A few years ago when you thought of an indie game developing team you couldn’t help but imagine some guy and his friend in a room making a small game, and for the most of it you would be right – a lot of games started out that way. There has always been that line between an indie game and a AAA block buster; on the indie side you had games on Steam where you just thought, well this looks average, and the AAA games were obvious because they were advertised on every gaming site and were pretty much thrown at you through your T.V.
I can’t help but feel that since the rise of indie, thanks to games such as Braid and Minecraft that line has swayed, if not dissolved a little. Since the uprising in popularity for indie games console companies Sony and Microsoft have really pushed for their consoles to be indie developing friendly, perhaps recognizing that more people are making games and that they could get some passionate buyers out of them. Whatever the reason, I’m sure small time developers could care less, they now have a tool that launches their project to unlimited heights. These small games are usually non-commercial, and now we have the two kings of console gaming trying to be the voice of indie developers who now have to choose which corporation they want a relationship with, signing with them to have their game featured on the front of their site and even on their stage at E3, up there with the triple A games.
The Wikipedia definition of an indie game is: video games created by individuals or small teams generally without video game publisher financial support. A lot of these titles are funded by Kickstarter and public interest, but when video game publishers are funding and promoting your game is it less indie than others? Forgetting the Wikipedia definition for a moment I ask you what is indie? What does indie mean? The truth is there really is no precise context for the word. Lucas Pope, creator of Papers Please spoke at the BAFTA Games Awards and said that there are no indie game-makers, just small studios and individuals making small games and large games.
“To be honest yeah I feel [these labels] are a little redundant… A lot of those games are very successful, so the categorization of indie games and triple A is kind of dissolving a bit.”
A gamers definition of the word would be small, small teams that make games. Compare Telltale that have 180-200 employees and Valve’s 330 to Hello Games (makers of No Mans Sky) 10 employees and Polytrons 2 man partnership to make Fez, all four of these companies are “independently owned” and two of them are known for an indie title.
A title to be considered “AAA” is therefore expected to be a high quality game and to be among the years best sellers, which is exactly what we are expecting of the upcoming independent titles of Sony and Microsoft. No Mans Sky is among the list and was featured at Sony’s E3 press conference and arguably stole the show, that same conference opened up with Destiny, one of the biggest triple A title to come.
Perhaps the biggest difference between the two categories is meaning. You won’t ever play a game more personal than the one made by one or two people, no matter how unpolished it is. Those people are telling you their story, their thoughts, imagination and feelings are in that game. Something a board of a 100 writers and designers could never achieve.
One of the biggest independently developed games ever is Minecraft, which during April celebrated 15 million copies of the original title sold since it’s release in Beta during 2011, how many people refer to the game as indie anymore?
With newer engines and software being readily available for anyone to create with, while Sony and Microsoft are fighting to support your creations are we losing the heart and soul of indie gaming? I don’t necessarily think so, the programs available from Microsoft and the support from Sony is an amazing step for wanna be game makers, but I do feel the line between “Indie” and “Triple A” is fading slightly.
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