Vault Dweller Soapbox: How to Survive the Indiepocalypse in 5 Easy Steps

[mondblut]

Step 1: Make a non-game pushing a SJW agenda.
Step 2: Conscript some twitter trannies to promote it among other twitter trannies.

Instant stronky indypyndy success.

 

[mondblut]

Troika game:
What the player experiences: You walk into a bar. The bartender greets you with a fine "Hello Stranger! Come and enjoy a pint of ale on the house!" At this point, you shoot an arrow through his neck.... he drops dead, the bar maid and most of the patrons freak out and run for the door... You laugh maniacally until you notice some guy in the corner (who happens to be the bartenders' brother in law enjoying a pint himself) unsheathing his vorpal sword and coming after you with bloody vengeance in his eyes... You kill him too and take his sword. You search the inn and find a key underneath a bottle of whiskey behind the bar. The key opens a lockbox upstairs in his room where you find a map.

Then you reload and do it the "regular game idea" way anyway, because the entire town is now hostile, all the ongoing quests are botched and the potential ones inaccessible, and there is no point to continue other than for autistic lulz.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Step 1: Make a non-game pushing a SJW agenda.
Step 2: Conscript some twitter trannies to promote it among other twitter trannies.

Instant stronky indypyndy success.

http://www.polygon.com/2015/6/22/88...io-will-no-longer-make-games-after-commercial

 

[Immortal]

VD it's obvious you game dev for the passion of it and not for the pay check.. But there is something to be said about not living hand to mouth and hoping your next game just at least covers the pizza and rent..

Have you considered releasing RPG's with more broad appeal? Or is your moral scruples too high a price to pay?

 

[Severian Silk]

Not sure what VD did in AoD that was so original.

• Recycled gameplay elements from Fallout.
• Recycled pagan Roman setting.
• Every character is the same exact asshole personality type.

On the other hand.

• Graphics are okay.

 

[Mustawd]

lol

 

[Immortal]

VD basically copied Tyranny..

 

[Lurker King]

Not sure what VD did in AoD that was so original.

• Recycled gameplay elements from Fallout.
• Recycled pagan Roman setting.
• Every character is the same exact asshole personality type.

On the other hand.

• Graphics are okay.

You can attest that the reception of AoD among codexers is improving over time if you compare haters earlier posts with the most recent ones.

Severian Silk posts

7 years ago: VD knows nothing about game design. Teleport hell lolollol

1 year ago: I don’t have any interest in this shit developer.

1 month ago: AoD is a good game among others.

Today: AoD has nothing original and has some gameplay elements in common with FO.

This is the PR magic happening, baby! What happened, Silk? Did Roxor’s positive review made you change your mind? No? Well, maybe VD is just bribing you. That is what is really happening here, guys!

 

[Lurker King]

^This interview is the reason I registered to the Codex, it's the best RPG-related interview I've ever read.

Did he made the game or not? If the guy he quoted quit, the interview is not very inspiring.

 

[mondblut]

Step 1: Make a non-game pushing a SJW agenda.
Step 2: Conscript some twitter trannies to promote it among other twitter trannies.

Instant stronky indypyndy success.

http://www.polygon.com/2015/6/22/88...io-will-no-longer-make-games-after-commercial

They did it wrong. Should have spent less time making a non-game and more time crying soggy knees on twatter.

In other words, failed at step 2.

 

[Vault Dweller]

VD it's obvious you game dev for the passion of it and not for the pay check.. But there is something to be said about not living hand to mouth and hoping your next game just at least covers the pizza and rent..

Have you considered releasing RPG's with more broad appeal? Or is your moral scruples too high a price to pay?

It's not the moral scruples. Once you start changing design that you like to sell more copies where do you draw the line? Might as well do what you like without giving a fuck about who likes what and let the market sort it out. If enough people like our design, great, we'll experiment some more and try new things. If not...

 

[LESS T_T]

Step 1: Make a non-game pushing a SJW agenda.
Step 2: Conscript some twitter trannies to promote it among other twitter trannies.

Instant stronky indypyndy success.

Seriously, most of the (financially) successful indie games are gameplay-centric games. Non-games in general sunk so hard.

 

[mondblut]

Seriously, most of the (financially) successful indie games are gameplay-centric games.

The grand total of 10 of them, out of a million which went unbought and unnoticed by anybody.

OTOH, a tranny walking sim is all but guaranteed to find xir loyal customer every single time. As an added bonus, you don't even need to actually ship the finished "game"

 

[BlackGoat]

Oh?

http://www.polygon.com/2015/6/22/88...io-will-no-longer-make-games-after-commercial

 

[mondblut]

In other words, failed at step 2.

 

[BlackGoat]

Derp

 

[Severian Silk]

As an added bonus, you don't even need to actually ship the finished "game"

 

[Viata]

Great article.

Got some questions about one thing here and there:

Your game has to stand out. It has to do at least one thing extremely well, preferably something that hasn’t been done before. Why be an indie game developer if not to try new things, right?

But what if I want to make a game that has nothing new going with it, but is purely love from a genre that is p. much dead now(survival horror like old Silent Hill, for example) or a genre that I love but hardly has a new game(wiz-clones, for example[8 not included in this question])? Should I give up on this idea if I want to stay alive on this industry? Keep in mind that I'm asking this(while ignoring the whole 'do what your love' thing) because of the whole 'staying alive on this industry' idea. It's kinda sad that you made a game that you love, spend money and time on it, to not only see it being a failure but having to give up and go back to a boring job. I mean, would you give up had AoD been a failure? The whole reason you are making a new game, if I understood right, is thanks to AoD selling well.

