Make Your Arrests in Echo Beach, a New Indie on Itch.io Where Music is Against the Law

Everyone here at Prima Games loves indie titles. The smaller and more personal games come from smaller studios. In fact, most of the time ‘studio’ is mostly just an official title for one or three people that share a vision for a game. 

Through the absence of shareholders and dozens of focus groups, indie titles are unbound from both expectations and consumer trends. And it’s in these conditions that games such as Deltarune, Adios, and Friday Night Funkin’ are able to exist and breathe.

Stories and gameplay that you likely otherwise may not have experienced. 

Make Your Arrests in Echo Beach, a New Indie on Itch.io Where Music is Against the Law

Echo Beach is another important indie game with a story to tell. And like the best indie games, the story and premise are wrapped tightly around interesting gameplay mechanics. 

Players take control of an employee working a job they describe as a typical “boring job”, even though it’s anything but. Taking place in a cubicle, Echo Beach allows players to research different information in the interest of tracking down musicians.

At the start of the game, music has been illegal within Echo Beach’s world for ten years. The player character says that it was apparently done in the interest of productivity.

As an employee of the Ministry of Human Correction, the player character is tasked with investigating the last remaining place where musicians create and share their work. 

While navigating music forums and listening to super rad music, you’ll also work to identify the filthy art criminals that made the tasty tunes going into your ears. Echo Beach features an interesting dialogue and commentary on art and its relationship with politics. 

Developer Tim Sheinman shares some insight on Echo Beach and its development in its description on itch.io, saying “Echo Beach is a game about the tension between trying to live an adult life and making art for pleasure.”

With Hypnospace Outlaw vibes and a tasty soundtrack, Echo Beach is worth your time and money. The game’s puzzles and short story make for a good and captivating experience. The game’s official description lists Echo Beach as lasting 1-3 hours. I’m not very good at puzzles and it took me just over three hours. 

I also took in as much of the game’s music as possible, which added to my playtime a bit. Being able to experience everything Echo Beach has to offer in a single gameplay session certainly made the game a better time as well. Shoutout to short games for being sweet to me and my time. 

No purchase is necessary to play Echo Beach but you should consider donating whatever amount you think is fair. Making art is hard even though we don’t live under the rules of Echo Beach — yet. 

Triple-A games are cool but trend burnout is real. Next time you find yourself feeling bored with games, consider making your way over to itch.io. The website is home to creative projects and is a place where creators are compensated more. It’s like BandCamp but for indie games. 

Related: The Best Games On Xbox Game Pass