According to an editorial published by Slate Magazine, there are no “indie” video games, and this is to the detriment of the gaming industry. Certainly, if the thesis were true, this would be a bad thing for gamers; large game publishers are becoming less and less willing to take risks. Looking at the top selling games over the past month shows a number of game titles that are based around previously established intellectual property; it is becoming harder and harder to find a hit game title without a number behind its name. But to say that there are no indie games seems to dismiss the works of a number of independent publishers.

Full discussion after the jump.

Part of the problem with the editorial is that the definition of indie games doesn’t seem to be static and gets compared to “indie” media in other forms. The analogy comparing the costs of development on the Playstation 2 seems rather egregiously flawed. Napoleon Dynamite is used as the epitome of the inexpensive independent production. At 1.2 million dollars, it is cheap for a Hollywood movie, but also came with a relentless marketing campaign throughout the summer, including heavy ad play on MTV, and a ton of free screenings in top markets in an attempt to drive up word of mouth. The cost of an “average” Playstation 2 game is listed at $8 million, but does this include marketing costs? If the reader is to get an accurate reading of the relative costs of building a console game, where is the low cost Playstation 2 data point? The average cost of a Hollywood production in 2005 was just short of $100 million; clearly the average price tag is not an indicator of lowest cost.

This is not to say that independent game development for consoles is easy, but independent movie making isn’t easy either. But to say that there are no independent console games ignores games like Alien Hominid that first rose to popularity on Newgrounds.com. It is possible to drive original content onto consoles, and homebrew development has been an underground activity for a while. A sanctioned release of Out of this World hit the Gameboy Advance this year, and there are other lower profile releases for defunct consoles, including the recent release of Beggar Prince for the Genesis.

One can make even less of a claim against independent game development on the PC. Some of the most successful games on the PC take the form of web-based gaming, like many of the offerings from Popcap Games. In terms of boxed games, one can point to Yohoho Puzzle Pirates, a successful independent massively multiplayer online game that got a boxed version published by Ubisoft, and the development of the Counter-Strike mod for Half-Life.

In spite of these successes, the author believes that independent games will be limited in their success because of lack of acceptance from the gaming public. He quotes Greg Costikyan: “Indie rock fans may prefer somewhat muddy sound over some lushly orchestrated, producer-massaged score; indie film fans may prefer quirky, low-budget titles over big-budget special FX extravaganzas; but in gaming, we have no indie aesthetic…” This statement inaccurately conflates taste for a particular kind of sound to an independent sensibility; that “indie rock” equates to “muddy sound” which vastly oversimplifies independent music production. Further, this convieniently ignores the games at the simpler end of the spectrum, offering basic gameplay and even more basic graphics, in games like Kingdom of Loathing.

The reasoning given that the lack of independent games is harming the game industry is that there is a lack of originality in video gaming, and the only way to get more creative content is to stoke the fires of the independent gaming community. The gaming industry’s supposed lack of originality has been a statement that has been made since the early Nintendo days, and is almost cyclical in its nature. There are low points and high points for creativity in the industry, just like any other, but independent gaming seems to be more on a upswing now than a downswing. Web gaming is an inexpensive way to tap into an audience. New marketplace options for Xbox Live and the upcoming Wii console, along with distribution methods like Steam seem to be expanding the independent game market, not shrinking it.

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