This Week In Indie: Indie Game — The Movie, Journey, And More

Well, this is a new exclusive for eGamer where I’ll be summarising all the latest developments, happenings, going-ons and overall awesome-sauce occurrences in the world of Indie games. A place where you can get a digest of all those interesting tid-bits without the hassle of scouring through scores of webpages. Yes, here at eGamer we’re that awesome and indie games are that important. Actually, we should just get on with the show, and look at the latest developments in the indie scene (not music, indie games that is).

Firstly, if you’re at all interested in indie games and indie development in particular. Indie Game The Movie has just received a worldwide release date. The film tracks a few indie game developers’ creative progression from the initial conception of a game to its eventual release. The film will be released on the 12th of June and will be available on a variety of platforms. Distribution platforms included in this film release are Steam, iTunes and a direct download from their site. Of course, you’ll have to pay a nominal fee, but the film is definitely worth it. It won an award at the Cannes Film Festival and is now showing at number of international film festivals. I’m really looking forward to this one.

In other news, the Journey demo is now out on PSN for all of those who haven’t had a chance to try out this gem of an indie game. As our review indicated this is one of the most beautiful indie games, and games overall, to come out this year. It’s now time to start your ‘journey’ through a beautiful desert landscape, gliding and sliding through landscapes meeting a number of other individuals who resemble you.

In my previous column, I spoke about the issues of cloning facing many indie developers and when I read about this news I thought it apt to write about it. iOS developers Ustwo have become the hottest topic of debate recently because of cloning allegations launched at the release of their app entitled “Papa Quash”. Allegations have been mounted at the game because it shares a striking resemblance to Die Gute Fabrik’s upcoming PlayStation Move title “Johann Sebastian Joust”, with claims that this is a copy-paste affair at hand.

Both games utilise a similar mechanic where players stand a distance apart and use their devices (in the case of Papa Quash your iOS device) and have to move around in a designated area jabbing, dodging and thrusting the device at enemies causing each player to lose balance. As a result of all the fighting either one of the players can fall to the ground. For a comparison here’s a video of “Johann Sebastion Joust”:

Also, an episodic horror adventure game called “The Dream Machine” has had the first three chapters, out of the proposed five chapters, released on Steam. Each short chapter costs $5 and the first chapter can be tried out for free on the developers’ website. You can buy the whole bundle on Steam for $15 if you prefer. The game looks very intriguing as it takes a unique different approach with its visual aesthetic with all the characters and environments made of out clay or plasticine. This enhances the surreal and eerie atmosphere of the game. Here’s the trailer; give it a watch:

That’s it for now. I hope you enjoyed the first weekly look at the indie world. There will be more to come in the coming weeks. Any comments and feedback will be greatly appreciated. Keep playing indie games like a boss, and I’ll be back next week with more awesome news.