What is an Indie?
This question has plagued the gaming industry for a while. There have been many discussions, rants, arguments, hit articles, grift content and trolling all in the name of trying to parse out what an Indie Game or Indie Publisher actually is. This article is prompted by a good article I read in Kotaku of all places. The piece was well written and not click baitey but actually was a thought piece looking into, not only the writer’s preconceived idea of what an indie is (of which he is VERY clear) but also gathering arguments and thoughts from various places. The article was prompted because Clare Obscura: Expedition 33 was nominated (or nominated themselves it wasn’t very clear) for awards at an indie only game award. The Kotaku writer, John Walker, was of the mindset that Sandfall should not be nominated in an indie only game award. The reasons, to be fair, are all reasonable ones for the most part, but I feel it doesn’t come any closer to clearing this up.
The most basic of definitions is a game that is self-published by an independent studio that is self-funded. Basically, a studio (from one to multiple developers but it is really an unwritten rule it should be a small studio in essence) that self-funds and self-publishes a game. This definition does not really fit 90% of indie devs anymore.
In the article John Walker states that the definition of Indie is of little to no interest to most people and only really is discussed, if strongly, by the people who care about the context of how a game was made. He brings up a good comparison to indie music. The indie music scene went through a similar process from a self-published artists or band through small record labels that were designed to support releasing their music (and then becoming larger labels through this or being subsumed into the bigger record labels) to a situation where Indie music is not recognisable to the people who started it. Indie games have hit the same wall. The definition most people come up with is identical to how people describe ‘proper’ indie music. It’s a ‘vibe’ you get from the game. Now of course that ‘vibe’ is difficult to explain and definitely has a range from person to person. But I think on the whole many people can get behind this definition even if there is a great amount of wiggle room there. He stipulated that we all cannot agree what an indie is but we can for the most part agree what it is not. I disagree with this to a degree as quite clearly many people feel that Expedition 33 is an indie game.
Looking at the basic definition of indie that’s makes up the name of the game category is the fact that the studio needs to be independent. This is almost the easiest of the categorisations and stipulations that many can agree on. There are developers like Mahjong, Double Fine and Mini Rocket that are owned in part or completely by a big developer or publisher. If these developers where independent there would be little argument as to whether they were indie or not but just being owned by a larger entity eliminates them from the category as expressed by many people when Dave the Diver was added to the indie category at an awards ceremony. At least in this there is virtually complete agreement.
When it comes to the article, aside from the game not feeling indie, he states the size of the team as a very big sticking point for him. I think this is another very vague and fluid description of an indie game defining it based on the number of people who worked on the game. Expedition 33 had 30 odd core people but did indeed use contractors to complete work they either didn’t have the skills to do or the time or they wanted someone who could do it well to create the polished look they wanted. He also describes Clare Obscure: Expedition 33 as a ‘behemoth’ when compared to other indies and although I realise this a comparison made for effect, I really don’t think you can call Expedition 33 a behemoth other than in its appeal and the narrative it has generated. The core development team started with 3-4 devs and friends of the lead developer and grew as the project went along. As stated in multiple interviews the team had to all wear many hats at points during the development. They did what they needed to get the job done. This to me sounds very much like an Indie dev. The second lead writer was in fact cast as a voice actor initially and later joined after becoming enamoured with the project. Again very indie dev. They used a composer they found on SoundCloud that had never done any work on games before and in fact was a complete unknown composer for all intents and purposes. Once again, very indie. I see that people see the complete list of people who worked on the game and are rightly confused but when all is said and done Sandfall was made up of 32 devs and a dog. I believe they may have now or in the future employed more people but their intension, from interviews I have seen, is to remain small and continue to use outsourced contractors to streamline work and complete work they do not have the skills to do.
