Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Explaining Indie Games, Illustrated!
In the XFire Debate Club last week (transcript of the discussion now available), we went a little long (I thought) explaining exactly what indie gaming is. In retrospect, I think part of the problem isn't that indie games are hard to define, but that they are defined by what they are not. But if you don't understand what they aren't, then you are totally gonna be confused about what they are.
Okay. I just confused myself. Let me draw some pictures.
The System
What we've got now, over the course of 30+ years of commercial game development, is a System. The System is very close to what you have in other media (book publishing, the music biz, etc.) - in fact, it was modeled after that. Here's what the system looks like:
Okay. Here's how the System works:The publisher is at the top of the chain. You'll note I have a crown over the publisher. That's because I'm obnoxious. The publisher wants a game made. The publisher either creates the game in-house, or contracts a developer to make the game for them. Let's talk about how the outside developer is handled.
Usually, the outside developer is pretty much told what to make. Something based on a cool movie or TV license, or a sequel / spin-off to a game another studio originally made (after the publisher has happily said to the original developer studio, "Go jump in a lake, we own the property, we don't need you, so NEENER!" or said studio has vowed "We'll never work with you again, you jerks! For definitions of 'never' that may only include this product cycle!"). Occasionally, the outside developer might have some cool proof-of-concept demo that the publisher is willing to go with, so long as the developer makes all these changes to it (usually converting it into something that is based on a cool movie or TV license, or a sequel / spin-off to a game another studio originally made... okay, you get the idea).
The publisher "funds" the development of said game. By "fund," we really mean, "loans money to the studio for." Because... really... funding is an interest-free advance against future royalties earned by the game. Which, according to modern accounting practice in the games biz, is actually just a myth and never really happens, so the loan almost never gets repaid, so the publishers can act all magnanimous about it. But hey - it's their investment money, and so they get to call the terms. If they want to make it their investment money back two different ways - both profit on the game and in recouping the cost from the developer's royalties - that's their call.
And because it's their money (the old "golden rule" - he that has the gold makes the rule - applies here as everywhere), they usually require that they own the game, the name, the trademarks and copyrights and all intellectual property rights. The developer is pretty much just a serf contracted to do the labor. See that crown? Which - in my opinion - feels backwards. You really don't want your creative people laboring in a system of serfdom, do you?
From the publisher, the game goes through distributors and to retailers in mass quantities. This is a bulky, impenetrable System that few developers could touch without a lot of money and clout. This way, the publishers make sure that any games that want to get to the customers have to go through THEM. The publishers don't have quite the lock on the media that they do on game distribution, but they definitely dominate that particular avenue as well.
For years, that's the way its been. The System totally serves the three primary groups who have invested into creating it: the publishers, the retailers, and the distributors (I believe in that order of precedence). And it gets the games to the customers, and it keeps developers in pizza and caffeine. It's got some flexibility built into it. So while it is sub-optimal, causing games to cost more, poorly rewarding developers, and limiting what the customer can buy, it more or less works.
The Indies - Bucking The System
The whole definition of "indie" that I think a few of us were getting at the other night is simply the developers who decide to sidestep the system. Ultimately, there are only two critical pieces to this whole arrangement - the producers of games (the developers), and the consumers of games (the customers). All those other guys - the guys who take up the lion's share of the money (and increase the cost of the games) - simply contribute to the process of getting the games from the developer to the customer.
So, ideally, the whole "indie" thing might look kinda like this:
Note that here, the word "developer" is singular and "publishers" is plural - the opposite of how The System works. Publishers may not be exclusive. And for "publishers" you can substitute the word, "portals," "distributors,"retailers," "hardware manufacturers," "your aunt Jane who meets ladies at Bingo on Thursday night," or any other point of distribution that can reach more customers. The indie developer may take advantage of any and all means they have available to get their game to the customer, and may bypass all those middlemen that make up "The System" completely.And ultimately, that's what "indie" is. It's not a game genre, or a game budget, or a size of team, or anything else. It's really about developers who are trying to bypass barriers and middlemen that block them from getting their game to the customer. The System is a game stacked against the developer (and, I'd argue, not in the customer's favor, either).
