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Warning: what you are experiencing are the gold old shareware days. A lot of small, simple yet addictive games.

John Romero and Tom Hall had that same feeling a couple of years ago when they erected Monkeystone Games: http://www.monkeystone.com/

Three recent trends lend credibility to the image of those modest studios (indies) developing games: 1) the fact that many such developers are are coming from industry proper; 2) the actual nomenclature "Indie" being a positive term; and 3) small studios' newfound ability to create games that are visually appealing.

First: An interesting but not-well-known fact is that many members of the indie gaming community come from a background of well-known companies. Take, for example, the Moonpod team, which had experience at Gremlin and Infogrames before starting out on their own. Monkeystone is headed by none other than id's John Romero. I would argue that games industry experience is not a prerequisite for the development of a good game; but the recent movement of folks from big gaming companies to their own studios makes independents more credible. Put simply: if folks who have worked on shipped, big-budget games are now part of the indie community, there must be something to the indie community.

Second: The actual term used for smaller studios (Independents or Indies) is an important one. You could call many of the products in this category "Shareware Games," but there's a horribly negative connotation to that term. "Indie Games" evokes the notion of a small, dedicated team of professionals crafting out something new and interesting. By contrast, the term "Shareware Games" evokes the notion of some dude in his basement churning out a buggy arcade clone that looks like it was written for the Intellivision. To parahrase someone, (I want to say Chris Barrie): A rose by any other name might smell as sweet, but may be less appealing if it were called "sewage-weed." The adoption of the "Indie" label has helped legitimize games made by smaller studios.

Fifth (20 years from now, we'll be those old farts still making Python references to people born in twenty-oh-one): Independents can make games that look good. It may be because indies now have access to tools that would have made Pixar cry during its formative years. (Maya, for example, can be had for about $2k, and is even free for personal use.) It may also be because there's great talent now available. Either way, I think indie titles, taken as a whole, have become visually appealing. During the '90s, shareware titles had a bad reputation for being ugly, because they lagged so far behind the cutting-edge. These days, titles like Starscape, Dark Horizons: Lore, and Wik & The Fable of Souls are (IMO) looking pretty good. And, while indie titles may not be as spectacular as those developed by a major studio, (our own Inago Rage focuses on bright colors, but doesn't quite outdo Tron 2.0, for example), decent sales suggest that gamers like what Independents are doing.

However, given the dearth of posts in this thread, I still believe we have a long way to go. :) So, if you haven't already, check out the DIY and Game Tunnel coverage of the 81 IGF entrants. You may find that precious diamond in the rough.
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It's also too bad that the whole team was fired as soon as the game shipped. Who gets the money when we buy Anachronox now? Eidos? Screw that. One of the fired devs recommended on some forum somewhere that people pirate the game, since he wasn't going to get any money even if they did buy it. If I hadn't bought it the day it shipped, I would have done that instead. I hope at least some of my money went to the devs. These are, after all, the people who released a patch after they were fired to allow me to play under Windows 2000. Something even Eidos wouldn't do.

Being that it is, at its heart, a console RPG, Anachronox is a really great PC game. I think it just took too long to develop and ION had its own problems at that time. Anybody know what Tom Hall is up to now? PocketPC games. I'm sure they enjoy making those, but I'd much rather see a second Anachronox game. Sorry about this being offtopic :|

Ravi

In case you really wanted to know, Romero and the rest of the crew are doing handheld games as
Monkeystone Games.

Any other hasbeens like clevernickname and john romero are invited to a bumscrew as well. After all, I am a hasbeen myself, I am Donny Most, TV"s fucken beloved Ralph Malph Alpha of Happy Dayz fame. I can get you Erin Moran's autographed photo, FUCKERZ, how do you like that. Yeah, you'd all like that huh.

He's got a real hosting service, I suspect that he didn't expect the page views that he just got today and didn't pay for the larger service agreement from them.

He's obviously not being extravagant like he was with Ion Storm these days. The core Ion Storm crowd seems to have formed a new company called MonkeyStone and they're producing games for handhelds (Something less ambitious than Daikatana and more easily done on a garage style development budget). The official offices are in Quinlan, TX (A small town some 15 or so miles to the south of Greenville, TX, a town 45 minutes drive time to the east on I-30 from the Dallas side of the DFW metro area...)- office space is dirt cheap there in Quinlan (it's not exactly "pricey" in Greenville, either...).

