True Indies Have Part-Time Jobs

Over the last few weeks I’ve adopted the motto of a new definition for “indie.”

“Indie” used to simply mean that you were independent, that no one was paying you to do something, that you were completely free.

And yet, we have multi-million dollar projects appearing on Kickstarter every year. Projects run by famous figureheads. Are these really comparable to the tiny developer spending their savings and their time into their work?

And thus, I repeat my new definition of “indie:”

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Kickstarter Funding Goals (How High Is Too High?)

Kickstarter is a fantastic site. Crowdfunding is one of the greatest inventions of the last decade.

Many people use this as a method of getting extra funding for their projects. But how much funding is too much? Who should be using Kickstarter?

Dan Crawley of “Gamesbeat” writes a fantastic article about the subject, and how larger developers using crowdfunding can both hinder and help smaller bedroom indies. Larger developers, with better experience with PR and marketing, can get in most of the viewership they require. But despite this, their funding goals are sometimes too high, and they simply fall short of their goals.

 

Contrary to popular belief, this is not what Kickstarter.com looks like (image from VentureBeat.com)

Contrary to popular belief, this is not what Kickstarter.com looks like…

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Some Cool Crowdfunding Projects (March 2014)

I’m going to start a new habit of listing some cool Crowdfunding projects you should check out every month. Not all of them get the press they desparately need, so why not tell the four people who read my blog about them?

Only games. Not MMORPGs or table-top games, I never liked them and there are way too many of those on Kickstarter to begin with.

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The Modern Definition of “Indie”…

Being “indie” was always a small trend of people thinking they were cool (most of them are cool, but not because of “being indie” like some hipsters would try, but what they do that makes them “indie”). The “indie” lifestyle is present in almost every aspect of creative culture. “Indie” music, “indie” films, “indie” writing (blogs or self-published), “indie” comics, and of course, “indie” games.

But what exactly does “indie” mean?

Of course, it stands for being “independent,” which according to Wikipedia, is simply being free from any government or corporate interests. If no big publisher is paying you for you to make something, or if you aren’t doing what you are told, then you are technically an “indie” artist.

But does this definition still hold today?

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