Last week I was at Develop:Brighton, the biggest UK-based gaming conference and a haven for indie developers on this side of the pond. It’s a great place to get eyes on an upcoming project as most of the expo visitors are professionals in the gaming sector and video game press, like myself. Across this article and the next, I played 10 games that were chosen to appear at Develop:Brighton’s Indie Showcase 2025 and the Brilliant Indie Treasures side-event and below are my thoughts.
In this set of indie game previews, I talk about a few titles I thought had potentional, one that I wasn’t so keen on and some that are very early in-development but could be ones to watch for later down the line.
Forager
Developer: Crybaby Studios
Forager is a retro inspired mushroom-foraging CRPG. Explore an alternative history, where a nuclear disaster isolated the sleepy town of Mudford Sock from the rest of England in the 80’s.
The most decorated game booth of the show, Forager is an early in-development game about foraging for mushrooms in radioactive forest, nestled behind a quaint but decaying fictional English town. Roped into foraging by a local scientist, the player has to explore the woods and pick up various different types of Mushrooms for their mycelium, which can be used to craft everything from explosives that open up new areas to jackets that protect from radiation poisoning.
The game has a low-poly aesthetic that replicates games of the late-90s, more-so console than CRPGs in my opinion but that’s my preference so I enjoyed it. At least in this early-build, only the main character has a 3D model but I was told that by the end of development all of the 2D art would be replaced with fully animated models. These animations should hopefully make its cast of quirky characters feel more alive. One of the goals is to have the town of Mudford Sock feel lived in, with the player able to clean it up and push back the mushroom infestation.
While players can’t clean the town yet in the demo, they can clean up the mushrooms they find. The game has several mini-games within that are related to the foraging aspect. Players use the mouse to cut off the radioactive growths on the mushrooms and then clean them. It was quite satisfying doing this, in the same way Powerwash Simulator is satisfying, and the game has a ton of variety of mushrooms to find. While I didn’t see it in this demo, I hope there will be an encyclopedia for all these types of mushrooms that the player can look through and learn facts about. It’s an ideal game for teaching players about proper foraging and mushroom etiquette.
Forager is still early in its development for sure, but I think there’s potential here for a cozy CRPG with light aspects of horror. It’s absolutely a game whose aesthetics and vibes will immediately appeal to specific niche’s, so if the game can build upon this with its content and animations then it may end up quite the success.
Mythmatch
Developer: Team Artichoke
Steam Link: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1778050/Mythmatch/
A Greek mythology anti-capitalist merge game about the power of community over authority. Challenge the Gods. Inspire the Mortals. Rebuild Ithaca.
A puzzle game with a Greek mythology aesthetic sounds like it was made for me, and I’m happy to report that Mythmatch was a very enjoyable game – both in its story and survival modes.
Mythmatch is a grid-based, match-three puzzle game where combining three of the same object transforms it into a new being. It starts as dung and goes grass > goat > snake > lion > satyr > medusa. I never got further than that as medusa begins turning other objects to stone and that really ramps up the difficulty. If the entire grid gets covered in objects then the game is over and the player is graded on how long they survived, as well as other missions for that level.
Players take control of Artemis, daughter of Zeus and sister of Apollo. In mythology, she is known as the Goddess of the Hunt but in Mythmatch she has yet to earn that title. In fact, the aim of the game’s story-mode is to prove to Hermes and the other gods that she deserves that title as they want to force her into a submissive ‘goddess of the moon’ role so she matches with her hedonistic and lazy twin, God of the Sun. It’s definitely a story with strong feminist overtones, with many female main characters here to support Artemis in her journey – from the Goddess Demeter to the wife of Odysseus, Penelope.
The main story plays much in the same way as the puzzle mode, with the player jumping around and fusing objects in threes to create the items its NPCs want. Helping out these NPCs will lead to the re-building of Ithaca, King Odysseus’ domain, and prove to the gods of Olympus that Artemis is just as capable as any of the male gods in the pantheon.
I quite enjoyed my time with Mythmatch. Artemis’ bow allows her to grab and launch items from a distance and this is used to great effect for fast-paced puzzle solving. It’s easy to get overwhelmed but fighting through that and clearing a large chunk of a certain object all at once is extremely satisfying. The artstyle is also really appealing, with the movement animations feeling suitably bouncy and fun. This was an easy game to put on the watchlist, and one to keep an eye on later in the year.
Supermarket Times
Developer: Rabbit Hole Games
Steam Link: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2223820/Supermarket_Times/
Prepare to enter the supermarket! Supermarket Times is a surreal comedy point-and-click shopping simulator. Complete legendary supermarket tasks: buy alcohol for the teenagers, stamp on the rat, and hit a seagull with a rock. Chat to the local hoi polloi, and buy the products of your wildest dreams!
Supermarket Times is a game that exists. It’s a simple title that parodies the experience of visiting a large British supermarket, with caricatures of British locals that you might find perusing its aisles. It’s quite over the top with a lot of gross-out humour, like an entire mini-game dedicated to using the toilet. Coupled with its purposefully very crude artstyle and you have a game that is a niche of a niche in its appeal.
The game is very simple, made by a team of two who made all the assets and did all the writing and voice-overs. There is a lot of talking in this game. Every object you pick up and every person you speak to is accompanied by a dull voice, one of the developers themselves, giving a very dry (but in many ways quite British) joke. It has a big improv vibe to it, like the developer was presented with the object or person and told to adlib. Because of this, it can be quite hit or miss and that’s a problem when the dialogue is really the main reward for exploring.
The game is short, beatable in a single sitting, and feels like a title made in a weekend at a GameJam. Maybe that’s being too harsh to the developers, but there really isn’t a whole lot here and if the humour of the game doesn’t land with you then there is nothing to really find enjoyable with this title.
Remnants of Yore
Developer: Harakka Studio
Steam Link: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3653850/Remnants_Of_Yore/
A cozy rogue-like adventure about spirits, spellcraft, and second chances. You are the proud new owner of a once thriving, now dilapidated antique shop! After your arrival, it’s quite obvious that something is wrong… but none of the remaining town folk can figure out what…
Another game for cozy genre, where you play as a black anthro cat who runs an antique shop in a small little country town. The game is a real-vibe, with a low-poly screen effect that gives the game a very dithered look to it that adds to the atmosphere. The player just exists in this town, hanging with town folk and doing everything you’d expect to find in a game of this genre: fishing, farming and getting to know the NPCs.
The main draw of Remnants of Yore is its combination of the cozy vibes with its exploration and combat mechanics. You explore dungeons in order to find the antiques that you then sell off in town. While doing so, you use magic to fight spirits and uncover the game’s narrative, giving the player an objective to work towards at their own pace.
It has all the makings of a solid cozy game, one that has appeal to all fans of the genre. Definitely a game to watch out for.
Calcium Crusaders 64
Developer: Sam Claydon Games
I wasn’t sure whether I should cover this game or not as it is very early in development. A retro action adventure game that wears its inspiration on its sleeve. The vertical slice I got to play managed to capture the feel of titles like The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time and Medievil while not having a whole lot actually there to show.
So the best I can say here is that it’s one to watch for anyone who likes retro-inspired games of the Nintendo 64 era. Hopefully we see more this year.
