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Can Independent Game Developers Survive?
Zanthor writes "Online Gaming - Comments and News has an interesting interview with Scott Miller and Larry Dunlap (Imperial Wars) about their up-and-coming game. While the concept has been around since the old Play By Mail games, their web-based client and world-class art pose the question: Can a small start up group compete with the big name publishers for the Multi-Player money?" EA employs how many people?
and not by how big you are.
It's all about the game, and how you play it.
It's all about control, and if you can take it.
It's about your debts, and if you can pay it.
It's all about pain, and who's gonna make it.
By outsourcing animation, sound and music, and concentrating on programming. That's what Bungie did (didn't save them from themselves though). There's just too much to do in a modern game for a small startup to cope with, unless they're really smart like Relic software and manage to make something which has high quality graphics/sound without much effort.
I defenetly think that this game can make it and compete. Snood survived with little or no advertizing and beceame a phenomonon. I defenetly think that this game can beat the big guys if it is unique and different from all the other drek that is handed out by the big developers.
I, for one, would pay for, and play this game if it is good. All it takes is a little work by the developers to make the game good, and then a lot of showing the game to the masses
> Can a small start up group compete with the big name publishers for the Multi-Player money?
s .net
:\
you'd be surprised, at least in the brazilian and portuguese market. It's pretty virgin in the game developing sector, and publishers are keeping an eye out for almost all projects made by "amateurs" in the industry. check:
http://fozi.no-ip.org
http://www.truedimension
TD is under construction
Moderators: Don't agree? pray tell why.
Remember Richard Garriot AKA Lord British? He used to sell his Akalabeth game with a plastic baggie and Xeroxed manuals. If the game is good enough, someone will buy it, no matter how bad the presentation.
My postings are informational and does not constitute legal advice. Act on it at your risk.
Introversion ended up quite successful with their simple hacking sim "Uplink".
It's a fun little game that started out as the guy's pet project, but ended up taking off and has sold many many copies since.
Heck I ended up buying a few copies for Xmas presents this year, and most of my friends agreed it was quite enjoyable. Runs on both Windows and Linux.
-----
Give their games away for free.
As somebody who's been in the industry for 9+ years, I'm going to tell you that you'd better have something so out of the water good (like, Doom, for instance) or noone is going to bother without the massive flood of marketing that the idio-trons have come to count on. I've seen GREAT games made by large companies flounder, due to not enough marketing. And conversely, I've seen sub-par drivel sell millions because of a marketing blitz.
Independant games can be "successful", in the same way that independant movies are. The majority of them are seen by a few, who love them. But only 1 in a few hundred make any money at all (like Blair Witch or My...Greek Wedding). It's not the fault of the movie (or the game), it's just the average lazy consumer DEPENDS on the magic box to tell him what to buy, wear, watch, etc. Without the voices from the wonderful box, the average person just does not have the gumption to go out and LOOK for whatever it is that they really want. They take the best of what is offered them. Truly sad, but very true.
I hope the gaming community keeps independance from the bigger gaming companies.
All music is controlled by the bigger companies and look at that as the failed model. I wouldn't want this for games either.
In the US already we have games which follow on from the success of others, advancing little but offering the tried and tested routine. (Like some movies an music)
If we keep some of these smaller publishers then it might raise the bar of game playing and game design.
In Europe some smaller gaming publisher see games as an art and not the same way as EA or Infogrammes. Thus their motives are different and allows them to take greater risk in their creation of games,instead of playing it safe, just creating sequels or clones and maximizing profits as much as possible.
I was part of an independant game studio for awhile, but funds ran out and we were done before we ever released our first project. It really is EXTREMELY rough for those of us indie companies to get by. Especially with the fierce competition that has spouted up over the last years.
The only real indie-type game that has even somewhat made it has been Serious Sam and Gore. And that isn't much. Serious Sam is certainly great but Gore left a bad aftertaste in my mouth.
but the OS X market is virgin enough for the picking.
You have tons of users to a relatively new OS missing featured and games from before while unwilling to leave the new features. Make games for them if you need money, but don't quit your dayjob first.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
www.llamasof.co.uk.
jeff minter was ultra cool at the alternative partys btw.. he even threw a special version of gridrunner++ to everyone who were there(no not actual physical discs/medium but download..)!
anyways.. he hinted that something 'big' is coming on 23rd day.. and this is on-topic on can indep. survive...
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
In some respects, indie developers can have a better chance as startups, since in theory their overhead is lower. The games industry is a lot like the movie industry, in that the big budget titles, even if they're very popular, can often end up not making a lot of money.
Of course, there's always the need to define 'indie,' a problem that applies to games as much as music or movies. Just being small doesn't make you independent; if you've got a relationship with a publisher or larger company, that makes a big difference, even if your company/studio is only a handful of people.
Whether a truly 'indie' developer can survive depends a lot on the market they're going after. If they're doing a niche product, especially something a little retro, they've got a chance to make it on the quality of their product (or sometimes even lack of competition, although that's rare). If they embrace an alternative business model instead of vainly trying to get shelf space, they've got a shot. If, on the other hand, they want to actually compete with major developers and big publishers, they rarely stand much of a chance.
At least that's what I've seen. There are exceptions. There are a lot of ways to approach the games industry, for those with the will to do so.
Bushi
Independant games are flourishing. (look at http://rpgtoolkit.com)
Really, anyone can break in as long as they find a good niche. Naturally, if an independent churns out a quake clone it's not necissarily gonna be picked up by fans everywhere.
But think of your favorite games -- weren't they unique in some way?
