openindie - your indie game podcast

Welcome to another dev talk episode of openindie! In this session, host Sarah sits down with Leo , the Creative Director at 6side Studio , to dive into the development of their debut commercial title, Dawn of Defense . If you've ever wondered what happens when you mash up tower defense, real-time strategy, and roguelite mechanics, this episode is exactly what you need. Leo shares the fascinating o...

You've poured your heart into developing your game, a publisher shows interest, and suddenly you're staring at a contract full of terms you've never heard of. Our guest today is there to help you in that situation. To kick off our brand-new format Behind the Build , Sarah sits down with René Otto , attorney and founder of Deviant Legal , a law firm built entirely for the games industry...

Sarah & iV sit down once again for a cozy chat about the indie games they really enjoyed playing in 2025 and the games they're most looking forward to in 2026. If you're looking for great indie games to play, give the ones mentioned here a shot. We're pretty sure you won't regret it. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ EPISODE TIMESTAMPS ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ TypInc.: 0:25 Blue Princ...

In this episode, we are trying something new! Instead of our usual developer interviews, Sarah and iV are sitting down to give you a dedicated review and deep dive into the unique indie gem, Cryptmaster . We spent 30+ hours snooping around dungeons, typing frantically, and laughing at the Cryptmaster’s insults so you don't have to (but you definitely should). Episode Timestamps: The Cryptmaste...

Sarah sits down with Lee Williams , one half of the duo behind Cryptmaster , the word-based dungeon crawler that mixes 80s gamebook visuals with dark humor into one of the year’s most original RPGs. Lee talks about his journey from teacher to game writer, voicing the Cryptmaster himself, and collaborating remotely with co-developer Paul Hart across time zones. Expect behind-the-scenes stories such...

Your host Iv sits down with solo developer Sydney , the creator of Qualia , a text-based philosophical game where players must figure out which of two participants is human and which might be AI. Built in the Twine engine, Qualia uses a retro computer interface, atmospheric sound, and embedded video to create an experience that questions consciousness, identity, and artificial intelligence. Sydney...

Your host Sarah sits down with Norwegian brothers Erlend and Kay , the duo behind Skogdal , a roguelike deckbuilder set in a '90s small town where everyone’s slowly losing their minds. With hand-drawn art, a quirky card system, and a love letter to strange corners of Norwegian life, this is their first game together—and it’s already something special. They discuss how the idea came to life on...

Your host iV sits down with Juan (Pirijuamps), the writer and narrative lead, and Pablo (Tucky), the 3D artist from Recurring Dream , to discuss their upcoming game, Desktop Explorer . This detective-like puzzle game lets players explore a recreated '90s operating system, uncovering a mystery hidden within cryptic files, chat rooms, and nostalgic mini-games. They discuss the challenges of recr...

Sarah sits down with game dev and content creator Emily , aka SonderingEmily , to talk about Lily’s World XD —a psychological horror game that turns early 2000s internet nostalgia into something far more unsettling. Set entirely on a young girl’s cluttered desktop, her game brings back the days of AIM chats, personal blogs, and art created in MS Paint—only this time, someone’s watching. Emily shar...

Episode 37 of openindie is a treat for 2D Platformer fans! iV sits down with professional Graphic Designer gone Indie Game Developer Shphrd from Creative Waste Studio to talk about the ups and downs of solo game development. After a decade in graphic design, Shphrd is now tackling his biggest creative challenge yet: making a cosmic horror-inspired pixel art platformer, "The Old One." Expect storie...

Join your host iV as he chats with Christopher and Josef from Swedish indie studio Y/CJ/Y Games about their latest game, Keep Driving . This road trip adventure took over five years to make, evolving into a unique journey filled with hitchhikers, resource management, and a soundtrack featuring local bands. The Gothenburg -based duo shares stories from their indie gamedev journey, how they met, why...

In this special New Year episode 35 of openindie, your hosts Sarah and iV discuss their favourite indie games of 2024 and some of their most anticipated, wishlisted games for 2025. Timestamps to the games we talked about: Ballionaire - iV´s 1st pick (1:14) Element TD 2 - Sarah´s 1st pick (13:34) Factorio Space Age - iV´s - 2nd pick (23:46) Portal Revolution - Sarah´s 2nd pick (36:40) Desktop Explo...

Before diving into video games, Elli created the successful board game " Worldbreakers: Advent of the Kani ," which gained significant attention and praise from industry veterans. Now, discover how Elli's unique background in computational biology and board game design shaped their approach to game development. Get an inside look at " Flocking Hell ," where players navigate fog-covered maps, manag...

