I vote Defender's Quest as my favorite indie, and what introduced me to the genre (if we are saying self-published games).

The tower defense given it's own take on strategy and some unique elements paired with a compelling story with branching paths as well as new content on higher difficulties kept things fresh. The art style was also no slouch in keeping things interesting.

My favorite indie game is Hades because I like the art style. I especially like the casual fun approach the developers have taken to the gods and enemies, as well as the historical touch and incredibly rewarding gameplay mechanics of this rogue-like dungeon crawler.

Good luck to everyone!

Hard to pick just one. Gorogoa (mentioned above) may be one of my favorites just because of the different style of play. I don't tend to pay much attention to the size of the publisher most times. Either a game is good and appeals to me or it doesn't appeal to me. Even the biggest publishers can have huge games that are bad or don't appeal to me.

Cosmic Star Heroine.

Very refined turn-based JRPG game. Chrono Trigger-like aesthetics, one of the best battle systems that rewards turn-based timing, and a camp story that doesn't take itself too seriously by satirizing 1990 JRPGs and other video game homages. I love the future cyberpunk setting, which is rare in JRPGs. The music is fantastic. Plenty of difficulty options and a flexible save-anywhere system; the hardest difficulty was especially interesting to play through too. For its price, it's one of the greatest indie purchases I've made here and satisfied that nostalgia kick for 16-bit JRPGs again.

There are probably many other candidates I'm slowly chipping away on my backlog. But so far, that's my favourite small indie studio game.

My favorite indie game is Slain Back From Hell.

Not only is it a considerably difficult platformer, the main character of the game is a huge plot twist; the character is there all along, you are looking at the character the entire time, and the big reveal still surprises everyone. There is not a single person that didn't see that plot twist coming, literally, everyone will be deceived.

I also love the doom metal atmosphere, with all that gore and macabre scenery and enemies. It's one of those games, that even though it is not that deep, or that original in its gameplay, it stays with your for a while after you finish it, and you do not know exactly why.

Risk of Rain

I saw it in a website giveaway,
It looks simple in graphics and gameplay.

I was lucky and won.
I didn't expect all that fun!

It became even better with a friend,
A challenging journey to reach the end.

Start looking different at indie games, that is my advice.
You'll never know until you reach a delighted surprise.

"Has to go to Indie hit Dead Cells, as my favourite title. "This was one of those games I randomly purchased on GOG without much consideration for what was in store. Only to realize how addictive the gameplay was, "not to mention the beautifully animated pixel art that pulled me in. As for the combat. It was solid and had finely tuned controls for controller and keyboard and mouse and offered. "A multitude of weapons to collect adding more diverse tactics to the overall gameplay. "Even looked. More gorgeous in VR using the Big Screen App for oculus. I will be looking "very forward to playing Dead Cells on my New Samsung QN90A TV when I can hopefully buy it, in January next year. "What a sight to behold. :)

The Aquatic Adventure of the last Human.

It has excellent explorative metroidvania like level design, Excellent aesthetics and boss fights, a interesting (albeit bleak) story, and some of the best music I have heard in a game.

I have many indie games that I love and many are a very close tie but this one stands out as one of, if not, my favorite. :)

There's quite a few I heartily enjoyed over the years, so it's tough to pick just one. This is just one of many:

CrossCode

I do get a kick out of playing fake (read single-player) MMOs, and CrossCode definitely is a standout title in that regard. While the overall world setting and story might not win any awards for originality, they're still very well done. Yet it is the big cast of likeable characters and their (often) genuinely funny interactions that make it a very fun romp.

Coupling that with superbly done pixel art, great sound design, tight and satisfying action-RPG gameplay, and a slew of well-designed environmental puzzles, this makes for an excellent package. Overall, I'd say it was not just a standout indie title, but one of the best games I've played in the past decade. :) Take that, AAAs!

Lastly, after inital feedback from the gaming community, the developers added much more granular adjustments that can be made to both combat and puzzle gameplay; this makes for much greater accessibility for those that may have a tougher time with some of CrossCode's elements. Frankly, I don't think I've ever seen this high level ability of difficulty-fine-tuning in a game of its kind before.

That said, I highly recommend a gamepad for play. While the game does feature decent keyboard & mouse support, I found the gameplay much tighter and accurate with my XBone pad.

"Indie" is a fluid term these days, but I'll go with Underrail. The love and dedication that went into that game, coupled with the design that captures the original Fallout feel without completely stealing the setting is fantastic.

Stardew Valley, It meets the right spot between completing quests and just playing and relaxing, gets you in sort of a Zen state of mind.

For me Bleeding Moons

Is one of the best Indie titles ive played in recent times.

Why becasue we here were games say your choices will effect the game but then by the end you find it made no diffrence. Bleeding Moons really dose. I found the story to be deep and meaningful.

It touched on adult subject matter as well. With diffrent endings and well written script and also low price it was really worth a play and why it one of my favouirte Indi titles.

Off the top of my head I'd say Streets of Rogue. I've mostly only played it multiplayer and enjoyed the diversity of the play throughs along with the character trait leveling/development.

Though I do really enjoy Seraph by Dreadbit for jumping in and just getting in a little single player time. Really enjoy the mechanics and visual design of the game.

My favourite indie game has to be Brigador Up-Armored Edition, the game has a surprisingly deep story if you check the audiobook and all the side content, has a really long campaign, very replayable, grat graphics and a fantastic soundtrack. The gameplay it's also very deep, has an incredible amount of strategy, yes you have to kill and destroy everything, but you have to do it using your brains, know the units and how to face them. In my opinion a fantastic game, thank you GOG for the giveaway!!!!!

The Binding of Isaac
Is one of my favorite Indie games. Because I think that it is unique in it’s art style both are disturbing and adorable. The challenge is great. Game play has top down shooting, by using his on tears as bullets it has lots of loot and remind me of dungeon from legend of Zelda but has it’s know game play. The only thing is that it not on GOG.