Ichiro Lambe on 9 Common Indie Mistakes

Posted by Rampant Coyote on November 28, 2012

Have I made every single one of these? Hmmm… No! No, I don’t think I’ve done #3 yet, at least not as an indie. But all of the rest of ’em, yeas, I think I have. Even the ones I am careful to tell other people not to make.

The 9 Common Mistakes Every Indie Studio Should Avoid

Like indie games, it’s a small but really cool article.

My own commentary may only be gilding the lily, but…

Do thou as I say, not as I do. Do not make big games! 🙂  Make a small game, and trust me, it WILL grow! Items #1, #2, and #9 all really speak to the same thing… the tendency for an indie to make THE GAME, the one they have their heart set on, which is inevitably impossible within indie constraints.Even with Frayed Knights, after I thought I’d aggressively scoped everything, AND chopped it into three pieces, it still ended up being something a lot larger and more complex than I’d imagined.  RPGs have a tendency to do that.

It’s hard. Unless you are falling prey to #3 – a completely mercenary project – game development is about passion. And if you are passionate about something, it’s hard to accept anything less than perfect.  But if perfection is unattainable, then this means you are always going to fall short and fail in one way or another.  It’s just the way it works, in any medium, any artistic endeavor.  Best to learn to live with it early, acknowledge that the perfect is the enemy of the good, and get cracking on the next game.

Points 4,5, and 8 are all about the need to juggle, as an indie.  Indie game development – unless you are just tinkering in your bedroom for a game you never intend to release – is about far, far more than making a game. Frustrating, but true. There are always a zillion other things you should be doing to give your game a prayer of actually being played outside your own circle of friends, and most of the time we’d rather be making games.  And there’s a zillion other things you have to know in order to do the zillion things you need to do. Just acknowledge this,  and add those tasks to your already lengthy list, and do what you can.

Filed Under: Game Development - Comments: Comments are off for this article



top