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Dhruin
Stranger In A Strange Land
Joined: 20 May 2002
Posts: 1825
Location: Sydney, Australia |
| Side Quest: Where Next for Indie RPGs? |
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We have decided to kick off a weekend series of short, informal discussion pieces on gaming issues and gripes – or anything else related that takes our fancy. So, without further ado, here’s the first one.
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<br>The game that has most captivated me over the past months is Taleworld’s Mount & Blade. This half-completed beta project is essentially a combat engine at this point – but boy, does it have good gameplay in spades. The centrepiece is the thrilling mounted combat and large-scale pitched battles – something very few RPGs have attempted and yet, this unassuming indie project manages to get it so <em>right</em>. I’ve spent many an evening on my spirited courser on the top of a hill, picking off the enemy with my longbow as they struggle slowly through the frigid waters of the mountain stream below, before galloping back to the open plain, switching to a lance and splitting the advancing army as I crash through the unfortunate foot soldiers.<br><br><table cellpadding="1" align="center"><tr><td width="200"><a href="http://newspics.rpgdot.com/imageview.php?dir=gallery/1154/Screenshots/&name=26_04_2005_time_17_15_00.jpg" target="ImageView"><img src="http://newspics.rpgdot.com/gallery/1154/Screenshots/tn_26_04_2005_time_17_15_00.jpg" border=0 alt="Display full image"></a></td></tr></table>
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<br>If you have even been near a gaming website in the last year or so you’re bound to have encountered a “Death of PC Gaming” article or two. In absolute terms, the idea is preposterous – while ever there is an installed base of PC users, someone will want to sell games to them. What <em>is</em> likely is that PC gaming will change – to some degree or another. Whether driven by rising development costs or giant publishers looking to maximise their profits for shareholders, it’s hard to deny that the peak of PC gaming has passed.
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<br>Good riddance to a sea of sequels and lazy license tie-ins, according to some. As retail stores cut back on PC shelf space but digital delivery becomes more accepted, many believe a vibrant downloadable “indie” market will see more projects driven by creativity rather than pure mass-market appeal.
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<br>It’s hard to know if this will be the nirvana sometimes described, at least for cRPG players. RPG development has always been difficult – there’s a lot of content that goes into a quest-driven, story-rich cRPG. It’s easy to see how simple puzzle games with quick development times can turn a profit but harder to envisage developers turning to complex cRPGs. While there are a large number of indie downloadable RPG developments out there -- including great projects past and present -- Spiderweb remains the only full-time downloadable cRPG developer of significant prominence. There <em>is</em> a market, if more small developers can find a way to bring quality cRPGs to players starved by traditional retail.
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<br>Do you regularly play indie games? Do you think the downloadable market will explode? Wouldn’t touch homemade graphics with a 10-foot polearm? We’d love to hear what you think. |
Sun Jul 03, 2005 2:05 am |
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Val
Risen From Ashes
Joined: 18 Feb 2002
Posts: 14724
Location: Utah, USA |
PC gaming will always be alive and well, because there will always be a market for it. More and more people are buying computers. The potential customer base is always growing. Computers have become a huge part of our lives and will most likely continue to do so. Consoles are already specialized computers built for gaming. If they want to continue to compete with the traditional PC, they'll take on more and more features of the PC until they practically are PCs.
Do I regularly play indie games? You bet your spirited courser, I do. Generally, the only place you can see truely unique games that grab you and drive you to play, are games made by independent developers. Sure, the graphics aren't the prettiest, but the gameplay, stories, and fun are all there in spades. I'll take a poor looking game that's fun to play over a beautiful, mind-numbingly boring game, any day of the week.
Do you think the downloadable market will explode? Eventually. Giving potential buyers an easy back-up solution or a discount on a hard copy of the game will allay people's worries about losing what they paid for due to a catastrophic crash of their hard drive.
_________________
Freeeeeeedom! Thank heavens it's summer!
What do I have to show for my hard work? A piece of paper! Wee!
=Guardian, Moderator, UltimaDot Newshound=  |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 2:06 am |
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ShadowMoses
Head Merchant
Joined: 09 Jun 2005
Posts: 69
Location: UK |
I don't know if indie games and the download market will explode exactly but if it grows and becomes sustainable, i'll be a happy gamer! 
The kind of cRPG's i'm interested in need to be made by enthusiasts without the distraction of commerce so a niche indie market could well start to emmunlate the "peak of PC gaming".
