Is There a Future for Indie Games?

An anonymous reader writes "If you've been following Greg Costikyan's recent rants (such as Death to The Games Industry), you would have seen mention of one developer's attempt at breaking the traditional games publisher funding model. Well, their game is now in the stores, and whats more it has been getting some pretty good reviews, but has anyone heard of it? Judging by some press, the marketing has been somewhat underwhelming. So the question is, is there still a viable space for good games developed outside the traditional corporate publisher model, or does E.A. already own the future of video games?" Moreover, when indie developers have to go up against the likes of EA and Steven Spielberg, what hope can they have for matching that kind of success? At least one company thinks they can do it by offering games for direct download. Is direct purchasing enough of an incentive for your average gamer to shell out money on something he's never heard of before?

Comments

Indie games were the wave of the past

[saskboy]

And they'll be the wave of the future. There will always be some lonely game creator out on the fringest making something cool that everyone will lap up. When it gets popular though, they'll no longer be an independent though. They'll get bought out.

Re:Indie games were the wave of the past

[JaredOfEuropa]

There will always be some lonely game creator out on the fringest making something cool that everyone will lap up. When it gets popular though, they'll no longer be an independent though. They'll get bought out.

It's becoming harder though. Back in the days of the C64 and the Amiga, I was technically fully able to create a state-of-the-art game on those platforms. I suck as an artist; I can barely squeeze a recognisable tune out of a keyboard, but on those platforms I could still do the art, music and all of the coding, on my own. In fact I did... my game made it to the stores but never sold a lot, instead of a nice Porsche I got perhaps a 2nd hand Alpha Romeo's worth out of the deal. (I can conveniently blame the producer going bankrupt though :) ). My college flatmate made a game on the Amiga, outdoing several of similar commercial games. (He never sold it but it got him hired at Rockstar).

These days, most types of games need good production values as well as a good concept. Hardly any game can get away with simple graphics like Tetris. You'll need good coders, level designers, artists, musicians, sound effects guys, motion experts... talents that are rarely found in a single person.

To add to that, games are getting more complex in the way of graphics engines, physics engines, and AI as well. It's hard enough to find someone up-to-date in these areas, let alone find someone who can improve on them.

So, you're probably looking at a team of various skills that are not widely available. I'd think these people are likely to be working in the industry already, and not much inclined to work on an extra project, especially not if you're on a typical EA 8 day workweek.

Then again, if you do have a good concept, it might be worth pursuing it, and convincing others to join in. Then hope you get bought out for craploads of cash. :) Nothing wrong with making money.

Secret bootloader

[tepples]

If PC gaming continues on a decline, and the console oligopoly continues to give a cold shoulder to letting independent developers obtain console devkits and sell games on indie labels, then no, there isn't much of a future for indie gaming. All three gaming handheld systems sold in U.S. stores, whether chain or local, are officially closed systems. (These include the GBA SP, the Nintendo DS, and the PSP.) Phones don't count because for one thing, most phones have decidedly subpar D-pads, and for another, a lot of people are happy with land lines and unwilling to pay $960 for a 2-year mobile phone service commitment (or import a SIM-free phone) just to play a video game.

MorePG

[Doc Ruby]

The future of gaming is users becoming game masters, not just players, even supplying their own computer hosts to the network in which the game is running. Like when Doom really exploded its genre to capture the entire gaming scene by allowing anyone to make their own "levels".

I want to put my own GPL game server up on the most popular gaming network. With my own features running on the common protocol, so people who play in my "module" can play by my rules. Maybe that means possessions and attributes beyond the universal ones can't transfer, because some modules are built for "Monty Hall" style cheats, just pumping up characters without restriction. Maybe such a network will have a "web of trust" where changes to character state are tagged with their origin, which must be accepted by an automated system elsewhere, or not apply. It's a little complex, but once we work it out, we'll have a canvas on which players and masters of games can all exercise our imaginations on one another. Where's the most popular, featureful GPL MMORPG running right now? I want to take a crack at it.

Well...

[Chickenofbristol55]

Considering most "gamers" today don't know the difference (and probably don't care), who makes the games they play, I think it all comes down to how indie games compare to big corporate games. If the games are fun to play, people will buy them, period. I doubt anyone really cares who made the game. For example, I wouldn't see a movie just because it was made by universal studios, I simply would see it because it was entertaining.

EA didn't make ID

[jmichaelg]

I had never heard John Carmack until he started giving away the first few rounds of Doom. EA's vaunted marketing can't compete with a very good game getting good word of mouth.

Re:EA didn't make ID

[Tankko]

Yeah, but don't forget that DOOM wasn't a huge widespread hit until GT Interactive picked it up, marketed it and got it into stores.

Misconeception about Indie Anything

[Monkelectric]

Just because you made a great Indie game, doesn't mean anyone will care. Seriously. You act as if you could only make a good game the world should coming running. The sad fact is that the average person doesn't have the ability to appreciate art. A few years back a great film called "Lost In Translation" came out. I saw it, and was the *ONLY* person who didn't walk out of the theater. I was enthralled, probably the best movie I saw that year, maybe the best movie made that year.

Year after year art and hard work are ignored for sex and cheap thrills. I wish it were different.

Mobile games good indie platform

[LarsWestergren]

I have some friends who are doing alright making Java games for mobile phones. As I mentioned in a previous post, since graphics on mobile phones and other limited devices are so cruddy development focus tends to be on addictive gameplay rather than eyecandy. It is possible to be a small independent game studio, since there are a lot of free tools for J2ME programming and the APIs are simple (what is difficult is making them run well on all different phone models). There is also no need for a big art studio to render orchestral music, hours of CGI, etc. At least not yet.

It seems most of the money in that market is not trying to sell your game through a portal (though if you get a really big hit you can rake in the cash), or even worse trying to sell it yourself, but to make ad games that companies can make available for free as part of a competition. I think there is a big potential market for really innovative and addictive mobile games, as at the moment a lot is just re-releases of games for old platforms, with slightly updated graphics.

A few links if you are interested in getting started on J2ME programming:
J2ME.org discussion board
J2ME Gamer
Midlet.org

If it's a good idea, the big guys will take it.

[Hyperlink Processor]

Independents are just that, independent. Rogue commercial organizations will usually scrape out a living in a niche market or become/join a large company.

If a small company comes up with a really good idea in their industry it'll end up being copied by the big dogs. Look at everybody and their brothers selling single songs for some variation of 99 cent.

Experimenters

[Tom]

With AAA titles consistently costing double-digit millions to develop, indie developers are pretty much the only ones who can afford (ironically as it is) to try out something completely new where nobody knows whether it'll be the next hit or just tank.

The next genre (not mix of genres, but completely new genre) will probably be started by an indie game. Of course, 5 years down the road nobody will remember that game, and everyone will attribute the fact to the first blockbuster game hopping on the bandwagon.

Indie games are where the truly exciting stuff happens. EA and Co. are tied up doing Random Game 2006 and Other Game Part 3.