Every year, PAX Australia features a selection of games under the ‘Aus Indie Showcase’ label. These games have been selected from across Australia, either recently released or upcoming, as deserving of a spotlight.

For the 2025 selection, there are six video games and six board games. You can view the complete list here, along with additional details for each game.

We’ve had the opportunity to chat with some of the team behind the games that will be featured during PAX AUS 2025 and have been able to get some questions answered about the games, as well as the teams themselves. In the lead-up to PAX AUS 2025, please enjoy this series of articles offering insight into some of the featured games.

What does it mean to you to be included in the PAX Rising

It’s super validating to get included at PAX. I’m sure we were up against a bunch of super-talented indies, so to be selected is a big deal for us. We’re always pretty keen to show our games off, so this is an awesome opportunity. Thanks to PAX Aus for selecting us!

What’s the best pitch to get people to play and check out your game at PAX AUS this year?

Well, hey, if you’re at PAX, come check us out, we’re a pretty friendly bunch! Dryft City Kyngs is probably one of the stranger games you can play at PAX. It’s funny and weird in a way like you’re half asleep- the TV’s on with late-night reruns of cartoons & all that stuff is seeping into your dreams. That’d be a good way, I’d put it. A bit like old school GTAs or something like Simpsons Hit and Run & a bit of Earthbound. We made sure to keep things weird; the whole world and characters have heaps of personality. There’s also a cute little DJ baby penguin.

Another good reason to check the game out at PAX is that the version we’re showing off has some exciting updates that you can’t play on Steam at the moment! There are some unreleased goodies to find in the PAX build. They’re part of our content update coming out, hopefully next year.

Can you tell us about your team: size, roles, and how you collaborate

There are between 3 and 4 of us at any one time, as well as the help of a lot of awesome, talented people. The team works pretty flexibly, being indie and a small team, you’ve got to wear many hats. Dweedes has done a bit of everything, including coding, writing the story, making sick beats and sound effects. He’s the driving force of Dryft City! I think also dweedes did a lot of stuff, making sure everything fit the tone of the game, so he was also the ‘vibe checker’ or something like that. Rowdy Brent Eaton did a lot of art and character design for the game. Later on, I (Sal Fontaine), took on Brent’s role and did art and character designs, etc. Ruimin Guo worked on a lot of story elements for the game & UX/UI design. Ruimin was also like the “voice of reason” on the team. Whenever dweedes and I were bouncing ideas off each other or disagreeing on how a gameplay element would work, she would chime in and be a third voice/ vote that’d help us figure out how we should approach a lot of things. Lastly, if you play the game, you’ll see a lot of penguins- that was all Ruimin 🙂 We also received assistance from a bunch of talented people who contributed through music & testing.

Besides just their roles, everyone would chip in and offer ideas/ feedback in different areas. Dweedes might send me preliminary ideas & doodles of a character that I would draw up. In the same way, I might help him work out how a sequence in the game should flow. We all get to voice how we feel different parts of the game should go, whether that’s how something looks or how gameplay feels. I think it’s a lot better this way, everyone gets to have their voice heard and generally, every part of the game gets a bit more refined because you’ve everyone looking at it from different angles. 

As for how we work & collaborate, dweedes and I constantly bounce ideas off each other, a bit like when you’re joking around with mates. You say something stupid, and then another friend adds onto the joke; it keeps getting stupider and more ridiculous -snowballing. We tend to do that sort of thing a lot with characters & game concepts, and that means that we tend to forget what we were having meetings about in the first place, but at the same time, get a lot of good material from going back and forth. 

What’s the year since the release of the game been like in terms of reception, and the feeling of having the game out in the wild?

The reception has been great, everyone who’s played it has had a good time, and people related to the humour and style. It’s nice when people just ‘get’ what you’re going for! We got covered by some game journalists, which blew my mind. I was like, “Hey, damn, I go on those sites all the time, and they’re talking about us.”

Really just proud & happy that everyone who played got something out of the game. 

Did you have anything come to your mind after release, or maybe something someone pointed out in a review, etc, where you wished you’d changed something in the game before release?

So this is Nonsense Machine’s biggest game to date. We learnt a lot and reflected a bunch after the game came out. There’s probably not really any singular thing we’re really disappointed in that we wish we had changed. We learnt while developing how to make production work a lot smoother (especially on bigger projects), and we’re taking those lessons on with new games. 

One thing I think we realised was just how insane the game industry is now, with so many games released every week. I think if we went back, we would’ve pushed marketing a bit harder- just getting more eyes on the game. You’re up against many other things competing for attention, and that includes a lot of stuff outside of the games sphere- everything is just shouting for your attention! So just a bit of a harder push on marketing next time. 

With opportunities like PAX, we’re really thankful for, because we get opportunities to show the game off to a whole host of different people that haven’t heard of DCK. That said, getting the game done was a hectic push at the end (like all games), and there’s only so much we could’ve done. I think everyone was pretty happy with how the game turned out. In retrospect, when you make any art, you always wish you could’ve tweaked things, but in the broad strokes, we’re all really proud of what we made. 