Open source game engines such as The Nebula Device which is free (even for commercial projects) are becoming more and more common and increasingly competitive with modern game engines. These kind of game development solutions could start to open up the indie market to a wider audience.
Although i do think more and more people are seeing beyond the graphics... cynicism can be a good thing! 
_________________
Dak’kon: "Your reasons for your incessant clicking are not *known* to me."
-=:ASHES:=- || -=:Xenus-hq:=- |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 2:18 am |
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Sir Markus
Counselor of the King
Joined: 11 Jan 2002
Posts: 369
Location: Columbus, Ohio USA |
I played my first CRPG (Ultima 3) in 1983 or 1984, and that was a pretty exciting time for computer gaming in my opinion.
The 'downsizing' of PC game development will result in better, but less polished games. In other words if you like lots of glitz and glamour and fancy cutscenes in your games, you're probably going to be disappointed. But I feel the CRPG purists are going to see some awfully good stuff down the road. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 2:31 am |
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corwin
On the Razorblade of Life
Joined: 10 Jun 2002
Posts: 8376
Location: Australia |
Let's consider some recent Indie games; Geneforge, Mount and Blade, Fate, and the upcoming Minions of Mirth and Grimoire- all excellent and incredible value for money, made by people who love games and who listen to their fans. Now let's consider recent Hyped releases: Dungeon Lords anyone?
The smaller development houses (Gothic, Kult, Arx) are still doing wonderful work because they are NOT afraid to innovate. Those tied only to the bottom line are failing even there. Yes, there is a definite future for PC games and especially RPG's, but NOT from the big developers outside of the really solid ones like Bioware and even they could quickly stumble and fall. Remember when Interplay was huge and Origin was a dominant force. I hope Obsidian for example thrives, but after the failure of Troika you have to be concerned; one disaster can wipe you out.
I like the downloadable; try before you buy model. I support it and encourage it. This is where we're seeing the innovation. Long may they prosper!! 
_________________
If God said it, then that settles it!
I don't use Smileys, I use Emoticons!!
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 2:45 am |
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Soothsayer
Guest
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It's topics like this that make me want to register instead of lurking around for another two years.
Look, I love indie games. I once did a review For Gothic 2 that was reported here on this site...I simply adore "The little guy" in this business. Games like Gothic, Sacred, Arx Fatalis, Divine Divinity...these represent the future of the RPG genre. Though in reality, it's just a return to the past.
Let me clarify: I've been in this hobby for far too long (22 years and counting) and I've noticed something: Every five or so years the PC side of the RPG genre goes through a "Growth spurt" which causes a lot of oily residue (Bad games) to be spewed up through the skin (Retailers), thus resulting in horrible acne (Bad image seen by outsiders). Five years ago we were all hearing the same thing after Might & Magic 9 completely tanked, shallow action RPGs like Diablo 2 took over, and Black Isle died, taking the hotly anticipated "Torn" game with it. I laughed as I heard it then, as I do now. Heck, people were ready to call PC RPG'ing dead back in early 96 too, thanks to Daggerfall's incredibly buggy release...not to mention Lands of Lore 2 and Wizardry Nemesis being two of the worst (And yet most heavily hyped) RPGs of their time.
Five year periods people...don't worry about this silly stuff. Just think, in not too long of a time you'll be playing Elder Scrolls Oblivion, NWN2, Dragon age, Dungeon Siege 2, The Witcher, Gothic 3, the spiritual successor to System Shock 2, and probably Divine Divinity 2. Just think positive, and start looking ahead...
The future is very bright indeed. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 3:04 am |
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Roqua
High Emperor
Joined: 02 Sep 2003
Posts: 897
Location: rump |
Soothsayer, the future might be bright for you since you like the craptastic action, rt games.
I look at your list and say, Jesus Christ, not a good game among them. But, Nival Int, is now the God fearing harbinger of good rpgs with Night Watch. Nival is to rpg, what window shopping for women in Amsterdam is to my idea of heaven (if only my wife would be cool about that; damn her prudish, old fashioned ways).
And Val didn't take her conclusion to the next logical step, which is something I take sole credit for predicting a long time ago. Computers will be intergrated with houses. You could play a PC game in your living room on your big hdtv with a wireless remote. Why would people own a pc that can play games and a console that can play the same exact games. It wont happen. As soon as the pirating issue goes away by tech, and computers become like central air and are part of your house, the console will die (why would devs waste money on console liscensing? when they can have dirrect dl and registration/activation on a steam like system and skip the pubs and int barriers)?
