Quix. Would you have someone on your team that: - Enjoys software development for software development's sake, or someone that will bitch and complain unless he is working on exactly what he wants, i.e. developing only non-casual games? - Enjoys producing, or someone that is only interested in producing a certain genre of game? - A QA tester that enjoys the process of QA - will QA any piece of crap that gets throw at them, or someone that will refuse to test anything other than a 'non-casual' game? Dan's article describes a 'hobbyist'. This is why indy developers are called 'hobbyists'. Professionals have a passion for what they do and not what they work on. Hobbyists are concerned with what they work on.
what? Thats the WHOLE POINT of being an indie. You work on what YOU want to do. If you want to work on someone elses idea, go work at a big developer. They have pension schemes and everything. I thought that was the whole point? I can work on someone elses idea, but I'm much MORE motivated to work on mine. Am I considered just a 'hobbyist' because my company doesnt have the turnover of Peter Molyneuxs? He makes the game he wants to as well. Is Will wright just a hobbyist? bah!
There we go again: Apparently: - I'm not professional - I have no passion. - I'm a hobbyist. (term apparently used as an insult, as if to say indie developers are inferior!) Anyway, cool, I'm a hobbyist if that makes you happy. More accurately though - I've made my 'hobby' into my profession, more accurately again, I've made my passion into my profession, and I'm loving it
Well said Cliffski.........for 'Indie' read 'Independent'.......in other words free to create what you want with no studio to answer to!! All the best Mark.
Well put Cliffy Ski. Game making is supposed to be fun... and I guess doing whatever's popular doesn't seem all that fun to me anymore. If you're not doing something you enjoy, you may as well be doing something that pays more, which tends to be just about everything. Oh boy, don't you just love these discussions that divide the community?
No, that's not what I meant to convey at all. I'm *not* saying that indie gamers are not professionals. If you can have passion for what you do and what you work on that that is the best of both worlds. I'm specifically addressing the underlying theme in Dan's article. That there is no passion outside of working on games that you want to make. That unless you are working on what you want, all you are interested in is the payoff. Someone working in the casual game space can be just as passionate. They might not like working on a casual game, but they really like seeing something to fruition, being creative, writing code etc.
Fost I have nothing but the utmost respect for the team at moonpod. You guys remind me of the old days of independent development. It can't be easy I'm sure, given the cost of living and the fact that every other indie on the block seems to be making boat loads of cash off knockoffs that took 3-5 months to produce. The fact that you actually live off it is pretty impressive as well, you may be a hobbyist but you are quite hardcore Retro64, you are an island in the sea when it comes to my articles. How long have we been rubbing shoulders on these forums? Since back in the old Dexterity days, what 4-5 years now? You've certainly shown your staying power, however in that time I've seen one or maybe two indies come close to replicating your financial and business successes. Once you have the income, the business sense, and the ability to make high quality games the equation changes to some extent. You are operating at a different level of the game then the majority of the members of this community so what I write is going to be of limited value to you. To be honest, I'm not sure what connects the dots between someone starting out and where you are. It's sort of like trying to duplicate godsol's business as someone starting out today. Everyone needs to find their own way of doing business that meets their own preferences. I think you have found that, but the way you find that is by following your preferences, not following what everyone else's preferences are. In any event, when I look at the majority of financially successful indies the metric that is the most telling is how many years they've been selling their games online. The more years in business the better they seem to be doing. This is not to imply that hanging around for 5 years will guarantee you a successful independent game development business, but it sure seems to help. I think to do it right, if you want build an independent games business that is sufficient to pay your bills and endure for the long term it takes about 3-5 years before you start realizing that goal. This is the nature of bootstrapping a business, without investment capitol to accelerate growth, it takes time. So finding a model that is sustainable is of high importance.
The better they do, the more years they'll be in business... That metric is meaningless for understanding the successes of industry veterans. I don't understand how you can base the whole argument of the hobbyist approach* on the length of existence. Experience gained, knowledge assimilated, and volume of ideas tried are all contributing factors, but time itself isn't one of them. *For those of you offended by the term "hobbyist," you clearly have a poor understanding of the English language: "hobby - An activity or interest pursued outside one's regular occupation and engaged in primarily for pleasure." I think that more than adequately describes such an approach as is being discussed.
Actually, I don't think anyone is really offended by it - we are just having a laugh at ourselves. I think it came up because of Phil S's blog, but you have to read that thoroughly to understand what he means, and, if I understood him correctly, I don't mind. I'll use my own game as an example - Starscape's front end, and general 'ergonomics' are far from where I'd like them to be. In fact, compare them to any recent, high profile casual game, and the Starscape front end is a bit of an embarrasment. Needing to compromise on one thing to give yourself time to make something else is not really a good excuse to your customers. Casual gamer devs on the other hand limit the scope of their games so they can make every aspect of them perfect - and that's being professional.
