5 tips for no-bull indie game design
Game Developer
OCTOBER 24, 2024
Solo VR dev Zander Dejah, formerly gameplay programmer on Vader Immortal, explores finding the fun with Vendetta Forever.
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Game Developer
OCTOBER 24, 2024
Solo VR dev Zander Dejah, formerly gameplay programmer on Vader Immortal, explores finding the fun with Vendetta Forever.
Game Developer
NOVEMBER 1, 2023
Indie designers and artists discuss different ways to make sexuality and intimacy more common in game design.
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PreMortem.Games
OCTOBER 11, 2023
The game immerses players in a captivating odyssey across worlds within worlds, beckoning them to master the art of world-leaping mechanics to uncover a cosmic mystery. Cocoon is the first venture of Geometric Interactive , a Danish indie studio founded by Carlsen and his ex-Playdead colleague, Jakob Schmid.
GamesIndustry.biz
JULY 8, 2024
Jennifer and Bjorn Pankratz – who previously served Piranha Bytes as story and game designer and creative director, respectively – hope to "develop immersive and fantastic indie games " at their new start-up, Pithead, which was formed on July 4, 2024.
Game Dev Unchained
MAY 9, 2023
The Transformative Landscape of Game Development: A Deep Dive with Willem Delventhal As a digital ecosystem thrives and transforms at a rapid pace, a recent conversation with game designer and educator Willem Delventhal offered insights into the evolving realm of game development.
PreMortem.Games
JANUARY 29, 2024
More and more South-Korean indie game developers take aim at the PC and console market. Set in a New York office building in the 1990’s, the game plays out as a action-filled mini series, including cutscenes that unravel the plot. “To Si-wooks’s deep passion for game development inspired Hee-sang to take a leap of faith.
Game Wisdom
MAY 25, 2023
The Clash of Choices in Game Design Josh Bycer josh@game-wisdom.com One of the many balancing acts of game design is the act of creating cool, interesting, unique, abilities for the player to use, and then balancing said abilities within the scope and design of your game.
PreMortem.Games
JANUARY 10, 2024
Some publishers now accept games that have undergone Kickstarter campaigns, emphasizing a focus on future collaboration and development potential. Some even engage in Kickstarter campaigns for indie games or support them financially. Kickstarter is viewed as a proof of concept and demand, offering valuable insights”, says Liebe.
PreMortem.Games
OCTOBER 2, 2023
Midnight Girl , from indie studio Italic , oozes French cool. Funny then that the game is made in Copenhagen, Denmark. Pedersen is the programmer and CEO of the company and Ryder takes on the roles of game director, graphics artist, musician and game designer.
Game Wisdom
NOVEMBER 23, 2024
Indie Developer Interview With Matt Enad and Burden of Truth Josh Bycer josh@game-wisdom.com width="560" height="314" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" For this perceptive podcast, I sat down with designer Matt Enad from Robproductions to talk about game design and his upcoming game Burden of Truth — a take off of the visual novel court room (..)
PreMortem.Games
MAY 10, 2023
Canadian indie game development studio Excellent Rectangle just launched their debut title Tape to Tape on Steam Early Access. Combining the world of ice hockey with a roguelite may seem like an odd match, but for game designer Hugo Julien and his fellow co-founders Jean-Nicolas and Mathieu Fortin, it was a natural choice.
Game Wisdom
NOVEMBER 8, 2024
Why You Can’t Objectively Build Great Games Josh Bycer josh@game-wisdom.com I was reading a piece over on Game Developer that gave me pause for a second about whether this is what game design at the AAA level is about now — focusing on analytics and trying to “math” the perfect … The post Why You Can’t Objectively (..)
PreMortem.Games
NOVEMBER 8, 2024
BitCake Studio , an indie game development studio based in Brazil, is celebrating its 10th year in the industry. Eduardo Lamhut, the company’s main Game Designer and Creative Director of the upcoming game Atomic Picnic , explains how the company started.
PreMortem.Games
AUGUST 21, 2023
What began as a casual endeavor gradually evolved into a fully-fledged studio as the game’s success solidified their path. Now, with the new game A Void Hope coming up on almost 3 years of development, Forslind finds himself juggling his roles as both CEO and Game Designer of his company called Elden Pixels.
PreMortem.Games
OCTOBER 25, 2024
If there ever was a fitting metaphor for the trials and tribulations that indie developers face while creating their debut game, it’s Ascending Inferno , the upcoming release by Australian developer Oppolyon Studio. As first-time indie developers, their journey mirrors the very game they’ve crafted.
