The Golden Age Of Indie That Never Was

Was there really an indie bubble? Or a golden age of indie? We look back in time and remember hearing about these successes on iOS, console, Steam - but when we try our own hands at going indie we don’t meet with those sorts of legendary financial success. I’ve been indie for almost a decade. Lost a lot of money in the process. If there was a golden age I somehow missed it. Thinking there was a golden age is survivor bias - a bunch of people struck gold on a particular platform. Gold rushes commenced. By the time we got there, the gold was gone. Then we tell ourselves, “We missed the golden age. We missed the bubble. If only we’d shipped sooner, or knew someone who could get us on that exclusive platform, in that exclusive market.” But even back in the days when a small handful of people had their big successes, most people were having their quiet failures. While Jonathan Blow was making millions with Braid our team made under $190K with Schizoid. (Split all the ways, it was more than minimum wage, but not by much.) And well before iOS there was shareware and before that people selling floppies in ziplock bags. While they had their loud successes and became who we think of as the big publishers and developers of today there were many more having their quiet failures. I’m not being negative. I’m being positive. Next year, new games will come out of nowhere and be big fat financial successes, maybe in some new emerging market we never thought of before (like Kickstarter) or maybe due to some crazy PR (like becoming a youtuber darling) or maybe due to something I can’t even imagine or think of. There never was a golden age of indie. Which means it isn’t over.