Very true, which is why I stated that the correlation did not imply causation. If you look at the fulltime indie game developers we had back in the dexterity days 4-5 years ago that posted on the forums their pretty much the same guys who post here now. Minus a few. Retro64, svero, goodsol, james c. smith, patrox, etc. Other then emmanuels overnight breakout success and subsequent acquisition why haven't we had any significant numbers of others that have achieved the same level of sustainability ? The thing is, in order to get that long term sustainability you need to find that place where you enjoy your work you enjoy what you create and you have enough critical mass to be profitable doing it. That takes time, it also takes an emphasis on becoming better at the craft of making games and running your own business. Once a developer hits that target, find the right combination of things that is sustainable they can start to be profitable. It's different for everyone, but I guarantee you it doesn't start with trying to make a fast buck, it has to come from something more substantial. If you are just in it for the buck you'll miss that spot where you find your sustainability. Finding that spot means you start with your emphasis on game design and development and work it ever so slightly towards profitability. People who have done this: Retro64 - Started with multiplayer online action games followed his retro gameplay passion to indie stardom. Goodsol - Like shorthike, started with a game he liked and stuck with it for a very long time. Nothing says sustainability like a 10 year track record. Who knew there were so many people out there that weren't satisified with the free solitare that came with windows? Positech - Made games he liked for fun, and a little profit, ended up making exactly what he enjoyed and ended up with enough revenue to sustain him full time. PuppyGames - Started full time working on his dream game, burned a ton of money had poor sales. Instead of giving up or going casual he just worked his game design preferences gradually towards games that resonated with customers. Give him one or two more games and I think he will be sustainable full time doing exactly what he likes. Blitwise Has always made games only for passion, seems people are passionate about the same things he is. He's full time supports a wife and kids, mortgage etc. MountainKing Always does whatever he wants, the father of Raptor (one of my all time classics) as well as galactix, demonstar and others. Fulltime indie (maybe chronically so at this point) ShortHike Back in the dexterity days when people were focusing on making 10k a month from logic games, Kai was making his 3d space station simulation. He never seemed to give a crap about conventional wisdom. He ended up liking his game so much he based his whole business around that one title and continues to support it full time today. (with 1 or two employees now I believe). WinterWolves Took his sim games to the next level, starting with soccer manager and going on to do boxing manager and various other sim/strategy games. Now doing quite well as a full time indie making exactly what he wants. Moonpod From day one investing in making great games they were interested in and have never looked back. Maybe not living rockstar lifestyles but they get to pursue their passion on a daily basis, hard to ask for much more. [EDIT] .... see this is why I dont put names of people in the articles themselves.. people always feel left out. I'm not trying to make a complete list just some that come to mind. Hamumu Making dumb games since 1809 and still loving it. [/EDIT] these are just ones i'm more personally familiar with.. there's lots more pompom, runescape, 21-6, those soldat guys.. all who do whatever they want and seem to be having financial success and sustainability doing it. Now for the success stories for those who focused on business values from day 1 Retro64 ok ok so he's in both categories, he likes his games, they sell well on his site, they sell well on portals. Definitely found a sustainable sweetspot. funpause (now bigfish) Created a few lackluster games then hit it big with faries and atlantis. Acquired by bigfish, now working on a game that interests him personally. Will it work out and be sustainable? who knows.. it very well might. Sprout games though he no longer posts here, started with a business perspective from day 1 and worked his way up and was acquired by popcap. Now the creative director at popcap. [EDIT] goodsol while he may classify himself in this camp, he was making downloadable games before there really was a known lucrative market or much of anything else. His focus on business and marketing has enabled his business to grow steadily over the years. I still maintain that it was his interest in solitare (based on things he's said) that got him started not the promise of big revenue streams. [/EDIT] The point I'm trying to make, is that there are a lot more guys who have found a way to be full time indies following their own preferences and passion for game development then there are guys who started out to create profitable game businesses.
I find this whole "indieness" thing to be absolute rubbish. A good game is a good game. Users are not blind, they like what they like. Sure great formula games can do well but we've also seen lots of non-forumla games do well. Should I make games that I like but know users will not? If you answered yes then go to the back of the line and be sure not to quit your day job. Almost unanimously everyone here says they want to quit their day job and be a "true" indie, but they always find crazy reasons why not to. I know I used to. The answer is your inventing reasons why not, instead of inventing a means and reason why to. btw - Funny we're never mentioned there. Guess uber popular freeware games that are totally inventive such as The Black Knight don't count
Dan: I think Brian should also go under the list of people who focused on business. He's clearly not just pandering to his own self-interested desires.