The Pros and Cons
I don't believe in barriers blocking games from being released. Courtesy of broadband, the technological barrier is slipping away. Now we're left with ... well, traditions. Habits. How gamers go about finding games and buying games.
Now, to be honest, most video games probably aren't worth your time. But here's the trick: The ones that aren't worth YOUR time may not be the same ones that aren't worth MY time.
Under The System, publishers and retailers (and, to a lesser degree, the distributors) handled things in a centralized fashion. Oooh, should I draw a communism parallel here? Okay, we'll pretend I did, and that I got flamed for it. Anyway, unable to determine what kind of game you, specifically, really wanted to play, they instead focused on games that "a lot of people" (these days defined by major publishers as "at least a half a million") would pay full price to play. If so, it got greenlit, otherwise, it was never even made.
So The System is good at serving the lowest common denominator. But unless you are completely Joe Average in all of your gaming tastes, The System isn't particularly good at providing you with what you really want. Just stuff you won't mind.
The indie methodology is more like the open market, a bazaar of the bizarre. The games just get made, though often at a lower budget because they might not have a half-million people willing to pay full price. Imagine thousands of street vendors right outside your house all hawking their wares. Nobody sets artificial limits on what you can buy.
But while there's an initial euphoria that comes with the feeling of being able to find anything if you look hard enough, it soon turns into frustration when you realize that you may have to look very hard to find anything of worth to you. And while the indie game scene may be exploding, a lot of tools that customers need to find the games they want and filter out the ones they don't aren't quite there yet. The media still focuses on mainstream games produced by The System, though that's slowly changing, too.
Multiple Definitions
Now, even this is fuzzy. There's plenty of room for arguing over who is "more indie" than someone else, and who is so big and mainstream that they are actually part of The System now (is Valve part of the system, or are they indie?) And there may be questions of approach to getting your games to the customer (Is someone who produces games strictly for portals still indie?) Besides all this, "indie" is in part a marketing element ("indie is cool"), and in part it is an excuse for having graphics that are obviously not burning out your graphics cards.
And there's an attitude that frequently comes with indie - the attitude of "screw 'em, I'll do it myself!" Which is also kinda cool and rebellious. Part of the image thing. But again, that's more of the fuzzy marketing definition.
But the whole thing about indie is that there are no rules. That's kind of the point, and I'm happy about that. Applying a hard-and-fast definition is doomed to fail. But hopefully this little explanation helped clarify things.
(Vaguely) related accounts of me waxing pedantic:
* GCG Tackles the "What Is An Indie Game?" Question
* Gimme That Old Time Indie Development
* Dependent, Independent, and Indie
.
Labels: Biz, Indie Evangelism
- posted by The Rampant Coyote @ 5:16 AM (Permalink)
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Damn, after reading the Xfire Debate Club transcript, I was starting to prepare a post just like this one. At least I don't have to write all of the details now.
I think what you wrote is really useful and important, although I think it would also help to understand where the whole "indie" concept came from -- which is essentially what you were trying to say.
Now, I'm no historian or expert, but my impression is that the "indie" term came from the music and movie industries, because of the way they were organized. In fact, you could add games to that group, and you really get the "entertainment industry" as a whole. (Television does also fit in with this in a sense, although the structure has been a little different, mostly because of advertising support.)
I think it's important to note that the entertainment industry was really formed during the time before the internet existed, so it was based on a more traditional business model which explains most of this.
As a business, the entertainment industry is out to make money. And you make the most money in entertainment by getting lots and lots of people to buy the product, whether it's albums, movie tickets, or games. The most successful entertainment businesses have been able to do this efficiently, which means having things like wide distribution and sales channels, big budget advertising, and so on -- and oh yeah, good products. But it's important to note that it costs a lot to have all of that in place, so these businesses need to make sure the product appeals to the widest audience to ensure enough sales to make a profit.
