The first of this year’s weeklong NextFest events landed at the end of February. There were well over 2000 demos available for players to get a taste of, and some obvious prevailing themes.

Have you ever wanted to play as an amorphous, eldritch killing machine? Of course you have. We all have. Now you can.

If you don’t get excited about a crow with a lightsaber, I don’t know how to talk to you.

The 90s were a strange old time - 3D graphics were just coming into their own, gaming had started to open to the masses, and theme parks were on a different level. Wait, what?

We’re not in a decrepit old church anymore, or crawling our way through slimy, alien tunnels - we’re on a revenge tour in a huge mech, and we’re not slowing down.

More volume, more metal, more better. Diving straight back to Hell, bullets first and balls out, in the sequel to Slain.

Heavy metal is always a good choice when picking a theme to base a game on - loud, energetic, and ready to kick you in the teeth.

Whilst many indie games are personal stories explored through interactive media, experimental ideas, or even epic tales, there are still some that are just fun adventures that don’t need to be big to feel big.

Graveyard Keeper feels like a game that happens when the intrusive thoughts win. What happens if you let a random guy in a morally loose town take care of the dead?

When it comes to an industry where so much has already been done, it’s hard to think of what new innovations could come along. Harold Halibut is proof that there’s always something new to bring.

Whilst I’m loath to compare everything to Dark Souls, or label any game with one-on-one combat and souls-as-currency a ‘souls-like’, there is some overlap here. It might be more appropriate to label Eastern Exorcist a souls-lite, but that still spikes the back of my brain. For now, let’s just understand a bit more about the game, and we can find a label later if we need one.

The nature of indie games very often allows developers to explore concepts that larger publishing doesn't always lend itself to, for a variety of reasons. Indie and puzzle games often go hand in hand, as do indie games and unusual gameplay mechanics. Indeed, the three very often cross over. So what exactly makes Cocoon special?