Jaakko Kemppainen Independent games What they are and are they different Master's thesis Digital Culture 20.2.2008 Jyväskylä University Department of Art and Culture Studies Jyväskylä JYVÄSKYLÄN YLIOPISTO Tiedekunta – Faculty Laitos – Department Faculty of Humanities Department of Art and Culture Studies Tekijä – Author Jaakko Kemppainen Työn nimi – Title Independent games What they are and are they different Oppiaine – Subject Työn laji – Level Digital Culture Master's thesis Aika – Month and year Sivumäärä – Number of pages February 2008 98 p. + Appendices 18 p. Tiivistelmä – Abstract This research figures out, how the concept of independent games and independent game production is understood in the field of game industry. Some comparisons are made to music and movie industry, using literature and different internet sources to find out commonly used definitions for independent concept on different areas of entertainment business. Three level definition for independent productions is formed, mainly from the commerce point of view - independent, semi-independent and non-independent games and producers. Second part of this research is a quantitative genre comparison between non-independent games and independent games. For the use of the genre research, a study of game genres is made and basen on that, a game genre systemi is produced. Main finding of the quantitative research is, that independent game genre distribution is different in the case of non-independent games, but there are a lot of similarities within both non-independent and independent games genre division. Asiasanat – Keywords independent games, game genres, game studies, ludology Säilytyspaikka – Depository University of Jyväskylä Muita tietoja – Additional information JYVÄSKYLÄN YLIOPISTO Tiedekunta – Faculty Laitos – Department Humanistinen tiedekunta Taiteiden ja kulttuurin tutkimuksen laitos Tekijä – Author Jaakko Kemppainen Työn nimi – Title Independent games What they are and are they different Oppiaine – Subject Työn laji – Level Digitaalinen kulttuuri Pro Gradu -tutkielma Aika – Month and year Sivumäärä – Number of pages Helmikuu 2008 98 s. + liitteet 18 s. Tiivistelmä – Abstract Tämä tutkimus selvittää, kuinka "independent" pelien ja riippumattomien pelituotantojen käsite ymmärretään peliteollisuuden piirissä. Joitakin vertailuja peliteollisuuden ja musiikki- ja elokuvateollisuuden välillä tehdään, käyttäen kirjallisuutta ja erinäisiä internet-lähteitä, jotta yleisesti käytetyt independent-tuotannon määritelmät saadaan selville viihdeteollisuuden eri osa-alueilla. Tämän osion lopputuloksena on kolmiportainen määritelmä independent peleille ja -tuotannoille - enimmäkseen kaupallisesta näkökulmasta katsottuna: riippumattomat, puoliriippumattomat ja ei-riippuvat pelit ja tuotannot. Tutkimuksen toinen osa on kvantitatiivinen genrevertailu riippumattomien ja ei-riippumattomien pelien välillä. Genrevertailua varten tehdään määrittelevä tutkimus peligenreistä. Ttutkimuksen tuottamaa genremääritelmää käytetään hyväksi pelien luokittelussa. Pääasiallinen tulos kvantitatiivisesta tutkimuksesta osoittaa, että independent-pelien genrejakauma eroaa ei-independent pelien jakaumasta, mutta molempien lajien sisällä genrejakaumat ovat hyvin samankaltaisia. Asiasanat – Keywords independent pelit, peligenret, pelitutkimus, ludologia Säilytyspaikka – Depository Jyväskylän Yliopisto Muita tietoja – Additional information Table of Contents 1. Introduction................................................................................................................... 4 1.1. Background............................................................................................................4 1.2. Previous work on game research .......................................................................... 5 1.3. About the methods and the structure of the research.............................................6 2. Meaning of independent................................................................................................ 8 2.1. Independent in gaming world................................................................................ 9 2.1.1. Independent Games Festival.......................................................................... 9 2.1.2. Gametunnel.com.......................................................................................... 11 2.1.3. Manifesto Games......................................................................................... 13 2.1.4. Eric Zimmerman on independent games.....................................................14 2.1.5. Independent game sites................................................................................ 15 2.1.6. Other independent game -related instances..................................................16 2.2. Independent cinema and music............................................................................17 2.2.1. independent film festivals............................................................................ 17 2.2.2. independent in film studies.......................................................................... 18 2.2.3. About differences and commonalities between independent movies and games......................................................................................................................20 2.2.4. Independent music....................................................................................... 21 2.3. Government funding............................................................................................ 23 2.4. Special features of independent game production............................................... 24 2.4.1. Game development competitions.................................................................24 2.4.2. Schools and brainstorm-sessions..................................................................25 2.4.3. Political games............................................................................................. 26 2.4.4. Games as art................................................................................................. 28 2.4.5. Hacker ethic................................................................................................. 31 2.4.6. Distribution channels................................................................................... 33 2.5. Conclusions on independent definitions.............................................................. 35 3. Game genres................................................................................................................ 38 3.1. About non-genre game type divisions................................................................. 38 3.2. Game genres in Wikipedia...................................................................................39 3.3. Genres used in researched services......................................................................41 3.4. Mark P.J. Wolf's 42 genres.................................................................................. 42 3.5. Chris Crawford's taxonomy................................................................................. 43 3.6. Espen Aarseth's Multidimensional typology of games........................................44 3.7. Genre synthesis of Aki Järvinen.......................................................................... 46 3.8. All Game Guides genre list..................................................................................47 3.9. Genre synthesis.................................................................................................... 48 3.10. Most common genres and their features............................................................ 51 4. Comparative game genre research...............................................................................59 4.1. Games in Pelit-magazine..................................................................................... 60 4.1.1. Platforms and games.................................................................................... 60 4.1.2. Genre division of reviewed games...............................................................61 4.1.3 Additional notes about Pelit-magazines material..........................................64 4.2. Suomipelit.com.................................................................................................... 65 4.2.1 Genres of Suomipelit.com.............................................................................65 4.2.2. Notes on Suomipelit.com's games................................................................69 4.3. Gametunnel..........................................................................................................70 4.3.1. Genres of games in Gametunnel.................................................................. 71 4.3.2. Notes on Gametunnel's games..................................................................... 74 4.4. Flash-game.net.....................................................................................................75 4.4.1. Genres of Flash-game.net.............................................................................76 4.4.2. Notes on Flash-game.net's games................................................................ 78 4.4.3. Specialties of browser games....................................................................... 79 4.5. Summary..............................................................................................................81 4.6. Discussion on genre comparison........................................................................