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So you want to be an Indie Developer?

gibbage.co.uk — The "So you want to be a Indie Developer?" project features articles of advice on the reality of making your own games from every corner of the sector; from those currently risking everything by going full-time Indie to established industry leaders such as DEFCON's Introversion via unmitigated nonsense like Lemmy and Binky.

Who dugg this? Made popular Nov 21, 2006

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  • radu79, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I am an indie developer, and quite successful. It's a lot of hard work, very frustrating, sometimes you feel like giving up, but in the end, if you build it, it will come.
    I have an article about it, let me know if you are interested (I don't want people to think I am pimping my articles).
  • SirShane, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I currently work full-time as an independent developer for a small game company a friend and I have started a few years back. I've so far invested over a year of my life and more than $10,000 into our technology, which we hope will give us an edge to make our game. Being an independent developer is incredibly hard work, especially since the game industry is moving so fast - it's hard to keep up. Still, I don't think there is anything else I would rather be doing. The ultimate reward is seeing your game work at the end of the day. It's frustrating, brutal work but the payoff is very satisfying.
  • hockey, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4It may be hard work however if you love it then it's not work then is it?

    :)
  • cheeze69, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I'll read it, radu.
  • NiroZ, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Well I am involved in a indie community, and even though I have no input into the creation of the game, I can assure you its hard work.

    However, there is something about the closer, more friendly communities that seem to come with indie games that I would say is well worth the price of admission.
  • nebari, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I'd be interested, as well, radu.
  • terminality, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Get off digg and back to work =P
  • Sillytuna, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Oh the joys of indie development.

    Hard work, really hard work!
  • MalDON, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1His other articles are great. Links are on the side of the page. It's funny, yet true.
  • sundancekid503, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Introversion's DEFCON is a brilliant indie strategy game. The graphics aren't spectacular, but it has a great retro "wargames" look to it. I've gotten a lot more playtime out of this than most $50 games.

  • xp3ll3d, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Links to the other articles in the series

    Introversion - http://www.introversion.co.uk/news/index.php

    Cliffski's Mumblings - http://cliffski.blogspot.com/2006/11/so-you-want-to-be-indie-developer.html

    GameProducer.net - http://www.gameproducer.net/2006/11/20/so-you-want-to-be-an-indie-developer/

    Lemmy and Binky - http://lemmyandbinky.blogspot.com/2006/11/so-you-want-to-be-indie-developer.html

    Reality Fakers - http://sharpfish.realityfakers.com/?p=103

    Zoombapup - http://www.zoombapup.com/2006/11/so-you-want-to-be-indie-developer.html

    BoneBroke - http://www.bonebroke.com/blog/index.php/2006/11/20/so-you-want-to-be-an-indie-developer/

    They Came from Hollywood - http://www.theycamefromhollywood.com/news.html
  • riplikethat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Honestly, Defcon is crap. You think 'strategy' is missing from games like Warcraft, but when you play Defcon, all strategy pretty much is limited to first hour you spend learning the game in.

    In other words, it get's repititive fast.. VERY FAST!
  • xp3ll3d, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Yeah please post it radu
  • apothe, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1How do indie musicians meet indie developers to do their game music?
  • Molt, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0I guess you're talking about Xna Game Studio. I've been playing with Beta2 of this for the last couple of weeks, and so far I'm impressed by what I've seen- importing content is easy with the configurable build pipeline, the framework API lets you very quickly get things lit, moving, and making noise on screen. The component model also is very nice for quick games and/or prototyping.

    What it is lacking however, at least at the moment, are things such as any kind of serious collision detection (Axis-Aligned Bounding Boxes and Bounding Spheres do not cut it, I'm afraid), scene management (Yes, it's a graphic engine not a game engine but this is a set of wheels so many users will reinvent), and performance-analysis tools (I've had to write my own frames-per-second counter, nevermind things such as detecting what shaders are causing the GPU bottleneck).

    All in all it's very promising, but I am expecting a lot more before Microsoft release the commercial version.
  • gundamoak, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0what are your guys thoughts on the xbox 360 development thing microsoft was making available. I forgot the name...but it sounds interesting. I wish i had the time to tinker though....;(
  • zoombapup, on 10/12/2007, -4/+1Its not easy being an indie.
  • GhostShipTim, on 10/12/2007, -3/+0Gibbage... pff. Yay for another public dose of indie realities! Pay special attention to the article by Lemmy n' Binky. That's the real stuff, there.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+0Know what? Make better games then what is being putout, AND HOW ABOUT SOME GOD DAMM UPDATES!

    Thank you
  • Zoomy, on 10/12/2007, -5/+0You don't paint the happiest painting, do you?

    P.S Buy Gibbage

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