comparisons to DREDGE for its mix of fishing and horror.

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The trailer, showcased during The MIX Summer Game Showcase, revealed gameplay and a water-covered world where rusted megastructures and forgotten machines hum, lost in time. Your mission is to navigate this vast, uncharted sea, gather resources, and protect warehouses holding the last human embryos. By reactivating complexes and managing incubation systems, you work to send these remnants to the stars to ensure humanity’s rebirth.

The gameplay revolves around four core pillars: connection, exploration, care, and resilience. You’ll collect resources to repair systems, upgrade robotic abilities, and craft tools essential for survival. Additionally, you’ll uncover encrypted recordings and restore dormant terminals to piece together humanity’s story. The trailer also hinted at a final phase: preparing the MOSES rockets for the launch of humanity’s future.

The post The Last Caretaker follows a robot saving humanity, but it won’t be an easy task first appeared on IndieGames.

You play as Samuel, a playtester for a video game company, tasked with testing experimental game worlds created by a revolutionary synthetic intelligence known as A.I.L.A. What starts as a routine job quickly turns into terror as the boundaries between virtual reality and the real world begin to blur. Each scenario introduces Samuel to a different horror subgenre: from evading a ritualistic cult in a creepy forest to investigating a missing person on an abandoned farm.

Powered by Unreal Engine 5, A.I.L.A. delivers a photorealistic experience, with advanced technologies like Lumen and MetaHuman creating vivid worlds and immersing you in distorted realities. The game’s design leans into psychological horror, supernatural scares, and action-packed frights, featuring customized gameplay mechanics for each scenario.

The post Horror Game A.I.L.A. Is Coming to PlayStation 5, New Trailer Shown at The MIX Game Summer Showcase first appeared on IndieGames.

In MOUSE: P.I. For Hire, you embark on an adventure through the corrupt city of Mouseburg. The story kicks off with a classic noir trope: a distressed dame seeking help. What begins as a simple case quickly spirals into a complex web of murders, corruption, and unexpected enemies lurking in the city’s dark underbelly. The narrative heavily draws on old noir films, delivering a tale of intrigue and danger that feels both fresh and nostalgic.

What sets MOUSE apart is its bold visual style, reminiscent of the retro “rubber-hose” animation seen in Cuphead. The black-and-white, hand-drawn aesthetic evokes the charm of 1930s cartoons, paired with a jazz soundtrack that enhances the noir atmosphere. As a first-person shooter, MOUSE promises fast-paced action, with Jack Pepper wielding an arsenal from classic tommy guns to quirky weapons that melt enemies.

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You begin as a nobody, traveling to the settlement of Garkai, with no overarching main storyline. Instead, the game emphasizes emergent narrative, where your choices shape the world through interactions with hundreds of unique NPCs, faction alliances, and quests. Deep character customization like race, attributes, traits, and starting faction unlocks varied dialogue and consequences, affecting how NPCs trust or distrust you.

A really interesting thing about Ardenfall is that it skips traditional quest markers. Instead, it uses a “ring of interest” on the map to guide lost players, mimicking Morrowind’s exploration-driven approach. Every NPC home is enterable, and you can steal items. Beyond standard weapons, you can use unconventional tools like a “potion of silence” for stealth kills or a throwing knife of fire.

The project began in 2017 with a couple of college students. Since then, they’ve gained new teammates and released an Ardenfall demo in 2022, which was a great success. Thousands of players tested the game, leading to a total of 30,000 wishlists on Steam.

What inspired Ardenfall, and what kind of RPG are you aiming for? How much freedom will players have in the game?

Ardenfall’s largest inspirations are classic action RPGs such as Morrowind and Fallout New Vegas. We’re aiming for an RPG that promotes reactivity and player choice through dialog, branching quests, and sandbox gameplay. Players will be able to enter any building (and rob the inhabitants blind), build a reputation with everyone in the world (or go the evil route and kill all characters, even “essential” NPCs). Our goal is to drop as many boundaries as we can, and allow players to experiment and play their own way!

