Confessions of a failed indie developer • Hacker News Board

Re: Confessions of a failed indie developer

#81

Post by precisioncoder » Tue, Aug 27, 2013, 6:02 AM UTC

tieTYT wrote: post #42

marijn wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you should probably not think in terms of the release that ends the project Yes. I want to stress this some more. I know several people who are/were working on big ambitious projects in a kind of stealth mode, citing concerns that their idea will be stolen, or emphasizing that it isn't "ready yet". I suspect this is usually rationalizing a fear of criticism. A single-person personal project shouldn't be worked on i…

Do you have any advice on how to put it in front of users to get feedback? Friends are good for a while, but they're biased. Just go on IRC and ask a few folks?

Depends on the technology you're using, for Flash Newgrounds is a great resource, even the worst game normally gets tried 500 times.

Re: Confessions of a failed indie developer

#82

Post by precisioncoder » Tue, Aug 27, 2013, 6:16 AM UTC

tinco wrote: post #56

primaryobjects wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I say this with humor, but this weekend, I took part in an indie 48-hour game-jam contest. I created the game, Fire Starter http://dummysoftware.com/games/firestarter Created it with HTML5, targeting the desktop, rather than mobile. Didn't win, but had a lot of fun. That's kinda like the op's story compressed into a time-span of a few hours, sort of. Btw, I recommend game-jams to anyone interested in indie game devel…

He participated in Ludum Dare (ludumdare.com), as did I, it's always a blast. I think you can't be thinking of going indie without having participated at least once sucessfully in a ludum dare (either in the jam or the compo, doesn't really matter)

I agree. Ludum Dare teaches you YAGNI. I built a better screen engine during LD in a couple hours than the bloated disfunctional monster I was building for my hobby game I had spend a dozen hours on. "First make it work, then make it modular" and "Create something small that works and then iterate" are now my game design commandments that I constantly have to repeat.

Re: Confessions of a failed indie developer

#83

Post by erikb » Tue, Aug 27, 2013, 11:57 AM UTC

erikb wrote: post #62

In my eyes this is not an article about a failed indie, but about one who never started. And yes that is exactly what is the biggest source of failure: Not starting. You still didn't make that iOS/Android game with simple mechanics! You still didn't earn even 1ct by selling any kind game! You still didn't start to be an indie developer. Maybe it's still too hard to finish a 3D game with so many different programs and…

Everything I wrote here was serious criticism.