IGDX 2025 Featured Indie Games: Once Upon a Kingdom
Following VirtualSEA’s coverage of Indonesia Game Developer Exchange (IGDX) 2025, we’re putting the spotlight on 5 games that stood out to represent the skill and diversity in Indonesia’s game development industry.
Once Upon a Kingdom is a card-based citybuilder being developed by Cliffbite Game, an Indonesian game studio with 7 members. Their focus is on cute and cozy games, which combine art and game mechanics to achieve this charming aesthetic.
In their newest game, the player chooses kingdoms that they will develop and prosper, with the goal of writing (by playing) a legendary history. The title opens with a fun backstory of an alien landing an ark on Planet Earth, and assigning an avatar named Satar to be their representative on the land. Players deal with resource cards in order to form buildings, collect resources, and protect the city from hostile villains.
The standout presentation of the game, with a clean UI experience and cute, detailed graphics, make it a promising game for hours of strategy and citybuilding. The quirky story and preview of chapters could promise an interesting narrative as you build your perfect settlement.
Currently slated for release by Q2 2026, Cliffbite Game is gearing up this exciting title, with a demo available on Steam. Learn more about Once Upon a Kingdom from the Cliffbite Game website, Instagram, and X.
