7 of the hottest indie games at SXSW Sydney 2025

SXSW Sydney returned for its third yr this October, bringing the tech, movie, music and gaming pageant to Australia as soon as once more. As at all times, this featured a bunch of impartial online game builders showcasing their newest tasks.

October is an enormous month for the Australian online game trade, with Melbourne Worldwide Video games Week and PAX Aus held the week instantly earlier than SXSW Sydney. Fortuitously, there have been nonetheless loads of indie builders who got here to indicate Sydney what they’ve to supply.

In no explicit order, listed below are among the coolest indie video games we checked out this yr at SXSW Sydney 2025. Most are nonetheless in growth, however there are just a few you’ll be able to already play proper now.

MIX

MIX from Melbourne-based studio Beethoven & Dinosaur stands out as the closest a online game has ever come to recreating an ’80s John Hughes movie. The second title from the builders of The Suave Escape, MIX is a story journey sport following three associates as they go to at least one final get together, reminiscing about their time collectively as highschool winds down.

Gameplay cinematics proven within the demo made MIX really feel such as you’ve stepped right into a nostalgic 80s teen film, full with skateboards, pranks and a terrific soundtrack. The sport options music from a bunch of bands from the 80s, together with DEVO, Roxy Music, Lush, The Smashing Pumpkins, Iggy Pop, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Pleasure Division and The Remedy.

MIX is slated for launch in 2025 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Collection X/S, and PC.

GET

Developed by Melbourne’s five-man studio 10PM Membership, GET follows Milo, a grim reaper tasked with erasing a soul’s “pointless” recollections whereas saving others. This process is digitized on a desk, in order that as an alternative of utilizing a scythe, Milo and his colleagues spend their days in entrance of computer systems, closing pop-ups and making an attempt to win Worker of the Week.

GETthe course and themes of his artwork it seems to be a bit paying homage to you Private sequence at first look. Nonetheless, 10PM Membership inventive director and narrative designer Althea Francisco informed Mashable that the sport attracts extra inspiration from Leaving workcompany surroundings and Paperwork, pleaseDifficult Empathic Dilemmas. It could be your job to erase all completely happy recollections from a soul, however is it proper?

GET is slated for an early 2027 launch on PC.

Psychotic bathtub

Psychotic bathtub it is the sort of sport that comes with a set off warning, and with good cause. This point-and-click sport offers with heavy themes resembling suicide, loss of life, guilt, self-destruction, intrusive ideas, and escapism, prompting Switzerland-based developer natsha to warn towards the sport if any of those points set off you.

The sport follows a lady who experiences a psychotic episode whereas taking a shower, which entails speaking to her rubber duck, consuming wine, and pondering the character of her towel. Gamers navigate her by her darkish ideas, deciding which of them to embrace and which to reject en path to considered one of a number of endings.

though Psychotic bathtub focuses on a fictional psychiatric dysfunction, the sport goals to boost consciousness of psychological well being points. natsha has pledged to donate 50 p.c of earnings from Psychotic bathtub for psychological well being tasks. Nonetheless, you will need to be aware that it isn’t a therapeutic sport, with gamers unlikely to stroll away comforted.

Psychotic bathtub is slated for launch in 2026 on PC.

The highway to the forest

The highway to the forest has an extended historical past. The sport first got here to consideration in 2015 when then 16-year-old Melbourne scholar Anthony Tan posted screenshots on Reddit, which have been noticed and shared on Twitter by Sean Murray from developer Hey Video games (the creators of No one’s Sky). Though his story and gameplay have been but to be decided, The highway to the forest attracted widespread curiosity, enthralling folks with photos of a deer and a deer traversing a world with out folks.

There have been a number of trailers and launch home windows introduced for The highway to the forest within the decade since, together with an announcement at E3 2019 that it was coming subsequent yr. All of those launch dates have been missed.

Fortuitously, the sport could lastly be near launch, particularly contemplating Tan was assured sufficient to indicate it off at SXSW Sydney this yr. Now working beneath the studio title onepixel.canine, Tan informed Mashable that he expects to be completed The highway to the forest inside six months. Nonetheless, a brand new launch date has not been formally introduced.

Every week within the lifetime of a social giraffe

For folks with social nervousness, navigating society can typically look like an insurmountable puzzle. Every week within the lifetime of a social giraffe takes this one step additional, turning such dilemmas right into a point-and-click puzzle sport.

Developed by Los Angeles-based Quail Button, Every week within the lifetime of a social giraffe follows the titular animal as he tries to go about his every day chores with out speaking to anybody. Sadly, the residents of Pleasant Metropolis are among the most chatty folks round and can instantly have interaction the Asocial Giraffe in dialog the second they see him. This causes his nervousness to peak and his head to blow up.

As such, our shy hero should rigorously keep away from folks whereas nonetheless making an attempt to realize his targets, utilizing techniques resembling hiding behind obstacles and transferring objects to lure folks elsewhere.

Every week within the lifetime of a social giraffe is slated for an early 2026 launch on PC.

Kabuto Park

Launched in Could, Kabuto Park is a brief, cute sport about catching and preventing bugs throughout summer season trip. Construct your staff of three bugs, stage them up and undergo a sequence of sumo-style bug fights to earn the title of Summer time Beetle Battle Champion. It is mainly like a cooler, more healthy model of Pokemon, solely easier and with actual bug sorts.

Created by French developer Doot Tiny Video games, Kabuto Park presents a comfortable and fantastically illustrated bug amassing expertise with over 40 cute bugs to catch. (In case you are apprehensive, arachnophobes needn’t worry – Kabuto Park it is with out the spiders.) Totally different species have totally different stats and skills, and gamers also can purchase sweet to stage them up, incomes cash by successful battles or promoting extra bugs. It is an addictive gaming loop that is simple to arrange, providing just a few hours of pleasing, enjoyable gaming for simply $5.

Kabuto Park is on the market now on PC.

Is that this seat taken?

Is that this seat taken? is a puzzle sport that duties gamers with assigning seats to shape-based characters in numerous chair-based areas resembling buses, film theaters, and eating places. Nonetheless, every character has totally different necessities. One could need to be close to a sure particular person, one other could need to keep away from individuals who scent dangerous (proper), whereas a 3rd could merely need a seat by a window. Due to this fact, gamers should transfer characters round to discover a seating association that satisfies everybody.

The sport has little plot, with an aspiring rhombi actor looking for religion in a world dominated by squares and circles (and ending up in numerous touchdown spots alongside the way in which). Even so, it is actually the gameplay that is the draw right here. Developed by Poti Poti Studio, which has members in Belgium and Spain, Is that this seat taken? was launched in August this yr.

Is that this seat taken? is on the market now on Android, iOS, Nintendo Swap and PC.