Indie Game Book Club '25: Year In Review
You know it, I love it, it's IGBC!
16 Dec 2025Another year of Indie Game Book Club (IGBC) is in the books! This is my third time writing about it, and I’m starting to run out of ways to open these yearly retrospectives. We play indie video games and then get together and discuss it like a book club would, and it’s our fourth year of doing it. That’s the highest level overview I can give without repeating myself. I’m sure you get the gist, you’re very smart.
Before we get into the meat of the post, I want to wax poetic a little bit. In this hellish AI infested era of the internet, my love for IGBC has only grown.
Online video games discourse is tiring and unproductive. Nuance, especially at scale, is dead - it feels like all that’s left are bots designed to make people angry, and outrage merchants who only speak in hyperbole and sensationalism, both with the shared goal of farming views in the hopes they will net enough cents from billionaire losers to make it all somehow worth it.
Having a space free from that ecosystem and the algorithms that form it is amazing. It’s a completely human made thing. I love when we disagree on things and I often come away with an appreciation for the other side because we get to actually have a discussion. Nobody is shouting over each other or resorting to insults in the hopes of somehow proving their point.
When we started this, I didn’t think the human driven curation and discussion element of IGBC would be notable, but I’m sure glad we have it.
How indie were we this year?
I’ve written a couple of times about how we define “indie” within IGBC, so I’m glad that those opinions have been established before a particular French game came out and caused a lot of strife over the definition. Ultimately, for us, it’s a vibe check when we nominate games if they’re “indie” enough. I think it’s worked out pretty well - we unintentionally continued our streak of the majority of our games being self published and we’ve also just happened to avoid some of the more well known indie publishers like Devolver Digital or Annapurna Interactive.
All these indie games and not a single Marvel actor in any of them, who knew it was possible?
Games We Played And What I Thought Of Them
Same as always: I’ll list the game, developer, publisher, and release year, plus my review for each game we played. If there’s a themed month, I’ll include any particular musings I have.
Session 1 - Suzerain
Developer: Torpor Games | Release Year: 2020 | Publisher: Self Published
Suzerain feels like a game that’s a bit unsure of how much it wants to commit to its genre. It chooses to obscure a lot of the mechanical complexities of the political and economic systems that drive the story of the game and the actions of the player. That abstraction rides a fine line - it makes the game more accessible since players aren’t overwhelmed with information and allows a greater focus on the narrative, but it also meant I couldn’t quite shake the feeling I was making the wrong choices because I didn’t have all the data in front of me. Clearly, it wasn’t too much of a detriment though, as I made it to the end of the game without getting shot and even won re-election. Being President is just too easy, I suppose. 7.5/10
Session 2 - Instant Sequel Month
This was the first time that we didn’t do a nomination process for a game. The original Citizen Sleeper game was one of our inaugural IGBC Games of the Year, and thus holds a close place in our hearts, so we all agreed to play the sequel without putting it through the normal process. I don’t know how I feel about this as something to bring back. I think it’s good when used sparingly and only if it’s going to be a proper sequel like Citizen Sleeper 2 was. I’m someone who prefers variety over returning to the same things if I can, and IGBC has always been a good space for that.
Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector
Developer: Jump Over the Age | Release Year: 2025 | Publisher: Fellow Traveller
“Everything you’d want from a sequel” sounds like a cliché thing to say in a review, but for Citizen Sleeper 2, it’s exactly how I felt. The ability to go on missions with a crew is a wonderful addition to the game loop, and the expanded scope of the world and varied locations really help build out the universe in a meaningful way. It’s a beautiful thematic companion to the first game, and most importantly - the soundtrack is just as good. An instant favourite. 9/10
Session 3 - Sorry We’re Closed
Developer: à la mode games | Release Year: 2024 | Publisher: Akupara Games
I thought Sorry We’re Closed was a really well crafted survival horror experience. Although I’m more of a fan of the Resident Evil style big interconnected areas, I think the relatively linear levels worked well and were all designed great! The narrative can kinda wear thin after a couple of replays when you’re seeing all the endings, but honestly, the writing is good enough that I didn’t mind it too much. Crazy stylish game too. 9/10
Session 4 - Short Game Month III
Short Game Month, our original gimmick month, and my most beloved. These games can all be completed in less than two hours, so you usually get a very tight and focused experience. And if it’s bad, it doesn’t matter because you’ll be done quickly!