Of course this is like 20 years off, but I dont care. My prediction is eminent. And I'll still probably be playing good rpgs like Realms of Arkania tril, Draklands, FO 1 and 2, and Wiz 7. And of course, the indie games. Omega Syndrome is getting better everyday. And for the long boring gaps between games, I have a penis and vasaline to keep me occupied, and a wife's life to plot the destruction and downfall of, a world coup to plan, among other things like smoking cigarettes, finding new parts of my body that hair is growing on, and thinking of boobs jiggling.
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Vegitarian is the Indian word for lousey hunter. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 3:42 am |
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bjon045
Fearless Paladin
Joined: 02 Jun 2003
Posts: 234
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I would love to see a website that reviews, ranks and categorieses all the indie rpgs. Is there one out there?
quote:
Originally posted by Roqua
Soothsayer, the future might be bright for you since you like the craptastic action, rt games.
....
I look at your list and say, Jesus Christ, not a good game among them.
...
I'll still probably be playing good rpgs like Realms of Arkania tril, Draklands, FO 1 and 2, and Wiz 7.
Arx Fatalis and gothic were pretty reasonable. Realm of arkania? - 1 was the best and it went downhill from there, 3 was pretty crappy, too short, too easy, and too many implausable insta death actions. Nothing is more annoying than a screen popping up saying "Your dead".
Personlly I think mmorpgs are partly responsible for the decline and the endless stream of worthless console titles filling up every game shop's shelves don't help either. The day everyone was raving about KOTOR2 was the day when I realised rpgs stand little chance of returning to their former glory anytime soon.
The infinity engine bought rpgs back into the mainstream - and it sadly seems like we aren't going to get a sucessor for quite awhile. Till then I guess we have to be content with action-rpgs like Gothic 3 and replaying old classics. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 5:04 am |
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Captain Kal
Village Dweller
Joined: 03 Jul 2005
Posts: 4
Location: Athens ,Greece |
I started playing games nearly 16 years ago, and although I love RPG's, I also love other forgoten genres like Space Flight/Combat/Trading Simulations, and Flying Simulations. IMHO, digital commerce is the chance for smaller companies to publish their games. I say digital commerce and not digital downloads, because it is easier to buy a boxed product from a small developer, using the Internet, than going to a retailer.
The way I see it, shareware developers will use digitall downloads, Indie companies may use digitall downloads and e-commerce for boxed products (like Egosoft and BC300AD), and high profile games the traditional channels.
As for the death of PC Gaming? Yeah, right. Consoles and PC's are different. I f I want to play something for half an hour, I play with my XBox. If I want to baby sit any kids, I also play MAME on XBox, with them. If I want to play something deeper and time consuming I play on my PC. It's a different kind of gaming. And "niche" games are constantly in development. Look at what happened in Falcon 4. Back from the digitall grave, after nearly 5 years.  |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 6:09 am |
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Namirrha
Noble Knight
Joined: 03 May 2002
Posts: 218
Location: Utah County, Utah. |
quote:
Originally posted by Dhruin
Do you regularly play indie games? Do you think the downloadable market will explode? Wouldn’t touch homemade graphics with a 10-foot polearm? We’d love to hear what you think.
Dhruin, first I want to thank you for bringing up the topic. They don't receive a lot of coverage except on a few select websites, so I'm glad to see the RPGDot crew do have strong interest in them.
I don't regularly play indie games, but I dabble in a lot of them. I have played the demos for Spiderweb's games, which are some of the better ones available, Omega Syndrome, Prelude to Darkness, and many, many free downloadable RPGs (which test the resolution of even the most stalwart RPG veteran). Of all of these, Spiderweb's games and Omega Syndrome have been the best experiences.
The future of the downloadable/shareware market looks bright, but let me mention a few obstacles I think it faces:
1. Piracy. This is so common to almost be a given with the nature of the medium. It's likely there are thousands (or millions) of illegal CDs of Vogel's games floating around some place like China. Here are Vogel's thoughts on piracy:
"We're just two people working hard to create neat games and sell them. We
aren't a huge corporation. We sell these things to buy food and make house
payments. If you met us, you'd like us. Why do you do things to harm us?"
Vogel makes a good point: indie companies are usually small operations, and every cent not paid will be more likely to hurt their work. The financial burden lies wholly on the small cadre of developers, not on the publisher. So the first step to really helping indie devs, who constantly struggle from funding problems, is to buy their games. Piracy will never go away, but RPG fans can show their support with their money and create an environment that can support diversity and creativity. Otherwise, we can share in the bounty of free downloadable RPGs, which, after trying perhaps a dozen of, I have found I don't care for. I suspect many RPG fans feel the same way: we're willing to pay, but give us something good to play!