How big is the team, and when do you plan to release Ardenfall?

Our core team is five devs, with a handful of support devs and voice actors. We’re planning to release Ardenfall into Early Access on Steam in late 2025.

The Steam demo is available, what does it include, and how will it compare to the full game?

Our 2022 demo includes a large region, a town with 40 NPCs, several quests, and multiple dungeons. It’s a considerably large area! But with the early access launch, the game will be over 4x the size, with a lot more density, quality, and features.

Beyond the demo, we’ve put a ton of focus on creating quests and locations that flesh out our world further, giving players a better look into the history, magic, and politics of Ardenfall and beyond. As we’ve added new towns, dungeons, and regions, we’ve ensured a high replayability and changes to the world players can create. New features will be present in the game – alchemy, expanded spells and potions, new enemies, durability and repairing, dodging and improved combat, and more.

After the initial release of the Early Access, we have a roadmap that involves expanding the world, introducing a perk system, guilds, and more. We’re incredibly excited to have players fully explore the world we’ve made so far, and look forward to growing the game based on feedback from the community.

Indie RPGs often face ambition vs. resource challenges. What’s been the toughest hurdle for Ardenfall, and how did you tackle it?

Developing Ardenfall has absolutely been a challenge for our small team. It started out as a passion project and has remained so, and thus funding was never an issue. We started off as students without any industry experience but simply had the desire to create a unique experience to fill an RPG niche that we felt was missing for over a decade. The journey has been the most important aspect as we continued to learn new things and it was exciting to adapt and evolve to make the game better in all aspects of design.

Project management and creating deadlines for ourselves have been a great challenge. The first six years were focused on building the engine and tech to support building the vast world we had imagined. We tried several different options to document and track project goals and shifted a ton. In the end we landed on something that was most accessible and easy to document using shared cloud drives and communicating with frequent check-ins with work sessions sometimes spanning hours long into the night.

The documentation process has been the most important aspect as we narrowed down each project’s scope, discovered gaps, and prioritized what’s needed for the next phase. This hasn’t been perfect, but over time we’ve learned what’s needed and what can be de–prioritized for later.

Tell us more about the alien world of Ardenfall. What factions and characters will we encounter?

Ardenfall doesn’t feel like an adventure you’ve had before – we’re inspired by Eastern Asian / South Eastern Asian and other cultures (in large part due to much of the team being from these cultures), that are less common in western RPGs, and have the goal to create a world that is both alien and grounded as if it could be a real place. Instead of each fantasy race having a single monoculture like many fantasy worlds, Ardenfall has a lot of subcultures that bounce off each other in interesting ways both in lore and in game.

The island of Ardenfall is controlled by several native clans, from wannabe techno-imperialists to militaristic isolationists to wine peddling slavers. This power is in question due to a foreign empire introducing a boon of trade, wealth, and law into the land of Ardenfall. Two of the three clans have succumbed to the will of this empire – what will happen next will be affected by the player.

How important are race, tattoos, attributes, and traits in character creation? Do they significantly impact gameplay? Can you give an example?

Character creation is very important for the gameplay that will follow.

• Attributes are your core stats – Strength, intelligence, agility, and charisma. These values are essentially set in stone, with some rare items giving boosts, and some even rarer ways to increase them permanently.
• Skills are more flexible – Your initial skill values are affected by your major skills that you choose, combined with relevant attribute values. If you have a high strength, then you’ll have higher weapon skills, and if you have higher intelligence, then you’ll have higher magic related skills.
• The player race will both affect how others see you – Characters will mention your race, some will give snide remarks, and others may even refuse to talk to you), as well as give special stat modifiers: Karu Elves are adept at stealth, while Obsidian Dwarves are great at wearing Heavy Armor.
• Traits are used to unlock dialog interactions – Perhaps you’ll use a “Criminal” trait to scare someone into giving you money, a “Scholar” trait to learn additional lore, or the “Mechanics” trait to repair a machine.

At the end of the day, pretty much every stat is used in dialog options, when interacting with objects in the world and completing quests, and of course during battle.

