Beginners Guide to Indie Game Development

[GnadeGames]

Hey everyone-

I'm working on a series of articles for the Indie Game Magazine next year. It will be a 6 part series with advice on how to start, complete, and market your first indie game magazine. I am interested in collecting other indies thought's and advice to include in this series. Here are the 6 'lessons' of the series:

Lesson 1: You’re Great Game Idea Ain’t so Great
This lesson details the inclination of first time devs being overly ambitious with their first game idea and talks about looking at other casual/indie games to target a market/demographic and find a tried & true game mechanic.

Lesson 2: If You Build It, They Will Not Find It
This lesson talks about the first stages of marketing and how building a website right before you release a game is a very poor strategy. It talks about building traffic with a blog, affiliated games, etc. Focuses on building a community excited about your game before it's released.

Lesson 3: Picking the Platform and Engine
Very straight forward post that touches on marketing and how different platforms are better for different types of gamers. Lays out the game making tools (Blitz, GM, MMF, Torque, RPGmaker, Flash, XNA, etc) pros/cons from least programming to most programming knowledge required.

Lesson 4: Your Game’s not Done when you Think it is
Talks about fine-tuning, player testing, beta testing, and marketing.

Lesson 5: The Big Release
Details actually releasing your game starting with previews/reviews to portal/distributor contact, to release announcement and the game actually launching on dev's website or portal.

Lesson 6: Marketing! It's never Over
Details the typical trappings of first time indies saying, "my games been out for a week and I still have no sales" - the answer to this is usually, you haven't marketed it. Any ongoing marketing things for a game would go in this article.

anyway, I would love some feedback and input.

[Backov]

Originally Posted by GnadeGames

Lesson 1: You’re Great Game Idea Ain’t so Great

You Are Great Game Idea Ain't So Great.

[Amirai]

Rename the first one (ignoring the grammatical error). I read it and thought it was too negative, and didn't feel like reading the rest afterwards. The idea could be a great one, even if it's not practical or realisitic. You should be encouraging hope, not bashing it.

Other than that, great idea for a series of articles!

[Cevo70]

Based on the subjects, I'd read them. I am starting to lose faith/energy in "marketing" so maybe I need a fresh take. Bottom line is that's it really hard to find people who 'give a shit.' (which makes sense)

But yeah, I'd recommend striking that balance between fully comprehensive, and bullet point take-a-ways. Give tangible examples and suggestions, not broad ideas and advice.

[hddnobjcttmmngmntmtch3rlz]

Looks interesting. Especially #5. I can't tell you how many smaller developers apparently think that this step is not important at all.

[defanual]

Overall, it looks good to me and will certainly address some of the many questions and pitfalls often asked about or overlooked by many.

[GnadeGames]

thanks for all the feedback. I will certainly consider renaming the first one.... it is the harshest lesson so far. I don't mean to be discouraging, but a big pitfall is a new indie thinking they can make the next great FPS.

None of this is set in stone and I've only drafted lessons 1-4 so far, but am glad to hear that there's some interest for the series. These forums are great, but it's tough to get together all the information here into a nice summary....especially for a beginner. Hopefully, this series will help.

[MrPhil]

Originally Posted by GnadeGames

I'm working on a series of articles for the Indie Game Magazine next year. It will be a 6 part series with advice on how to start, complete, and market your first indie game magazine. I am interested in collecting other indies thought's and advice to include in this series. Here are the 6 'lessons' of the series:

Sweet... I think I'll call mine the Magazine of Indie Games: Games seen through the eye of the People's Front of Judea.

[wazoo]

Originally Posted by Backov

You Are Great Game Idea Ain't So Great.

someone set us up the bomb!

[aiursrage2k]

I am pretty interested to read about it.

[DavidR91]

Lesson 1: You’re Great Game Idea Ain’t so Great

As already mentioned, I think that's a tad too negative. I recommend you place emphasis on needing more than just an idea (rather than bashing any potential idea they have)

[Junkyard Sam]

Lesson 1: You’re Great Game Idea Ain’t so Great

I think this is an important point... I wouldn't change it TOO much. Maybe change it to

"Maybe your great game idea ain't so great"

A simple "maybe" would make it less "negative"...

