FEATURES,INFLUENCE AND POSSIBLE FUTURE OF INDIE GAMES ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Varun Sriram Zongming Han ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​​ ​​ ​ ​ ​ M.S. Game Science and Design M.S. Game Science and Design ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Northeastern University Northeastern University ​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​ ​ ​ [email protected] [email protected] ​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ​​ ABSTRACT The term “Indie” is short for “Independent” which describes the independently funded ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ game companies/organizations. Starting from 2009, there has been a huge rise in the number ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ of Indie game companies and surprisingly, they succeeded in attracting a huge multitude of ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ players. This study analyzed the influence that indie games had on both the player and ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ developer’s perspective. By conducting one-to-one interviews, we gleaned information about the ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ possible reasons for such an influence of indie games, as well as the possible future of indie ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ games. Keywords: Influence, Indie games, game, emotions, experience, interviews, qualitative ​ ​ analysis 1.INTRODUCTION The main objective of this research is to identify the reasons for the recent growth and success of the Indie game industry in the recent past, and the possibility of the future of indie games. Before around 2012, games were often published by large companies usually with a significant amount of investment. Steam was a platform for 394 games during 2012. A whooping 1479% increase was recorded in the year 2016 where steam held 5037 games that year, as pointed out by Galyonkin(2016). While after that time, more and more games different from this business pattern came into being. Hereby questions arises: Why did this happen? What qualities do these so-called indie games have so as to share a significant market in game industry? And what will their future be? There are already researchers who started answering the similar questions, but they didn’t exactly examine these particular aspects mentioned above. We conducted 5 private interviews with the objective to explore questions previously mentioned, to have a deeper understanding of the features, influence, and the possible futures of indie games. 2.BACKGROUND Nowadays, with the development of video game industry, the sale mode of video games are going through a change. Traditionally, there was a selling style of “developer plus publisher”, which meant that the game developer usually can’t put their products onto the market “independently” -- they need a publisher (For example, Half-life 2, developed by Valve, published by Sierra). Usually a publisher was a retailer, before the thriving of e-commerce. So now, more and more independent video games, in short, indie games come into being, simply because thanks to the digital game sales, developers with lower budgets no longer need to cooperate with a publisher -- they can be “independent” and directly publish their games, without a publisher’s support, according to Lipkin (2012), who proposed the basic literal meaning of Indie games to be the independence of a publisher (usually a large one). ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ But based on their influence, there are discords among researchers about the definition of Indie. De Jong (2013) argued “Indie does not simply mean independence, it is a complex and ambiguous term, comprised of a confusing mix of economic, technological, and cultural factors.” and Parker (2013) posted that “part of the label of 'indie' is that you make games for the sake of making good games rather than just to make money”. But regardless of how indie games are defined, there is one thing that is almost for sure: indie games are taking territories of the game industry. Stuart(2012) even stated that “small studios and even lone developers create offbeat subjective titles rather than noisy mega-bucks shoot-'em-ups.”, which indicates some indie games are even doing better than some traditional AAA games. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Greuter(2014) pointed out that many AAA games “are repetitive, which created a feeling of dissatisfaction among the developers.” That’s one of the potential reasons why many developers started their own company making their own games. Another potential reason is that at the beginning of the second decade in 21st century, many designers parted ways with the big companies to work on games that were close to their hearts. Designers funded their own projects or asked for donations through social media to materialize their dreams. Websites like kickstarter are a source for crowd funding that has led to the success of several independent games. To help prove the above statement, 2014 report infers that from 2009-2012, the annual rate of direct employment in USA only increased 9% every year for gaming industries. This accounted to 0.724% percent of employment which clearly states that the masses which were being recruited were young talents who were new to this industry. That being said, in this research, we are going to discover other possible reasons contributing to the emergence of indie games. ​ ​ Those are for the reasons of the emergence of indie games. But then how much popular are indie games going to be and how indie game developers and players think about them come into questions. According to Parker (2013), mainstream views for indie games were “non-commercial, not-for-profit, activist, and amateur games”. In Vogel’s (2017) study of Japanese Indie games he also noticed the indie games in Japanese society are not isolated from mainstream nor of less commercial impact, instead they are to some degrees a social need based on the culture context. But so far the works done are not complete enough. researchers are still exploring the impact and functionality indie games have brought about. Hence this is what this research for. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Then what qualities do those popular indie games have? McGee (2011) wrote in the review of “The Binding of Isaac”: “It masterfully brings together the randomization and difficulty of a roguelike, such as Dungeons of Dredmor ... to create an enthralling experience that will keep you hooked.”, which highlighted the quality of randomization and difficulty. In another review of a sequel of this game, “The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth”, Stapleton (2014) stressed the quality of randomness: ”a rare balance is struck where its brutal bullet-hell difficulty isn’t a punishment, but an opportunity to see something totally new. Because of excellent randomization and seemingly endless content, I’m still seeing items, bosses, and entirely new types of dungeons even after 30 hours of intense twin-stick shooter-style battle.” But those reviews mainly focus on traits of a specific game, which are insufficient to answer the question of what qualities of indie games made them arise in the market. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 3.METHOD Data for this research were collected by interviews, which is a qualitative approach. The medium for conducting the interviews was a mix of face-to-face and video calls. All of the interviewees were people with a good amount of knowledge regarding indie games. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ For this research, we conducted semi-structured interviews, which had a set of pretty vague introductory questions as well as some compulsory questions, so that the key aspects of the interview data were collected for analysis. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Semi-structured interviews will be an apt medium for this research because through open ended questions, we can gather high quality data from the participants. Well thought questions will help gather data that will contain emotions, experiences and opinions, after which follow up questions can help bolster the data already provided by the interviewee. In addition, asking interviewees questions based on the answers they give to the compulsory questions will make the interviewee feel more personalized hence more inclined to produce effective data. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 3.1.CONTEXT The people we interviewed have a very good background or connection with indie games. Three of the interviewees are indie game developers and the remaining two are ardent indie game players, who have at least 4 years of experience. Additionally, all the five participants have their fair share of experiences with other games too. Their experience made us choose them to be our interviewees. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 3.2.DATA COLLECTION ​ ​ Data collection was done by interviews. It was a semi-structured interview where certain questions were compulsorily asked to cover key point and important aspects of the data which was necessary for our analysis. We conducted interviews either by personal(one-on-one) or by online skype interviews. The speeches were recorded by a microphone or softwares that record voice on video calls. ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ The questions revolved around these 3 categories: ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 1. Player’s experience playing indie games ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 2. View about the qualities of good indie games ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 3. Current and future impact of indie games ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Which is worth notice is that these questions