I Can Has Steemburger?

Last week I watched the documentary Indie Game: The Movie and was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. Before watching it, I had next-to-no idea about the indie game industry. While I still wouldn't call myself an expert after watching it, I definitely began to appreciate all of the nuances that can be found within numerous indie games.

To my mind, the best sequence was Jonathan Blow, the creator of Braid, explaining how much of his "deepest flaws and vulnerabilities" went into making the game, and how personal it became because of it. While I've never been of the Roger Ebert opinion that video games are not art, I'd struggle to place a video game on the same cultural pantheon as an amazing piece of music or literature of film or whatever. But that sequence genuinely made an impact on me...

After pondering it for a bit I wanted to explore that idea - of intensely 'personal' games - further, so downloaded Steam! Which was something I didn't see myself doing annnnnny time soon. But now I have no idea what games to download for it, which is where you lot come in!

I still have next-to-no idea about indie games so this whole thing is a brave new world for me, and it'd be nice to have a little bit of guidance. If people could suggest any games to me, that'd be most appreciated. I'm technically up for anything, so long as it isn't a shooter/open world game, can be played at a fairly leisurely pace (i.e. not something that requires multiple hours at a time - kind of a busy man!), is fairly cheap, and is playable on a Mac. In terms of taste, I've already picked out four games that I will download at some point: Super Meat Boy, Braid, RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 and Portal 2. Games among the vein of SMB/Braid are preferable, but I'm not entirely averse to bigger-budget titles.

So... yeah. Fire away! I can't guarantee I'll take all suggestions on board, but my eyes are open to new possibilities. Thanks! :D

And yes, old meme is old. Just like me!

You make me wanna watch the documentary too. Seriously, where did you watch it? I really searched a lot for it back when it was probably new. :B

Totally get Braid and SMB. Braid is a really unique game with some innovative time reversal mechanic usage while SMB is, pretty much, my fave platformer of all time. Also, Fez if it is available on mac.

Only one recommendation since you said you'd like something in vein of Braid/SMB. :3

I WATCHED IT WITH YOU IN PERSON AND IT WAS GREAT

Castle Crashers is an absolute must. It's an amazing game that's even more fun with multiple players and quite a few people here have it so it'll be a good chance to talk to some new people too whilst saving princesses. I highly recommend it :)

It was a couple years ago that videogames got officially recognized as an art form, actually :3

And I really liked that movie, too!

Hotline Miami is a pretty awesome indie game if you like movies from the 70/80s that seem like they're on drugs and you have no idea what's happening. Its also damn fun.

Also, post your Steam ID plz :3c

I'd say Sim City 4 Deluxe Edition, but you've mentioned that your favorite part is more the skyscraper phase of cities, and that takes a little bit of patience with the game and Sim City is far too open-ended to ever be properly "finished" in a traditional sense. It's also not an indie game, being produced by a well-known studio and published in a money-grab fashion by EA.