2015 Independent Games Festival finalists named

A bunch of cool games are getting awards soon

We’re a couple months away from March’s Game Developers Conference, where everyone has to travel to where I live (uh, the city, not my home) and I just get to roll out of a nice non-hotel bed and make my way to appointments. One of the staples of GDC is the Independent Games Festival, at which Lucas Pope (Papers, Please) cleaned up last year. You almost felt bad for him having to keep walking up and accepting awards. 

The IGF has named its finalists from nearly 650 entrants. The nominees for the Seumas McNally Grand Prize (last year, $30,000) are: 

• 80 DAYS
• Invisible, Inc.
• Metamorphabet
• Outer Wilds
• The Talos Principle
• This War of Mine

I’ve only played Invisible, Inc. out of the bunch, but I liked it enough to give it a Steven Hansen’s Destructoid’s 2014 GotY award despite it not being out of Early Access yet. And I’ve only heard good things about Talos Principle, 80 DAYS, and This War of Mine. Metamorphabet seems like a weird Sesame Street app, which I am also okay with. 

Honorable mentions include: Donut County (Ben Esposito); Endless Legend (Amplitude Studios); Killer Queen (Joshua DeBonis & Nikita Mikros); Shovel Knight (Yacht Club Games); The Sailor’s Dream (Simogo); and The Vanishing of Ethan Carter (The Astronauts).

Other awards and finalists:

Excellence in Visual Arts:

• Donut County
• else Heart.Break()
• Lumino City
• Memory of a Broken Dimension
• Metamorphabet
• Oquonie

Honorable mentions: Crawl (Powerhoof); Future Unfolding (Spaces of Play); Hyper Light Drifter (Heart Machine); Mini Metro (Dinosaur Polo Club); The Sailor’s Dream (Simogo); and The Vanishing of Ethan Carter (The Astronauts).

Excellence in Design:

• 80 DAYS
• FRAMED
• Invisible, Inc.
• Killer Queen
• Outer Wilds
• The Talos Principle

Honorable mentions: Desert Golfing (Captain Games); Dungeon of the Endless (Amplitude Studios); Endless Legend (Amplitude Studios); Helix (Michael Brough); Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes (Steel Create Games); and Mini Metro (Dinosaur Polo Club).

Excellence in Audio:

• Ephemerid: A Musical Adventure
• Phonopath
• Shovel Knight
• The Sailor’s Dream
• The Vanishing of Ethan Carter
• Thumper

Honorable mentions: Deep Under the Sky (Rich Edwards and Colin Northway); FOTONICA (Santa Ragione); Goat Simulator (Coffee Stain Studios); Hotline Miami 2 (Dennaton);Nuclear Throne (Vlambeer); and Smash Hit (Mediocre).

Excellence in Narrative:

• 80 DAYS
• Coming Out Simulator 2014
• Ice-Bound: A Novel of Reconfiguration
• PRY
• This War of Mine
• Three Fourths Home

Honorable mentions: Curtain (Llaura, dreamfeeel); Never Alone (Kisima Ingitchuna) (Upper One Games / E-Line Media); Outer Wilds (Team Outer Wilds); The Fall (Over The Moon);The Sailor’s Dream (Simogo); and The Talos Principle (Croteam).

Nuovo Award:

• BECOME A GREAT ARTIST IN JUST 10 SECONDS
• Bounden
• Desert Golfing
• Elegy for a Dead World
• how do you Do It?
• Plug & Play
• Rooftop Cop
• Tetrageddon Games

Honorable mentions: Curtain (Llaura, dreamfeeel); Ice-Bound: A Novel of Reconfiguration (Down to the Wire); International Jetpack Conference (Rob Dubbin and Allison Parrish); Outer Wilds (Team Outer Wilds); Phonopath (Kevin Regamey); and Push Me Pull You (House House).