So whether it's music, movies, or games, you have a system set up that basically excluded music/movies/games that weren't produced through the big-name production companies. Imagine trying to create, distribute, and sell an album or a movie made pre-1990 that wasn't through one of the big production houses. It was very difficult to do it, since there was little structure or support in place to get the product into people's hands. So if you really wanted to get your product sold to the widest audience, you had to sell your soul to the big companies. And usually that meant doing what they wanted you to do, because they knew better than you what would sell well -- and they wouldn't want to waste their time on anything they thought wouldn't sell well.
That is what I believe led to the first real "indie" scenes. People who didn't want to "sell out" to the big production houses, to make their own music and movies that didn't require bending over to the System. In the early days, though -- especially before the internet -- it was (I imagine) incredibly tough to survive that way, because of the lack of resources for reproduction, advertising, distribution, and sales.
As you said:
...ultimately, that's what "indie" is. It's not a game genre, or a game budget, or a size of team, or anything else. It's really about developers who are trying to bypass barriers and middlemen that block them from getting their game to the customer. The System is a game stacked against the developer (and, I'd argue, not in the customer's favor, either).
The games industry started out just like the other entertainment industries, with a few large companies establishing control of the channels for distribution, advertising, sales, and so on. So it was the same story -- if you wanted to really get your game out there to the masses, you had to sell out to the System. And that typically meant losing control and letting the companies decide what went into your game, in order to maximize sales and profits.
So now we have the "indie" gaming scene, which I agree arose out of the desire to bypass the System and its control over most everything. But I think the important thing to remember is that, just like with music and movies, the desire to bypass the System is there in order to secure creative freedom, so you don't have to sell your soul and make what the System tells you to make.
But what's interesting, particularly with the rise of the internet, is that the System is waking up to the fact that yes, you really can make money off of those "indie" products. So now you see different arrangements, like Sony funding the development of a game with no influence (so it would seem) over the development process. Is that indie? Is a movie still indie when, after it's made, it gets snatched up by a Big Company to be distributed?
I think that's what you're getting at with your comments at the end. It's a little fuzzier these days, I'll admit, but when trying to define "indie" I still like to think back to its roots and refer primarily to the creative process and the no-strings freedom allowed.
I think what you wrote is really useful and important, although I think it would also help to understand where the whole "indie" concept came from -- which is essentially what you were trying to say.
Now, I'm no historian or expert, but my impression is that the "indie" term came from the music and movie industries, because of the way they were organized. In fact, you could add games to that group, and you really get the "entertainment industry" as a whole. (Television does also fit in with this in a sense, although the structure has been a little different, mostly because of advertising support.)
I think it's important to note that the entertainment industry was really formed during the time before the internet existed, so it was based on a more traditional business model which explains most of this.
As a business, the entertainment industry is out to make money. And you make the most money in entertainment by getting lots and lots of people to buy the product, whether it's albums, movie tickets, or games. The most successful entertainment businesses have been able to do this efficiently, which means having things like wide distribution and sales channels, big budget advertising, and so on -- and oh yeah, good products. But it's important to note that it costs a lot to have all of that in place, so these businesses need to make sure the product appeals to the widest audience to ensure enough sales to make a profit.
So whether it's music, movies, or games, you have a system set up that basically excluded music/movies/games that weren't produced through the big-name production companies. Imagine trying to create, distribute, and sell an album or a movie made pre-1990 that wasn't through one of the big production houses. It was very difficult to do it, since there was little structure or support in place to get the product into people's hands. So if you really wanted to get your product sold to the widest audience, you had to sell your soul to the big companies. And usually that meant doing what they wanted you to do, because they knew better than you what would sell well -- and they wouldn't want to waste their time on anything they thought wouldn't sell well.
That is what I believe led to the first real "indie" scenes. People who didn't want to "sell out" to the big production houses, to make their own music and movies that didn't require bending over to the System. In the early days, though -- especially before the internet -- it was (I imagine) incredibly tough to survive that way, because of the lack of resources for reproduction, advertising, distribution, and sales.
