Games Collecting Digital Dust in My Library
The consumer economy dictates that there must always be more. More video games, more places to sell them, more sales to encourage more purchases. A result of thisāone that interests us todayāis that its harder than ever to find games you might like, and even harder to find the time to play them all. All of us have fallen to the trap of buying games during a Steam Sale that we know weāre never going to play.
That delusion is only exacerbated when you run a YouTube channel dedicated to video games. For years, I bought dozens of indie games, justifying these purchases by telling myself Iād cover them in a video at some point. Obviously, that rarely happened. For one reason or another, a good 85% of the games I bought between 2019 and 2025 were banished to some digital library, never see the LED lights of my gaming PC.
Now that that both my YouTube channel and PC are dead, Iāve occupied my time with cataloging this massive pile of games. Games that countless pour souls collective lifetimes of work into that I bought for cheap and never touched. With my peculiar interest in obscure indie games, itās like traversing a graveyard of broken dreams. Developers who never made another game again, games that were never know enough to be forgotten in the first place, and games that at best can only hope to make some hidden gems list one day.
Today is that day for some of these, though not quite in that guise. With a busted PC, the best I can do is continue my ālook at this neat stuff I want to read/watch/play one dayā series. Itās not easy being a hero, but I try.
Astrologaster ā Nyamyam
Astrologaster was a game I was excited about when it was announced, so much so it made my āBest Upcoming games of 2019ā video. That excitement did not translate to me playing the game and making a video for it. I didnāt even buy the game, not specifically. I only have it because it came in an Itch.io bundle from several years ago that I purchased.
Astrologaster is a comedic adventure game that follows Simon Forman, an astrologer in medieval London. You go around town āhelpingā people by consulting the stars and using that to advise them on what medicine they should take or whatever they should do in their lives. Forman was a real person, and a real astrologer, which is to say someone who claimed to be an astrologer, and there are several other real historical figures in the game.
This is one of those games that I was interested in thanks to its absurdity. It didnāt hold it though, and this is one of those games that was a casualty of my flakey attitude towards video production. The game wasnāt a success, so I decided not to cover it. Thatās the kind of YouTuber I was, integrity first! First out the window.
Tonight We Riot ā Means Interactive
Tonight We Riot is one of the games I didnāt know I had until putting this list together. Itās a beat āem up, which is not a genre Iām a fan of. But I like Yakuza despite its dull gameplay, and this game is so strongly anti-capitalist and pro-anarchy that I canāt help but like it, and I havenāt even played it yet.
In Tonight We Riot, you riot. Against a cabal of wealthy capitalists who control the media and elections and are subjugating everyday citizens. Things have gotten worse over the years, and man this is sounding familiar. Instead of playing any single character, you control the mass of ordinary citizens rising up against this evil and fighting for a world without billionaire ghouls lording over us. There promises to be kaiju, dogs, and whimsy, so thatās all a cherry on top.
This feels like a game I really need right now. Punching douchebag rich guys and nationalistic prudes is something we all need more of in our games, but thatās never been more true than right now as our democracy is slowly but methodically dismantled. Itās too late to do anything about it in real life, but (for now) we can at least do something about it in video games.
Underhero ā Paper Castle
Underhero is one of those games that only about ten people have played, and all of them adore it. The game is notable for casting you as a random enemy from a dungeon. Not the hero, and not even the main villain, but a random scrub enemy. Itās a side-scrolling JRPG, very much in the style of Undertale in terms of humor and atmosphere.
I featured Underhero once before on a video I made about hidden indie gems. Despite not having played it. Look, I just compared a quirky RPG to Undertale, you should have realized then that Iām a hack. Ever since I made that video, whenever I saw this game in my library I would abashedly look away. I should give it a try for once, it sounds like something that would be right up my alley.
It occurs to me I never played a side-scrolling RPG before. Having zero frame of reference for these kinds of games, Iām interested to see how it goes. Something tells me its going to be rather flat. Aha. Thank you. I wonder how much of this is going to be 2D platformer, metroidvania, and RPG.
