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Hello? Yes, I do wish to terraform an entire planet.
Don't believe it?
Ask for proof that a thing is "good" and you will most often be handed sales numbers, quantities of reviews, or testimony from known figures.
It's ugly, wrong, and diminishes the subjectivity of our experiences, but must be considered if you wish to make a living in this machine.
There's a strong argument that economic value has overtaken cultural or qualitative values in many regards. The very concept that 'goodness' is detected by the market is a fallacy.
Awareness of your game must coincide with proximity to power, capital, or social leverage. Even more in a skeptic age.
Folks said the same thing back in 2021... and 2016... and...
Truth being, it's more of everything always, forever.
Simple as, there's a very finite number of people who buy vanity skins compared to those who buy amazing indie games, so you end up with this kind of crazy price imbalance.
Kinda like how a band T-shirt was 10x the cost of a CD.
Nothing in this world makes sense when valued evenly.
Money is fake.
Eight bucks is basically Five bucks, but 2,000 V-Bucks is basically 2,400 which is really like $22.99, but that's more like Twenty-Five bucks...
This is very true, and yet so many fresh developers shelve their best efforts because they don't want to feel like a ripoff or copycat, even when there's something new and unique in the mix.
Truth is, we all enjoy more of a good thing.
"Holy shit, two cakes!"
The great irony of AAA game dev is that often the fella with actual hands on keys gets fired during cutbacks, while the guy who points at screen receives a six-figure bonus.
Tough to balance the unconstrained imagination and the realities of completion, which gets worse in isolation.
Many indie devs are explosively creative, and redesign on behalf of hypothetical audiences or theoretical issues.
Get real playtesters!
Trust, there will be real feedback to react to.
As developer economies suffer, continuing to produce video games instead of surveillance, gambling, or military technology is an act of defiance against the coldness of reality.
Your talents can bring joy, which is a sustenance, whereas many other uses of your skills can only extract or exploit.
Indie games have always been alluring in-part because of the humanity behind them. We become aware of real people doing something personal and difficult, and grow attached because it is inspirational and heartening to witness.
Don't be shy, at least not deliberately.
Open yourself up, if you can.
Like most creative realms, our games industry is full of highly empathetic individuals and emotions often play a huge role in orchestration.
Being aware of feelings while developing better patience, understanding, and a willingness to listen will help you find greater potential than any raw matter.
There is this wonderful aspect to our minds (our literal brains) that can find just as much delight in a AAA blockbuster, or a little indie pixelshit, or even a just book.
If we deem the journey worthwhile, then it makes us happy.
Keep this in mind as the cutting edge tries to decimate your hope.
Anyone who's been in this industry long enough eventually realizes that at a core level, satisfaction has never been fulfilled by graphics.
Sometimes they enable new experiences (2D -> 3D) but sheer fidelity seldom contributes to the engagement that games provide, regardless of their appearance.
Beyond destroying artistic intent, the greatest issue with this DLSS 5 is the division in user experiences it will cause.
Players become siloed within visuals nobody had any say in, then come to review your game based on it.
What role will NVIDIA play in managing those inconsistent bug reports?
Is that a custom Walk / End Turn controller?!
Wow, money!
Interesting structure with indie devs paying up the publisher, rather than royalties retained and split back down.
Requires better indie accounting, but worthwhile for control.
Also cool there's more open contracts like those from @rawfury.bsky.social and @whitethorngames.bsky.social
Unfortunate to see more of these 'good will' attacks.
There's a rash of scams with folks posing as notable game developers or friends-of-friends, with pleas to "play my game!"
Running the .exe steals your passwords (or worse).
Only real answer is for everyone to rely on provable release channels.
Seems every cultured country of ample means realizes the economic uptick that comes from empowering their local games industry.
As grant recipients in Canada, and knowing others worldwide in Sweden, Australia, France, and elsewhere... we've seen first hand the growth these funds can help commence.
Another day, another game apocalypse!
While there will definitely be "casualties" in the most gluttonous projects, this is the kind of hardship where lean indies thrive by doing as much as they can with as little as possible.
Summon those ancient game dev spirits who worked magic with only 256 KB.
Don't haggle with artists.
Even though our culture insists upon the stupid dance of overshot and whittle-down, the difference in quality from satisfying unmet needs for creatives will outperform whatever you save avoiding their (very rare) overpay.
Budget can't match? Scrimp elsewhere if you can!
This can be subverted by digging in your heels and calling yourself an auteur while repeating "git gud" or "you don't get it" until you win a bunch of awards.
A bar graph showing the consistent rise in games releasing on Steam year-over-year, peaking in 2024 at 16,212 titles.
Over 10x more titles release on Steam today than when we first joined the games industry.
It used to be that making something novel and unique was a way of standing out from the crowd, but now it's sort of an essential defence against the absurd nihilism of it all.
Just go make whatever you want!
You can waste a lot of time trying to explain yourself and the things you're doing to people who will only try to conform your ideas to their preexisting mindset.
If you can game dev without validation, then tough out the long silence with confidence in yourself. It gets things done!
This presentation from @foddy.net is quite revelatory in terms of understanding the sort of motivations that can help you find your own unique style / voice / method in game dev.
Worthwhile for anyone doubting the pursuit of their own weirdness.
www.twitch.tv/videos/27148...
What made you decide to make games?
This ad is what got us started:
youtu.be/BRWvfMLl4ho
In your game development journey it isn't hard to find those willing take financial risk on your ventures. Where there is potential for profit (or exploitation), those with capital will appear on their own terms.
Finding those who will adopt your emotional investment is far more difficult and rare.
Now, over a decade later, there's hardly any such criticisms and people feel free to create with whatever tools they enjoy.
Part of this comes from more successful games across more engines, but also the popularization of an eternal truth:
Doesn't matter what you build with, making games is HARD!
One of the best things to happen in game dev culture since our retirement was the dissolve of engine elitism.
In our day we got so much flack from gatekeepers, just for using RPG Maker that it caused a real bad psychic weight.
Imposter syndrome slows progress, keeps great ideas down.