So you make a game on enthusiasm, use what it earned to make a second game, use what it earned to make a third game, etc.

Doesn't this keep you in a loop that as soon as one game is a failure, all hell breaks loose and you are fucked? It seems like the reason you are making a game is to be able to make another game(which makes sense, you want your game to sell well to make more games), but what happens if one of them is a failure? As an indie developer, failure may be fatal in some cases. It's for non-indies, too.

All step 4

This is the best advice for one that wants to stay alive. But it's a dangerous one, though. The recycle thing, if selling well, may keep you recycling over and over and we got 10 editions of Fives Nights at Freddy.

Also, is not going out in forums, sites and whatnot telling about your game still marketing? It's cheaper to go out and do it yourself, it also makes people trust you more if they are talking with the developer directly.

Again, great article. Bookmarked for future re-readings.

 

[Viata]

^This interview is the reason I registered to the Codex, it's the best RPG-related interview I've ever read.

Did he made the game or not? If the guy he quoted quit, the interview is not very inspiring.

http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/michael-mccarthys-dropship.16652/
Nope.

Fake edit:
This is the only thing related about the game I could find:
https://web.archive.org/web/20090709102519/http://appliedcinematics.com/Applied_Dropship.html
Website still exist, but the guy, who was one of the two founders, is now working as creative director at Zynga.

 

[Mozg]

But what if I want to make a game that has nothing new going with it, but is purely love from a genre that is p. much dead now(survival horror like old Silent Hill, for example) or a genre that I love but hardly has a new game(wiz-clones, for example[8 not included in this question])? Should I give up on this idea if I want to stay alive on this industry?

Stardew Moneygeyser was an old gameplay revival

 

[Viata]

I don't think Harvest Moon is a dead game, mate. Every console has one, unlike old Survival Horror. But yeah, can see where you coming from.

 

[thesheeep]

Step 1: Make a non-game pushing a SJW agenda.
Step 2: Conscript some twitter trannies to promote it among other twitter trannies.

Instant stronky indypyndy success.

http://www.polygon.com/2015/6/22/88...io-will-no-longer-make-games-after-commercial

Haha, that thing.
I know an artist who has worked for some time on the project - from what I've heard, it was a complete desaster and lack of communication in all directions.

 

[kangaroodev]

Pretty funny (and true) article, thanks for sharing

 

[ZagorTeNej]

I’m talking about numbers here. What is the proportion of classics per period? Maybe we have three classics per decade? My point is that if you unintentionally compare the set of all classics from past decades with any recent crop of good games, things will always look like shit because the sample is too uneven. 10 years of game design cannot beat 40 years. That is what I’m trying to say.

Well let's take the gaming period of say 1992-2004 (2005 being the year in which multiplatform garbage and XBawks started to fully plague the industry), classics off the top of my head (a number of genres included, not just CRPGs):

-Ultima 7
-Doom
-Wizardry 7
-Betrayal at Krondor
-System Shock
-Hexen
-Ultima Underworld 1 and 2
-Daggerfall
-Fallout
-Quake
-Jagged Alliance 2
-Warcraft I and II
-Starcraft
-Myth TFL and Soublighter
-Planescape Torment
-Thief 1 and 2
-BG2 (I know, I know, butts are hurt but it has been a staple member of Codex top 5 for years)
-Gothic I and II (NOTR)
-Unreal
-Half-Life
-Arcanum
-Deus Ex
-Morrowind (arguably)
-VTM Bloodlines

Mind you I'm sure I left out a few (and grouped original and the sequel in few instances) and I don't give many bonus points for innovation/being a pioneer, it's much more about the game's quality.

Let's compare it to 2005-2016:

-Knights of the Chalice
-Risen (just the first one which is a good execution of the Gothic formula, the rest in the series is garbage)
-FEAR (for gunplay alone)
-STALKER
-FNV (though I personally can't stand that fucking console garbage engine)
-Age of Decadence
-Underrail
-Sits maybe
-D:OS arguably

Eh, that's about it I guess. It's the reason why nostalgia argument (which regretably is starting to pop out even on the Codex more and more lately) fails to convince me every single time. Of course all of this is heavily based on my perceptions and preferences but that's always the case really.

 

[Mustawd]

I think it's a simpler matter than most people realize, the most productive (when it comes to quality, not quantity) period of gaming was basically basement dwelling, tabletop playing nerds making games for other nerds, there's not much more to it. Once the industry got too big and moved away from that and the quality of games predictably plumetted with a few indie gems here and there peeking out of a huge pile of mediocre garbage.

I think that a lot of the productivity of that era was mainly due to the fact that the genre was being created. But I do agree with you that the broadening of the market killed a lot of experimentation.

If you were to put in a lot of resources to make a Wizardry or M&M style game, how many people would care? There have been blobbers released in the past 5 years, and the codex basically yawned. What do you think the rest of the market would do? "What...turn based movement and combat? I'm relegated to grid movement? No romances? Gross!" I'm surprised the new Bard's Tale did as well as it did. There are some sensibilities that would fly in the old era, that just are just hard for a modern audience to stomach.

Another factor is the fact that resources are less of an issue. So there's no need to be creative. Wanna see combat in first person? Put it in first person! Want to ride around vast amounts of countryside? Create a countryside! There's no reason for devs to make games in a creative way since the inherent limitations of the old days are basically gone.