this might be a kind of weird rec request, but, do you know any other games with the same vibe as HLD? not in gameplay, but in like, setting and story? other games that i know of that has the same vibe is Creature In The Well, Sable, Hob, and kind of RIME, if that helps
Getting straight to the point, I see – I appreciate it!
Based on your examples, I’m guessing we’re aiming for a sort of melancholy post-apoc milieu that doesn’t resort to gratuitous gore or real-is-brown to get its point across, ideally with a French comic book twist to its visual design, and that you lead with Hyper Light Drifter tells me that the occasional burst of technically challenging violence isn’t a deal-breaker for you. If I’ve got that right, you might have a look at any of the following:
Anodyne 2: Return to Dust - The first game in the series is more of a Yume Nikki meets Legend of Zelda sort of deal, but the sequel fits the brief much better. The gimmick is that the mechanics and visuals shift eras depending on what scale you’re operating on, going from PSOne to GBA and in a few cases zooming all the way in to ZX Spectrum.
Bastion - I’m quite sure you’ve heard of this one, but just in case! Known mostly for its conceit of having a fully voiced narrator who dynamically responds to the player’s actions, including some very cool sequences that play with the unreliable narrator trope by having what the voiceover is describing depart from what’s happening in front of you.
Etherborn - I’m throwing this one in on purely aesthetic grounds, as I strongly suspect that if you liked the atmosphere of Hyper Light Drifter, this’ll be right up your alley. It’s an experimental walking sim/puzzle-platformer hybrid where you play as a voiceless something-or-other that can manipulate gravity.
FAR: Lone Sails - I’ll level with you: this one’s on the list specifically because you name-checked Sable. It’s about navigating a landship across a dry ocean bed in search of other survivors; starts out as a nearly pure walking sim, and gradually introduces light engineering puzzle elements to spice things up.
FEZ - A perspective shifting puzzle-platformer, it may initially appear that this recommendation is based entirely on visual similarity, but it has a lot of overlap with Hyper Light Drifter in terms of the themes and implications of its story, too – at least if you can figure out what the heck is going on! Be prepared to take notes; there will be a test.
Omensight - That you mentioned Hob put me in mind of this one. It’s an outlier in this list in that it takes place during, rather than following, the apocalypse: it’s a time-looping action platformer/murder mystery hybrid where you repeatedly play out the world’s last day, trying to solve – and hopefully prevent – the murder of God. No pressure!
OneShot - A nonviolent puzzle-RPG where you control the Messiah on a quest to restore the sun to a dying world. The twist? The Messiah’s god is you, the player, and they’re aware of your existence. The puzzles are heavy on the meta, with some involving manipulating the game window or manually editing files on your hard drive, among other things.
Superbrothers: Sword & Sorcery EP - Self-described as a prog rock album you can walk around in, this point-and-click adventure/rhythm game admittedly edges toward real-is-brown territory, but it’s stylish enough that I’m willing to give it a pass. The story has some of the same thoughts as Hyper Light Drifter on the subject of self-sacrifice.
In terms of forthcoming titles beyond those you already mentioned, you might keep an eye on The Last Campfire, NYKRA, Orion: Shadow of Jeroba, Omno, Outrider Mako, Prisma Light, Radio the Universe and Voyage.
