Frostpunk 2 is one of the most anticipated new games of the year. Dark, bleak, and brooding, with intricate political systems and strategy gameplay, it promises a journey into the depths of social psychology. Appropriate then that its publisher, 11 bit, has just dropped one of the most original and strange games of 2024 so far. Combining Telltale’s The Walking Dead with decaying, dreary European landscapes that feel reminiscent of Stalker and The Witcher 3, it’s just hit Steam, and you can play it right now.
Part puzzler, part narrative-driven adventure, and part horror game, Indika is published by 11 bit but developed by Odd Meter, a relatively new studio that previously created fantasy shooter Sacralith. At the turn of the 19th century, you play the eponymously named novitiate nun as she embarks on a surreal, strange spiritual journey across the desolate landscape of rural Russia. Frightening religious visions clash with reality as Indika communes with God, the Devil, and her inner self, and leaves the safety of her monastery to complete a twisted pilgrimage.
Normally, it’s possible to explain a game’s mechanics via references to other, better-known contemporaries. But Indika – in the words of Odd Meter itself – “constitutes an open challenge to the industry’s established approach to creating videogames.” Branching dialogue will have consequences and repercussions on later events, akin to Telltale’s Wolf Among Us and The Walking Dead. Puzzles and exploration meanwhile feel not dissimilar to Resident Evil or Silent Hill.
But Indika is truly an original work, the austerity of its environments playfully contradicted by trippy camera work and moments of bizarre dark humor. Truly, this is a single-player game that has to be experienced first-hand – there are some familiar elements, but they’re combined and subverted by Odd Meter to create one of the most striking new releases of 2024. If you want to try Indika yourself, it’s out right now on Steam, and available here.
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