2. Infrastructure, distribution networks, and information/news/reviews sites. There aren't a lot of well-known sites for indie game developers to distribute their games through or to receive indie industry news and reviews. Some of the ones available are for those already in the game industry. For example, Gamasutra often pays special attention to indie developers, and their magazine, Game Developer, had an April issue with Alien Hominid, an indie console game, as the cover story. It was an excellent article, but I don't think most players will ever pick up a trade mag or visit a trade site. But there are a couple sites like RPGDot, which has always shown interest in small and indie developers, RPGCodex, etc. which provide reviews and information on upcoming games. Download.com and some others host indie games. Garagegames.com, from the creators of the Torque engine, is also another notable site which supports indie gaming. There is also the Independent Game Festival every year, but this doesn't get much notice either, which is troubling.
Self-publishing indie games can be a nightmare without a publisher if they want to put out a boxed, retail product. To publish a game and burn it onto CDs/DVDs can cost millions of dollars, even though each CD/DVD is individually cheap. Burning CDs at home is much more expensive per unit than if a big press were to do a large order. This makes digital distribution more appealing, but there are still issues of bandwidth and download size to deal with as well. These issues should lessen as prices for broadband drop and its coverage expands.
3. Funding. I think this is self-evident. Indie devs, especially RPG ones, often live and die by self-funding, and a lucky few get venture capital or regular jobs from publishers or other clients to keep the bills paid. Creating an indie game is still not cheap--the funding for one called Starscape by Moonpod cost around $60,000 US, and it was created by three full-time game developers. They reported in their forums that despite rave reviews and community enthusiasm, sales had only brought back two-thirds of their investment a year later. That's disheartening. I've seen the costs for other indie games run several hundred thousand, according to postmortems on Gamasutra.
4. Advertising & marketing. It seems a lot of good indie games fail in large part due to a lack of advertising and marketing. The customers are unaware of many games. It's important to create a game, but once that's done, you need to sell it, which means the customers need to know it exists. It seems to me many indie devs have not mastered marketing, even though their games (and lives) depend on it. Games like Omega Syndrome rarely make a blip on the radar. Spiderweb, on the other hand, has been pretty good at getting the word out; for example, working through gaming magazines to distribute demos.
5. Old-school & copycat indie. I've seen quite a few indie games which are trying to make new old-school games (such as ones inspired by first-person, party-based RPGs--the Might & Magic series, Wizardry, Bard's Tale, etc.) without a number of new innovations or indie games trying to copycat popular action-RPGs, except with a more limited budget and scope. In the case of old-school indies, I can't help but wonder if they are limiting their audience too much, when the number of indie gamers is already very small. It's one thing to be inspired by the old-school games, another thing to try to remake them down to the smallest detail for nostalgic purposes. In my experience, nostalgia lasts for about 5 minutes, then you move on. In the case of copycat indies, they seem to be afraid to experiment, and are a "poor man's" imitation of more mainstream, popular games. If they can't beat the big developers at technology, sound, music, etc., then they should make other areas their strengths. Here's a quote from Vogel on the technology in Geneforge 3:
"Nobody is going to be very impressed with our technology. It's a simple, icon-based game with fairly simple sound effects. We don't have a ton of money, so we focus on what we can... story and gameplay. Whatever else you can say about a Spiderweb product, there's always a solid game there."
quote:
It’s hard to know if this will be the nirvana sometimes described, at least for cRPG players. RPG development has always been difficult – there’s a lot of content that goes into a quest-driven, story-rich cRPG. It’s easy to see how simple puzzle games with quick development times can turn a profit but harder to envisage developers turning to complex cRPGs. While there are a large number of indie downloadable RPG developments out there -- including great projects past and present -- Spiderweb remains the only full-time downloadable cRPG developer of significant prominence. There <em>is</em> a market, if more small developers can find a way to bring quality cRPGs to players starved by traditional retail.
RPGs are some of the most complex games to develop, from both a programming and design standpoint, according to one of my friends who used to work for Black Isle. On the other hand, they can be some of the most pleasurable to work on, because the team is often devoted and committed. To me indie games are the new "Wild West," where those with the know-how, gusto, and a pair of six-shooters can make a name for themselves. Some are doing it already. And more can follow in their footsteps.
