Gimme That Old Time Indie Development...
It's good enough for me...

Juuso Hietalahti takes a stab at describing a typical indie game developer in his article, "The Difficult Definition of Indie Game Developer." It is a dark, dark place he goes, where I have travelled more than once and still feel the scars. Just a few comments, because I am just that kind of petty, bitter geek:

Budget: I don't know if "tight budget" is a good descriptor of indie-dom. I guess it's safer to say, "Indie games have no lower bounds on budget." There are plenty of indie games out there (and many that have done very well, I should add...) that have been done on a budget of pretty close to nothing but volunteered time. And there are indie budgets pushing (or exceeding) $100k now, especially for consoles. Really, the point is that indie games are just not funded by publishers... which often (but not necessarily) means they are on the lower end of the budget scale.

Innovation: Indies aren't blessed with more creativity than anyone else in the games biz. I mean, you need go no further than to type the URL of your favorite major online game portal to see we come out with some of the most derivative and lame clones in the biz, too. It's just we're empowered to see our wild, weird, hairy, scary ideas get released into the wild... even with all the critical and commercial failure they deserve. It's just us and Darwin, baby!

Indies and Publishers & Portals: You won't find a more bitterly discussed relationship amongst the old-school indies. For many, it's a case of meeting the new boss, the same as the old boss. And the very rebelliousness and refusal to play with the herd that made the indies reject the old publishing / distribution model makes them reject being told that they have to cater to the portals now if they want to be successful. But the savvy indies out there take advantage of whatever options are available - from portals to box deals to stuff the shelves of Wal*Mart - but refuse to be ruled by them.

What makes indies so hard to define or describe is that you are really talking about something that is not something else. It's like describing "everything that isn't colored blue." It's not a unified culture or community or anything else. It's just those nutcases out there who figure they can make (and, sometimes, sell) their own games without relying upon someone else with bags of money to tell them what to do.

So with all that being said... go indie!

(Vaguely) related indieishnessocity:
* Dependent, Independent, and Indie
* What Is an Indie Game?

Labels: Biz, Indie Evangelism

- posted by The Rampant Coyote @ 1:33 PM (Permalink)