The problem for independent game developers comes down to this: game creation is a massively labor intensive process, requiring more cash than most can acquire. Worse, many game developers are young and inexperienced making schedules and budgets neigh-impossible to control. When small start-ups begin to hiccup on the development, the end usually isn't far off.
My guess is if Imperial Wars is to last, it'll be picked up by a major publisher. It's interesting to note, the entertainment software market is narrowing down to 2 main publishers, EA and Microsoft, making the market less friendly towards independents hoping for publishing deals.
He passes to Moses! Moses shoots! He scores!
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
I haven't been following it lately, but last time I looked they had 20 employees.
They seem to be doing alright.
Snood survived with little or no advertizing and beceame a phenomonon.
Snood was a port of an arcade game called "Puzzle Bobble" aka "Bust-A-Move". It rode on the advertising of BAM.
Will I retire or break 10K?
.....only has the text "THIS WEB SITE IS CURRENTLY UNDER CONSTRUCTION".
:P
Looks pretty cool to me - he's certainly got a blank sheet of paper to start with
This story is a dupe
So how does a small startup, not big enough to get recognized by Nintendo, publish on a popular handheld platform with a decent game-style input device?
Will I retire or break 10K?
Independent Game Developers are developers of softwares.
And the term "softwares" does include things like MOVIES, MUSIC, WEB CONTENTS, ONLINE BOOKS, and, yes, computer softwares.
We all know how powerful is the Hollywood behemoths, right ?
But if we pay enough attention, we will see that there are still a large group of movie producers who prefer to work OUTSIDE of Hollywood's control and/or influences.
They are known as "independents".
Yes, the game industry is very competitive right now. The lifespans of game titles are in usually weeks, not months or years, like it used to.
But hey, in the world of movies, lifespan are in weeks too, and there is no lack of independent producers/directors keep churning out movies according to their own liking.
Yep, most of the products suck. But once in a while, we do have some real gems.
As the world of the movies never count out the "indies", we, in the software world shouldn't count out our own "indies" too.
It's the indies who work in garages or basements who often come out with ingenious notion of how things are done.
In the gaming world, we have largely two genre of games - Shoot-em-ups and race-and-flips.
Well
And perhaps this time, it'd be the indies who'd come up with it.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
I'm surprised that no one here has mentioned some biggy indie developments. Granted, they are not necessarily full-fledged games within and of themselves, but the modding community does have the ability to crank out some great games, including the ability to make and/or break a game.
... that's just the way our current (crappy) system is set up.
For instance, Half-Life. OK, it's a great game, good storyline, sold pretty decently. Then comes the Counter-Strike mod for it (created by an indie developer). Suddenly H/L explodes, and is still selling thousands of copies per year (don't forget that it came out many many years ago). From here, the CS team has since been "merged" into VALVe Software, and a new game (Counter-Strike: Condition Zero) is the result.
Other great examples of this are the original Team Fortress for QuakeWorld and Action Quake for both Quake I and Quake II. (Action Quake actually partially inspired Counter-Strike).
Independent developers are rampant in the RPG and War Simulation genres. Simple Google searches can reveal a surprising amount of good games out there, including ones that are sold on a per-download basis (thus eliminating the publisher altogether). Granted, they may not be making a tremendous amount of money, but almost no indie in any form of entertainment will make a lot of money
For a more corporate aspect, I would recommend taking a look at GoD Games, which started out as a collection of developers joining together to form their own publishing group. (Publishing is where the actual game is made/broken. If you don't have a publisher, your game, however good it is, will not go very far) It's since been phenomenally successful.
I see no reason that indie developers can't stay together and functioning in the big world of mega-hits like EA's (well, Maxis') The Sims. The form of entertainment is simply too broad for the big wheels to cover everything.
topreacher@signature.slashdot.org 1% rm -rf sig
look at how successful the Sims became. They had NO advertising at first. All you need is a great game, good reviews, and word of mouth.
Make a game that doesn't suck.
Compare all the computer games in history. Compare them to the original half-life.
99.99 percent of all computer games have sucked, regardless of who made them. They suck!
An on-line mmporg called Planetarion set up by a 5-person company called 5th Season in Norway has gone throught this cylcle already.
The game is/was based around hourly 'turns' running 24/7, and it is entirely html based, there is no client software beyond your browser. It has run for a few years now, and peaked at over 180,000 accounts when it was funded entirely by banner adverts, when the big advertising crash forced it to go 'pay to play' id dropped to around 10,000 people paying about $6-10 for a 3 month 'round'
Eventually, last November, they ran out of money and abandoned a round part way through. Possibly this was because the community of players didn't approve of recent changes to game design, or possibly because the game required too much on-line time to be successful in - strong alliances would expect a 12-hour on-line time per day from their members. The game has been take over by another company, Jolt, who plan a re-launch early this year.
I was very active in [Titans], the Legion [Vts], and originally in Yi-He Quan [YHQ], and had a lot of fun in the game, but I'm probably not playing the new round because to do well, you need to check your planet every 3-4 hours continually for 3 months.
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
Note the year. Yes, it's 2003. Games have become a lot more complex than they were in 1980. In 2003 game production is an extremely costly process, not unlike movie production. You need a whole team of programmers and artists, not to mention sales, marketing, distribution, and who knows what else. To say that an independent developer can compete on this level is simply insane.
I mean, really, what's so damn hard about producing a nice box and manual? The cost of entry to writing documentation is zero, after all, and the cost of printing it is, while certainly greater than the cost of writing the CD, not high on a per-unit basis.