Long Gone Days ā This I Dreamt
Long Gone Days has been on my mind for years. Made in Chile in the late 2010s, I interviewed one of its lead developers, Camilia Gomez, way back when about the then ongoing political crisis in Chile. Since then, the country has elected a far right-wing dictator in the mold of Donald Trump, so its safe to say things havenāt gone well. Still, itās one of the best pieces I ever wrote. Certainly better than all these lazy list blogs Iāve been posting lately.
Long Gone Days is about the consequences of war and the divides created by language. You play as a young adult named Rourke, forced to fight for a group called The Core, a subterranean paramilitary state. He and his friends eventually break free from their control, and learn the truth about what theyāre fighting for.
A big part of the game is language barriers, as there are multiple languages represented in the game that Rouke canāt understand without recruiting an interpreter. Choices play a big part in the game, and youāll frequently run into characters who donāt speak your language, so without that interpreter, youāre going to have an especially tough time making those choices. Itās an interesting concept for a game, similar to what MGSV was (I think) trying to convey but I think Long Gone Days will do it in a better way.
Galaxy of Pen & Paper ā Behold Studios
Chroma Squad is one of my favorite games, and I always wanted to try Beholdās earlier games after playing it. I picked up Galaxy of Pen & Paper with the intention of making a follow-up video. This is a tactical roleplaying game in the most literal sense.
What really attracted me to Galaxy of Pen & Paper was its setting. Youāre not playing as a bunch of space marines fighting aliens, youāre playing as a group of friends who are in turn playing a tabletop RPG about space marines fighting aliens. Playing a game within a game has been a fascination of mine since the Dungeons and Dragons sections in Life is Strange: Before the Storm, and Iāve been looking for that unique blend of chilling with friends while playing a game, but also experiencing major events that require horrific decisions and bloody combat. Is that weird?
From what Iām seeing, Galaxy of Pen & Paper is very much like Chroma Squad indeed, with lots of customization, an emphasis on combat, a good story and characters, and choices that affect that story. Itās also goofy and self-aware, but not too much so. Iām not a fan of the direction Behold went later, venturing into multiplayer online games and lifeless dungeon crawlers. I hope most of all that this game will recapture that early magic of theirs, because Chroma Squad really was that good.
Felvidek ā Brozef
I had a bad habit of browsing Itch often, seeing something that I knew I had to cover, buying it, and adding to the ever-growing pile of games I had to cover that I quickly lost interest in. Felvidek was one of those games, and thatās a shame because itās regarded as something of a hidden gem.
Felvidek is a Slovak-made and inspired RPG where you play as a drunk, divorced knight who is dragged out of another stupor to save the kingdom. The highlights are the unique art style, which looks like the love child of a PS1 and a 1950ās Eastern European film, and the witty writing. Or so Iāve been told. The game is only 3-4 hours long, and the comedic plot and characters are the one thing youāll see consistently highlighted among reviews that say other things like āthe combat is okayā and āits an RPG Maker gameā which I guess is some type of quality indicator.
Like Astrologaster, there doesnāt seem to be much to talk about in the way of gameplay, before having played it, anyway. This is another game thatās more about its atmosphere and presentation, or āthe moodā as the kids would call it. And because I like going into games knowing as little as possible, that certainly makes talking about them difficult. I hope I donāt ever write a blog about games I havenāt played yet and try to describe them, that would be a terrible idea.
Highwater ā Demagog Studio
Highwater is one of those games I didnāt even know I had until I started this cataloging process. I have the Itch version, so this must have come with one of the bundles I purchased from there. Interestingly, the game is no longer available for purchase there, though it is still for sale on Steam and GOG. I wonder what the story there is.
Highwater is an open world exploration game with turn-based combat against bears, judging by the screenshots. It takes place in a post-apocalyptic world thatās been destroyed by flooding. This is a game with a clear environmental message, which upset the usual bunch. You play as Nikos, whoās on a risky journey to smuggle herself and her friends on a rumored rocket taking rich people to a colony on Mars. Along the way you can explore whatās left of the world, scrounging for food and looking for a way into the rocket base by exploring islands.
