Indieventure

• #35. What is a cosy game? A love letter to gaming's gentler side (feat. Wanderstop)

  Sakes alive, we're 35, and in this episode we've been inspired by the recent release of Wanderstop to turn our attention to the nebulous topic of cosy games. Is "cosy" a genre? A theme? A vibe? Are all cosy games broadly the same, or is it just a blanket term that can refer to any game without a central combat mechanic? Is "cosy" even still a valid classification now that we've moved so far past all major new titles being, essentially, Doom with a different paint job? All these questions and more will be debated enthusiastically by the Indieventure trio, even if we entirely lack the ability to form a consensus that provides you with definitive answers. What we can manage, however, is to rattle off a bunch of cosy game recommendations, drawing from personal favourites and cosy classics (and indeed both) to come up with a list that encompasses indie titles as disparate as Stardew Valley (naturally), Chicory: A Colorful Tale, Dorfromantik, Dungeons of Hinterberg, the Frog Detective trilogy, House Flipper 2, Lil' Gator Game, Ooblets, PowerWash Simulator, Proteus, Tangle Tower, Tiny Life, TOEM, Wilmot Works It Out, and Frostpunk (no, really!). We also have a crack at an informal group review of Wanderstop, which has elicited an impressive array of thoughts and opinions among a trio of people who normally tend to kind of agree on most things. Who thought what? You'll have to listen to find out, but I can reveal it's a good chat. (And if you haven't yet listened to the recent Indieventure Extra episode where Liam interviews creators Davey Wreden and Karla Zimonja, here's the link to that!) Finally, as always, we end with our current hyperfixations. Liam is still absolutely caning through an essential catalogue of new and recent game releases, and has this time turned his attention to Monster Hunter Wilds, the latest in Capcom's long-running series about invading the habitats of majestic creatures and turning their hides into some fancy pants. Rebecca is trying to live by Wanderstop's example and be kinder to herself, which mainly involves taking a lot of naps at the moment, but she also throws in a couple of bonus recommendations for anti-burnout narratives in the form of Travis Baldree's high fantasy coffee shop novel Legends & Lattes, and of course the evergreen Pokémon Concierge miniseries. And Rachel's circled back to Mindhack, a dystopian visual novel about neutralising enemies of the state with beautiful electronic flowers that painfully rewire their dissident thoughts. You might remember this one from a couple of years ago, and it's good to see it still steadily making its way through early access, and now including four chapters of a planned eight-slash-nine. Our music was written and performed by Ollie Newbury! Find him on Instagram at @newbsmusic. Meanwhile, you can find us at indieventurepodcast.co.uk or wherever you listen to podcasts, and don’t forget that you can now join our dedicated Discord too!

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• EXTRA: Spilling the tea with Wanderstop's Davey Wreden & Karla Zimonja

  Hello and welcome back to Indieventure Extra, our bonus series where we interview key members of the games industry. Liam recently sat down with Davey Wreden (The Stanley Parable, The Beginner's Guide) and Karla Zimonja (Gone Home) to chat about Wanderstop, their recently released game about a burned-out warrior attempting to find solace by running a tea shop in the woods. If you've yet to play Wanderstop, there are no spoilers to be found here, so don't worry. Davey and Karla mainly chatted about how the game came to be, what it's like to make a game about burnout that is actively burning you out as you're making it, as well as the challenges - and the benefits - of making a narrative-led game within the cosy genre framework. We also spoke about Boro. Best Boy Boro. Here is the TTRPG about parrying that Karla mentioned in the Hyperfixations section. Enjoy! Our music was written and performed by Ollie Newbury! Find him on Instagram at @newbsmusic. Meanwhile, you can find us at indieventurepodcast.co.uk or wherever you listen to podcasts.  

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• #34. Listener mailbag V3 + Lost Records Tape 1 chat

