The greatest indie games I have played.

[midnightreunion]

Post your favorite indie game here.
Rules : It has to come from an independent developer [ So NO EA, Ubisoft, Rockstar Games etc.]
You must upload a cover image or cd cover for visual effects.
Add a short description from Wikipedia or type out your own.
Rate it out of ★★★★★.
Tell us why you liked it.

Here's one to begin with:

LIMBO
By Playdead

The primary character in Limbo is a nameless boy, who awakens in the middle of a forest on the "edge of hell" (the game's title is taken from the Latin limbus, meaning "edge"). While seeking his missing younger sister, he encounters only a few human characters who either attack him, run away, or are dead.At one point during his journey, he encounters a female character, but is prevented from reaching her. The forest eventually gives way to a crumbling city environment. On completion of the final puzzle, the boy is thrown through a pane of glass and back into the forest. He walks a short distance until he again encounters a girl, who, upon his approach, stands up, startled. At this point, the game abruptly ends.

Rating : ★★★★★
Reason : Brilliant & Unique gameplay.

 

[midnightreunion]

The Swapper
by Gacepalm Games

Humanity has exhausted their natural resources, so seven remote outposts are established in distant space to extract and synthesize useful materials from their neighboring planets, to send back to Earth. The crews of the space stations must survive independently off Earth for several decades. First Station 7 loses orbit and disintegrates into its closest sun, then Station 6 goes offline for unknown reasons.

When the crew of Theseus explore an uninhabitable desert planet called Chori V, with abundant natural mineral deposits, they find a more durable steel amalgam, an alien life form similar to Earth's silkworm, and highly complex rock formations of unknown origin. The rocks display unusual electro-chemical activity, leading some to believe they may possess rudimentary intelligence. The crew call these rocks 'The Watchers'.

Over time, the crew begins to notice that the rocks are penetrating their dreams, and come to believe that the rocks are telepathic. The scientists use what they learned from the rocks' electro-chemicals to create a device they call 'The Swapper'. They learn that this device creates clones of the user, and allows them to become the clone. A failed attempt at swapping two different people, which causes such massive memory loss as to make it impossible to know if either person was actually swapped, leads to a ban on person to person swapping. One of the crew, Dr. Chalmers, circumvents the ban by performing brain transplants on terminally-ill patients and keeping their brains alive. She believes she can use the swapper directly on the transplanted brains, and swap the person's consciousness into a body, prolonging their life. Her colleague, Dr. Dennett, disagrees with this practice on ethical grounds.

As time goes by and the scientists learn that the Watchers are millions of years old, they are believed to be much more intelligent than previously thought, perhaps even more intelligent than humans themselves.

The first Watcher to be found mysteriously resembles the shape of a human face, with eyes, a nose, mouth, and ornately carved decorations. It exhibits far more neurological activity than the other Watchers. The scientists hypothesize that it acts as a communications hub for the rest of the Watchers. They record radioactivity from the Head Watcher, but deem it safe enough for the crew to be around. However, members of the crew begin dying, and areas of the ship are deemed uninhabitable. The crew barricade themselves inside one area of the ship, thinking something must have followed them back from the planet surface. It soon becomes clear that the Watchers are causing the deaths. People report being able to hear the Watchers' thoughts. Those who do die shortly afterwards. By the time the crew realize the cause of the deaths, it is too late. They have brought on board so many hundreds of them, they would never be able to jettison them all into space and off the station.

Rating : ★★★★★
Reason : Makes you think long and hard.