And if you really can't afford to do either of these things, try to partner with an established marketing company that can. Cut them in for a % - probably a fat %. Make sure you can get out the next time you produce a game, because for game #2, you'll have money in your pocket to produce (or hire to have produced) these things on your own, and your established rep will give you more market share.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
A lot of independant game developers survive just fine. Depending on the game style you work with, a single person can do all the work - surviving then is a lot easier than a 40 person team. Most of my games have been single player puzzle games *. I have a day job, and do my game programming at night - it's trivial for my game company to 'survive' in that environment.
But when you get into monsters that require a team like Trajectory Zone (under development - have some sample screen shots), then things change a lot. As a single person development team, it's easy to make all the choices, do the job, and not have to worry as much about timelines, depending on someone getting thier job done (or, just as important - you getting your job done on time.) And that's just doing it 'part-time' - IE, keeping a day job, and working on games at night. Try and do it full time, and it gets even more complicated - where's the next infusion of cash come from? Or more importantly, where's lunch come from?
That's not to say it's so complicated that people aren't doing it as Indies - they are. Heck, after Trajectory Zone ships, I'll finally move to full time game development instead of part-part time. (Funny words actually - "part-time" doesn't describe living, breathing, eating, and dreaming game development in all your "spare time.")
I always like readin' about games like Imperial Wars - nice to see someone doing' it. When I spoke at Indie Games Con 2002 my co-speaker was a full time Indie developer. Really cool to spend some time talkin' to someone who was doin' it full time, and find out how they managed to pull of what they have done so far. David Michael wasn't the only person there doing it full time, of course - there were others too, and talkin' to them ended up giving me a lot of insight. If you are really seriously interested in Indie game development, hit the next Indie Game Con - there's a lot to be learned there.
Oh, and for those interested - here's a transcript of the speach. It's got a lot of interesting stuff in it - oddly enough, the title of the speach is "Can I Make Money As An Indie Game Developer?" - very appropriate to this particular /. thread :-)
Another place to go look around at when it comes to Indie Game Development - Garage Games lots of people there working towards Indie game releases at the moment, and some people who have already completed thier current projects and moving to the next game. Look in the business section and the general sections for some really good discussion on the subject (note - just like anywhere else, gotta sift a bit to find the good stuff from the crud.)
(*Yes, some shameless self-promotion there. Sorry, it's totally nessisary :-)
Davis Ray Sickmon, Jr - looking for something to read? Check out my three free novels at MidnightRyder.org
It remains a key feature of IT that the skills involved allow entry to such a wide range of differing industries that there's practically no reason for someone to feel they're at a dead end. The video game industry, is in many ways, a case in point: although not wonderful - the salaries are generally so bad it makes analyst programming look positively well paid - it's a great entry point for any programmer with imagination who wants to use programming skills that are normally cut off at other levels. Database management is well known, dynamic web page building is understood and there are limits to what you can do: but video game development is different - algorithms are always being bettered, and the very good can end up pushing video game development into another sphere, creating types of application previously unenvisagable.
It's ironic that this happens and yet it's considered a poor-man's profession. Programmers in this field are generally poorly treated, with poor contracts, little chance of advancement, and little cross-skillification that would allow a programmer to move into a more respected arena. This is, in part, because it's an entertainment area, and in part because for every superskilled programmer who is able to push the arena into a new paradigm, there must be a hundred who can barely put together a bunch of assembler instructions to copy memory from one place to another without it taking five times as long as it ought to, and containing bugs.
This quagmire of the more innovative area of programming being hampered by a low perception of the people involved and the skills they bring to the table will not disappear by itself. Unless people are prepared to actually act, not just talk about it on Slashdot, nothing will ever get done. Apathy is not an option.
You can help by getting off your rear and writing to your congressman or senator. Tell them you value programmers who have the imagination and skills to create entirely new technologies for the manipulation of complex graphics, and who have the cut needed to understand the essentials of good game play. Tell them that you appreciate the work being done to create wonderful new games but that if good programmers are put off by poor working conditions and salaries, you will be forced to use less and less secure and intelligently designed alternatives. Let them know that SMP may make or break whether you can efficiently deploy OpenBSD on your workstations and servers. Explain the concerns you have about freedom, openness, and choice, and how poor working conditions detering the best of the best harms all three. Let them know that this is an issue that effects YOU directly, that YOU vote, and that your vote will be influenced, indeed dependent, on their policies on elite computer game programmers.
You CAN make a difference. Don't treat voting as a right, treat it as a duty. Keep informed, keep your political representatives informed on how you feel. And, most importantly of all, vote.
This game by Delta Tao got it's start in 1997 as an MMORPG and has been going strong ever since. It's catering to more of a niche and underrated market of course, the Macintosh platform, but they were able to create a highly addictive, playable game that was able to establish a real sense of community. It's something larger companies like Blizzard and Sony aren't capable of due to the fact that they can't possibly listen to all of their customers and customize the game to suit the individual's taste.
I definitely agree with the previous poster that the Macintosh platform is an untapped market. If you've millions of users with hundreds of choices, you're less likely to succeed, even if your game is awesome. There will always be something better. If you're working on a platform with less users, still millions, but with maybe 2 or 3 choices, you're far more likely to make money.
This is what our studio is attempting to do, and though it's too early to tell how successful we'll be, we believe it's the best route to a self-sufficient indie studio. Successes like Popcap and GameHouse are inspiring, and give one roadmap to being self-sufficient. Another good example is Small Rockets.
In our case we are working very closely with GarageGames as our primary publisher/distributor. Between their help teaching us how to handle PR and marketing, their willingness to give advice on how to be successful, and our own attempts at networking, we think we will be a successful indie in the not-too-distant future. A good example of such cooperation was last week's MacWorld in San Francisco, where we helped run an arcade station for GG showing their title Marble Blast and our title Orbz (small, shameless plug). By joining them in SF for a few days, we were rewarded by making several contacts for future game development work and possible OEM deals.
