Episode 7: The best indies we played at PAX East 2023

It's episode seven of Indiescovery and this week, wow, the gang is tired. With a busy four days in Boston for PAX East, Rachel and Liam's brains are basically mush, so Rebecca - an absolute angel - graciously said she could host a special PAX East episode where she chats with Liam and Rachel about the indies they saw on the show floor as they desperately try to string together a coherent sentence. She also made bullet points of our entire chat so writing up the show notes would be easier. We do not deserve her. Saying that, it doesn't stop us from kicking up a riot over the BAFTA Game Awards at the start of the episode. We then delve into our PAX East indie round up and, as always, we end with our current hyperfixations. It was the BAFTA Game Show the night before we recorded this episode, so we start off chatting about what we thought of the winners as well as a general natter about the nominations. The three of us were very happy that Vampire Survivors won big, snatching both Best Game Design and Best Game, but we also thought that some other games were particularly snubbed. Rebecca's particular beef was that cat sim Stray didn't take home any awards (a sentiment that Liam had some spicy words about), and I felt particularly attacked over the fact that Citizen Sleeper missed out on Game Beyond Entertainment. We all agreed with Tunic and Rollerdrome winning an award or two - we love to see it. Onto the PAX chat! Rebecca was keen to know more about Demonschool and Goodbye Volcano High, so Rachel jumped into why both games are pretty great. In one, you fisticuff with a slew of demons that have entered our world from an open gate to the depths of hell, and the other is a sweet coming-of-age tale about teen dinosaurs who want to make it big as an indie band. We'll let you figure out which is which. Liam then chats about Pacific Drive a survival roguelite roadtrip where you need to navigate through a an area in the Pacific Norwest called the Olympic Exclusion Zone, scavenging for resources to keep your station wagon running while dealing with the zone's strange anomalies. It sounds SO GOOD and Rachel cannot not hide how gutted she is that she missed out on this demo. Deceived. Bamboozled. Swindled. The next game is Cobalt Core, a cool-looking sci-fi roguelike with cute animals and fun deckbuilding that Liam played. Continuing on with the themes of animals and roguelikes, Rachel brings up the chaotic junk food-swiping sim Pizza Possum, an arcade-style hide-and-seek game about being a ravenous possum. We then jump into Wrestle Story (and, by association, WrestleQuest and Wrestling With Emotions) and finish with both Liam and I saying how much we enjoyed Animal Well, our bestest best indie pick of the entire show. For our hyperfixations, Liam chats about how PowerWash Simulator has taken up his evenings which leads to us all chatting about the game's DLC and then onto some incredibly feral conversation about the potential for Life Is Strange content which I'll leave for you to listen to without spoiling. Rebecca's hyperfixation is Life Is Strange: Steph's Story, a LiS novel written by Rosiee Thor (if you're an RPS supporter you can Rebecca's good words about Steph's Story in last week's supporter post). Rachel wraps up the pod by banging on about how much she loves pins. She blame PAX's pinny arcade and Fangamer for making such nice pins. You can check out Liam's documentary about Pinny Arcade here. Indiescovery is a podcast by Rock Paper Shotgun. Our theme music is by Dylan Sitts, specifically the songs Tahoe Trip, Pool Sticker, and Express Check-in. You can contact the podcast by chucking an email to podcast@rockpapershotgun.com, or by chatting to like-minded individuals about PC gaming over in our Discord. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices