Uh oh, the Steam/PC game Dave the Diver (https://store.steampowered.com/app/1868140/DAVE_THE_DIVER/) is under fire, for being nominated for The Game Awards indie category (https://www.thegameawards.com/nominees) for, hold the phone, not being an indie game, via Dexerto:
Mintrocket is the team behind Dave the Diver, and while a smaller group of developers, it is a subsidiary of Nexon – a billion-dollar corporation.
Full disclosure: I’m in the reviewer minority that did not care for the game Dave the Diver, but it’s not for any of the reasons in this article. I played it, didn’t like it, refunded and was out. Did not even bother reviewing it, but did play it on the Twitch stream. Ironically, I paid for and gave away several copies to PGM members.
Personally, the game wasn’t for me, other than the Dave makes drinks at the bar dynamic, but that aside, it’s not an indie game. Indie games are made by very small studios, usually by a small team or one developer. Indie games are not made by small teams owned by billion dollar parent companies.
But enough of Dave the Diver, which hopefully will be disqualified from consideration, let’s focus on indie games that do deserve recognition? What are the other indie games nominated?
1. Cocoon – https://store.steampowered.com/app/1497440/COCOON/
2. Dredge – https://store.steampowered.com/app/1562430/DREDGE/
3. Sea of Stars – https://store.steampowered.com/app/1244090/Sea_of_Stars/
4. Viewfinder – https://store.steampowered.com/app/1382070/Viewfinder/
Good luck to the other games. I’ve only seen play of Dredge by PGM member Bionic_Toothpick ( https://www.twitch.tv/bionic_toothpick), and wasn’t too excited by it. Are any of these games your pick for best INDIE game of 2023? The comments area is yours to discuss, friendly readers.