What about Sandlot? Business Hipsoft? Business Arcadelab? Business (passion too) Puzzle Labs? Kraisoft? There are a ton of successful (smaller) developers who focus on business first, maybe you're more inclined to make friends with "hobby" developers?
I just removed him from the list, while he crossed my mind initially I decided not to include him for the same reasons I didn't include game tunnel or reflexive. Their primary business is not the creation of games, which is what Im trying to talk about. I don't have nearly the same level of visiblity into the distribution / portal business so I don't feel really qualified to make any statements about it. The purpose of the above list is not to list who's indie and who's not. The intent in posting a list of references is to show that there appear to be a lot of people who invested in doing what they wanted to do and ended up having a business that could sustain them full time (and independant of any other controlling influence). It also shows some examples of what happens when you focus on creating a profitable game business first. You end up being acquired. I would like to point out, that this is not a proof of my way of thinking, even if the examples were clearly stacked in a way that opposed my way of thinking, I would still hold it to be true because my convictions are made from my own experience not the experience I observe others to have.
Yeah, I don't like to ever sound like I'm bashing casual games because as you say - a good game is a good game (Chuzzle being a great favourite of mine and most definitely casual!), but I do find the distinction between 'indie' and 'casual' a useful one to make - the types of games in both categories really require a sightly different approach, to development certainly, but also to marketing and selling. There's lots shared between the two, but I find particularly on these forums, that there's a duality in thread replies - one set from indie devs and one set from casual devs. Take the recent Rage of Magic II announcement - there were calls to make it work with the mouse there - even to change the gameplay so it would work. I bet people who take the 'indie' approach, were (like me) thinking 'no!!!!!' -it would ruin a classic gameplay style, and I'm really thinking that game might be great if they get that traditional golden axe style play spot on. Casual devs were all probably thinking 'hmm, looks nice, but how could it be changed so a 50 year old with low experience of arcade style gameplay can slip into playing it easily'. Now, to each side, it might seem like other other is insane to think that way, but it's really just a different approach and no way is right or wrong. In reality, that situation is unlikely to occur, unless you are some kind of freak. Making a game you yourself like is a valid technique that I think has lost favour with developers from all walks of life. Surely if you like something, then someone else out there also will like it? How about just doing something a certain way because you feel that it's right and you like it that way. Ok, I like subtitles black and white French movies, and that puts me in a very small minority in the UK - hopefully you can see the link in that statement; yes, there's a lot to be said for finding a bigger target audience, but surely you can't let money rule everything? At the end, I don't think anyone is doing that. Like you say - there's good games and bad games, casual or indie makes no difference to that.
Well I don't find much value in listing developers, It was brought to my attention that it would help if I provided some examples. As I said I think the idea stands on its own, it doesn't really require long comparisons of various developers to test weather it's valid or not. If you have a rational mind then you should be able to evaluate it based on your own experience as a human being, and if you've been doing the indie thing very long you can apply your own experience as an indie developer. I've only met the hipsoft guys a few times, but they are an example of the type of people who tend to do well in the casual games business. They aren't constrained with the same resource problems that most solo developers are. They started as a team with enough money (they founded monolith) and experience to bring to market games that were industry quality in all areas of development. (Design/content/programming). I imagine that they probably have a few developers working for them now that do all the dirty work and the founders are there purely to do planning and set direction. (I could be wrong but this is typically how profit oriented businesses work.) This is a good way to go if you want to run a business, but if you want to continue to make games, if creating them is your passion then you have to come at it differently. Anyway, if other people find value tallying up the list of those who followed their own preferences in game development and those who set out to make profitable game businesses, go ahead. I don't see much continued value from it other then making people upset and stepping on peoples toes. If you can't see any value to what im saying, even an exhaustive list of developers and their histories isn't likely to convince you. It either makes sense to you or it doesn't.
The value of the list is in recognizing how few of the examples illustrate your point as a contention of success. In fact, it suggests that taking a business-like approach to game development more often leads to sustained existence, with a notable exception of the few early birds who captured tiny, niche markets before they closed or dried up. The truth of the matter is evident in the sheer number of failures in this industry as a whole, regardless of approach. The only constant found in all of the successful developers is excellence, and excellence alone. From this we can infer that there is a safe approach (business), a dangerous approach (hobby), and the only path that offers sustained success (excellence). How you get there is ancillary to how well you get there.