Wet Blanket Indie
Wet Blanket Indie
At the first Indie Games Con in 2002, I joked that I had come as the “wet blanket”. I never expected much competition for the title, but … well … a lot about indie game development has become more competitive in recent years.
Starting last month, Jeff Vogel of Spiderweb Software, another longtime indie game developer, has a new column at RPGVault, “The View from the Bottom.” I think Jeff is vying to take over the soggy mantle of being the wet blanket, the bearer of bad news and realistic expectations–but in a good way.
Jeff provides what I’ve decided to call the anti-Pavlina view of indie game development. From his first article:
“When you write a game, you have in your mind a spectacular, glorious, golden image of how it will end up. When your game is done, it will be a lowly, misbegotten thing, lumpy and misshapen, a foul parody of your original goal.
“…Nobody died and made you the King Of All Game Designers. You’re a lone person, with minimal resources, limited time, and probably not so much experience. Shoot for something that is fun and basically functional. That is already a huge job. Accept that, if you want to succeed, you will have to release something short of what you wanted.”
In his second article, he tackles the thorny issue of innovation in game design:
“One of the inspirational things about writing about computer games is that, if you really get stuck for an article, you can just complain about how uncreative they are. What? More shooters? More sequels? Curse those corporate whores for denying us the completely new, innovative games they should be providing!
“…Whenever I read one of these articles, I usually find that the writer presents one ray of hope, one bold knight who will struggle to invent the new genres that will totally rock us – the Indie Game Developer.
“Well, speaking as an Indie Game Developer, I have this to say… Don’t look at us, man.”
Here are his first two articles:
Great stuff.
-David
[...] Spiderweb Software’s Jeff Vogel (Avernum, Geneforge) describes his View From the Bottom of the game industry over on RPG Vault. Or what Joe Indie calls the “anti-Pavlina” view of game development. What is the moral of this? The game industry is a highly competitive, scary place. It’s not hopeless, but it’s a tough road. And that’s a good place to start to describe the view from the bottom. [...]
Anti-Pavlina? You’re funny, David.
I happen to agree with Jeff. I thought you were aware I started out the same way, making very basic arcade-style games to build skill and experience and to test shareware marketing. It wasn’t until years later that I released something original and began treating shareware like a business. My first four shareware games weren’t my main source of income — they were just side projects/experiments while I the bulk of my time was spent on retail game development.
This initial period of releasing lame games is like being in indie training camp because you’re unlikely to be able to sustain a business that way. Once you’ve gone through this period, however, then it’s a different story.
Same thing goes for my personal development business. I was building skill and experience in this field for almost 15 years before I attempted to turn it into a viable business. If I dove into this field with no prior experience, I seriously doubt I’ve have been able to make a living from it.
Hey, Steve!
If there’s a poster boy for The Optimistic Indie, you’ve been it for some time. Especially since the short-lived “Earn $10K per Month” period.
-David
I notice that a number of indies are making substantial income today, some much more than $10K per month. Many of them have emailed me to share how they did it. Some used a strategy similar to mine (i.e. build direct traffic to your own web site and sell a variety of products), and others used an approach that takes advantage of various distribution outlets.
Personally I still favor the direct approach, regardless of the specific business. With a little luck, you can make a killing with good distribution partners in a short period of time, but then you may end up being vulnerable to their whims. I’ve seen some indies fall into this trap. Plus a lot of these distributors just want cheesy knock-off games now, which can suck a lot of the creative joy out of being an indie.
I stuck with the direct approach for my personal development business, and it worked just as well. It took a little over a year to build decent traffic (over 800,000 visitors per month now), and with that much traffic, it’s hard to fail. The ad revenue is already substantial, and I don’t even have any products yet. I should hit $10K+ per month with this strategy by the end of the year. I know other bloggers who already make considerably more than this. It’s not really all that complicated.
The one approach that seldom works is focusing on the reasons to explain why something can’t be done, why the odds are against you, or why it just won’t work for you personally. The Pessimistic Indie usually thinks he’s a realistic, but he’s just taking minor setbacks and everyday business challenges (competition, barriers to entry, lack of distribution, etc.) and turning them into excuses for giving up. Such an indie would be well-advised to buy The Journal software and use it to help get past his own self-doubt and lack of confidence.
The failure rate of new would-be indies today is similar to what you see in other industries. In fact, I think blogging is even more competitive, since there are fewer barriers to entry vs. developing a game. There are tens of millions of blogs now, and probably 99% of them will never see much traffic.
I don’t mind being a poster boy for the Optimistic Indie, although it’s sort of funny that some people still think of me like that today, since I haven’t written any game code in years. But optimism won’t save people from incompetence or from giving up. People who turn pessimist at the first sign of trouble… well, they’re better off being employees than going the entrepreneurial route. There be dragons out here.