Small Radios Big Televisions
Developer: Fire Face | Release Year: 2016 | Publisher: Adult Swim Games (2016), Self Published (2024)
A decidedly average game. The only thing I can say without attaching a “but” to it is that it had some good music and lofi visuals. It should have included either more or less story, but what was there didn’t drag it down. The puzzles can be unclear or have inconsistent rules, but they’re not particularly hard, so I didn’t feel much about them. Definitely benefits from being short. 5/10
CLICKOLDING
Developer: Strange Scaffold | Release Year: 2024 | Publisher: Self Published
It’s got one “joke” that lasts for about 40 minutes, but it does it well enough that you can have some fun with it. It has some meta stuff at the end which was detrimental to my enjoyment, but it seemed to land better for others so your mileage may vary. 7/10
The Dark Queen of Mortholme
Developer: Mosu | Release Year: 2024 | Publisher: Self Published
This is the type of game that I love to see in Short Game Month. It’s a fun little meta story which is well presented using the interactive medium. Feels akin to an early 2000s Flash movie that you actually get to play in the best way possible. 7.5/10
Arctic Eggs
Developer: The Water Museum | Release Year: 2024 | Publisher: Critical Reflex
Highlight of the month, probably highlight of the year as well. Really can’t sing the praises for Arctic Eggs enough. It’s effortlessly funny while maintaining this very specific atmosphere that’s a mix of irreverent and philosophical? Words fail me, I just think it’s super neat! 9.5/10
Iron Lung
Developer: David Szymanski | Release Year: 2022 | Publisher: Self Published
When I played Iron Lung, I came away thinking that it’s good atmospheric horror with simple gameplay that I was very bad at. As time has gone on, I’m less positive on it. It has some good moments, I think I’m just less impressed with the structure and feel like it’s a bit one note. There’s a lot of lore in the game that I never interacted with, which I don’t think would make the game better but is enough for me to want to see the Markiplier movie for it. 7.5/10
The Music Machine
Developer: David Szymanski | Release Year: 2015 | Publisher: Self Published
A very meandering, dated feeling game. I don’t want to judge this too harshly because it’s an early game by a developer who was still figuring things out, but there is just not a lot of good here. Really rough around the edges to say the least. 4/10
Birth
Developer: Madison Karrh | Release Year: 2023 | Publisher: Self Published
A game that’s full of easy, low-stakes puzzles which are fun to complete and never challenging. Kind of like an adult colouring book - a fun way to spend the night but not something I’d reach for every single time. 6.5/10
REPOSE
Developer: Bozó Attila Bertold | Release Year: 2025 | Publisher: Akupara Games
I don’t really have a lot to say on this one; it’s got a solid sci-fi story which is more of a puzzle game than a dungeon crawler. That’s okay, I just wasn’t expecting it to be a puzzle game. As a Playdate owner, I was appreciative of the 1-bit graphics. 7.5/10
Session 5 - Haste
Developer: Landfall | Release Year: 2025 | Publisher: Self Published
Haste suffers from being a jack of all trades and master of none. The core gameplay is great, effectively being a 3D version of Tiny Wings, but everything around it is not as good. The standard roguelite mechanics are present but felt like they hurt the game more than improve it. The story and writing are pretty horrendous, especially since not a lot of good pacing can happen when you’re confined by the overall structure. If they committed to either a purely roguelite experience or a linear game with set progression and unlocks, I think Haste would have stuck the landing a lot better. 7/10
Session 6 - Primal Planet
Developer: Seethingswarm | Release Year: 2025 | Publisher: Pretty Soon
Sometimes when I’m not enjoying a game, I ask myself “is the game not enjoyable, or is it me?”With Primal Planet, it saddens me that it’s the former. The cool prehistoric meets aliens theming and aesthetics go to waste in a clunky game. It’s got a dull world map filled with uninteresting and repetitive combat, which really sucks a lot of fun out of the adventure of it all. It also has an ending that requires the player to put in an amount of effort that drastically outweighs any feeling of reward or climax, even after a patch to try and make it better. 4/10
Session 7 - Old Game Month
We all nominated indie games from before 2012 in order to acknowledge and appreciate some historical games that may not come up otherwise considering the deluge of games that come out yearly. Personally, I think it’s a very neat idea; the date constraint made me do a lot of research and digging into early Humble Indie Bundles so I could try to find something.