Although the team size is a compelling characteriser of an indie developer, deciding on a final number is very difficult. There is the above-mentioned definer of core vs total number of developers credited. On top of that what is an acceptable number? Team Cherry is 1-10 people depending on the day. Supergiant is 25. Larian is 500. AdHoc who created the well-received Dispatch recently, is 30-40. So where do we agree to draw the line? I fee we should work on the number of core developers, but again another definition is needed here as is core developers the number directly employed by the studio? How much of overall the work attributed to someone needs to be done before they are included if they are a contractor? I think there is a consensus that Larian is not an indie dev but they used to be. Are Supergiant and AdHoc indie at 40ish developers? Do we need to be below 30? 20? 10? This will be more of a ‘vibe’ thing again.
The publisher argument is interesting and to me it is a snake eating its own tail situation. There are now indie specific publishers that are massive but are more about diversity of games and a large number of smaller games rather than overall sales of say an EA or Sony. They publish many games from multiple studios but overall, these studios don’t sell as many copies on average and many of the games would never have been made without these publishers being there to find funding or to act as the funding stream for these developers. The expectations are also lower in reality as there is not an expectation to sell millions of copies. Publishers like Devolver, Team17, Tiny Build, Raw Fury, Hooded Horse, Coffee Stain, Curve, 11 Bit and so on have all built a reputation for finding and publishing good games. This must be a boon for a studio as if their game is published by one of the well know publishers, it is a stamp of approval that is recognised by the gaming community. This sign of quality has been built up over many years by said publishers. If you see a game is being published by, say Devolver, you know there has already been a significant amount of quality control done. Another benefit is exposure. It is well documented that to even be seen on Steam is 90% of the battle especially for indie devs. Having one of these well know and recognised publishers behind you with their marketing team to help generate buzz and exposure must be a god sent.
Things have changed a lot in the gaming space and with over 19K games released last year on Steam, finding your audience and getting your head above the pulpit is a worrying and energy draining task. When the initial wave of indie games came out there was more room to be noticed and fewer time sink games like Fortnite and DOTA/League to contend with. You also had a group of gamers who actively searched these games out. There were many content creators and areas within mainstream gaming media dedicated to finding and elevating indie games. Now due to the sheer volume of small, developed games this is an impossible task. This is another area the publishers help. In general (and very loosely) if a game is published by a specific publisher, you have an idea what sort of game it will be. Devolver games have a very similar feel to one another as do Team17, Hooded Horse and so on. If you like the games a publisher publishes, you will likely like a new game they are publishing.
There are also developers who can build on and benefit from previous success. Team Cherry, Larian (although I feel they are firmly in AA edging towards AAA now) and Supergiant all benefited from their previous games being a success and often this has been built up over multiple games that expanded on the success of the previous game. This is almost a way I feel to categorise when a developer stops being indie. When Larian had huge success with Divinity Original Sin (specifically with the second one) they stopped being an indie dev. Team Cherry’s success with Hollow Knight (believed to be in excess of 15mill copies) paved the way for Silksong to be made and made with little time pressure. Supergiant had bigger and bigger success until Hades (believed to be 8-10mil sales on Steam alone) left room for Hades 2 to be made in relative comfort.
One of the biggest sticking points is budget but it leads to the question how big/small a budget is allowed to be before the developer loses the indie label? With budgets ballooning in all forms of game development the development cost over the last 10yrs has expanded exponentially. Some examples are Factorio had 3.5mil sales and had a budget in the region of $7-$10mil. Stardew Valley was a single developer that sold 41mill copies with development cost less than $1mill. Hollow Knight had 15mil sales with a budget made up of $57K from a Kickstarter campaign with overall budget in the low millions with additional funding from sales. Cult of the Lamb sold 4.5mill copies and had a budget of $500K. Expedition 33 had sales over 5Mill and budget that has been estimated around $30mill. All of these show that the budgets and sales of various indie games are vastly different and are really not a good judge of whether the game is indie or not. Defining what is the upper budget in the current gaming market is more difficult than when the original indie games released.