  Do you need to say #SPON #AD if all you're advertising is your own free-to-join Discord server? That's the question our intrepid Indieventure trio ask ourselves this episode, as we return to answer more of your listener questions in a shameless plug for the lovely little community space we've built up for ourselves over the past few months! If you've ever wondered which indie game character would react best to their beloved partner waking up one morning to discover they were just a tiny little mealworm lying on the pillow, amazingly it turns out you're not alone – unless you're the person who submitted that very thought experiment to us in the first place, in which case… well, now everyone else has to think about it too! We also mull over questions such as which indie game character(s) would be most helpful if you needed to hide a body and which Monster Prom monsters we'd all be, as well as some slightly more serious topics, like our dream "X meets Y" indie game elevator pitch, and which indie games we'd like to see expanded into other media. But that's not all because a recently-released AA title has landed right at the intersection of all our interests, which means it's time for another group-review-in-progress! We've all played Lost Records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1 and – between Life is Strange die-hard Rebecca, Life is Strange enjoyer Rachel, and Life is Strange novice Liam – we can guarantee some interesting chats when it comes to Dontnod's self-published spiritual successor to the game that made their name. Be sure to check back in with us sometime around late April-ish for a longer discussion as we review Tape 2 and the game as a whole. Last but not least, of course, are our hyperfixations, and Rachel is still firmly in the grip of Real Housewives fever. Rebecca has finally rolled credits on Animal Crossing: New Horizons' Happy Home Paradise DLC and is absolutely obsessed with the DJ KK remixes of every song in the game you get at the end, which you can listen to here. And Liam has not only finished Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, but he's also found time to check out recent retro indie racer Parking Garage Rally Circuit. Our music was written and performed by Ollie Newbury! Find him on Instagram at @newbsmusic. Meanwhile, you can find us at indieventurepodcast.co.uk or wherever you listen to podcasts, and don’t forget that you can now join our dedicated Discord too!

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  1:36:01
• EXTRA: From murder to mascots with Kaizen Game Works (Paradise Killer & Promise Mascot Agency)

  Welcome back to Indieventure EXTRA, our bonus series where we interview key members of the games industry. In this episode, Liam sits down with the directors at Kaizen Game Works to chat about their highly anticipated next title: the open-world mascot management crime adventure Promise Mascot Agency. Rachel Noy (Art Director), Oli Clarke Smith (Game Director) and Phil Crabtree (Technical Director) discuss the game's unusual origins, what it's like to work alongside Ikumi Nakamura and the - quite frankly - bizarre story of how the voice of Kazuma Kiryu himself, Takaya Kuroda, came to voice their protagonist. The Kaizen Trio also reflect on (our beloved) Paradise Killer five years after its original release. Enjoy! Our music was written and performed by Ollie Newbury! Find him on Instagram at @newbsmusic. Meanwhile, you can find us at indieventurepodcast.co.uk or wherever you listen to podcasts.

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  1:09:49
• #33. Dark Valentines: Indie horror and the 2020s

  It's Valentine's Day(ish, still, shush) and so naturally the Indieventure trio have turned our attention to… horror games! Yes, we're really on-form with our historic refusal to do normal seasonal celebration episodes, as it's recently occurred to us that it's been about a year and a half since we last did a dedicated horror deep dive. And since resident goth-at-heart Rebecca is steering the ship this week, and the only thing she craves more in games than a relatable love story is a good spookening with a side-order of existential dread, this theming makes total sense, trust us. Since our Season Zero horror episode focussed on the stone-cold classics of the indie space, we've decided to make this episode specifically about the cool indie horror games and gaming trends that we feel have emerged in the first half of this decade. (Also, do you ever think about how the 2020s are half over already? Surely that's the scariest thing of all.)  We've got it all covered here: liminal space horror, hidden object horror, mascot horror, retro horror, even non-horror games that borrow liberally from the horror aesthetic! Because it's love day and all naturally we touch on the up-and-coming genre that is romantic horror too, which just as naturally leads to a discussion about queer horror. There's also some chat about the indie horror developers whose work is codifying the whole scene for this decade, as well as some of the formerly-indie devs who've broken out into AA and AAA spaces thanks to their earlier work. It's a whistlestop tour but we take in all the hits, and if there's an essential work of indie horror from the past five years you think we've missed, please do let us know – we love a good recommendation! We end as ever with our hyperfixations, and Rachel has been watching all of the various Real Housewives series, and we mean all of them, no city has been spared as long as it has a ready supply of disgustingly filthy rich families willing to entertain and amaze reality TV aficionados with their antics. Liam is still on a roll with hunting down cool recent indie releases following our last episode, this time in the form of Spirit Swap: Lofi Beats to Match 3 To and Rift of the Necrodancer. And Rebecca has some big feelings to share following her recently-completed first-time playthrough of Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony, which means she has now finally finished the whole main story of the franchise (but somehow still has a lot of supplementary materials left to go before she's really done-done). Our music was written and performed by Ollie Newbury! Find him on Instagram at @newbsmusic. Meanwhile, you can find us at indieventurepodcast.co.uk or wherever you listen to podcasts, and don’t forget that you can now join our dedicated Discord too!

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