This is how indies can "compete" with the big publishers.
Dave Myers
21-6 Productions, Inc.
Yes. If the game the small company offers is good, why shouldn't they be able to compete.
Most big companies aren't evil and *gasp* even allow competition.
I did a:
/dev/null /dev/null
:(
wget -rl5 http://www.imperialwars.com/
grep -l "inux" `find` 2>
grep -l "INUX" `find` 2>
And not a word!
FRA: STFU GTFO
I'm happy! I'm happy! I'm happy! I'm happy!
/. and still functioning!
My site's on
Crazy!
Zanthor
I have been working for four years at an indie development shop (~5 employees). We make war games (www.ezgame.com). About half-way through the development of our first game, we found out that a big publisher was making a game with the same setting and general approach to gameplay as ours. We did finish our game (and eventually got published), but it was very difficult to compete. It is important that your game has features that are different than those found in mainstream games. If two companies are trying to implement a game with the same set of features the bigger budget is much more likely to win out.
One good thing about working at a small shop, though, is that your costs are much lower so you don't have to make nearly as much money to break even.
Small indie developers generally don't want to stay indie. Usually, you will try and make a prototype for a game, then land a publisher to fund the rest of development (which kind of takes you out of the 'indie' category). If you weren't able to find a publisher, that might be a bad sign for your game.
www.ezgame.com/SNH
Jesus saved Soviet Russia! It is no more. It's true!
Effects considered "cheesy" in A.D. 2003 were not considered "cheesy" during the production of the original Star Trek series. Mass audiences of 2003 demand effects typical of the Enterprise series or the Star Trek: Nemesis movie.
Will I retire or break 10K?
[quote from "Green Eggs and Ham" by Dr. Seuss]
I wouldn't promote that kind of stuff. Seuss Enterprises submitted an amicus brief in favor of copyright term extension.
Will I retire or break 10K?
One problem with online games (a lot of online things these days) is that they usually demand and involved registration process before you can do anything worthwhile. I honestly don't have the inclination to register like that for every game that comes out just to find out it sucks (or, less likely, doesn't suck). Snowcrash had generic avatars, and Slashdot has ACs. Regardless of how much you favor or disfavor the idea, I know I wouldn't have spent much time on Slashdot at all if I didn't initially have a voice as an AC.
The need for bloated companies hasn't necessarily been to make the games, with a small to medium team of programers/artists you can make a great game. But historically you've needed marketing and distribution people to get your product known and on shelves.
Small companies may not have the money to get their product on shelves, but nowadays you dont have to. The internet provides an inexpensive means of marketing and means of product distribution. Even Sony Entertainment is going to an internet based distribution system with their new expansion for EQ.
What about Activision, who publishes id Software's games? Between EA and Microsoft, which company do you predict will swallow Activision?
Will I retire or break 10K?
...but the way that the entire video game industry works right now.
This is the model: you have a few (maybe 15 with $200m+ sales) publishers, and you have maybe 2,000 independent developers. (There are also in-house development teams, like Core Design, but we're going to ignore them.)
The independent developers come up with a game idea. But because these firms are (usually) hideously under-capitalised they then need to go flog their idea to a publisher. The publisher then agrees to fund development of the game - subject to milestones - and and negotiates a pitiful royalty rate, which the developer will never (unless they are exremely lucky) see.
In addition, the publisher usually gets all IP such as brand names. (So, when MegaHunterKiller II is developed, there is no gurantee that the original developer will be asked to make it. A classic example of this is StarFox on the SNES which was originally developed by Argonaut...)
Oh yes; the publisher can usually pull the plug on the game at any time, leaving the developer high and dry.
Because advances usually only barely cover the cost of developing the game (and not all the inevitable overheads of running a business), the independent developers lead a nasty hand-to-mouth existence.
Oh yes, and because the publishers are usually publicly quoted companies that need to make quarterly sales and earnings "numbers" they like to rush games out before they are finished so they can keep their shareholders happy. (Never mind whether that's best for the developer, the publisher or the gameplayer longer-term... lets think of the stock options.) For an example of a stupidly rushed out game, think Turok; ahhh what three months more development could have done to that game...
No wonder developers want to find another way to finance and get their games to market.
Self-publishing is one option, but this doesn't solve the problem of finance.
What I would like to see (as a finance person, closely involved with the video game industry) is a number of private equity houses that finance games independent of publishers. Then, developers could complete (or nearly complete) games before they sold them onto publishers.
These private equity houses would manage a portfolio of projects, and so wouldn't worry too much about whether a game came out on March 31, or April 20.
Anyway, just my 2c
--- My dad's political betting
The short answer is No. These days, money is everything.
If you dont have the expierence, you wont get the BIG name games (and money). If you dont have the big name games, you wont sell enough (aside from a FEW exceptions which stem from old titles). Youll need to sell a lot to make a decent profit/survive
It takes time. EA have lots and lots of money, lots of employees, lots of links(with owner of names), and because of the money, they have the big lisceneces.
Therefore they generate more money.
So, NO, a small startup cannot compete with the big names.
Of course, small developer and large publisher arent the same things anyway...
The games are decent. No other way possible, can you say Snood? Sure you can.
...id's got John-to-the-C...and he's a pretty smart mother f*cker. He's a programmer who actually knows what he's doing, where there's a lot of no-counts out there who THINK they know how to program. Newbies keep cranking out code that has already been written by someone else, and as Bjarne Stroustrup always says, don't re-invent the f*cking wheel.
