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I think there has been some windows of opportunity for single-developers teams. - In the 80's and 90's when PC games where simple enough. - At the beginning o

I think there has been some windows of opportunity for single-developers teams. - In the 80's and 90's when PC games where simple enough. - At the beginning of Steam - At the beginning of the App Store and the Play Store At those time, there wasn't that much competition so while it was still hit or miss, you still had a decent chance to be successful as a single-person indie developer.

kayoone 8y ago
true, the first generation of successful iphone and android games that made their authors rich were extremely simple remakes of classic games.
eksemplar 8y ago
I remember buying games in the 80ies and 90ies, I’d go to a supermarket and rummage through a mixed box with literal hundreds of different $5 games and pick the one that looked the most exciting. The biggest treasure I found that way was the original x-com. I don’t think times have changed that much. The upcoming game I’m most excited by is it lurks below, and that’s being developed by a single developer. Stardew Valley released in 2016, after the explosion. Into the breach, though not single developer did well in 2018. I mean, it’s not uncommon for solo-small teams to top the steam charts, but you really do need both quality and a little luck. I just don’t think that’s different from how it’s always been, and I think the author of this article in particular lacks quality. What has changed though is the amount of games people own. In the 90ies you didn’t have a backlog of thousands of games that you picked up from a humble bundle where you only really wanted one game. You also didn’t have MMOs or forthnite competing for your attention. So I agree with you somewhat, it’s become much harder to sell bad-mediocre games in the past few years, and that’s 99% of indie games. And there is obviously always a market for remakes when a new platform/generation arrives.

kayoone 8y ago

true, the first generation of successful iphone and android games that made their authors rich were extremely simple remakes of classic games.

eksemplar 8y ago

I remember buying games in the 80ies and 90ies, I’d go to a supermarket and rummage through a mixed box with literal hundreds of different $5 games and pick the one that looked the most exciting. The biggest treasure I found that way was the original x-com. I don’t think times have changed that much. The upcoming game I’m most excited by is it lurks below, and that’s being developed by a single developer. Stardew Valley released in 2016, after the explosion. Into the breach, though not single developer did well in 2018. I mean, it’s not uncommon for solo-small teams to top the steam charts, but you really do need both quality and a little luck. I just don’t think that’s different from how it’s always been, and I think the author of this article in particular lacks quality. What has changed though is the amount of games people own. In the 90ies you didn’t have a backlog of thousands of games that you picked up from a humble bundle where you only really wanted one game. You also didn’t have MMOs or forthnite competing for your attention. So I agree with you somewhat, it’s become much harder to sell bad-mediocre games in the past few years, and that’s 99% of indie games. And there is obviously always a market for remakes when a new platform/generation arrives.