What can we expect from combat? Is it similar to Avowed or Elder Scrolls? Any standout mechanics you’d like to point out from the trailer?

The design for combat is built around sandbox elements with an array of different play styles in a first person view. The player is free to use swords, magic, stealth, throwing potions and much more at any time. The player can still specialize in skills to unlock each weapon’s full potential but there are no hard requirements preventing players from using items outright.

Something we avoid compared to some RPGs is a hard level requirement for equipping items – this goes against our design philosophy of player freedom. Rather than gamifying the requirements, the weapons may just be less effective if skill requirements aren’t high enough.

Combat itself is meant to feel dynamic and fluid between different enemy types. Monsters can teleport, dash, or dig to maneuver around the player. The goal is to keep the player on edge, switching between different combat tools like throwing potions to poison or stun enemies, casting a levitation spell to gain high ground, or pushing enemies away with a gust of wind magic. There are a lot of different approaches to combat and the design is built around freely experimenting and discovering fun ways to defeat enemies.

The environment introduces complexity as well – rain or water will apply wetness, which cancels out fire damage, but increases shock damage. Fighting enemies or running around in the dirt may make you dirty, which will reduce many npc’s opinions on you – getting wet or using soap will clean you right up.

How do NPCs influence gameplay? Do they offer quests, protection, or act as mercenaries? It seems stealing is really emphasized in the game, something we rarely see nowadays.

NPCs in Ardenfall are incredibly important. Many provide quests, act as traders, or offer fast travel for a price. Players will come across a variety of NPCs where increasing reputation can lead to economic gain, unlock rewards that have permanent effects on the player. Gaining favor from one faction can result in a betrayal from another, locking away options and unlocking others. All this creates a truly reactive world with consequences that can be rewarding or punishing depending on player actions. This allows for high replayability as NPC faction and reputation systems can open or close doors to the player.

The stealing aspect is really important as there is various tech involved to ensure items are “owned” by a particular NPC. A fun thing we discovered through building the system is not only can you pickpocket an NPC, the reverse can be done as well, such as putting an item into an NPCs inventory. I wonder what will happen if you place a potion of explosion in someone’s pocket? Only one way to find out!

How significant are the political and economic aspects of the game? Will players have the ability to rebuild or construct new cities?

Ardenfall’s world is shaped by a web of political and economic histories, interconnected across factions and eras. The largest way players will be interacting with these concepts is through quests and dialog – you aren’t merely sent on a quest to collect an old ring, but instead you may be sent to assassinate a political opponent, erase wrongdoings of allies, or find yourself being merely a pawn.

Players can affect the world in large (and sometimes quite visually stunning) ways, changing how characters react to you, unlocking new quests, and even altering the economy. Prices on certain items will rise and fall depending on your decisions, affecting both yourself and others.

What can we find in the dungeons?

Dungeons are the best place for players to find dangerous monsters to slay, and rare and unique items to help you along your journey. Each dungeon is handcrafted, with many being quite expansive – secret rooms, hidden treasure, and glimpses of an ancient world await those brave enough to explore.

The low-poly art style looks amazing. How did you choose it, and how does it shape the game’s tone?

In a way, you could say that Ardenfall’s art style is utilitarian – dropping most textures and embracing a non-realistic artstyle allowed us to produce more models, necessary for such a large game!

We try to push the brightness and saturation of the colors, especially the fog and sky. The stylized look also lends a more abstract feel to the game, allowing us more flexibility with game systems that would look goofy and out of place in a graphically realistic world.

The tone of Ardenfall is a blend of serious and light hearted. Our world often takes itself pretty seriously, but not in a dark fantasy blood-and-guts everywhere sort of way – instead we are more interested in presenting a very beautiful and rich world, and showcasing equally beautiful and rich cultures, while also presenting their flaws and dangers.

With so many RPGs releasing every year, how will Ardenfall stand out? What do you think will attract players most?

We believe Ardenfall can stand on its own even in this current market. The “total freedom” aspect is very important to us, as is the reduction in hand-holding, both of which we view as a clear desire for certain groups of players.