Spread the RC luvin'
Starsphere is a webbased mmorpg that is 100% free that has been running for ages and has a huge player base and community!
Clearly independant developers can survive!
The problem with slashdot is that most of its users were bullied and stuffed into lockers as kids!
A good place to see dozens of independent game publishers succeeding is www.shrapnelgames.com where you can find good stuff like Runesword (a sharware RPG now gone commercial) and Space Empires (a shareware 4X game also gone commercial). Both are products of small 1 or 2 person developers and both are making a profit. The author of Space Empires has quit his 'day job' and gone to full time work on his game. There are thriving communites for both games on the message boards, as well. These are only the two most successful of Shrapnel Games titles.
It's too bad that many of the game companies (and many of us) have been convinced that if a game isn't using the most advanced and expensive technology, it can't be good. Yet we long for the olden days of "Blaster Master", "Super Metroid", or even "Combat."
I applaud those who are working to build foundational tools for Linux games. We need the renderers, photoshops, modelers, etc., so we can focus on game design.
...just my 2 gil.
I'm surprised nobody's mentioned Chris Sawyer, developer of Rollercoaster Tycoon, only one of the best-selling games of the last few years. (He also wrote Transport Tycoon, of course.)
He's still basically an independent developer. It's mostly just him and his graphics guy. He has an agency handling the business end of things, and of course Infogrames does the publishing, but as far as the actual game development and programming is concerned it's still a largely independent effort.
I'm not sure, but it could also explain why RCT had such a low price when it was released.
No, there really isn't a payola in gaming, BUT there is a flood of useless information, which is just as bad. Whenever a game is released by one of the BIG GUYS, the reveiw copies of the game come with pre-made reviews, descriptions, and a bazillion screenshots. Of course, websites like ign.com doesn't descriminate between good screenshots or bad, they POST'EM ALL. Jet Grind Radio screen shots, for the Defunct DreamCast.(2000)
:)
This is a simple way of pushing an independant game programmer out of the market. How can someone like IGN afford to have space for a game with one or two screen shots, when they HAVE to store every screenshot for the latest gaming blockbusters?
Seemingly forever
~~~
Click here, you know you wanna!
Survival is irrelivant. Independant games will always survive as long as there is some kid toying in his basement (looking to put gary winston out of buisness..... its a joke.... laugh) there will be independant games. Competing is another question. Games have become the equivilant of music. 85%-90% of game revenues are from so called 'hits.' Game companies are always looking for another hit, so they can't really experiment the way indy game developers can. Indy developers can nab themselves a hit, and then "sell out" to a bigger company to make more money. I see this happening. Instead of forming a garage band, many people will begin forming (or have formed) garage development houses.
"Martha Stewart can lick my Scrotum......do i have a scrotum?" -- Sharon Osbourne
Drink their blood? Right, you need to get some facts straight and think before you post. Or at least have some common sense to realize that not everyone drinks pigs blood.
If you just want to write small games for the bargain bin (e.g. "Desert Rats", "Rock Manager", "Bejewelled") I think you can survive. If you mean "Can indie game developers survive going head to head with Id and Epic?", probably not. It'd take a REALLY great game.
But remember, at one point Id, Epic, and all of those companies started out as Indie game developers.
"For a successful technology, honesty must take precedence over public relations for nature cannot be fooled." -Feynman
A lot of success for independents has come from focusing on a single product and releasing it for FREE. If it lasted, it would go PAY later.
s html
However, another way this works is through the developer making contacts with other developers through the process. A developer also gains a lot of valuable experience that helps him or her in future endeavors. Experienced developers teamed up together CAN compete with the big companies!
To see what I am talking about, read this:
ARC Attack, Retrieve, Capture. When it was client-side (meaning server passed on packets without verifying client data), it was fast and fun. It was independent for a while, then joined a couple of networks including TEN.NET (Total Entertainment Network).
TEN.NET became pogo.com, a web-only service so downloadable games had to go. ARC was made server-side (and slower) and licensed for WON.NET, Flipside, and SIERRA--companies that bought it each other out one way or the other.
Then, we have UniBall (uniball-central.com) created by a guy named "C:\". He made both the graphics and wrote the code. Oh, incidentally, he made all of the graphics for ARC. He hasn't worked on UB since 2000ish. The game is up through donations and admin contributions.
Finally, we have Pop Cap (popcap.com), makers of those java games you see on MSN's ZONE, YAHOO!, and everywhere else. You can even buy stand-alone versions for Windows and PalmOS.
What does this have to do with anything? You see, Pop Cap, in a way a monopoly on java games, wouldn't have existed without ARC and UniBall.
A game designer from Pogo.com (which licensed ARC when it was TEN.NET), an engineer from WON.NET (which licensed ARC), plus two other guys who had to do something with ARC when it was on WON.NET, and ARC's graphic designer and UB creator C:\, all make up Pop Cap Games.
You see, just make some free stuff to get noticed and to team up with others you meet along the way!
Also, enter your games into the Independent Games Festival. They award thousands of dollars to winners in different categories, now for the fifth year in a row.
You can see a bunch of entrants, representing many independent games, at their list of entries.
http://www.indiegames.com/2003entrants.
Cover your eyes and click this link!
