Leave it to indie publisher Devolver to introduce their week-long sale on Steam with a three-minute cartoon mocking people for buying games in sales. Inventing the netherworld of PurGAMEatory, the superbly made short features characters from a dozen Devolver games trapped, unplayed, desperately seeking a means to escape.
It’s a fair point. There are few of us blessed with expendable income who haven’t seen the ludicrously low prices some games reach in a Steam sale, bought three of them for a couple of bucks each, and then never even installed them.
“I was wishlisted over a million times!” cries the latest arrival to PurGAMEatory, a stick man from Stick It to the Stickman, likely a snarky reference to some of the discontent I’ve recently been hearing from various smaller publishers about the exaggerated efficacy of the Wishlist system. “I’m so fucking fun!” screeches another gaming character in the background, as the explanatory voice of an Enter The Gungeon bullet makes reference to “overflowing Humble Bundles.” Much arguing breaks out before the bullet intones, “This is your home now. None of us will ever leave,” immediately followed by Cult of the Lamb‘s lamb being lifted up in a beam of light.
“Additional content is the path to freedom!” realize the characters. And as funny as this certainly is, it must hit a very different way for indie developers for whom this is all too true. Sure, they got your money—albeit at 90 percent less than they would have liked—but if you don’t play the game, you’re unlikely to buy their follow-up.
Of course, this is all invective-driven irony, given it’s to promote Devolver’s own sale on Steam, with game prices reduced by as much as 90 percent. And we’re talking really good games, the likes of The Talos Principle, Return to Monkey Island, Loop Hero, Hotline Miami and Anger Foot.
Looking through the sale reminds me of Devolver’s impressive hit-rate for top-notch original indie games. I wanted to pick out some recommendations to grab while they’re so cheap, but damn, I could go on forever here. So, with apologies to the games I don’t include, here are some titles that’ll definitely offer you a great time if you remember to play them:
Wizard with a Gun
Price: $7.49
Discount: 70 percent
The one-to-four player survival action-adventure had me hooked for so long when it released in 2023. It’s a third-person sandbox game that has the feeling of a roguelite, without all the incessant dying. There’s crafting, collecting, and fighting, and an awful lot of old-school AoE combat dodging.
Pikuniku
Price: $2.59
Discount: 80 percent
A three-hour morsel, Pikuniku is borderline inexplicable in its nature, a gentle puzzle game in which you control a long-legged blob guy who moves like he’s made of sticky Jell-O, who’s going around town trying to improve the lives of the other odd creatures. Look, leave me alone, I didn’t make it. I just adored it when I played it. It’s also a superb satire against corporate culture.
Children of the Sun
Price: $5.99
Discount: 60 percent
Last year’s Children of the Sun throbs with a sense of utter wrongness like little else. This sniper sim sees you magically controlling a single bullet in an effort to take out all the evil cult members in each level. This means you must find the perfect path for your bullet, which can change direction after each kill, and god, just writing this out given recent events feels incredibly wrong. But the incredible wrongness is a huge, important part of this game.
Pepper Grinder
Price: $5.99
Discount: 60 percent
Another 2024 release at an incredibly low price is the incredible Pepper Grinder. This 2D platformer involves not only running and jumping, but also drilling, carving through the scenery such that you can sling yourself up to higher platforms and take out enemies. As Kotaku pointed out on its console release, the movement in the game is just sublime.
Carrion
Price: $3.99
Discount: 80 percent
Carrion is a special game to me, not just because it’s an utterly incredible take on platform gaming, but because it’s also the first thing I ever wrote about on Kotaku five years ago. My nostalgia aside, in Carrion you play as the enemy, an amorphous tendrilled horror that devours the scientists that imprisoned you. Your motion is completely unique, something that needs to be played to be understood.
Minit
Price: $1.99
Discount: 80 percent
Minit, created by JW of Vlambeer fame among others, is the titration of everything that makes Zelda games exceptional, purified into minute-long bursts. You live for one minute at a time, with a whole RPG world to try to understand. It sounds like it should be an exercise in frustration, but the little monochrome adventure is anything but.