Our dream is for players to fall in love with this world as deeply as we have. There’s something magical about stepping into a bustling inn, the light of two moons spilling through the bamboo windows, while the cheerful rhythm of jelly drums drowns out the distant cries of beasts in the wilderness. After braving temple ruins and cutting down ancient horrors, there’s no better reward than a strong drink and a slurred conversation with the locals. Rest well – tomorrow, anything could happen.

The post Morrowind-style RPG Ardenfall comes alive in our developer interview first appeared on IndieGames.

In FEROCIOUS, you awaken after a shipwreck on an uncharted Pacific island, tasked with finding your missing brother. You’ll gather resources to craft weapons and gear, customizing your arsenal for stealth attacks or open combat. You can even use the wilderness to your advantage, luring dinosaurs to attack enemy camps or using them to clear paths.

Combat is fast and unforgiving, blending Far Cry’s open-world style with dinosaur hunting from Turok. The first level, “Crevasse,” introduces the island’s most dangerous areas and serves as a tutorial.

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You begin as a prisoner, freed by a mysterious stranger, and your task is to shape Avalon’s future. The story was written by Polish fantasy writer Krzysztof Piskorski and spans three acts across regions like Misty Horns, Cuanacht, and Forlorn Swords, each packed with over 200 side quests and 250 NPCs. This isn’t your typical Arthurian tale; it’s a mature, morally ambiguous journey where every choice feels incredibly weighty, offering multiple endings.

Tainted Grail is a love letter to open-world RPGs, offering limitless freedom. Its character creation lets you craft unique builds, whether you want to be a stealthy archer, a mystical blacksmith-mage, or even an alchemist-berserker, using over 50 spells, countless weapons, and customizable gear. Combat feels responsive, with light and heavy spell casts, stamina-based melee, and a Souls-like dodge-and-parry system for tough elite enemies and bosses.

The world is packed with hidden dungeons, secret items, and journals with lore. Activities like fishing, farming, alchemy, and even sketchbook journaling really enrich the experience. Plus, there’s a Wyrdness mechanic that transforms the world at night, making enemies tougher but also making the loot more rewarding. A portable bonfire system for leveling up, cooking, and fast travel adds a unique twist too.

With a “Very Positive” rating on Steam (that’s 87% of 6,483 reviews), Tainted Grail is clearly resonating with RPG fans who crave depth and freedom. Its Elder Scrolls-inspired gameplay, paired with a darker, more desperate tone, really fills a gap left by titles like Oblivion and Skyrim. While some technical issues and a few unpolished mechanics keep it from being absolutely perfect, its heart and soul truly make it a standout RPG title.

The post Tainted Grail: Fall of Avalon Is Your New RPG Hit first appeared on IndieGames.

In Shroom and Gloom, you play as a fungal forager diving into creepy, hand-drawn dungeons, armed with two card decks to outwit and outfight your foes. Your combat deck drives fast-paced battles, letting you hack, slash, or fry enemies with powerful card-based attacks. The explore deck shapes your path through the dungeon, helping you transform cards, unlock weapons, and pick up new skills.

Each trip through the dungeons throws up new challenges. The demo’s 26 unique tunnels show off the game’s slick combat, humor, and striking art style, echoing vibes from Inscryption and Slay the Spire. Early Access is expected to last about a year, with the hopes of getting the community feedback to add new cards, dungeons, and mechanics, with hints of multiplayer features teased on their Discord.

The post Devolver Digital Announced Shroom and Gloom, Roguelike Deckbuilder Set to Release on Steam Early Access in 2025 first appeared on IndieGames.

Among The Whispers – Provocation is a singleplayer first-person paranormal investigation simulator. You take on the role of Stephanie, a young investigator exploring a haunted castle in New Eidolon to uncover dark family secrets and free trapped spirits. Using authentic ghost-hunting tools like EMF readers, you navigate procedurally generated locations and family stories, employing a unique “provocation” system to interact with ghosts. While not focused on jump scares, the game creates an eerie atmosphere and may trigger psychological consequences if provocations are used carelessly.

