Play These Indie Video Games From Developers of Color

Indie games bring innovation and artistry to the video game industry, and people of color bring diversity and perspective to indie games. These PoC-developed indie titles should be on your radar.

(Credit: René Ramos; Surgent Studios, Strange Scaffold, Weathered Sweater)

One of the most effective ways to celebrate Black history is to not only remember the legacies of Black people in the past, but to support Black people in the present—especially in industries you care about. If that means you also get to play dope video games, then everybody wins.

There are far too many awesome games from developers of color for just one list, which is an exciting problem to have. But if you need help knowing where to start, check out this sample selection of indie games from developers of color.

Some of these titles are still in development, some have playable demos via Steam, and some are available now. And don't forget to check out the Game Developers of Color Expo later this year.


In Stars and Time

Free your friends, and the future, in the time-loop RPG In Stars and Time, from developer insertdisc5. It’s the hottest new repetition title for a world in which a pandemic is just one of multiple crises making you question if tomorrow will ever come.

Belle Automata

Many sci-fi stories draw parallels between humanoid machines and other types of marginalized identities. Belle Automata by Jellyfish Parade is another entry in this canon. In this visual novel, you take on the role of a discarded android questioning the validity of her own feelings.

Advent Neon

Featuring a hero fresh out of the radical 1990s, CyroGX’s Advent Neon is a gorgeous, 2D platformer that dares you to keep up with the action. Attack with blinding speed, freeze time, and unleash all of your energy.

Dot's Home

Discrimination isn’t just about one individual person being mean one to another person; it’s about vast ongoing social systems that lift up one group while disempowering another. Dot’s Home is a free adventure game from Rise-Home Stories Project that illuminates these systems as you travel through time in a Black family’s Detroit home.

The Shadow Government Simulator

You’re not paranoid if they really are out to get you. With The Shadow Government Simulator, Chupacabra Games Studio offers you a peek behind the scenes at who really runs the world. Master the turn-based strategy, and that secret mastermind could be you.

Project Anomaly: Urban Supernatural Investigator

The modern world still has many ancient secrets. Project Anomaly: Urban Supernatural Investigator, by Dark Science, is a first-person, open-world photography game about solving mysteries happening right down the block. Plus, you befriend nifty cryptids.

Little Hellions

Little Hellions is a long-awaited, indie fighting game where you use devilish schemes, not brute strength, to win. To attack, you fling yourself toward a stage hazard and use your Trick Hook to switch places with other players so they get damaged instead. No wonder the developer is named Schadenfreude. 

Grid Force - Mask of the Goddess

Grid Force - Mask of Goddess does that beautiful video game thing of throwing together a bunch of awesome ideas into a delirious, new creation. Dreamnuts Studios gives us a real-time, tactical, bullet-hell, action-RPG about futuristic cyber deities. Don’t you want to see what that’s all about?

Kabaret

Kabaret uses new technology to share humanity’s oldest stories. Witness myths and experience traditional games pulled from Southeast Asian folklore in this visual novel from Persona Theory Games.

Do Not Buy This Game

Do not obey the title. Do Not Buy This Game is a comedy-adventure game from Kingblade Games that tries to make lemonade out of the lemon you’ve purchased. You were warned. It gives off a lot of Stanley Parable energy.

502’s Arcade

Indie games embody the creative, anarchic spirit of early arcade games. 502’s Arcade from 502 Studio collects multiple games into a single package that would play perfectly in your local pizza parlor. The games include ghost-hunting, potion-brewing, and alien-blasting action. 

Solace State

Visual novels are the perfect genre for developers who put excellent writing and intriguing storytelling above all else. For a cyberpunk game that cares more about characterization and conversations than car chases, check out Solace State from Vivid Foundry Corp.

Gedda Cake

Let them eat cake! In Flannel Bear Games’ Gedda Cake, if you want your dessert prize, you must explore the game's whimsical, Metroidvania-like world. Different characters have different moves that all come in handy as you look for the path forward.

Love Shore

What better place to fall in love than a dystopian future city full of murder conspiracies and gods to fight? Here's hoping developer Perfect Garbage does (or doesn't?) live up to its name with Love Shore.

Validate

While many of today's modern dating games opt for an ironic premise or gimmicky mechanics, Validate from Veritable Joy Studios looks like a straightforward visual novel about dating as an adult. That's more than challenging enough.

Tales of Kenzera: Zau

Voice actor Abubakar Salim heads up Surgent Studios, the team behind Tales of Kenzera: Zau, an Afrofuturist Metroidvania and one of our favorite games of 2024. Grief over a lost father turns into a powerful drive to reclaim his spirit as you search every inch of a lush world drawn from various African cultures and mythologies. Genre veterans may recognize concepts like double jumps and icy projectiles, but Tales of Kenzera: Zau's passion and unique blend of influences deliver something you've never seen before.

El Paso, Elsewhere

With El Paso, Elsewhere, Xalavier Nelson. Jr and his team at Strange Scaffold deliver an intensely moody and stylish supernatural shooter like no other. Granted, the bullet time shoot-outs, retro visuals, and noir atmosphere intentionally evoke the Max Payne franchise. But El Paso, Elsewhere turns into its own beast thanks in part to original hip-hop performed by Nelson himself.

About Jordan Minor