PS. "Your", not "you're"

[Amirai]

I think the point, as he wrote in the description, isn't necessarily that the ideas tend to be bad - it's that they tend to be not practical. That's what the lesson describes, and the title should represent.

As it is, the title can be read as an automatic assumption that "your game idea is bad." Without any analysis of the game idea, it feels insulting and demoralizing, stating that your idea is bad without even giving it a chance. I think this could really put off a lot of the people the articles would be trying to help.

"(#) reasons why your great game idea might not be such a great idea" would probably be enough to fix it. People tend to be very passionate about their ideas, which requires a gentler introduction to the point. This both does that and piques curiosity.

[Junkyard Sam]

Good explanation, Amirai.

And such a great point it is... I am so embarrassed by the enormous scope of my first game concepts... Absurd, looking back. I think it's critical for people starting out to make ULTRA small games, so you can make mistakes and learn from them on a small-scale.

The weird thing about starting out is you THINK your stuff is small enough, but dear god it never is. I bet a lot of people go through this.

[PoV]

I don't think any level of tweaking will really get the message across. People have to fail at it first to find out.

Originally Posted by wazoo

someone set us up the bomb!

For great justice

[zoombapup]

Point #1 should definitely point them to a few books. I'd recommend "Positioning" by Reis/Trout and "Purple Cow" by Seth Godin.

Outside of that, I'd also make it MORE harsh rather than less. "Your idea is drek" or something

Seriously, ideas are EASY. Easy usually equals crap.

I've definitely been party to the crap idea syndrome myself, so I'm pretty clear that #1 is the key to a lot of this (the other key is finishing a game). In fact, where is "Finishing the game" in your list? Its absolutely the second biggest killer of indie games (outside having a really crap idea).

Actually, there are really three pillars here arent there:

Think of a GOOD game
Finish it
Know how to sell it

Simples!

[GnadeGames]

Originally Posted by Amirai

"(#) reasons why your great game idea might not be such a great idea"

@ Amirai- You definitely got the point of the article just by reading a summary. I'm liking your alternate title too.

@ Junkyard - Yes the advice is to start uber small - that's really the major takeaway from lesson 1

[Over00]

Well, if it can help you, I started to write about my humble 2 years of experience working on an indie MMO here: http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/Over00

I don't pretend to have a recipe that fits everyone but that's so far what I learned, saw and most important did.

I thought it was a good idea to start this kind of blog for indie MMO as some tips you usually read for indie game developer have some twists here. For example, we often see things like "first game will fail, start working on your second than third then fourth..." but when you're working on an MMO, the work is never really over on your "first" project so... And I still haven't discovered a way to work on more than 1 MMO at the same time (unless I finally get to clone myself...).

Anyway, take what might be of interest. More posts are on their way.

[Jim B]

You might want to add a section dealing with the basic legal issues indie gamers face, particularly dealing with IP rights and licensing.

[GnadeGames]

Jim-

We will probably cover this aspect briefly during the publisher/distributor stage of the game. However I am not an expert in legal advice and wouldn't offer advice on it other than - setup a legitimate business/proprietorship and don't sign away your IP rights to a developer.

[MiceHead]

How about a bit on one of my favorite resources? How to take advantage of the indie community!

Thoughts:
- Online communities -- Right here?
- Real-world events -- For example, I find the Boston Post Mortem invaluable, and there are a few indie-specific offshoot events in the area now. There's likely something in your area.
- Get in the habit of asking -- Breaking the NIH attitude
- Understanding advice -- What's right for one person is not right for all. If your target audience is women 18-45, specific marketing tips from John Carmack may not be for you.

[GnadeGames]

Thanks for all the input. The first part of the guide is finally available for free on the internet:

http://www.indiegamemag.com/indiedevguidelesson1.html