PreMortem.Games
APRIL 12, 2023
Set in a storybook kingdom filled with magical creatures, kings and castles, the game gives players the opportunity to build their own kingdom and find their true love. First time game developers Max Nielsen and João Martinez form Grenaa Games , a Sweden based indie game studio. “We
PreMortem.Games
JULY 8, 2024
His turning point came in 2019 at Comic Con Africa, where he discovered a Game Design degree at Wits University’s stand. “I However, it still took a nudge from a dreadful experience in an Applied Mathematics class to propel him to switch from Computer Science to Game Design. It was great! I had so much fun with it.
PreMortem.Games
JANUARY 24, 2024
Physics-based 2D platformer Bionic Bay is a collaboration between the Finnish one-man-studio Mureena and Taiwanese indie game company Psychoflow Studio. The game started as a demo shown on Reddit, but picked up momentum when Badland art director Juhana Myllys offered to mix and match his distinct artwork with the gameplay.
PreMortem.Games
MARCH 15, 2024
In Guntouchables by Danish indie developer Game Swing , enemies randomly power up from the upgrades that a team of four players can’t lift out of the levels. This leads to some unexpected and quite frankly, explosive situations as the game progresses. Game Swing was founded in 2013 by five Danish game design students.
Ask a Game Dev
AUGUST 5, 2024
I think you have the wrong idea about what game designers do. We're not project leads that pitch entire games, we're [ content creators ] that build the bits of specific content in games - the spells, the monsters, the fights, the classes, the races, the quests, the environments, the stats, the companions, and so on.
PreMortem.Games
APRIL 24, 2024
If Triple-A games are the equivalent of Hollywood blockbuster movies and indie games are comparable to independent films, then you could call Indika by Odd Meter an arthouse experience. The game, centered on a nun grappling with the voice of the devil within her, deviates from the standard in almost every aspect.
Brand Game Development
DECEMBER 26, 2016
At the time, the industry was worth about $880 million , with the majority of that being for existing collectible card games like Magic: the Gathering , Yu-Gi-Oh! , Everyone – the most indie developers, the established companies, the fans, and the investors – get to participate in an open forum. and Pokemon.
Interesting Choices
OCTOBER 5, 2011
It's rather surreal to see my name in a list with a bunch of indie luminaries , but hopefully I'll be able to live up to expectations. On Friday I'll be giving a talk at IndieCade alongside Chris Hecker entitled A Dialogue on Depth.
PreMortem.Games
AUGUST 16, 2023
“We as a team learned from The Ancients to pace our enthusiasm and scale the game to the size of the studio. There are plenty of indie developers that say this and it’s possibly the most crucial part of game design and development.
Ask a Game Dev
AUGUST 3, 2023
A level designer doesn't need to create the individual assets, but will need a rock-solid understanding of how the placement of objects and division of space can create places that are intuitive for players to navigate. If he wants to go into the indie space and work with an extremely small team, he's going to need to wear a lot of hats.
PreMortem.Games
SEPTEMBER 17, 2024
The game immerses players in a captivating odyssey across worlds within worlds, beckoning them to master the art of world-leaping mechanics to uncover a cosmic mystery. Cocoon is the first venture of Geometric Interactive , a Danish indie studio founded by Carlsen and his ex-Playdead colleague, Jakob Schmid.
Game Development News
JUNE 20, 2023
Sophie Artemigi tells us what it’s like being a video game design master that works outside of the big companies to make weird and entertaining art that connects with people
PreMortem.Games
APRIL 22, 2024
Welcome to the unsettling world of Zoochosis by indie game studio Clapperheads. The teaser trailer of the game, which featured a heavily mutated giraffe scurrying over the enclosure, received over 10 million views across YouTube. The game has since gathered well over 200.000 wishlists on Steam.
Brand Game Development
MARCH 22, 2021
Many of you who read this blog know that I am self-publishing board game designer who uses Kickstarter as my platform of choice for funding the bulk of my projects. Certainly no surprise if you’ve read some of my articles like A Crash Course on Kickstarter for Board Games. Alternative 1: Go through a Publisher.
The Bottom Feeder
FEBRUARY 9, 2023
I’m only being driven out of my shell by my need to push the Kickstarter for our next indie RPG, Geneforge 2 - Infestation. Let’s talk about games. There is a surprise hit indie game I really like, and breaking down that kind of thing is very much in my job description, so let's talk about Vampire Survivors.