Yes, it is 2003, and I agree that selling games in a plastic baggy would probably not work anymore, you're right. But the thing that you are incorrect about is that all games must be extremely costly to produce and sell; this is incorrect. Perhaps all of the games that you are thinking of, such as Halo, GTA 3, or Final Fantasy could only be done with massive teams and large amounts of people, but that does not exclude anyone from making smaller, less ambitious games that will still sell a few copies. Someone mentioned Bungie Software, who before joining Microsoft both developed and published its own games. One of their more successful titles, Myth: The Fallen Lords was produced by a total of seven or eight people on its team. It sold well in respect to Bungie's standards, which was only a few hundred thousand copies, and made them enough money to continue developing games. Many people at Bungie predicted (and accurately, I believe) that Halo would never have become the game that it was, nor would it have sold nearly as many copies, had Bungie continued outside Microsoft and released the game for PC's. It certainly would have been successful in _their_ eyes, but because it lacked the backing of a large publisher, could never have reached the magnitude of the best-selling games on the PC. So while I think it is possible to develop games independently, it takes lots of talent, knowledge of the markets and your product's niche, and a little luck to have a chance at being successful.
Argh, there went my carriage returns. Let me repost that so it's readable...
Yes, it is 2003, and I agree that selling games in a plastic baggy would probably not work anymore, you're right. But the thing that you are incorrect about is that all games must be extremely costly to produce and sell; this is incorrect. Perhaps all of the games that you are thinking of, such as Halo, GTA 3, or Final Fantasy could only be done with massive teams and large amounts of people, but that does not exclude anyone from making smaller, less ambitious games that will still sell a few copies.
Someone mentioned Bungie Software, who before joining Microsoft both developed and published its own games. One of their more successful titles, Myth: The Fallen Lords was produced by a total of seven or eight people on its team. It sold well in respect to Bungie's standards, which was only a few hundred thousand copies, and made them enough money to continue developing games. Many people at Bungie predicted (and accurately, I believe) that Halo would never have become the game that it was, nor would it have sold nearly as many copies, had Bungie continued outside Microsoft and released the game for PC's. It certainly would have been successful in _their_ eyes, but because it lacked the backing of a large publisher, could never have reached the magnitude of the best-selling games on the PC.
So while I think it is possible to develop games independently, it takes lots of talent, knowledge of the markets and your product's niche, and a little luck to have a chance at being successful.
Even more interesting is that he writes his games in assembly language!!! This is probably the reason why Transport Tycoon is not compatible with a modern Windows system, but it is still amazing that a bestselling game can be written in assembly.
GODGames ran out of money three times, then got borged by Take 2 Interactive. (Gamespot did that story, which at the time I excerpted here.
I think you've got the right idea, but your facts are lacking.
Free can be good. Remember though it is a secret! Shhhhh.
Did they fail because they didn't get ordered by the stores/distributors, or did they fail because after making it to the display racks they did not sell enough copies?
That is, would Joe Average have had a chance to have seen copies during a visit to the local computer store? I've always been curiuos about this. I wonder if there are great works which never even had a chance to compete in the light of day. Is this the case?
Just curious. A list of "failed great" titles would be cool. The chance that there are hidden bits of gold glittering out there someplace is enticing!
-Fantastic Lad
wasn't this posted about 2-3 months ago?
Don't become a regular here, you will become retarded. -- Yoda the Retard
You do realize that many of the most popular games today were written by small software houses. Some of them became big, and some of them just got snapped up by other companies, but some of them retain their individuality. They make games, they take some creative and a great deal of directive input from whatever company distributes their game, and they form a working relationship with a distributor. Many many game houses work this way.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
At the end of this year, I'll release a Tekken clone, a pokemon/kingdom web browser game, or a 2d bitmapped wasteland game... At first I assumed you couldn't compete, but corporate people hardly ever put money into good game ideas.
God spoke to me
The game industry has been taken over by the corporations and the media conglomerates so completely now that any small time developer is basically locked out of the big revenue streams. I did not say that it is impossible for an independent game to be successful from the standpoint of popularity (example: Counter-Strike). What I mean is that it is very difficult for an independent game developer to compete for the big money. There are quite a few barriers to entry for potential independent developers in the games industry:
1. The major game companies: Blizzard, EA, Interplay, Nintendo, ID, and others have an extremely high percentage of the market share in their target age groups and game genres. That is to say, the battle for hearts and minds has already been won and it would take an independent game or series of games that are nothing short of revolutionary to have a chance of recapturing even some of that market share (which leads into my second point).
2. It has become VERY expensive to produce a game which has any chance of competing against the established franchises. So not only are you fighting an uphill technical battle against opponents with more money and more experienced developers, but you are also competing in a marketing battle against the established brand and players loyalty to it which is why franchises like Madden Football, Warcraft, Half-Life, and Baldur's Gate are so valuable to their respective companies.
3. Even if you have a great independent team behind you, and you have a game idea which could potentially revolutionize the industry you will find very few publishers who are willing to take the risk of investing perhaps $1 million dollars (and probably more) in your unproven game company so that you can actually bring your game to market. In short if you want to do something revolutionary but unproven you had better bring your own suitcase full of money along for the ride.
4. Finally, if you want to earn the big bucks then you will have to deal with Wal-Mart because they are the largest game retailer in the US. Now, if you are some no-name game development company then Wal-Mart will probably want an agreement which guarantees that you will pay them back for any unsold stock and that you will give them a big chunk of the profits from each sale. If your publisher (see above) takes care of the Wal-Mart payola (shelf space fee, aisle end caps fee, advertisement fee etc) for you then you can bet that they will pass that cost onto your small independent game company. As if that wasn't enough, the big guys (Blizzard, EA, and the others named above) who can really bring in the sales, over 300,000+ copies sold with each release, probably get much better terms than you which means more profit for them and even less for you.
