Board 8 > How do you define an indie game?

(+) Yeah! (+)

I've been trying to consider what my favorite indie games are, but I feel like there's kind of a grey zone when it comes to what actually counts

for instance, I'd definitely call Journey an indie game, and probably one of the most significant indie games, even though it was published by Sony

but does that mean any game made by an independent developer but published by a major publisher is an indie game? because by that arguement, DMC: Devil May Cry is an indie game because it was developed by Ninja Theory, even though it's a Capcom game

there's a lot of games in that bubble, where some of them were published by major publishers but still feel like indies (The Unfinished Swan) but other don't (ex. 13 Sentinels)

It doesn't have money behind it

porn

It comes down to budget and how big the developer is. Commercial games may need a publisher.

anything from a studio or dev team of more than like, 50 people should be automatically disqualified unless it's like an unofficial fan project imo

and yeah no major commercial funding, it can be something picked up by a publisher of note but if it's marketed heavily (outside of like, explicitly indie showcases) it probably isn't one any more

unfinished swan extremely doesn't count under this criteria lol and it's a weird case for sure

I think to a large extent I've been going by vibes? Because without heavily researching each one it's hard to tell outright how many people worked on a game

but that's also pretty flawed, because something like Lies of P coming out here soon by all means seems like it should be an indie game even though it feels like a big studio game

Johnbobb posted...

by all means seems like it should be an indie game

nah neowiz is actually a gaming giant in korea i think (mostly because they do mobile games but still, they had money to put into it for sure lol)

UF8 posted...

nah neowiz is actually gaming giant in korea i think (mostly because they do mobile games but still, they had money to put into it for sure lol)

whoops that's what I get for assuming

I think I also often use price as a measurement (also not a flawless system obviously) where a $15 game is usually an indie game but a full price game is usually Triple A

I also don't know how pre-2000 games fall into this since I feel like at the time teams by default were smaller and less funded given the nature of the medium

but that might also be a wrong assumption

For me I always defined it as developed and published by an individual or the same studio but not explicitly connected to a large game publisher, but that probably isn't perfect and maybe a bit hard to draw lines.

It's definitely an "I know it when I see it" thing for me. I think I'd call the biggest criteria who has creative control. If there's a publisher/financier/etc telling the creator/devs what to do, it's not an indie game anymore.

I take it on a case-by-case basis.

Developer I haven't heard of? Probably indie.
Lack of a publisher? Probably indie.
Made by a small or small-ish team? Almost certainly indie.
Sells for less than $30 at release (without alternate monetization)? 100% indie.

And beyond that, I just look at the game. You can (usually) tell what's AAA, and what's indie, just from the graphics and the UI, albeit it may be more challenging to pinpoint the gray nether between the two.

Kenri posted...

I think I'd call the biggest criteria who has creative control. If there's a publisher/financier/etc telling the creator/devs what to do, it's not an indie game anymore.

Fair. Perhaps the most accurate way is to look at who the publisher is. There are certain publishers, like Annapurna and Devolver, where I wouldn't regard that as depriving a studio of their indie status. But then there's publishers like Gearbox, Bethesda, and the awful giants (Activision, EA, Ubisoft) where it's no longer in doubt who's going to be in charge of the game's direction.

One of the biggest challenges too is the size of the company at the time, which is hard to tell in hindsight

Is Psychonauts 2 an indie game? I don't think so. But is Psychonauts an indie game? It definitely feels like it!

another question, where do games like Hot Wheels Unleashed and Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl fall? Obviously major brands but also developed and published by small companies

I'd lean against calling them indie games, but they DO fall under like all the major criteria (small teams, limited budget, small developers) except they might not have had as much freedom of creation

Some games with publishers are still indie but one I am adamant about is that Bastion was not an indie game. It was funded by fucking Warner Bros.

This gets a lot harder when talking about games from the 90s and 80s

vibes

all and none of the above

MoogleKupo141 posted...

vibes

yep

Johnbobb posted...

another question, where do games like Hot Wheels Unleashed and Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl fall? Obviously major brands but also developed and published by small companies

I'd lean against calling them indie games, but they DO fall under like all the major criteria (small teams, limited budget, small developers) except they might not have had as much freedom of creation

licensed games are only indie if the license feels indie

so a Nickelodeon game? Never indie.

the Scott Pilgrim game? Indie. (Even though Im pretty sure its a Ubisoft joint)

If a studio develops one or more games with publisher backing, then takes that success to make more games in their own style, are the first games not indie but the later ones are?

Basically just anything that isn't published by one of the major legacy publishers or some other very large entity

WazzupGenius00 posted...

Some games with publishers are still indie but one I am adamant about is that Bastion was not an indie game. It was funded by fucking Warner Bros.

Every day 1 Gamepass game is funded by Microsoft. Does that make them not indie?

I get the literal meaning of independent, but games developed by a small studio that isn't entirely a subdivision of a big company are night and day with ones developed in-house by those publishers.

MacArrowny posted...

Every day 1 Gamepass game is funded by Microsoft. Does that make them not indie?

That's a marketing deal, not publishing

Is the studio not owned by a bigger company and the game not published by a publisher? Then its indie.

Of course this excludes Devolver and Annapurna games so its not a perfect definition as most of those would be defined as indie.

Do you get message board cred for playing it? If so, indie.

With a little less snark: this was somewhat-alluded to earlier, but it feels like the definition of indie has changed from decade to decade. That seems like a topic worth exploring.

Is Cadence of Hyrule, a game made by 22 people, an indie game?

Cadence of Hyrule is definitely borderline. Maybe indie-adjacent instead of pure indie.

MoogleKupo141 posted...

licensed games are only indie if the license feels indie

so a Nickelodeon game? Never indie.

the Scott Pilgrim game? Indie. (Even though Im pretty sure its a Ubisoft joint)

I was specifically going to ask about Cadence in response to this, considering Necrodancer is definitely indie.

Licensed properties make it unlikely that the license-holder won't meddle at all, but with Cadence, Nintendo seemed to be hands-off enough, or at least took on a collaborative role. It's sort of a unique situation. I'd still consider Nickelodeon possibly indie. There was severe meddling if not sabotage there, but Ludosity was developing in its own style and was barely funded at all.

By definition, no definition for this is gonna be great. You can get somewhat close but there's always strong exceptions.

imo the key part of being indie is being self-determinism, where it seems like the game could've been made regardless of any support. So it could have some publisher backing or outside investment, which could make it a triple-I studio, but the devs could've still done something without them at a smaller scope. This includes some big studios like Kojima though.

It's also fine to think of it as studio size. Small but well funded studios can be triple-I too (like Cadence, or The Witness). But there are also small studios withing Ubisoft or Valve who would fall under that.

one game that i was thinking about regarding this matter was fuga

i wouldn't necessarily count the other little tail bronx games, but i'd say fuga counts as indie despite being from a company that has 200ish members total and primarily does licensed anime games, purely because it was a self-funded trainee project in said company... that said, if it had been another naruto game instead i probably wouldn't have held the same view...

on the other hand, there was also that one case where Kadokawa produced an official Overlord game with supervision from the creator, official voice actors etc, yet that one is... probably still safe to call indie since even counting all of the sound team, localisation team etc it still only comes out to about 40 people, and it only happened because of a lone member of Kadokawa getting the green light for what was explained to be very much a passion project