the last ones Twitter and Unity casesAlthough they travel through different levels, in the world of video games, especially indie sceneIt’s not going very well on its own anyway. Let’s try to assess the situation and why so-called independent apocalypse It may not manifest itself as a magnificent explosion or a sublime and inevitable destructive phenomenon, but it may be a slow and painful death that many may not realize.
an abused scene
One of the constants of the video game industry, ill-treatment reserved for indie developers who are snatched and trampled several times and then spit out as soon as they can be replaced by more profitable forms of business. Because they are always used as a temporary barrier, they are forced to suffer every time, regardless of changes in the industry or the tools that seem to be at their service, but often take advantage of them. Consider, for example, the birth of mobile stores: who took the job of filling them up when the big publishers still didn’t want to even touch them with a stick? Over time, these vast ideas, filled with incredible promises and exceptional applications, were invaded by free-to-play products and their insatiable greed, so much so that veteran Jeff Minter, who was very active in mobile devices in the more experimental era, said: It breaks my heart to see that it’s adopting more and more Byzantine and fraudulent strategies designed to make money from as many people as possible.” While all this was going on, independent developers were no longer able to sell their works, albeit at very low prices, in the stores owned by giants, who made billions by using the inherent weaknesses of human psychology, and found themselves out of the game. Spend millions on marketing and afford maximum visibility.
Make way for the bullies!
What’s happening in the mobile market isn’t an isolated case: indies set up and supported the digital media of various consoles, but were marginalized once major broadcasters saw the road clear and started reaching millions of shots. dollars of investments to buy the best seats. They helped platforms like Steam Between inadequate tools, zero visibility, flawed algorithms that only support big names, and a selection system that allows thousands of junk games to fill the list of new releases, just being mistreated in every way by Valve. Developers without marketing money even this minimal guaranteed exposure from launch. In short, they have experienced and continue to do things that we would not hesitate to describe as real. bullying acts.
Still “they landed” is playing a game important role for the industry, which will act as pioneers for new industries, making them lively and interesting, thus attracting early audiences of users who will form the core from which they can thrive. Consider, for example, how many studios support the virtual reality headset market with tech-savvy games that often have little prospect of return.
Major publishers are careful not to venture into uncharted territory of the media and often confine themselves to declaring their love for innovation after releasing another sequel to a franchise that may have existed for two decades. The larger they are, the more confident you can be sure that later, when they start owning securities, they will try to make up for their initial absence with the brute force of money. Let’s take an example of the enthusiasm for battle royale (PUBG), a genre that was made autonomous by a very small studio at the time (PUBG), a game that aims to sell several tens of thousands of copies. Epic Games (Fortnite), Electronic Arts (Apex Legends), and Activision Blizzard (Call of Duty: Warzone) have become a conqueror for dozens of other mid-to-large publishers, with haphazard launches often just to make up for the numbers. Or consider MoBAs, born out of a mod, developed around the success of a small Riot Games game at the time, which then became a hunting ground for Western and Chinese giants.
Unity, an ad engine
The Unity and Twitter cases that have been making the headlines lately may be another brick being lifted from the feet of indie developers, which for different reasons could pose huge challenges for many. unity It is the graphics engine widely used by medium-small studios and it managed to grow thanks to them in its early years. Unity’s growth is closely tied to that of standalone mobile stores, despite the fundamental vulgarity of some of the solutions adopted in the past that have created many problems for anyone wishing to develop mid-to-large projects. For years, developers have been able to rely on affordable and accessible technology to run their business. With the advent of the old Electronic Arts John Riccitiello But things changed as the company’s CEO. Riccitiello is widely regarded as one of the most greedy guys in the video game industry, smashing dozens of development studios within Electronic Arts and pretending to be a steamroller, not looking at anyone when he smells a deal. Looks like a nicer Jack Tramiel. The arrival of Unity led to a complete shift in the company’s focus, from being a valuable supplier of software technology for developers, to becoming more involved in advertising with systems that were first directly integrated into Unity and now target the metaverse. derail the image of the company, which has become less reactive to the independent scene to which it owes its existence and early success. A recent report by Jason Schreier for Bloomberg highlighted the character’s angularity and their implications for defining new targets for the engine, which is increasingly seeing video games in the background. After all, he called those who didn’t plan the monetization system before the games stupid…
Twitter and community disintegration
Another blow to the indie scene twitterie post-purchase Twitter Elon Musk. The selfish and childish Tesla tycoon’s first moves between paid blue checks, mass layoffs, and irresponsible promises made fear the worst for the Twitter social network, leading to a minor migration to Mastodon, many abandonments, and in general all of his regulars, the line that aroused many concerns in the neighborhood. It allows them to breathe the atmosphere of arrival at the end. Why do indie developers fear the worst? The reason is simple: Twitter is great for quick communication and short announcements, that is, to do that cheap marketing that is often needed to get one’s projects announced because they don’t have the capital to invest in communication. If Twitter fails, as many fear, major broadcasters will take notice and pay for the transition and look for other channels for their promotional campaigns, while smaller broadcasters will have to scramble again to find them. communities that are painstakingly built and represent the heart of their sales, that is, what sustains them economically.
Source: Multiplayer