If all of this does not discourage you then by all means try and compete with the big guys, but just remember that your chances of winning the state lottery are probably about the same as the odds that your small startup game company will become the next Blizzard or EA. In conclusion the game industry today is a lot like the other entertainment businesses (publishing, movies, music, etc.). There are a few big name developers and companies which make bank and the rest just eke out a living and are happy if their first game isn't also their last.
SIDENOTE:
As a side note I do not work in the game industry, but I have friends who do and this information is thus secondhand. However, I think that the essential facts are obvious and that most people realize that the days of producing a hit in your garage and making it big (ala MYST) were over a long time ago.
I like seeing company's take time to develope an idea. I caught part of Extended Play the other day where they showcased some independant developers. I supppose that is what prompted the original post?
I hear you on the fact that the majority of game companies out there are riding on the sale. How many games do the leading companies release that flops; yet, turns out a meager profit. That is out of the 200 games they released spaning all areas of the genre (console,PC,arcade?).
peace dogs! and good kibble....
It depends also on web-site design and content presentation. Content presentation depends on CMS. Another question was raised: Can independent Content Management Solution developers survive? Meaning CMS like Typo3, Managee, ezPublish that is not like phpNuke, postNuke and brothers. You may think everything you want, but Content Management tools are very important!
I guess you don't know this, but a little game called DOOM was made by an independant. Today is no different. This legend that it ABSOLUTELY takes MILLIONS of dollars to create a game worth playing is disproven by all the counterstrike players around the globe, and further disproven by every shocking success coming out of some guys basement. Perhaps in the thick of the industry it's hard to fathom a few extremely dedicated people making something worth playing, but trust me -- every derivitive, hackeyed game you've played this year came from an innovative independant company.
It's been a long time.
Take one look at online first person shooter games and you'll notice that the most popular games out there at the moment are free modifications for commercial games. Would half-life have sold as many copies as it had without counter-strike and other modifications?
Mods can mean a lot of money to developers, and I think in coming years we'll see this with financial support from the primary studios for established mod development teams. This would mean developers could concentrate on the single player story and hire an outside mod team to work on multiplayer additions. For example say if id software hired crt to work on rocket arena for doom3 to be included in the finished product.
Just think? Would of UT2003 sold more copies if something like counter-strike, Natural Selection or team fortress been included in the release?
It's certainly not the only route indys can take but given the overhead for most fps now days it seems to be one of the most viable.
Open Beta, great game, releasing in 25% parts
pay as you go.
http://www.liveforspeed.com
great game...
From the website..
Release plans:
Hello Racers!
The LFS development team has come up with a plan for Release 1.
Firstly, note that Release 1 is intended to be a complete product and will contain a range from road cars, through modified rallycross cars and up to GT cars. Karting, single seaters and buggies are to be left out of Release 1 and will come out in later releases. That was decided a while ago but please read on to find out about the new Release 1 plan.
Note : all dates given in this announcement are only estimates - not promises.
The next proper update is Demo Test 0.2 - this will be very like the current Demo Test and of course free of charge but will contain mainly improvements to the tyre physics and multiplayer system including qualifying, better reliability and reduced lag. In addition there will be minor improvements to the track and the car models including working dials and so on, non-uk keyboard support, clutch and shifter support with associated engine damage and some other things that have been mentioned on the Suggestions for Improvement forum. We may include a skid pad as well. This is expected in early February 2003.
Our new plan for Release 1 is to release it in 4 downloadable stages, we will charge a price for these - each one at 25% of the total price of Release 1.
The first 25% release will come out a few weeks after Demo Test 0.2 after sorting out any bugs or problems that come up. So - we estimate early February 2003. It will contain the 3 cars from the Demo Test and 3 more road-style cars including one or two four wheel drives. Two extra tracks will be included - a city track and a country track with a few configs in each. More music will be included as well. At that stage neither the full damage system nor all the planned improvements to graphics and sound will have been done - the idea is that while Eric is continuing to add or finish more tracks and cars for subsequent releases, I will be continuing to develop the program all the time as well on the way to Release 1.
The next three 25% releases will contain in the region of 4 cars and 3 tracks each and will come out at intervals of 2 or 3 months. The 4 stages are downloadable and a CD will become available when the full Release 1 is completed (i.e. the 4th stage is finished).
We like this plan a lot because we avoid any need for the services of a publisher, the community will no longer be bored with the same cars and tracks, we start to earn a living, we continue learning and improving our methods with each 25% release, and the whole thing builds up in a way that we can handle.
Hitler was a vegetarian.
I hope I cum before they get old
My RPG is coming out in 2003 and it's a
remake of Moria with improved gfx and sound.
Morgoth! Mines! 50 levels !
Random level generator!
2 years in the making!
It'll be way better than all that lazy corporate
eye-candy!!!
ATITD had thousands of players over three beta periods, with several communities and fansites already up and running, and they're now planning to publish and release it themselves. I think this game is going to be the first test of whether independent developers can survive in a scene that's more full of multi million dollar, hollywood-scale games than ever before.
- Stormcaller
http://www.stormcaller.net
I absolutely agree - indie sites need to get the word out. I'm pretty tired of the standard RTS/FPS games, and have found some of my favourite games on indie sites this year.
