Weirdness Maxxing: 2025 Indie Games Predictions
Every new year, I enjoy the tradition of watching pop culture prediction TikTok videos. I swipe through them, forgetting everything immediately, only to revisit them at the end of the year and discover that some of their wildest predictions actually came true (tragic example here). In a similar spirit, I attempt to do my own predictions for indie games.
Time is a continuum, and in 2025, many trends I observed in 2024 will likely stay and become more pronounced. If they don’t, I hope by writing this article, I might be able to manifest some of it into reality. With such potential influence I will make sure to keep the content positive. I hope that by the end of 2025, this article will serve as a testament to the world shaped by our collective (sub)consciousness.
Screenshot from RATSHAKER™
Define indie games
In the context of this blog post, indie games refer to games intended for the mass public and made by a small team. I’ll leave it up to you to decide what qualifies as "small."
My credentials
4.20.2025 will mark my five years in the games industry, specifically in the indie games publishing niche. As part of my profession and general obsession with information, I spend an unhealthy amount of time browsing Steam daily and taking notes of my findings on social media (currently most active on Bluesky). I'm also a believer and practitioner of a myriad of forecasting methodologies such as astrology, qualitative research, and business analytics.
Prediction 1. The world yearns for Weird Games
2024 has seen the rise of Weird Games into the mainstream. To name a few: Arctic Eggs, Mouthwashing, While We Wait Here, and more recently, RATSHAKER™, MiSide, KLETKA, and The Cabin Factory. Weird Games occupy the space between arthouse and mainstream, using tools and symbols from both sides to complete their vision. They explore subversive and unpleasant feelings and realities that don’t often get highlighted in this medium but deliver them in a way that is digestible and relatable to the average player.
Many of the Weird Games lean into horror because it happens to be the best art form for representing and expressing taboo themes and emotions — things buried deep in the dark corners of everyone’s psyche. In other words, horror games are more likely to make you feel something. Some Weird Games also emerge from and reference niche subcultures and reflect the previously under-discussed shared hyperfixations of the generations that have recently matured into game dev.
A few of the most hyped indie games releasing in 2025 align with the Weird Games ethos:
- Psycho Patrol R, which I’m sure is on everyone’s radar
- No, I'm not a Human: the game's stunning demo outlines the normalization of alienation and the question of humanity under extreme (political) climate through the lenses of horror. This narrative-heavy game seems to be against every industry success formula but is somehow the #134 most wishlisted game on Steam.
- We Harvest Shadows: a clever take on classic horror formula with a farming twist. #128 most wishlisted game on Steam.
Screenshot from No, I'm not a Human
Prediction 2. Short games are making a comeback
Related to the first point, short games have the potential to deliver a more controlled, orchestrated, potent experience, as opposed to gameplay-heavy games, the fun of which mostly relies on players' level of engagement. People don't need an incentive as strong to buy, play, and finish short games since they are less mentally taxing. From a business perspective, I also believe that the quicker players finish the game, the faster they will likely leave a review, resulting in better visibility and conversion.
On average, shorter games are also cheaper. Since we're entering a global recession, people have less money to spend on games, if they're buying new games at all.
My prediction doesn't completely contradict the mainstream industry belief that highly replayable sticky games will be reliable winners; it just means that there will be more space for shorter (and cheaper) games. It’s about time.
Prediction 3. At least one humble-looking unserious indie coop game will be a blockbuster and I may know a good contender (unfortunately under NDA)
This one feels obvious, but co-op games remain underserved as a genre. 2024 has also seen the success of a range of coop games of various production quality, such as Helldivers 2, Content Warning, Chained Together, and Supermarket Simulator. Steam just released its Best of 2024 roundup last week - interestingly, Helldivers 2 is Platinum while the other 3 games all made it to Bronze. This shows when it comes to coop games at least, there are things players value more than polish, great visuals and high production quality.
Screenshot from Feed the Cups
While many big-budget survival crafting games have coop mechanics from day 1, I don't think they fully scratch the itch. i.e. the desire to meaningfully interact with each other, not so much to interact with the world while being on the same server. You & I against the world and building a meaty fortress isn't quite enough, we also want to make a mess of each other, have laughs and create real memories while doing all that, hence the word "unserious" in the subtitle.
Bonding with your friends and loved ones is a luxury these days, especially in real life, where third spaces are slowly going extinct almost everywhere. As someone who lives in a foreign country with most of my friends 10,000 km away, I've increasingly felt the appeal of real co-op.
Theories on long term trends beyond 2025
- The future of games always lies in the hands of those who have the most time playing: not those who have the most money buying. Because the former won't just buy games, they'll use the time to actually play them, leave reviews, stream, 100%, speedrun, create fan art and fanfic, argue with developers daily, and come up with theories. Some of them will eventually make their own games and media, and in this process, culture is produced.
- Specificity and nuance are in, polish and holisticness not so much. There will be more games made out of spite, and some of them will be life-changing to some people. I will not explain further here.
- The Alternative Auteur: Related to the point above — more developers will join the indie games scene from unconventional spaces. This could mean disciplines outside of games, as well as underrepresented social/economic/cultural backgrounds. Most of them probably won’t have a degree from art or game design schools. They will be the ones making games that blow everyone's minds, case in point: 1000xRESIST.