I actually won this month with Uplink, but it ended up going to Wolfenstein 3D as I lost a wheel spin which inverted the poll results for the month. It was a whole year long gimmick and in joke that’s not going to make sense or be funny if I explain it more.
Wolfenstein 3D
Developer: id Software | Release Year: 1992 | Publisher: Apogee Software
It’s always hard to return to a landmark game of a genre after you’ve gotten to experience the decades of innovation and improvement that came after it. It can make it hard to appreciate something in the context that it existed. So with that being said, I don’t think Wolfenstein 3D is bad, but playing it felt like torture at times. Just not a lot of variety going on to make it engaging. The levels all looked and played the same, and you resign yourself to clicking on walls until you get the chaingun to make it go faster. It was an interesting trip to the past, but thank God glad things evolved past this. 5/10
Session 8 - Darkwood
Developer: Acid Wizard Studio | Release Year: 2017 | Publisher: Self Published
Darkwood’s an interesting game for me. I adore its tense and unforgiving atmosphere, and how that permeates through everything in the game from the desaturated visuals, sparse music, to even the overall narrative and characters. There’s a lot of depth to the world, a lot of which it is happy to present to you without comment and leave for you to piece together if you want to. It’s engaging in a way that I don’t think many other games have been for me before. But boy does it have the 2010s survival crafting craze stink on it. While I think it fits the game well, I have to admit my patience for intentionally clunky combat and item management has not recovered enough for me to appreciate it in 2025. It’s not overly detrimental or anything, I just personally never want to think about using cloth scraps to craft a bandage ever again. 8/10
Session 9 - Party Game Night III
There are so many party games that I just never experience because I’m a Nintendo Aware Gamer who only wants to play Mario Party or Mario Kart, so I always enjoy seeing things outside of my sphere of awareness.
Judofuri
Developer: pataya | Release Year: 2024 | Publisher: Self Published
The complexity of the player select menu betrays the wonderful simplicity of single button minigames. Feels like the video game equivalent of the board game you play a couple rounds of to start or end a night (this is a good thing). 8.5/10
Unspottable
Developer: GrosChevaux | Release Year: 2020 | Publisher: Self Published
Unspottable has a good amount of stages with a variety of gimmicks, but I feel like something is missing here with the core “hide and seek” style gameplay. Might be that there’s no penalty for wrong guesses, or that the bots don’t ever feel convincing as players, so it’s easier to spot suspicious behaviour. 6.5/10
Drink More Glurp
Developer: CATASTROPHIC_OVERLOAD | Release Year: 2020 | Publisher: Yogscast Games
Strong early 2010s physics meme gameplay (QWOP, Mount Your Friends) but with slicker graphics. Hard to tell if it’s got long term appeal, but I’d play it again. 7/10
Make Way
Developer: Ice BEAM | Release Year: 2023 | Publisher: Secret Mode
Ultimate Chicken Horse but 3D car racer. A chaotic blast and my favourite from the night. The car physics and handling are both very floaty, which doesn’t make for the best driving experience, but you learn to embrace it, and also you’re more likely to die from the multitude of items and hazards, so it’s not so bad in the grand scheme of things. I don’t mind progression mechanics in party games but also give me the option to just unlock everything. 9/10
I want to say “it’s crazy that we’re about to do our 5th year of IGBC” but I just know a year from now I’m going to be pissed off I used an easy opening line as a closer, so I won’t do that. Instead, I just want to say again how much I love this little club of ours, and that I don’t think I can express how much joy it brings me to talk about video games with everyone. I love all the dumb gimmicks we do, from themed months to the Stonk Market. Can’t wait to do it all again, and maybe next year I’ll even win a nomination without losing it to The Wheel.