...and tons of others. These folks need to get the word out - they already have great games!
http://www.pompom.org.uk - great shoot'em'ups
http://www.midnightsynergy.com - cool retro games, and their 'Wonderland' is my absolute favourite game from last year
http://www.dexterity.com - lots of cool little puzzle games. Keeps you entertained for days.
http://www.mking.com - shmups, shmups, shumps
http://www.jjsoft.com - neat little pacman clone
You're absolutely right about how the traditional indie gets things going
Follow the money trail though and you'll see how the system perpetuates it:
$ 49.95 retail title subtract the $ 20.00+ retailer profit (or simply assume that the distributor paid 1/2 face value or less -- how else can they deep discount titles?)
which means they paid distributor somewhere between $8-15 subtract the "COGS" or Cost of Goods Sold (ie the CD, jewel case, box art, manual et al), with an average weighing in around $3, and that leaves the publisher and developer to split about $8
don't forget to subtract that advance they gave you, and of course the 'reserve' they hold to handle all the returns the store is going to push back if the game doesn't sell -- oh yeah, and the fact that they hold the money for nearly 90+ days.....and the 'comps' the store gets to sell essentially free for full face value, otherwise known as the 'grease' factor...
this isn't even specific to Software, its the exact same game that the music industry is doing to artists all the time
For every title you see on that precious retail shelf-space, there are a dozen that didn't make it there
the salvation? internet connected consoles -- get ready and start focusing your efforts here....
Old age and treachery almost always overcome youth and skill.
Man, I wish I hadn't wasted all my mod points before reading your post. I would have used them all on you. BTW- I grew up on a farm. Pigs aren't intelligent, they're crafty, mean, and disgusting. Piglets are cute until they turn into 400 lb monsters with sharp teeth and nasty tempers. Why do you think you pen pigs and pasture cows? Because nobody is afraid to walk in a field with 50 cows. Try that with pigs. They'll kill and eat a small child, given the chance. If they'll eat me if given a chance, why should I not eat them, given the chance to?
Why do we kill and eat them? Because they're made of MEAT. Meat is FOOD. We don't have a four-chamber stomach and our eyes are in the front of our heads. Not on the side, like a goat, but on the front, like a lion. Fucking militant vegan. Is there any other kind? Pigs are delicious. They taste kinda like manatee. Pigs make better bacon than manatee does, though, IMHO.
Pigs blood is an inferior product. Baby blood is sweeter and has a less greasy tongue-coating sensation. Sometimes, if they're fresh, babies' stomachs contain a kind of curdled cheese from breastmilk that's kind of like feta.
Try making Dolphin Bacon. It's just not as good, and it spatters too much when you fry it. Dogs barely have any bacon on them at all. Saint Bernards that are grown on CGH and manatee blubber are very tasty on kebabs, though. Very tender, with a slight liver flavor. And I never killed a pig without thinking. It's just not something that happens accidentally, you know? You have to go all the way to the shed, get the knife, and make sure it's REAL sharp. Then you tie up the porker and haul him vertical, ass up. Slit his throat all the way to the vertebra. Let him drain for an hour. I don't advise licking the knife clean. Trichinosis, you know.
from your mod points, it is evident that someone disagrees with your premise that nerds and other hominids need to eat protein. Mod me down, too, you mod cowards!
"Deer Hunter" did very well.
;) ), than those playing CS. There are TONS of people in the Yahoo games channels (and other online games channels).
:) ) - e.g. like handheld tetris gamesets or like backgammon/chess sets.
Strange but true.
Anyway, independents should just leverage the Internet. Charge a few bucks. Use Paypal or some other online payment service like Kagi http://www2.kagi.com/ or whatever you like.
I don't expect most small teams to be able to create lots of movie quality visuals and audio (you can do some but not lots). Start small, don't quit your day job. Do _fun_ and/or _cool_ simple games.
You'd be surprised how many people just want to sit down and play immediately, not learn the keys, what weapon to use, the map etc.
There are probably just as many people playing games like minesweeper, freecell, and that gem matching game (can't remember what it's called - not my genre
It's difficult to be cutting edge because usually by the time you finish your game the edge has moved. And what's the point?
It's still gameplay - millions of people aren't playing CS or Starcraft for the visuals.
They're still playing the same old maps too!
If in 50 years they are still playing Starcraft/CS, maybe it'll become Tetrified(my term
we kill and eat them to gain their intelligence. their strong and tasty intelligence.
Free as in mason.
Thank Gods that today is a holiday (in the US) and we have just a skeleton crew at work, `cause if my coworkers heard me laughing this hard they'd think I'm stranger than they already do. If they knew I was laughing this hard over a post about slaughtering animals have me committed!
I've gotta go get lunch now. Your posts have left me absolutely ravenous...
-Cybrex
Boundless Expansion, Self-Transformation, Dynamic Optimism, Intelligent Technology, Spontaneous Order- BEST DO IT SO!
It's interesting to note, the entertainment software market is narrowing down to 2 main publishers, EA and Microsoft, making the market less friendly towards independents hoping for publishing deals.
Seems like you're overlooking some pretty big players with that statement. Sony (SCEA, SOE) still seems to be holding up okay (EverQuest, anyone?). Infogrames also publishes a wide variety of games, some quite popular (Civ3, for example). Obviously EA and MS are huge, but there are others.
Of course, I wouldn't want to bet against MS dominating anything they felt like dominating...but it doesn't seem like they've really targeted the games publishing market as something they want to own. I could be very wrong about that though.
101010, 222, 52,
Strange Adventures in Infinite Space was produced by a two-man team, and they're able to use what they make on SAIS to fund their next game.... which you're really going to dig.
-- thinkyhead software and media
Watch this Heartland Institute video
I wasn't kidding. God, you geeks think everyone's a fucking comedian. I only use the dolphin bacon because it's perfect wrapped around emperor penguin breasts. You see, they're rather dry without the added moisture. With the added moisture they taste alot more like spotted owl. And all you GNU/Linux people can kiss my ass about eating penguins.