As you said:
...ultimately, that's what "indie" is. It's not a game genre, or a game budget, or a size of team, or anything else. It's really about developers who are trying to bypass barriers and middlemen that block them from getting their game to the customer. The System is a game stacked against the developer (and, I'd argue, not in the customer's favor, either).
The games industry started out just like the other entertainment industries, with a few large companies establishing control of the channels for distribution, advertising, sales, and so on. So it was the same story -- if you wanted to really get your game out there to the masses, you had to sell out to the System. And that typically meant losing control and letting the companies decide what went into your game, in order to maximize sales and profits.
So now we have the "indie" gaming scene, which I agree arose out of the desire to bypass the System and its control over most everything. But I think the important thing to remember is that, just like with music and movies, the desire to bypass the System is there in order to secure creative freedom, so you don't have to sell your soul and make what the System tells you to make.
But what's interesting, particularly with the rise of the internet, is that the System is waking up to the fact that yes, you really can make money off of those "indie" products. So now you see different arrangements, like Sony funding the development of a game with no influence (so it would seem) over the development process. Is that indie? Is a movie still indie when, after it's made, it gets snatched up by a Big Company to be distributed?
I think that's what you're getting at with your comments at the end. It's a little fuzzier these days, I'll admit, but when trying to define "indie" I still like to think back to its roots and refer primarily to the creative process and the no-strings freedom allowed.
That's ultimately what it comes down to - the developer being free to not only develop games, but to sell them.
Back in the early days of gaming, things were really... weird. There was the sort of thing we'd call "indie" now - people making games in their basements, and selling them via mail-order, or in zip-lock bags to local mom & pop computer stores and electronics shops.
At the time, nobody seemed to really know what computer games WERE, so you had companies from many different industries jumping in to act as publisher. Were they electronic gizmos and mass-produced widgets? Were they like books? Did a game maker need an agent? Were they like record albums (EA's initial approach)? Were they like movies (seems like that has become the most common comparison nowadays)? Were they like toys?
So you had book publishers, toy companies, leather companies (!), amusement game manufacturers, playing card companies, department stores, and all kinds of others jumping into the fray to see what they could do to sell games to a wider audience. Many gave up after only a couple of years.
In order to hit that wider audience back then, yeah - I don't think you had much choice.
Nowadays it's simple to distribute your game to anyone in the world, but it's a lot harder to get anybody to notice it. I see, going forward, publishers taking on more of that role and less of their traditional role (mass duplication & arranging distribution). Undoubtedly for a smaller piece of the pie, which they don't like.
And yes - I think that's parallel to ALL entertainment media today. Music is there already, and at a crisis level.
Back in the early days of gaming, things were really... weird. There was the sort of thing we'd call "indie" now - people making games in their basements, and selling them via mail-order, or in zip-lock bags to local mom & pop computer stores and electronics shops.
At the time, nobody seemed to really know what computer games WERE, so you had companies from many different industries jumping in to act as publisher. Were they electronic gizmos and mass-produced widgets? Were they like books? Did a game maker need an agent? Were they like record albums (EA's initial approach)? Were they like movies (seems like that has become the most common comparison nowadays)? Were they like toys?
So you had book publishers, toy companies, leather companies (!), amusement game manufacturers, playing card companies, department stores, and all kinds of others jumping into the fray to see what they could do to sell games to a wider audience. Many gave up after only a couple of years.
In order to hit that wider audience back then, yeah - I don't think you had much choice.
Nowadays it's simple to distribute your game to anyone in the world, but it's a lot harder to get anybody to notice it. I see, going forward, publishers taking on more of that role and less of their traditional role (mass duplication & arranging distribution). Undoubtedly for a smaller piece of the pie, which they don't like.
And yes - I think that's parallel to ALL entertainment media today. Music is there already, and at a crisis level.