PreMortem.Games
SEPTEMBER 26, 2024
Small teams and solo developers often produce some of the most unique and personal games, and this holds true for Rablo Games, an indie studio led by founder Pablo Coma. Six months into development, Coma accepted a job at Appeal Studios as a game designer, eventually becoming a game director.
CG Spectrum
NOVEMBER 24, 2022
He decided to start his own indie game development studio, Overwrite Interactive , and create a video game from scratch. For Alan's video game to come to fruition, he needed a team of capable artists to help him. Game Designer and second CG Spectrum recruit, Alexios, joined the team from Greece in February this year.
PreMortem.Games
OCTOBER 28, 2024
Set in a beautiful, Slavic-inspired world, Selfloss by Kazakhstan-based indie studio Goodwin Games is an adventure that explores themes of grief, healing, and resilience. ” Epic MegaGrant Developing a game in Kazakhstan poses its own set of challenges, as Khoroshavin explains.
PreMortem.Games
SEPTEMBER 6, 2024
Midnight Girl , from indie studio Italic , oozes French cool. Funny then that the game is made in Copenhagen, Denmark. Pedersen is the programmer and CEO of the company and Ryder takes on the roles of game director, graphics artist, musician and game designer.
The Bottom Feeder
NOVEMBER 1, 2024
After the exhaustion of shipping a game, I have a period of deep uncaring about the medium. I need to play a few really fun games to get interested again. It's a truly remarkable indie title. Each game also has an extra-difficult goal, and completing it rewards you with a cherry. (As Lucky for me that UFO50 just came out.
PreMortem.Games
MAY 15, 2024
French indie studio Seed by Seed appreciates the importance of players’ time. We’re aiming at making non-violent games that bring families and friends together around the screen.” The idea of community and consensus is fundamental in the whole story, so we needed this idea to appear in the game design as well.”
Game Designing
AUGUST 31, 2023
What is a Game Designer? Summary Game designer wears many hats. This is especially true in a small indie team. Whether game designers are part of a small or large company, they play an important role in ensuring that all aspects of the game development align with the initial vision of the creators.
PreMortem.Games
MAY 21, 2024
Set in a storybook kingdom filled with magical creatures, kings and castles, the game gives players the opportunity to build their own kingdom and find their true love. First time game developers Max Nielsen and João Martinez form Grenaa Games , a Sweden based indie game studio. “We
PreMortem.Games
AUGUST 21, 2024
There's an exclusive playable demo for the game that is only available for a limited time. Additionally, Hollow Home will be at Gamescom, as a part of the Polish Indie Booth, Hall 10.2, With the game Hollow Home , Ukrainian indie studio Twigames shows what it means to live in an occupied city. Booth E-069. Unfortunately.
PreMortem.Games
MAY 10, 2024
With the game Hollow Home , Ukrainian indie studio Twigames shows what it means to live in an occupied city. Valerii Minenko , Founder of Twigames studio, explains how his team came up with the idea of the game. When the full-scale invasion began in February 2022 we decided to temporarily leave Kyiv. Unfortunately.
PreMortem.Games
MAY 1, 2023
BitCake Studio , an indie game development studio based in Brazil, is celebrating its 10th year in the industry. Eduardo Lamhut, the company’s main Game Designer and Creative Director of the upcoming game Atomic Picnic , explains how the company started.
PreMortem.Games
FEBRUARY 15, 2023
The game is the debut of Swiss indie game studio Naraven Games. Co founder and writer Julia Jean found inspiration for the game in her fascination for the ordinary. Rubber duck “The puzzles and game design flowed naturally from narrative ideas like ‘we should be able to delete everything!’.
PreMortem.Games
SEPTEMBER 23, 2024
In the indie game dev scene, the use of AI is often met with suspicion and disdain. Grandmother of ChatGPT Her vision for 1001 Nights started during a game design course in 2020 at Goldsmiths , where she thought about making something based on natural language interactions, using a story everyone knows. “I
PreMortem.Games
SEPTEMBER 30, 2024
Welcome to the unsettling world of Zoochosis by indie game studio Clapperheads. The teaser trailer of the game, which featured a heavily mutated giraffe scurrying over the enclosure, received over 10 million views across YouTube. The game has since gathered well over 200.000 wishlists on Steam.
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