Indie game devs to follow

Filkata

Member
For some personal reasons, I have decided that I want to live and breathe indie game dev. So I would like to gather a list of influential indie game devs you find inspiring/give useful tips on how to be like them.

Some obvious ones I have started with are Game Dev Underground and Thomas Brush on Youtube, but I am looking for more, particularly blogs and Twitter.
 

ceaselessly

Member
Sort of an obvious one around these parts, but Shaun Spalding is the reason I started using Game Maker again after roughly eight years away. His tutorials are probably what he's best known for, but he also makes some really neat games, including Another Perspective. Beyond his GML tutorial videos & series, he has some more general game design videos I really like.
 
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zendraw

Guest
so you want to make games or just be passionate about making games?
 

Filkata

Member
so you want to make games or just be passionate about making games?
Fair point. I guess I need people from which to learn tips and tricks, more on the marketing, getting eyes on your game, everything about actually selling games besides actually making the game, hope this makes sense.
 
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zendraw

Guest
your core knowledge will come from experience one way or the other, do what you want but keep that in mind.
 
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zendraw

Guest
Would you not say that educating one's self is a part of their experience? ;)
no, knowing ready answers are not worth much and are like a temporary foundation for whatever your trying to educate yourself, you need to dive into practice and develope yourself in whatever aspect that activity requires, and you will see for yourself what it requires during the process, it will come like a natural need.
 
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Lonewolff

Guest
no, knowing ready answers are not worth much and are like a temporary foundation for whatever your trying to educate yourself
This isn't educating yourself.


you need to dive into practice and develope yourself in whatever aspect that activity requires, and you will see for yourself what it requires during the process, it will come like a natural need.
This is...
 

Niels

Member
Fair point. I guess I need people from which to learn tips and tricks, more on the marketing, getting eyes on your game, everything about actually selling games besides actually making the game, hope this makes sense.
The people started making YouTube video's to promote the game their working on.. It's all marketing
 
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pixeltroid

Member
Sure, but some of them do have insight on marketing I would like to know.
then check out the channel called "game dev underground".

IMO its one of the best game dev channels on youtube. The owner creates lots of good content about game marketing, among other things. :)
 
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debleb

Guest
Fair point. I guess I need people from which to learn tips and tricks, more on the marketing, getting eyes on your game, everything about actually selling games besides actually making the game, hope this makes sense.
Extra Credits has a few videos on marketing and managing your games. I believe they're a team of indie devs. Hope that helps.
 
You should make a game worth playing before you worry about marketing. If a game is good enough, it’ll spread like wildfire without you doing *anything* besides posting about it once in awhile on social media. There are no tricks. People just tell other people about things they like. The guys with “awesome marketing knowledge” are mostly marketing *themselves* by constantly posting bull💩💩💩💩 that young hopefuls eat up and regurgitate.

Every awesome indie game I’ve seen just exploded on release or through social media, depending on the type of game. Gamers are a RIDICULOUSLY savvy audience. Make something awesome, and you’ll get noticed.

The one “trick” to marketing that works is spending lots of money on marketing. That’s not a useful tip for most people though, lol.

How far along are you on your game?
 

Filkata

Member
I am nowhere near where I need to worry about marketing, I'll admit that :) You are the first person to give this advice, all I've heard from others is that you need to be soo focused on marketing.
 
Extra Credits has a few videos on marketing and managing your games. I believe they're a team of indie devs. Hope that helps.
I wouldn't recommend Extra Credits. They only tackle issues at the surface level. Rarely, if ever, do they give explicit examples of what they're talking about. Everything is ethereal; like the entire situation they're describing is theoretical. Lately I've also heard they've had some hot takes on shooters turning you into a Nazi. The part that really annoys me is how they constantly appeal to James Portnow's "expertise" for whatever game mechanic they're talking about. He isn't even a developer. He's a "game designer and consultant" whose only major credits I'm aware of are narrative design consulting for Call of Duty and Farmville. Their history videos are also hilariously inaccurate. If they put the same level of effort used for their history videos into their gamedev videos, I don't trust anything that comes out of their un-animated mouths.

Sorry if I got a bit heated there. Some channels I would definitely recommend are:
 
Extra Credits has a few videos on marketing and managing your games. I believe they're a team of indie devs. Hope that helps.
I think they're friends with an indie dev, or maybe the narrator is the indie dev writing in third person and gets someone else to narrate it? It's tough to know sometimes. Ah I see from their wiki that it's written by the game dev... so when the narrator talks about his friend James, if it's written about his friend James and James is the writer, it's the third person thing and wow that just demystified the entire channel for me:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extra_Credits

I am nowhere near where I need to worry about marketing, I'll admit that :) You are the first person to give this advice, all I've heard from others is that you need to be soo focused on marketing.
How do you expect people to discover your game if you don't promote it? Having your games in your signature is promotion. Twitter is promotion. While both can be considered "you need to market to players, not developers" it's a good start to get the ball rolling and get noticed by Youtubers and publishers, who will then promote your game with their reach.

You can't dump your game onto a website and expect them to promote it. You need to show people why you're special so they recognize your game.
 

Niels

Member
then check out the channel called "game dev underground".

IMO its one of the best game dev channels on youtube. The owner creates lots of good content about game marketing, among other things. :)
Too bad he seems to have dissappeared from the earth when he released his first game haha
 
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zendraw

Guest
I wouldn't recommend Extra Credits. They only tackle issues at the surface level. Rarely, if ever, do they give explicit examples of what they're talking about. Everything is ethereal; like the entire situation they're describing is theoretical. Lately I've also heard they've had some hot takes on shooters turning you into a Nazi. The part that really annoys me is how they constantly appeal to James Portnow's "expertise" for whatever game mechanic they're talking about. He isn't even a developer. He's a "game designer and consultant" whose only major credits I'm aware of are narrative design consulting for Call of Duty and Farmville. Their history videos are also hilariously inaccurate. If they put the same level of effort used for their history videos into their gamedev videos, I don't trust anything that comes out of their un-animated mouths.

Sorry if I got a bit heated there. Some channels I would definitely recommend are:
i also very dislike extra credits, and this from alot of time. all theyr conclusions and videos about subjects are just delusional, probably based mostly on theyr dreams and a popular opinion then anything else.
 
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