Slashdot Mirror
Throwing Himself On the Innovation Grenade
spidweb writes "A long-time Indie game developer writes on IGN.com about trying to make innovative games, and the occasionally painful consequences. From the article: 'Like all (or many, or some, or none at all) other game developers, I spend a lot of time staring into the void of my own uselessness. So, to try to give my life a sense of meaning and accomplishment, I occasionally try to innovate. I really hate trying to do something new. Sure, it gives personal satisfaction. But you know what else is fulfilling? Staying in business. Not losing your house. And you can't pay for food with Creativity checks. But, every five years or so, I try to do something that isn't the standard material.'"
...if you are independent and one unsuccessful game still wrecks your place!! The whole reason you run a studio as an independent developer/distributor is so you don't have to make the same stupid marketing/management mistakes as EA or Acclaim or Midway or any of the big giant studios out there. How is it that you run your place so close to the bone that you can't afford to make a slightly experimental game every now and then? Why don't you have your own community site to help promote all your games? Even tiny companies need to promote their work (MoonPod have banners on all the major game-related webcomics for example) (although i see the author is using articles as a way to advertise too, which is pretty clever! he even got onto slashdot...). What happens if the market tanks or a more talented developer moves into your niche? There is plenty of room to innovate, and many video game companies (heard of Nintendo?) actually require innovation in order for their business plan to succeed. 3M does the same in their industry. If you can't innovate without unreasonable risk then it is your fault, not the consumers or the publishers.
:P look at your games' strengths, find your audience, target your niche, and help people find games they love!
I am working on building a self-supporting indie studio right now, and there are plenty of very valid sources of income that can help support you and your studio while you develop innovative titles of your own. They're not my dream projects, but they are short and pay VERY well, and give me lots of free time to pursue my real goals. If you box yourself in, and continue to make titles that sell ok but not great, and you never build yourself a financial cushion so that you can experiment, well then shit man too bad! Don't whinge on the internet about how innovation just doesn't sell; if you're going to innovate, PLAN on it not selling, and build your business around that. Time, word of mouth, and creativity are all on your side here! Just because your first couple experiments didn't sell well, that's no reason to start bitchin and moanin. They might have been bad games; they might be ahead of their time; they might be too late.
Final thought: If the game had real historical content, why do you cringe at its possible Educational (TM) value? There is a market for educational software that badly needs exciting historical games. A man can only play Oregon Trail so many times, and try as it might, Oregon Trail will never be received as the new God of War, especially if its a shareware PC title
I think he was speaking a little bit tongue-in-cheek, but still, he does have a point.
Did the ad copy for Civ read "Learn history while commanding an empire!"? No it did not. When I think of a Civ game, my first thought is "That's a sweetass epic strategy game". The education just happens to be snuck in there. Many games have some educational aspects snuck in. They sell despite that, because no fuss is made about it during the sales pitch. Most people equate more educational with less fun. When playing most "somewhat educational" games, you find out about the educational bits afterwards. By then it's okay, because you already know the game is fun.
When you're trying to get someone to buy a game (or most anything else for that matter), education just doesn't sell. It never really has. Perhaps we should blame our education system for instilling us with a basic belief that education is not fun.
Random and weird software I've written.