The overall problem, in my opinion, is the category is just too diverse, with Stardew Vally being pitted against games like Mega Bonk and Balatro and for all intense and purposes Baldur’s Gate 3. Even those first three games are so diverse and the appeal of the individual games so personal, that they cannot be compared. The diversity within indies is one of its greatest strengths. A developer can make a game that is concise, focused and aimed very specifically at a particular audience. This can be done because they don’t need to sell 30Mill copies unlike AAA or AA games. Baldur’s Gate 3 could not have sold 1-5mill copies but rather needed the suggested 18mill it has sold.
I think the indie fanbase are a very positive but protective fanbase. They are hyper aware of the trials and tribulations indie developers go through to make a game that is often very vision focussed. We all love an underdog story and love rooting for the little guy. Often when discussing this subject and developers like Sandfall come up they seem to describe them as a hulking brute entering a weightlifting competition for under 10’s. I don’t think that is entirely fair and not at all the same thing. Rather it is more like a very strong 9yr old entering that competition. You are asking someone who fits the category to not enter into the category to give the other kids a chance. Sandfall did what many of the other developers could have done but didn’t for whatever reason.
I would like to add a thought that is derived from that ‘vibe’ that people speak about. I would like to detail one of my favourite developers that was always counted as indie until they were bought by Microsoft. I am speaking of Double Fine. While watching a documentary about the studio one thing that repeatedly struck me was something that I feel feeds into that ‘vibe’ and the need we have to cheer on the underdog. Double Fine always seemed to be on the edge. Each game they put out seemed to be a miracle, was driven by design and the want to see their creative vison out and each game was aimed at a specific audience with the understanding that not everybody will like or want to play it. But the main thing I noticed, and to me is the definition of an indie studio, is the feeling of fearing to fail and it being the end of the studio. Every game Tim Schafer and his team put out was a last ditch effort and a monumental task. Psychonaughts cost $11Mill to make and initially sold only 400K copies but eventually sold over 1.5mill copies over its lifetime. I would love to compare it to Psychonaghts 2 but the sales numbers haven’t been released, it was also on Game Pass day one as well as Double Fine being bought by Microsoft. Double Fine have created many classic games that seemed to be well received but generally sold few copies and are seen as commercial flops. This is why I don’t ‘feel’ or have a ‘vibe’ that developers like Supergiant, Team Cherry and Moon Studios are indie anymore. Due to various factors, there is less of a fear of failure or there being a direct and immediate threat to the studio. Sure their next game could be a disaster, however unlikely, but there is a significant chance the studio will be fine overall.
This is why I feel studios like Sandfall are indie. The game ticked all the boxes until it was successful. If Expedition 33 hadn’t been a critical success, universally loved, sold many copies or overall been seen as darling of both the critics and gamers, I feel we would be having a very different conversation. People would be crying it was an overlooked gem, that what the developers achieved with the little they had was amazing, there would be no mention of the contractors (or it would be less of a conversation point) and there would be praise for them sticking to their vision and creating something that was unique. Now I will add very quickly and strongly that they are no longer an indie studio as the success they have built for themselves leaves them in a very strong position for their next game. They are in the AA studio now similar to Larian. But building up to the release and eventual success of the game they never knew if the game would find an audience or even be completed for that matter. It wasn’t until they had funding streams and Game Pass money, that they were able to polish and add to the game with some confidence and certainty. If you look at the released character models from 2019, they had a very different look and polish compared to the final product.
Mike Towndrow creative director of Six One Indie Showcase’s definition of an indie studio is ‘a developer having the independent freedom to create in an unrestricted environment and fully swing for the fences in realising their vision.’ I really like this definition. Although I think all the various talking points should be added into the mix as budget, staff numbers and the ‘vibe’ are all important. In Sandfall’s situation I feel we should cheer their success and give them all the praise they deserve with the understanding that they are no longer part of the indie developers but due to their vision and hard work they have moved on.