Looks like he's going for the garage games route of develoment, etc.- something sustainable with reasonable resources. Your guess is as good as mine as to why he's selling it. Could be he's trying to capitalize the GBA version of his game (they DO have to pay a license fee to produce the game for GBA) or he just decided it was an expensive toy (read: penis extention) that he just couldn't justify anymore and is trying to shift it for that reason.

Let's hope the money he gets from the sale of the Ferrari will help keep Monkeystone alive.

... after all, Stevie Case's new tatoo would probably be not be that hot if Monekystone goes the way of Ion Storm. ;)

theRomero was on the Quake team. Deus Ex, however, was done by the awesome, ever-so-talented Warren Specter. Deus Ex was also done at the ION Storm Dallas (or wherever it was -- not Austin, where theRomero was) office, which was not closed. Instead, it went for some name change, I don't remember what. That same studio is now working on Thief 3, as well as Deus Ex 2. ION Storm Austin is gone. Dead. Finito. Tom Hall (also an ex-id guy, sucked into ION Storm by theRomero, made the moderately successful yet still fun Anachronox) and theRomero started Monkeystone Games, where they make games for various handhelds. They already have one game out for the PocketPC, something about a delivery boy. Maybe theRomero is learning, since this game was done in a matter of months, rather than years.

And remember, "Design is Law!" Oh, yeah, and theRomero has cut his hair. He's no longer sexy.

theRomero was on the Quake team. Deus Ex, however, was done by the awesome, ever-so-talented Warren Specter. Deus Ex was also done at the ION Storm Dallas (or wherever it was -- not Austin, where theRomero was) office, which was not closed. Instead, it went for some name change, I don't remember what. That same studio is now working on Thief 3, as well as Deus Ex 2. ION Storm Austin is gone. Dead. Finito. Tom Hall (also an ex-id guy, sucked into ION Storm by theRomero, made the moderately successful yet still fun Anachronox) and theRomero started Monkeystone Games, where they make games for various handhelds. They already have one game out for the PocketPC, something about a delivery boy. Maybe theRomero is learning, since this game was done in a matter of months, rather than years.

And remember, "Design is Law!" Oh, yeah, and theRomero has cut his hair. He's no longer sexy.

Selling his car..
Stooping to doing commander keen clones for pocket pc for a living..
He even recently cut his hair short (expect it on ebay soon?)

All these lamars who sya i am a stonar and haev crayz ideas aer just lamars - hwo mayn games haev you maed lamars? I haev teh imaginashun adn storylien it taeks to maek it in tihs indsutry.

Grate ideas can not be limmited to a lamar codar or mappar's gay limmitashuns. All taht mattars is what i see in my dreems when i am stodned. Taht is why i haev learned to code progroms myself adn teh art to, so my grate vishons can be reel and make me mroe money for fast cares that teh chickes liek.

So fi you want ot see i am nto a lamar anymor PLEASE DOWNLODE MY NEW FREE PLAM PALOT APPES AT HTTP://WWW.MONKEYSTONE.COM. Remembar ZELDA on teh GAY NES (Nentindo Extra Suck) systum? Well if u are a PLAM PALOT or jsut want to be a PLAM PILOT get ARE NEW GAME THAT IS NTO GAY "HYPERSPACE DELIVERY BOY". Be teh boy!

Do not downlode are gaem if you aer gay, we like chickors and have fast cares. When i go to town, poeple know who i am, becuase i haev a fast care. Be teh boy!

TEH RAMIRO

ps i am nto gay i haev a fast care and killcreke

ps u need ur credat card to play aer free games lamar. Don't wory, i am not teh hackor.

ps u need ur credat card for killcreke to

ps brign teh weed adn u can haev a ride in my fast care.

ps no my gaem is not gaye! hyperspace delivary boy gets all teh chixors. downlode teh APPES and see!

ps remembar that gaem Quaek from IT softwaer? i rote that for tohse LAMARS. i sued to be rich befoer teh lamars i hired rewened my good ideas and stroylien

ps brign a pizza for killcreke

ps bring teh weed

I see theRomero is still sticking with the frog theme captured so well by Daikatana ....

Nothing makes a game more fun like frogs!

Withess Hyperspace Delivery Boy. That took what, a week?

I'm suprised that you didn't mention that John Romero and Co have moved to making games for the iPaq at MonkeyStone Games.

Not only are they making games for them, but also trying to base a business on them.