Obviously, there’s an alt-culture, rebellious nature to the game: do you think of yourself as a rebellious person, and in what ways?

Personally, I’m not too rebellious, I think everyone wants to think they are– at least a little bit. I’d say some of the work when I draw weird, outlandish critters in my free time can be a bit weird, but really, it’s all pretty tame. I speak my mind and want to push against the sucky status quo stuff in the world. But that’s about it, I’m not out on the streets being a cool skater dude, throwing molotov cocktails, fighting evil CEOs or anything like that. Between Me and dweedes, I feel like in a lot of ways I’m the more conservative dude, but that works for us because the differences in takes lead us to bounce ideas off each other and come up with more stuff as we joke or butt heads. Dweedes for sure has some alternative, chill, no worries sort of way about him. You can see it in all his work, even if you’ve never met the guy.

On DCK, when you make something, especially a big project, you want it to stand out be a bit unique, be special, etc. You can almost go too far trying to be subversive, trying not to do things how they’ve always been done. I think DCK definitely has a bit of a rebellious, alt vibe to it in a lot of ways, especially visually & with story beats. But there’s also lots of good stuff in the game that are just straightforward, traditional gaming tropes/conventions, etc, because they’re fun, they work and are stuff we love in games. One thing I appreciate about DCK is that it doesn’t take itself too seriously, or tries always to be different for the sake of being different. 

This MS Paint aesthetic characterises the art style for all the games from Nonsense Machine: how would you describe the art direction? And what do you like most about that style?

So, I jumped into the project halfway through- the art direction was already well underway. The team was going for a style that invoked retro lollie (candy) wrappers, as well as stuff like Oddbodz by Andy Hook– think like Ren and Stimpy– a bit of a gross-out sort of style. Everything in the game has an exaggerated, cartoony looseness– a bit rough like MS Paint drawings. You’re spot on there, I think it just gave everything a bit more character, a bit grungier and more alive by being more loose in the art department.

For me, I loved going a bit crazier than my everyday drawings. I tend to be a perfectionist, drawing more static stuff. For this game, it really pushed me to up the ante – exaggerate more, making characters a lot more emotive– in a way, sort of reminded me of little cartoons I’d draw as a kid. Also, because the city was so grungy, I got to cover it in little doodles as graffiti. Lots of funny little doodles and jokes are on rooftops because I got to go wild with the graffiti. 

There’s a fusion of genres in Dryft City Kyngs. Were there any others that hit the development room floor and didn’t make it into the game?

I can’t really say we really switched out genres or anything like that, but initially, there were a lot more RPG & simulation elements in the game. More mechanics based around the time of day, with characters having their own sort of mini lives. A lot of that got reigned in as time went on; we’d be working on a new chapter and have a character missing from a sequence. We’d be like, “Where’s this guy? Oh, why is he over there?” and it was just a bit of a logistical, programming nightmare. We made things more straightforward in some ways, so everything would work and flow better. I’m surprised, though, how much dweedes managed to work out programming-wise and fit into the game in the end.

Here’s one example I can think of with cut content, though. Not genre-related, but a quest in the game I wish we’d managed to squish in. There was a quest involving a certain scrappy little goblin character who collects bits and bobs. He’s in the game, but we had a fun idea of collecting parts for him, and he ends up flying off in this poorly cobbled-together rocket he’s built from all the parts. There was a lot of stuff like this, a lot of silly quest ideas that didn’t make the cut. Who knows, maybe some gameplay ideas or story beats will find their way into our next game.

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How have you attended PAX before, and what’s your favourite Aussie game you remember checking out?

I attended PAX a while ago, but only as an attendee. It was a little while ago now, so recalling back is kind of foggy. I remember really enjoying the indie booth when I was there, though. There’s so much hustle and bustle with the big players like Nintendo, so I spent more time checking out the smaller booths. All the indies are just super friendly and earnest. There are no queues; you just chat to the devs, ask questions, and play cool games. The only game I remember playing, unfortunately, wasn’t Aussie, but it was Eastward- I remember being blown away with the art (I finally got around to playing it last year!) 

What’s the most recently played/watched/listened to Aussie thing that you loved? 

Oh man, I want to rant, but I’ll try to keep it short. At the moment, a big one I’ve been playing is Cult of the Lamb. I’ve been really enjoying my time with that. I think the whole fusion of roguelike dungeon crawling and the cult building aspect was a great idea. Especially if you’ve just died to a boss and need a breather, another one is Void Bastards. I love system-based games, and the graphic art style is just- chef’s kiss. Can’t wait to play Silksong like everyone else. Hollow Knight is a classic, and I loved my time with it. In terms of stuff that isn’t games, I really enjoyed “Talk to Me” & “Bring Her Back”, two really tense, anxiety-riddled horror movies. 

Thank you to Sal for taking the time to answer the questions and help us learn more about the game! You can now add the game to your wishlist on Steam.

You’ll be able to find Dryft City Kyngs at the Indie Showcase Area, which is not far from entering the PAX Hall via the Que Hall, as circled on the map below.