The castle has over 30 rooms and hides generational secrets, with each playthrough offering different ghosts and narratives. Among the Whispers – Provocation is set to release next week on May 22, 2025, and will be available on PC via Steam.

What drew you to start developing Among the Whispers – Provocation, and how does its approach to ghost hunting differ from other games in the genre?

I wanted to create a ghost investigation game that had an authentic approach to investigating the paranormal. I haven’t played many other ghost hunting games. So, I don’t think I could give a fair comparison. From my basic understanding about most of them: You are trying to eliminate ghost types from the actions you observe.

In Among the Whispers – Provocation (ATW-P), players will use an ancestry database to review the potential family members who haunt the mansion. Then collect evidence from the ghosts. Players will need to review audio, photos, and movies collected and make deductions about who the ghosts are. Once the players believe they know who the ghost was in life, they can try and help them pass on, releasing them from haunting the mansion.

Given the positive reception of Conrad Stevenson’s Paranormal P.I., what key lessons or improvements did you carry over into Among the Whispers?

I felt Conrad Stevenson’s Paranormal P.I.’s (CSPPI) gameplay at times was really slow. Most of the constructive feedback I received was in alignment with that. In Among the Whispers – Provocation, I implemented a provocation system which allows players to drive the action. So players can influence ghost behaviors much more aggressively and obtain evidence quicker. A big thing in CSPPI was, once the ghost gave evidence, you knew the story. There wasn’t a lot of figuring things out. With ATW-P, the ghost only gives you clues. You must do more research and investigating to figure out who they are.

Did you collaborate with real paranormal investigators to create a more authentic experience in this game?

I’ve been a paranormal enthusiast for a long time. I felt that from my personal experiences and research I had it covered. Although, I have discussed some elements with folks who investigate regularly.

A question we’ve all been wanting to know, will there be a multiplayer?

No. I want players to have an immersive streamlined investigative experience. I feel like multiplayer would ruin that.

The game’s procedural generation creates unique family trees and ghost types for each playthrough. What was the biggest challenge in designing this system, and how does it influence the gameplay

In early builds, the focus was on getting the system to work, but I encountered bugs like duplicated names or names combining two first names. These issues helped create endless replayability. Even as the developer, I don’t know what I’ll be investigating each time. I have to gather evidence to figure it out, which is really fun. I still get jump-scared occasionally, too.

Could you describe the work put into the game’s atmospheric immersion, particularly regarding sound design and horror elements?

I think this is one of the largest parts of the game. I spent a ton of time adjusting everything I could to dial in every aspect of lighting and sound. I tried to create a feeling of safeness when in lit areas and a feeling of dread in the dark.

To maximize immersion, sound design must be carefully crafted. I worked to ensure every area of the mansion features sounds that create a sense of truly being there. Additionally, ambient sounds tied to gameplay heighten player tension, intensifying as the ghost grows stronger the more you learn about them. All ghost voices use directional audio, making them sound as if they’re whispering in one ear or both. This effect can be quite creepy.

The provocation mechanic, where players choose how to interact with ghosts, adds a layer of risk with stress penalties. What inspired this system, and how do you see it evolving in future updates?

The inspiration for this feature comes from watching ghost investigation shows, where a person asks questions to a “ghost” and reacts to any noises that follow. I also want to reward players for planning and being prepared. So they need to be mindful of what they are asking the ghost to ensure they get the evidence they are looking for. When I play and lose nerve, it’s usually because I rushed, asked a question without the proper equipment ready, and missed the chance to collect evidence when the ghost responded, resulting in a loss of nerve.

Can you give us a brief overview of the equipment we’ll be able to use in the game?

EMF Meter – It detects electromagnetic fields. It helps locate ghosts but also goes off next to anything electronic.

Temperature Sensor – Point this device at an object and the digital screen will show you the temperature. Ghosts generate cold spots, but the old mansion is drafty. You’ll have to look for inconsistencies.

