We know it’s been a while, but with life and the need to be here, there and everywhere, we’re finally here to sit down and report on TGS 2026!
For its 30th anniversary, this year's game show is bigger than ever, with many big-name releases like Final Fantasy VII Revelation, Monster Hunter Wilds: Ascendance, Persona 4 Revival, and many more.
Of course they're great and exciting and all, but this time, we wanted to do something a little different. That is, we focused on trying as many games as possible from indie developers/publishers to find the freshest ideas and unique game mechanics out there.
The reason why we did this is, first of all, we love playing indie games. That's where you usually find something fresh, out-of-the-box, genre-defining, and a totally different experience. For example, games like Slay the Spire, Cult of the Lamb, Absolum, Balatro, and many more. Second, at these booths, we get to talk directly with the developers whose passion for their craft is very admirable. The energy that exudes from them was contagious.
RED DUNES GAMES
Our journey begins at this collective studio and publisher from the UAE called Red Dunes Games. They collaborated with and publish games from indie developers and studios from different countries including Indonesia, The Netherlands, and Japan.
We played some of their games like Nightmare Circus, an action-adventure with a cute storybook art style; Port of Jumanah, a Cult of The Lamb-inspired dungeon crawler; and Princess of the Water Lilies, a puzzle platformer where you play as this adorable, slightly chonky cat.
Nightmare Circus
Port of Jumanah
Princess of the Water Lilies
Light SUP
But one that stuck with us is called Light SUP. A party dungeon crawler game with unique mechanics where every time you enter a dungeon, you have to first find a lantern-pillar to "pray" to light it up, providing a well-lit radius for you to fight the monsters. Stay out of the dark too long, and you'll start slowly losing health.
Playing Light SUP with one of the developers
We played with one of the developers, and we had such a wonderful time! We got a similar feeling to playing Minecraft Dungeon or Castle Crashers where you can traverse the world and dungeons (chaotically) together with your friends, or partner, or family, or alone.
THAILAND INDIE GAMES
Next we moved on to this pavilion of indie games from Thailand, which also has many, to say the least, interesting games. Here are the highlights:
Pigs and Wolf
Pigs and Wolf
This three pigs story inspired game sort of feels like if Fortnite and Harvest Moon had a kid. You build farms, gather resources, etc just like you would in a farming life sim. But what makes it unique is the POV that you can switch between third-person and first-person, plus when building, it borrows from Fortnite mechanics where you build panel by panel.
Although we always struggle with enjoying farming sim games, this seems like a fresh take on the genre that I haven’t seen much of.
Lost and Found Co.
Lost and Found Co.
Another breath of fresh air is this hidden object game (you don’t see many of those these days) where you become a duck-boy with a new job: helping a goddess run a company that helps people find their missing items. If that doesn’t intrigue you, I don’t know what will.
While trying this game, we were already thinking about how this game is perfect for rainy days, cozying up under the blanket, and just getting lost in the world.
We also got to talk to the main animation artist of the game, Richmond Lee! He said there are over 10,000(?) objects he and his team had to animate in the game. And indeed, almost every single thing you see on the screen, you can click and interact with. Talk about hard work.
Not only that, he’s very sweet and gave us an omiyage from Thailand, a spicy gapao-flavored Pretz, since we were talking about how we all like spicy foods. Thanks …Richmond
RED THREAD GAMES
Hello Sunshine
Hello Sunshine
While we are walking to look for another game, a blinding light grabs our attention, with an opening word of "Narrative Survival”, before we know it, we are trying out Hello Sunshine, a dystopian world where the sun is too hot and lethal to humans for prolonged exposure.
This game is a body of work from a Norwegian indie studio that has released video games with a heavy narrative aspect.
In this one that they have yet to release, we are traveling with a giant robot with a mind of its own who provides a moving shadow for us to move to the next destination while doing missions and surviving!
The storytelling aspect, the local co-op, and the freshness of the concept are what made us hooked and we really can’t wait to play the full version once it’s released!
KOREAN PAVILION GAMES
This pavilion encourages visitors to play as many as their games by conducting a stamp rally! Although we didn’t have time to try a lot of them, one caught our attention:
FAKEBOOK
This game is perfect for an internet sleuth who enjoys looking at people's profiles and posts for background checks. The visuals are similar to Facebook, and it has similar functions, including messaging, so the more time you spend, the more it grows into its own reality.
The game had us play as this high school student who has a “service” that helps people find out about things like someone’s names, their current partner, what they like, etc. by surfing the appropriately-named social network Fakebook. While you’re providing this service, you’ll also uncover a huge mystery involving the person close to you.
FAKEBOOK
Highlights
These are just a fraction of the games we experienced during TGS 2026, and there’s many more that we didn’t have time to try.
That said, the highlight for us is we got to play with the developers. Not only that, we got to discuss the ideas, mechanics, inspirations, and their process of making the games. And to top it off, the cute merch!
This helps us realize that the gaming and game developer community is so warm and welcoming and full of admirably passionate people. And that, for us, was an amazing thing to experience, bigger than trying the game.
What’s Next?
So many new indie games are coming out with interesting and creative concepts!
We are so excited to try them out when they get released!
P.S. We finally bought and tried Lost and Found Co. on Steam and we’re having a great time so far :) (Although being completionists like we are, we can get a bit stressed out when we can’t find the items)