4 ms·

Better advice: Pick another industry, no field is nearly as competitive and difficult to make a profit in as indie-games. Most industries you have a handful o

by soup10 13y ago

Better advice: Pick another industry, no field is nearly as competitive and difficult to make a profit in as indie-games. Most industries you have a handful of relevant competitors. In indie games you have thousands, most of which are some combination of better funded, better connected, and more experienced. Combined with the fact that it's a hits based market, where only a few games make a majority of the wealth.... Most indie game devs would do much better salary wise working a 9-5. /gamedev cynicism

andrewb 13y ago
With no backing data, my reasoning would be it's the ideal time to jump into the industry. Before the iPhone, I can only imagine how hard it'd be for developers to handle the business side of building a game, e.g. purchasing, delivery, website hosting, etc. Now a days you have multiple mobile app stores, Kickstarter, Greenlight, Humble Bundle, etc.
- kayoone 13y ago
  Barriers to entry are extremely low, thats why you have an incredible amount of competition fighting for gamer attention. So in the past it was harder, but there were also a lot less people doing it.
  - eropple 13y ago
    The good news, such as it is, is that most of that competition is shit. The quantity of games is huge. The quantity of ones people play is not, and generally correlates with quality. Be interesting, be notable, and find ways to differentiate, and you have a much better chance. Get on Greenlight, get on Steam, be excellent enough to get on the radar of the new consoles (indie dev programs for both are underway). This is not easy, but it isn't impossible--I know two devs building their first game with a PS4 target. (Also, avoiding the mobile market is probably wise. Competition is a lot harder there, and the games people generally gravitate towards so much simpler, that the barriers really are low there.)
Kiro 13y ago
I think the indie game dev industry is like the EDM scene where the really talented bedroom producers rise to stardom very easily while it's nearly impossible for everyone else.
daliusd 13y ago
I have no idea which industry is not competitive if it is programming related.

by soup10 13y ago

andrewb 13y ago

With no backing data, my reasoning would be it's the ideal time to jump into the industry. Before the iPhone, I can only imagine how hard it'd be for developers to handle the business side of building a game, e.g. purchasing, delivery, website hosting, etc. Now a days you have multiple mobile app stores, Kickstarter, Greenlight, Humble Bundle, etc.

kayoone 13y ago
Barriers to entry are extremely low, thats why you have an incredible amount of competition fighting for gamer attention. So in the past it was harder, but there were also a lot less people doing it.
- eropple 13y ago
  The good news, such as it is, is that most of that competition is shit. The quantity of games is huge. The quantity of ones people play is not, and generally correlates with quality. Be interesting, be notable, and find ways to differentiate, and you have a much better chance. Get on Greenlight, get on Steam, be excellent enough to get on the radar of the new consoles (indie dev programs for both are underway). This is not easy, but it isn't impossible--I know two devs building their first game with a PS4 target. (Also, avoiding the mobile market is probably wise. Competition is a lot harder there, and the games people generally gravitate towards so much simpler, that the barriers really are low there.)

Kiro 13y ago

I think the indie game dev industry is like the EDM scene where the really talented bedroom producers rise to stardom very easily while it's nearly impossible for everyone else.

daliusd 13y ago

I have no idea which industry is not competitive if it is programming related.