From Balatro to Animal Well, here's the best indie games of 2024

After a stellar showing last year, the best indie games of 2024 have only continued the trend: some of the most interesting and creative work in gaming is coming from small teams with tiny price tags. With a wonderful spread of genres across the board, there's been something for everyone, from artsy puzzlers to slapstick comedies to deviously addictive roguelikes. The indie game space continues to be a powerhouse of innovation and expression – so don't overlook these important games.

If you've had your eye purely locked on this year's big blockbusters, this list should help you find indie gems that may have slipped through the cracks. So good are most of these releases, that there's plenty of crossover with our full best games of 2024 picks! For those who keep up with our Indie Spotlight initiative you'll also see some familiar faces. After all, the picks below are the ones that have captivated us throughout the year and kept the conversation flowing throughout that whole time. We've played a hell of a lot of amazing indies this year, making this one of the hardest lists for us to assemble, but after some heated discussion, we've chosen a top five. So, please join us in celebrating our picks for the best indie games of 2024.

5. Thank Goodness You're Here

Developer: Coal Supper
Platform(s): PC, PS5, PS4, Switch

Comedy slapformer Thank Goodness You're Here may be the funniest game of 2024. Playing as a teeny tiny salesman, you've traveled to the fictional town of Barnsworth for a meeting with the mayor but decide to have a nice romp around the town and help the locals with their problems. This unassuming Yorkshire town becomes the perfect stage for an absurdist comedy where grocers are engaged in fruit-based warfare with their customers, one chap has his arm trapped down a drain grate, Big Ron the pie maker has run out of ingredients, and Matt Berry's having a barney with a garden mole – and you're the only one who can help them all. The Yorkshirisms and Northern charm are out in full force in this love letter to British comedy. Thank Goodness You're Here is hilarious, absurd, and a fantastic debut from Coal Supper.

Learn more in our Thank Goodness You're Here spotlight where we said it shows "the side of England you won't get from Downton Abbey"

4. Lorelei and the Laser Eyes

Developer: Simogo
Platform(s): PC, P55, PS4, Switch

With a stylish noir design stuffed to the brim with captivating puzzle designs, all wrapped up with an intriguing and mysterious storyline, once Lorelei and the Laser Eyes has its hooks in you, you won't be able to break free. Invited to the Letztes Jahr Hotel, a sprawling building with endless rooms and impossible architecture, everywhere you explore is home to strange and interconnected puzzles that tease out the larger narrative. Keypads with odd symbols, math problems, wordplay, riddles, hidden symbols, cipher decoding, the moon phases during one week in 1846 – you're bombarded with information at a rapid pace, and untangling this web of information as you head deeper into the jaws of the hotel is wholly satisfying as it all feels important and relevant. Keep a notebook to hand! A haunted house ride meets puzzle box, Lorelei and the Laser Eyes is a compelling and enthralling puzzle adventure.

Learn more in our Lorelei and the Laser Eyes review where we called it "totally engrossing" and "effortlessly stylish"

3. Tactical Breach Wizards

Developer: Suspicious Developments
Platform(s): PC

Tactical Breach Wizards isn't just about wizards with guns – it also manages to be a deep strategy game that's able to carefully onboard those who often find the genre intimidating. In this world, spellcasters have replaced staffs with modern-day tactical gear, and must take on similarly supernatural enforcers. There's a focus on puzzle solving challenges here rather than brute force, as you're encouraged to use your squad's magical abilities to reach peak room clearing efficiency. Fiddling with different combinations of moves until you're happy with the plan is all part of the fun, though booting an enemy out of a 4th-story window is still very much an option. With a genuinely captivating and funny cop drama storyline,Tactical Breach Wizards manages to put its own spin on the genre, while appealing to newcomers at the same time.

Learn more in our Tactical Breach Wizards spotlight where we called it "a hilarious blend of Harry Potter and Into the Breach"

2. Animal Well

Developer: Billy Basso
Platform(s): PC, PS5, Xbox Series X, Switch

With multiple "layers" of puzzles (as developer Billy Basso describes it), Animal Well is an enigma that's full of "aha" moments right up until the very end. What begins as a retro-style metroidvania quickly becomes more as you come upon cryptic symbols in the background, discover new uses for items that were always possible, and learn new ways to approach rooms you've already navigated. Spelunking through an ancient, underground cavern solving devious platforming puzzle rooms, and surviving deadly encounters with the cave's unwelcoming animal dwellers (often rendered in an almost creepily realistic style), Animal Well always rewards really taking in the details of every screen, and pushes you to dismantle it a little more at every turn. Simply hitting credits for the first time is satisfying enough, but for those looking to unpack a much bigger mystery, Animal Well becomes a true must-play.

Learn more in our Animal Well review where we called it "an endlessly inventive Metroidvania with unfathomable depth"

1. Balatro

Developer: LocalThunk
Platform(s): PC, PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X, Xbox One, Switch, Mobile

A winning hand indeed! Balatro is a twisted rougelike that's become a dominant talking point for good reason. Deviously playing with the scoring rules of poker, your task is to rack up points to pass challenge blinds. The trick comes in how you must bend the rules to keep up with the challenge curve. Between rounds, you add special cards to your deck, altering their properties in unique ways. Tarot cards, planet cards, and special seals add new ways they're scored, while the fiendish joker cards completely rewrite the rules of the game, almost all of which can combine with one another to enhance their effects. You're building one big, well-oiled machine, the highs of seeing everything ding-ding-ding and coming together to deliver massively inflated numbers only matched by the lows of making a devastating miscalculation that has you bulldozed by a particularly tricky challenge. It feels hypnotizing, cursed, and oh-so moreish all at once. Why not deal us in for one more go-around?

Learn more in our Balatro mobile Now Playing where we said that "chasing new ideas as you stumble upon new cogs for your great big scoring machine is all part of the fun"

What's next on the horizon? Check out our upcoming indie games list to add new favorites to your calendar!