The next few sentences describing the newly revealed indie game OctoPinbs will be surprising.
First, it’s a game revealed at Indie Live Expo 2026 with the backing of Aniplex as its publisher. Second, the co-developers for OctoPinbs are Tri-Ace (yes, the RPG specialists behind the Star Ocean and Valkyria Profile series) and Lasengle, the Aniplex-owned developer that now operates the mobile game Fate/Grand Order as well as the developer for fighting game Melty Blood: Type Lumina.
Third, Octopinbs is a sort-of like a co-op firefighting game where you must douse a burning building, the twist is that one of the players is secretly a fire starting squid. And last but not least, look at the logo for OctoPinbs upside down, and spell “pibs” backwards.
Now don’t just call OctoPinbs a straight-up Among Us-like. The multiplayer online social deduction game where you can team up as a team of three to ten Octopus firefighters to put out flames has more to it. One of them is a Squid Artist whose goal is to simply start and spread more fire, all while disguising as one of the Octopus firefighters.
Getting found out isn’t game over for the Squid. They can change into their true form, fight back and start stuffing the Octopi team into jars. Once the social deduction elements have unfolded, OctoPinbs becomes a PVP game.
If the concept of Octopinbs intrigues you, good news is the game is about to release. Octopinbs will be out on May 11 on PC (Steam).