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Give me the shadows, shield me from the light, and I shall let nothing pass in the darkness of the night. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 7:50 am |
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Ratavuk
Noble Knight
Joined: 08 May 2005
Posts: 213
Location: I-Net |
Good thread people.
@ Soothsayer
Was Lands of Lore 2 really so bad ? LOR2 wasn't a real Rpg anyway it was more of an actionrpgadventurehybridgame like Gothic or Outcast. But that doesn't mean that it is a bad game. Perhaps LOL2 was hyped like shit but i played it years after the release and i enjoyed it although the graphics were really ugly. Even though LOL3 was really shitty compared to LOL2 i would wish for a LOL4 but i know it will certainly never happen. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 10:06 am |
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Guest
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Why it would be so hard to get more Fallouts and Baldur's Gates? I mean, it has been done before at low cost so why not now, right? I hear all this jibber jabber about rising development costs. Thats BS because you can make isometric look good without all the bells and whistles. The truth of the matter, I think, is that gamers have changed. We like to have our collective hands held now. When ToEE came out, half the reviews criticized it for not having features it had simply because they didnt RTFM. People bitch and moan about accessibility like crazy. I have even seen CONSOLE RPGS (like Nocturne on PS2) be nailed for not being accessible enough and most of those criticized titles are so simplt a retard on crack could figure them out in under 10 minutes. What do we want now? Deep gameplay? Meaningful character development? NO. We want stories. We, as a culture, have forgotten about these little things called books. As a replacement, people go for videogames. This is why you see so many shit moron reviews stick opinions on STORY in the GAMEPLAY section.
CRPGs are dead not because of rising dev costs. No no no no. They are dead because this new gen of gamers is retarded. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 4:00 pm |
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bargeral
Village Dweller
Joined: 13 Feb 2005
Posts: 13
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I find it humors that so many people refer to Baldur's Gate and the infinity engine games as the heyday of CRPGing. At the time of the the first BG game many die-hard true-blue CRPG fans decried it as having many of the flaws we currently complain about (graphics over gameplay) on some the shallower games of today. It is a predominantly a statbuilding, plot optional, puzzle free monster romp. I am not saying that it was bad, but it was criticized. Most reviews were very positive. But there are those that feel the reviews were heavily influenced by the advertising in the magazine publishing the review, and in fact I agree. One critical review was by Scopia. Those of you that remember Scorpia's articles will recall that she did not pull her punches. I always read her reviews before buying, and even if I disagreed I could decide based on an unbiased appraisal. Disagreed isn't the right word, more I mean that If I knew (for example) the dialog was poor I might still buy it, but I would not expect good dialog.
Back to the topic of indie developing. While money can be a problem, in some ways it is a bigger problem for the established developer/publisher. Given that they have investor's and creditors to keep happy. The three million dollar budget is much more likely to be shoved out the door on the financial schedule instead of the creative schedule that then the 'hope I can scrape up 300 bucks for photoshop' budget is. Grimoire may be laaaaaaaaaaaaaa (breath) aaaaaaaaate, but is it not rushed by financials. Another example of money working in the indies favor is Malfador Machinations. His Space Empires games, while not RPG, have never hit the bargin bin. It's even on his faq, he doesn't have to answer to anyone and sets the price base on the gameplay, not the age. He may not get scabs of new buys, but his slow trickle is at premium price. You can't do that with a game that the only sell feature is a cutting edge look.
Not being rushed by money isn't absolutely unique to the idies. Blizzard has managed to keep a large part of the timing under their control and duke nukem forever is cetainly not rushed. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 4:13 pm |
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Guest
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barg:
I just mentioned Fallout and BG because I would nothing but blank stares if I said Ambermoon, Realms of Arkania or Darklands. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 4:22 pm |
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bargeral
Village Dweller
Joined: 13 Feb 2005
Posts: 13
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quote:
Originally posted by Anonymous
barg:
I just mentioned Fallout and BG because I would nothing but blank stares if I said Ambermoon, Realms of Arkania or Darklands.
I started writing that post before your's came up, so don't take it as directed personaly at you.
As It happens I agree, BG level isomentric is approchable for the indie crowd and I'd love to see more efforts in that direction. It is a bit tight for a single person effort thou. This is very like the indie fan film crowd - lots of one man teams making, uh, well trying very hard. And one or two stand outs. The stand outs are almost always team efforts that have talent, time and at least a small budget. |
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Sun Jul 03, 2005 5:09 pm |
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