Laser Pen – Displays a green dot grid pattern on surfaces. Helps to see movement on flat surfaces or if a ghost is walking past a wall. Also, the ghost will absorb some of the lasers light and change its color. This can also help to locate the ghost.

EMF-POD – Acts like the EMF meter but can be placed.

Camcorder – This device will take 8 second video clips automatically when something paranormal occurs in its viewing angle. You can watch your movies in game on the camcorder whenever you want and upload them to deduction board.

Camera – This device allows you to take photos of paranormal events. It will only allow you to take photos of paranormal events, this way you know if you caught something.

Digital Recorder – The game records audio in 5-second intervals. When you hear a ghost, press record. If the ghost’s sound falls within the recording window, it’s captured. All recorded ghostly tracks can be reviewed immediately in-game.

ParaMic – Used to amplify ghostly sounds and muffle ambient noise. It take up two hands slots, since it’s being paired to the digital recorder, but ensures you won’t miss any ghost noises. Doesn’t act like a real Parabolic Microphone. 

Mugwort Smudge Stick – Mugwort is used to interact with Residual Ghost. Since they don’t really know you are there, you have to smudge the area with specific chants to elevate their energy in different ways.

Tablet (Deduction Board) – The tablet is where you access deduction board. You can upload your evidence, ancestry data, locations with maps, and archives found in the mansion. You can flag evidence to organize where you found it. Ultimately, identifying who the ghosts are and help them pass on into the afterlife.

Laptop – This is where your email is, the ancestry database Fallen Apple, and Stephanie’s blog. The email is where you have details about your investigation. Fallen Apple is where you research the family’s history. Stephanie’s blog is where you can organize your provocation loadout.

Some players have noted a steep learning curve, particularly with mastering investigation tools. How are you addressing this feedback to make the game more approachable without losing its depth?

The final version of the game will include a tutorial at the start, guiding players on how to use all the equipment. During the second investigation, Conrad will call Stephanie to provide additional information. Afterward, Conrad sends Stephanie an email with bullet points summarizing their discussion, so players can revisit details if needed. Additionally, the tutorials, now available in the pause menu, have been reworked for better clarity.

As a solo developer, what has been the most rewarding part of bringing Among the Whispers – Provocation to life, and what’s been the toughest hurdle?

As with Conrad, just the fact that I made a game is pretty amazing. And now I have done it twice. It’s hard for me to wrap my head around it. I think the hardest thing is probably getting the game in front of people. There are so many games out there these days it is very easy to get lost in the pack.

How many players have played the demo during the Steam Next Fest and do you think Among the Whispers will be able to find its audience?

A few thousand folks have downloaded the demo. It seems like those who have played it enjoyed it.

I think the potential audience for this game is larger than my first game. I believe AtW-P is significantly better balanced, in terms of gameplay. This allows players to have a much more engaging investigation than in CSPPI. Additionally, the investigation aspect is more fleshed out. To help ghosts move on, players must make thoughtful deductions based on the clues provided.

The archive system’s passive storytelling allows players to deeply engage with and review all pieces of information. This enables each player to interpret the family’s overarching story in their own way, while still arriving at the same conclusion.

The post Conrad Stevenson o Among the Whispers – Provocation: Iza kulisa najrealističnije igre lova na duhove first appeared on IndieGames.

Sofia dreamed of a home brimming with plum jam pancakes, pickled cucumbers, and homemade moonshine, and as Rusty, you’ll bring her vision to life on Mars. Using advanced robots, you’ll grow tomatoes and potatoes in high-tech greenhouses, automate production, and craft Martian delicacies. Explore an open world to gather resources, blueprints, and secret recipes, while unraveling a mystery linked to the shady AgroNova corporation.

AGRONOM blends cozy farming with clever automation as you manage quirky robots to plant, harvest, and build. From your Household Utility Base, you’ll craft tools and plan your Martian homestead’s growth. Quests from neighbors bring a warm village feel, offering rare seeds as rewards, but also uncover tensions, as some allies may align with AgroNova’s profit-hungry agenda.

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