The more I see of the game, the more interested I become. These singular, obscure games always end up being some of my favorites. Throw in turn-based combat and a strong āeat the richā message and this has all the ingredients for one of my favorite hidden indie gems. Any game with less than 50 reviews on Steam is like catnip to me. I like getting lost in an open world, and I like the emphasis on chilling out with survivors between excursions into this ruined world.
The Hex ā Daniel Mullins
Daniel Mullins made a couple of big hits in Pony Island and Inscryption. Between those two he made a game called The Hex that seemed to fly under the radar. Like Pony Island this is a game that looks like a sweet and innocent little RPG, but thereās much more going on underneath the surface.
You play six different patrons in a bar, during a raging storm outside. The bartender informs you that they got a call informing them that one of the people in the bar is planning a murder. This six patrons, all video game protagonists from other games (not real games, mind) have to figure out who the murder is and who the intended target is.
Anyone whoās played one of Mullinsā games knows that the best way to experience this games is to go into them knowing as little as possible, and I intend to keep it that way when I play The Hex in about fifteen years. This is another genre, or rather type of game that I donāt have much experience with. I havenāt played Pony Island, or Doki Doki Literature Club, so Iām not used to games subverting my expectations in a drastic way. I suppose knowing that not all is as it seems might blunt the impact a little, but I wonāt know until I play it.
Bug Fables ā Moonsprout Games
I'm only now realizing how many indie JRPGs are on this list, so I might as well close with what's often called one of the best. Bug Fable is a cross between Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door and A Bugās Life. To say this that this game is Paper Mario with bugs would be reductive, but it wouldn't be far off, either.
Bug Fables has an identical art style, identical gameplay, and a similar overall structure to Mario le Papier. About the only difference is the story, where you play as the team of Vi, Kabbu, and Leif on a quest to find The Everlasting Sapling, which is said to grant immortality.
Iām not against even this level ofā¦ letās call it homage, especially when the thing thatās being homaged has changed (for the worse) so dramatically over the years. PlayStationās contempt for Jak & Daxter is why Iām so excited about GearGrit, after all. As the one guy that never cared much for The Thousand-Year Door anyway, I canāt say Iām dying to play this one. But I went on a pretty deep tear into JRPGs in 2024 and 2025, and Bug Fables was but one of many games I bought simply to satisfy my thirst, even if I never played it. With a pedigree like this, and a hankering for another JRPG, I donāt think itāll be long before I give it a go.
Ys: The Ark of Napishtim ā Nihon Falcom
Ys isnāt an indie series, but Iāve been on a kick for this series since finally starting Ys IX a couple of weeks ago. My first was Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana in 2024, and I loved it so much I bought almost every game in the series before I finished it. I didnāt regret it, because I had a blast with every game, until the then newly released Ys X: Nordics. Then the Proud Nordics re-release happened, and Falcom have breathlessly talked about how much they love AI, so I fell off hard with this developer. But, you know, I still have a few Ys games I havenāt played yet, and Iāve already got them.
One of those is Ys: The Ark of Napishtim, which is an important milestone for the series. Ys V in 1995 was a disaster, and Falcom were struggling at the time. They stepped away from the series for eight years (which was a long time, considering they released seven Ys games between 1987 and 1995) before reinventing the franchise with The Ark of Napishtim, overhauling combat and navigation. The game wasnāt a huge hit, but it did well enough to rekindle interest in the series, and the new engine served as the basis for the next several games, kicking off the āNapishtim Engineā era.
The Ark of Napishtim, chronologically set after Lacrimosa of Dana, sees Adol and Dogi board a new ship after their last one sunk during the events of that game. Theyāre sunk once again, because Adol is the modern Sinbad, leaving the duo washed up on a beach somewhere in the Canaan Islands. Dogi, being Dogi, wanders off somewhere, leaving Adol to save the day by himself after a mysterious calamity befalls the nearby village. Iām excited to fully explore the start of this era of Ys, and see how it compares to the newest entry which once again introduced a new era to this series that I love so much.
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