My first thought on reading this was "Well, that's all fine and good, but no indie developer is ever going to be able to afford, say, a Star Wars license for a game, so if we want Star Wars, we have to go to the System publishers." Then that sort of got me thinking... where do games with extensive user-modding capability come in? Neverwinter Nights, The Sims, Depths of Peril, games where the originally created game can and is modded to something else entirely. I understand that modding an existing game is not the same as creating from scratch, but you and I both know that there were alterations made to NWN by the player community that were never anticipated or intended. Is there a way to represent those sorts of potential changes on the diagrams, or is that a separate question altogether, since both System-published and indie games can have that capability?
Well - on the original question on licenses - it depends upon the license. There was a situation not too long ago where a DEVELOPER had the license to a TV property, and the publishers had to woo the developer to get the property (I think it was Stargate: SG1, but I can't remember).
It really depends on the license. The hotter the property, the more the IP owner will want for it. And to truly make the most of the license, they would want to go through The System for the best return.
But there are other licenses well within indie reach... and that could help increase the audience even with a small license. Sure, you probably wouldn't be able to afford D&D or GURPS, but an indie not long ago obtained the license for Macho Women With Guns (I never saw the game released, though, which is too bad...)
As far as mods are concerned - you know, I usually don't include modding efforts with indie because they are piggybacking on mainstream technology and resources, and I'd hate to draw comparisons between a from-scratch indie game and a mod that is 95% a mainstream, $10 million game.
But functionally, there's not much difference between what the modders are doing and what the indies are doing, and there are some truly awesome mods out there - both based on licensed properties and original works. NWN was one game where the mod community really impressed me.
It really depends on the license. The hotter the property, the more the IP owner will want for it. And to truly make the most of the license, they would want to go through The System for the best return.
But there are other licenses well within indie reach... and that could help increase the audience even with a small license. Sure, you probably wouldn't be able to afford D&D or GURPS, but an indie not long ago obtained the license for Macho Women With Guns (I never saw the game released, though, which is too bad...)
As far as mods are concerned - you know, I usually don't include modding efforts with indie because they are piggybacking on mainstream technology and resources, and I'd hate to draw comparisons between a from-scratch indie game and a mod that is 95% a mainstream, $10 million game.
But functionally, there's not much difference between what the modders are doing and what the indies are doing, and there are some truly awesome mods out there - both based on licensed properties and original works. NWN was one game where the mod community really impressed me.
Hmmm, would have liked to have participated in that XFire debate in some way but I seemed unable to find out how to do anything whatsoever in that regard after registering with XFire. Is/Was there a public discussion aspect to it?
But anyway, interesting discussion and good points. :)
But anyway, interesting discussion and good points. :)
Hey Coyote - you've heard of the Long Tail theory? The idea is that as the internet reduces certain costs to near zero (i.e., getting your product to market) and the tools start to come online to help people find the stuff they are REALLY interested in (i.e., how Amazon gives you recommendations based on what you have shown interest in), we start to see a lot more of the low-sales products become viable for companies to sell, and for people to make money on.
The thing that indies are lacking at the moment is a way to suck people in and drive them down the long tail of games - show them that if they like RPGs, well heck, there are a pile of them you've never heard of before. Manifesto is attempting to be that place, but I'm not sure how well it is going at the moment.
The thing that indies are lacking at the moment is a way to suck people in and drive them down the long tail of games - show them that if they like RPGs, well heck, there are a pile of them you've never heard of before. Manifesto is attempting to be that place, but I'm not sure how well it is going at the moment.
# posted by 
: January 30, 2008 8:43 AM
: January 30, 2008 8:43 AM
s/Was there a public discussion aspect to it?
The previous day there was a more open Q&A session that I couldn't participate in. And there were questions taken from the attendees during the last 15 minutes. But the one I was in had a more formal procedure.
The thing that indies are lacking at the moment is a way to suck people in and drive them down the long tail of games - show them that if they like RPGs, well heck, there are a pile of them you've never heard of before. Manifesto is attempting to be that place, but I'm not sure how well it is going at the moment.
Well, you could say we lack one, lack a GOOD one, or that we constantly fight against any place that looks like it will BECOME that place... because in a business relationship with a portal, the guys downstream of the flow of money grow weaker and more dependent upon the guy upstream. So those kinds of arrangements are the very ones canny indies try to resist (or keep as non-exclusive as possible, so they can be commoditized).