In this episode of openindie, we sit down with newobject , the indie developer behind the upcoming roguelike game Ballionaire . After spending two decades in the corporate world and experiencing the 2023 tech layoffs, newobject returned to his lifelong passion for game development. He shares his journey from corporate life to indie dev, the creative process behind Ballionaire, and the challenges o...

In episode 32, we dive into the world of chess and Autobattlers with our guest, PlistA, a talented developer from the Netherlands. He is currently working on AFK Chess (check it out in ⁠ here ), an innovative game that seamlessly blends the strategic depth of chess with the laid-back mechanics of Autobattlers, all wrapped in a beautiful art style. AFK Chess offers a unique experience that you can...

One topic we never expected to explore on openindie? The unlikely game dev origins of solo creator Leo, who used PowerPoint to craft point-and-click adventures way back in kindergarten! Today, that precocious creative spark has culminated in RollScape - Leo's dice-rolling adventure hitting Steam on May 22nd, just a week away from this recording. We're thrilled to sit down with Leo and unravel the...

In episode 30, we explore the development journey of Thronefall , a captivating kingdom builder/tower defense game seamlessly blending key elements from classics like Kingdom, tower defense titles, and real-time strategy games. Thronefall has taken Steam by storm since its early access launch in August 2023, garnering over 8,000 overwhelmingly positive reviews for its innovative hybrid genre appro...

In this episode of our podcast, we delve into the captivating world of Tiny Rogues , a game that seamlessly blends gameplay elements from iconic titles like Hades, Dark Souls, Diablo, and Binding of Isaac. Tiny Rogues made waves on Steam, amassing over 3,200 reviews with a staggering 97% positivity rate. Join us as we sit down with Benji , the talented indiedev and founder of Studio Pixlpunk from...

In this exciting episode of openindie, join us for an one-on-one interview with James Letherby , co-founder of CATASTROPHIC_OVERLOAD , an indie game dev studio located in Bristol, UK. Discover the fascinating journey of CATASTROPHIC_OVERLOAD, co-founded by James Letherby and Josh Burr , as James shares their passion for crafting captivating co-op experiences. Learn about their creation " Drink Mor...

Three friends - Sarah, Ben and iV - share their top 3 favorite indies of 2022 and what game they are looking forward to in 2023 the most. #Indiegames from these awesome #indiedevs covered during this cozy talk: Darkest Dungeon 2 by Red Hook Studios Midnight Fight Express by Jacob Dzwinel Hellslave by Ars Goetia Retro Gadgets by Evil Licorice Vampire Survivors by poncle The Last Spell by Ishtar Gam...

Did you ever want to design, build, and program your own working Game Boy?  I sure did. Maybe like me you are also lacking the necessary soldering, airbrushing and programming skills or simply don’t have the time or the space for a fully fletched electronics workshop. Then you will have a blast with Retro Gadgets from studio Evil Licorice . Iv talked with Marco Di Timoteo , Luca Marchetti and Marc...

Dome Keeper has a lot going for it: stylish pixel art with great atmosphere, resource management, mixed with mining and exploration and a dash of tower (dome) defense and with rogue like elements. It released on Steam released 27th of September 2022. Iv had the chance to talk to indie studio Bippinbits founder and main developer René abouth the road to Dome Keeper, his passion for games developmen...

Back in August 2022 , Sarah and iV headed to Gamescom in Cologne , Germany, marking the return of one of gaming's biggest events after the COVID hiatus. They sat down with 21 talented indie developers to discuss their upcoming and recently released games. Here's a rundown of each conversation, with timestamps included for easy navigation. Phantom Galaxies (0:00) Ben Lee from Blowfish Studios (Aust...

tERRORbane was developed by the italian indie-devs of BitNine Studio – a̷n̴d̷ ̴i̵t̶’̶s̸ ̷f̴u̶l̴l̴ ̵o̵f̸ ̶e̸r̴r̵o̸r̷s̷.̷ Why do we need such a game, when there are enough buggy and glitchy games out there?!  Well, let’s check the story behind this. The story-writer of the BitNine-team, Andrea Leoni , did not only tell me their intentions but also, if players actually have fun playing a broken game....

Today we look at the point-and-click mystery adventure Crowns and Pawns: Kingdom of Deceit , which mostly takes place in Lithuania . Set against the rich historical backdrop of Lithuania, this narrative-driven game weaves together real locations , historical facts , and compelling mysteries. Discover how the development team collaborated with historians to create an authentic experience, blending...