Welcome to the second issue of Attract Mode. In these I’ll highlight old, new and upcoming lesser known, mostly indie, games that I’ve come across. Notably I have not played them (most I plan to); don’t treat this as a recommendations list but rather a collection of games that have caught my eye and ones I haven’t seen many folks talk about. Please look forward to it.

A screenshot of a battle scene from Secret of Varonis with its predominatley white/blue monochromatic palette rendered in a low-res pixel art style. The top half of the screen features the party of 4 facing away from the player towards the boss and two enemies, while the bottom half features the battle menu.

Image via Secret of Varonis Presskit

Secret of Varonis

Secret of Varonis is an open-ended RPG, choosing to hearken back to an older style of play within the genre, along with wearing its (SaGa) influences upon its sleeve. This allows for a broad choice of exploration, party composition and types, as well as the skills you can build within those choices, offering a breadth of expression for the player. It seems to make for an entertaining and “fresh” feeling experience for those familiar and new to RPGs alike. Explore this fantastical world and discover the mystery of the magical portal of Varonis...
Attraction: Honestly If this little highlight doesn’t make it obvious, its inspirations from SaGa do hold a lot of weight in making it appealing to me. The range and customisability of party members is also quite enticing.

A screenshot of an encounter in Dragon Ruins. The game features a overall minimalistic visual design, with the dungeon being reprisented through rasterised lines in the center (first person view). The party of 4 is situated at the bottom of the screen as portraits, while the map, enemies and damage text is at the top, in that order.

Image via Dragon Ruins Steam page

Dragon Ruins

“A dungeon crawling microgame for tired people.” is how the game is breifly advertised, and it says what it does on the tin – a nice, bite sized, straightforward dungeon crawler. Strong focus on automated battles as well as keeping things moving along at a steady pace.
Attraction: Initially found it through another game from the same developer (Ringlorn Saga). I can appreciate it when a game keeps it simple. And I do love a good, to-the-point dungeon crawl.

A screenshot of Angeline Era. A top down view of an room in a level featuring a lush low-poly style. The main character is talking to a bugdog guide and it is saying (in all caps): Listen. You can double jump. It is important.

Screenshot from my playthrough of the Demo

Angeline Era

Angeline Era brings back the old bumpslash system of combat, wherein you “bump” (walk into) enemies and objects to attack them, rather than using a button. This interaction is even brought into how you talk with NPCs in the world, overall giving it a really tactile feel that is absent with a button press. My impressions from the demo released last month stay really strong and the world and how you interface with it (you discover entrances to levels in the overworld by finding interesting spots and “searching” them, then enter the level with a charming little minigame, as well as the bumpslash combat) opens up for what is at it’s core, a really fun and engaging game that asks you to explore not just itself but the world around you too.
Attraction: Been a fan of Anagelsic Productions for a good while now, they’re always cooking up such interesting things in their games and this one is shaping up to be a real gem of game. If you want something fresh feeling in the action space, that excels at selling it’s narrative through the spaces you explore this is really going to be a game for you.

These were originally posted onto my tumblr blog and are mirrored here.
Some editions may differ from the original posts due to editing.