Also, while that can work (I mean, I LOVE Amazon...), there's also something to be said for more decentralized system of specialty sites. For example, if I was looking up... I dunno, pulp mysteries of the 1930's... Amazon would NOT be the place to go, but I'll bet there are several sites on the Internet that could provide me with very detailed information on the subject. While those sites themselves might be part of the "long tail", they branch off into more tails the user can follow.
That's more how I envision things working, rather than replacing the existing EA with another EA that just happens to be more long-tail savvy.
The previous day there was a more open Q&A session that I couldn't participate in. And there were questions taken from the attendees during the last 15 minutes. But the one I was in had a more formal procedure.
The thing that indies are lacking at the moment is a way to suck people in and drive them down the long tail of games - show them that if they like RPGs, well heck, there are a pile of them you've never heard of before. Manifesto is attempting to be that place, but I'm not sure how well it is going at the moment.
Well, you could say we lack one, lack a GOOD one, or that we constantly fight against any place that looks like it will BECOME that place... because in a business relationship with a portal, the guys downstream of the flow of money grow weaker and more dependent upon the guy upstream. So those kinds of arrangements are the very ones canny indies try to resist (or keep as non-exclusive as possible, so they can be commoditized).
Also, while that can work (I mean, I LOVE Amazon...), there's also something to be said for more decentralized system of specialty sites. For example, if I was looking up... I dunno, pulp mysteries of the 1930's... Amazon would NOT be the place to go, but I'll bet there are several sites on the Internet that could provide me with very detailed information on the subject. While those sites themselves might be part of the "long tail", they branch off into more tails the user can follow.
That's more how I envision things working, rather than replacing the existing EA with another EA that just happens to be more long-tail savvy.
This sentence makes very little sense? "When they want to it back two different ways, that's their call." Otherwise an interesting read.
# posted by : February 03, 2008 11:09 AM
: February 03, 2008 11:09 AM
You are correct, DragonL. I modified it for greater clarification. It now reads, "If they want to make it their investment money back two different ways - both profit on the game and in recouping the cost from the developer's royalties - that's their call."
The best explanation of this can be found in Scott Miller's Blog. He writes:
"Developers ALWAYS pay the development cost of their projects, regardless of who owns the IP!!!
"Let this sink in for a moment.
"You see, whether the game’s funding comes out of the dev studio’s own pocket, or the publisher advances the funding to the studio, either way the studio pays for the game’s development cost. A publisher's advance is a loan, and the loan gets paid back from the dev studio’s royalty stream.
"Publishers argue that they’re still taking on loads of risk in case the game doesn’t sell well enough for them to recoup their advance. But, the truth is that publishers can break even on a game well before the dev studio has repaid the advance. The payback of any particular game’s advance by the developer is not a reliable measure of a game’s profitability."
The best explanation of this can be found in Scott Miller's Blog. He writes:
"Developers ALWAYS pay the development cost of their projects, regardless of who owns the IP!!!
"Let this sink in for a moment.
"You see, whether the game’s funding comes out of the dev studio’s own pocket, or the publisher advances the funding to the studio, either way the studio pays for the game’s development cost. A publisher's advance is a loan, and the loan gets paid back from the dev studio’s royalty stream.
"Publishers argue that they’re still taking on loads of risk in case the game doesn’t sell well enough for them to recoup their advance. But, the truth is that publishers can break even on a game well before the dev studio has repaid the advance. The payback of any particular game’s advance by the developer is not a reliable measure of a game’s profitability."
Hello, The Rampant Coyote.
This is isdead, a indie cartoonist/game design from Korea.
I'm very interested in your article, so I want to translate this posting to Korean.
If you don't mind, please mail me, or reply on this. =)
You can find my information from Pig-Min, and here.
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This is isdead, a indie cartoonist/game design from Korea.
I'm very interested in your article, so I want to translate this posting to Korean.
If you don't mind, please mail me, or reply on this. =)
You can find my information from Pig-Min, and here.
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