The Rise of The Indie Developer

Gamasutra has up a feature on The Rise of the Auteur & the Return of Indie Development. The article's argument is that the explosion of gaming into mainstream consciousness is opening up niche market opportunities. From the article: "As the overall market of game players increases, the subset of people interested in indie development will naturally increase. Have an interest in indie artists in any medium usually takes more effort (finding new artists via word of mouth or niche communities) and so most people are not interested in putting forth that effort. The formulaic nature of most game development will slowly help spur some of these new players to look for new sources of game experiences."

Comments

The mainstream won't buy it.

[KDR_11k]

It's not exactly called the mainstream because it has a tendency to search every nook and cranny for the niche stuff. You need ads and retail presence if you want to reach those people and want to sell to more of them than just confused mothers who think it'll make a nice gift for their son.

Also, those new gamers don't long for innovation yet, they aren't as jaded and see no reason to divert from the hollywood-style market with big flashy graphics and mediocre gameplay. Going the indy route won't gurantee good games and I doubt they'd buy another indy game if they encounter a bad game first.