Most big-budget games are designed to keep you playing through FOMO (fear of missing out) and battle passes. Most "educational" software is designed by committees to meet curriculum standards, often forgetting to be, you know, fun.

Indie developers, however, are usually obsessed with a single mechanic. They want to simulate exactly how a bridge collapses under a load, or how a logic gate works. Because they aren't trying to appeal to 100 million people, they can make games that are actually hard. And as it turns out, kids actually love hard things when the reward is a massive explosion or a working spaceship.

This is the gold standard. You run a space program for a race of small green aliens. You have to build rockets using real parts—engines, fuel tanks, fairings—and then try to launch them. The STEM Lesson: It’s literally rocket science. Your kid will learn about thrust-to-weight ratios, gravity turns, and why you can't just point a rocket at the moon and hit "go." It teaches the iterative process: Build, Fail, Analyze, Rebuild. Ages: 10+ (Younger with a parent's help).

You are given a budget and a gap to cross. You have to build a bridge using wood, steel, and hydraulics. Then, you drive a vehicle across it. If your engineering is bad, the bridge snaps and the car plunges into the water. The STEM Lesson: Structural engineering. They’ll learn about triangles, tension, compression, and weight distribution. It’s incredibly satisfying to see a complex drawbridge finally click into place. Ages: 8+.

This looks like a simple retro game, but it’s one of the most brilliant logic puzzles ever made. The "rules" of the game are blocks on the screen (e.g., "BABA IS YOU," "WALL IS STOP"). You can push these blocks around to change the rules. If you push the blocks to say "WALL IS YOU," you suddenly become the wall. The STEM Lesson: This is the purest form of programming logic. It teaches how syntax works—how changing one operator in a string of code changes the entire output of a system. Ages: 7+ (though it gets very difficult very quickly).

You play as an office worker who has to move boxes from an "In" belt to an "Out" belt based on instructions. It starts simple (move the box) and gets complex (only move the box if it’s a zero, then add it to the next box). The STEM Lesson: This is visual assembly language. It teaches "if/then" statements, loops, and pointers. It’s basically a coding course wrapped in a quirky, slightly dark office satire. Ages: 10+.

This one is for the high schoolers or the very precocious middle schoolers. You start with a single NAND gate and eventually build a fully functioning computer architecture. The STEM Lesson: Computer science and hardware engineering. It’s high-level stuff, but for a kid interested in how computers actually work, it’s unmatched. Ages: 13+.

Most "city builders" are about expansion and consumption. Terra Nil is the opposite. You start with a wasteland and have to use technology to clean the soil, create oceans, and reintroduce wildlife. Once the ecosystem is perfect, you have to recycle all your buildings and leave without a trace. The STEM Lesson: Ecology and sustainability. It shows how different biomes rely on each other and the delicate balance required to maintain a climate. Ages: 6+.

You crash-land on a planet and have to build an automated factory to build a rocket to get home. You start by mining coal by hand and end with a massive, sprawling network of conveyor belts, trains, and robots. The STEM Lesson: Systems engineering and optimization. This game is famous for "the factory must grow." It teaches kids how to manage complex supply chains and solve "bottlenecks"—a skill that is surprisingly applicable to almost every high-level career. Ages: 12+ (It’s a bit of a "time sink," so set boundaries).

Kids love these games because they offer agency. In school, they are often told the "right" way to solve a math problem. In Kerbal Space Program, there are a thousand ways to get to the moon, and nine hundred of them involve hilarious explosions.

However, these games can be frustrating. They don't hold your hand. If your kid is used to the instant gratification of Brawl Stars, they might bounce off these at first. Check out our guide on helping kids manage gaming frustration

The biggest "danger" with these games isn't violence or online predators (most of these are single-player, offline experiences). The danger is the "just five more minutes" factor. Because these games are about problem-solving, it’s very hard for a kid to stop when they are right on the verge of fixing a bridge or landing a rover.

Pro-tip: Instead of saying "Turn it off now," try asking, "What’s the current problem you’re trying to solve?" It shows you value their work, and usually, they can give you a concrete timeline for when that specific task will be done.

Learn more about setting healthy gaming boundaries

Not all screen time is created equal. If your kid is going to be on a device, moving them toward games that value logic, physics, and systems thinking is a massive win. These indie gems aren't just "games"—they are sandboxes for the next generation of scientists and engineers.