Discussion Hot Take: 'Indie Games' today are really just the modern version of Flash Games. Except they're not free.

[Narroo]

So... realizing that having a good faith discussion would be impossible (which, fair enough so far) you instead decided to give up on it and... have a bad faith discussion? What?

Like, I get it, some topics are rough - there's things I'd love to talk about that I will never make a thread here on, because I don't think I could articulate myself well enough to get a good discussion going - but I genuinely don't understand why after the train of thought you just outlined, you would want to post a thread that by your own admission would backfire.

Also I just want to say that while I can see how your OP gave a slightly different idea of your stance than some of your replies, I think chalking it up to being all "misinterpretation" is a bit of a cheap way out. Sometimes people just disagree with you (I know I do, on several points, including those you already cleared up) and that doesn't mean they didn't understand. It just means they still disagree.

And please understand that this is me being as respectful as possible because as an indie dev both your OP and replies have not felt very respectful regardless of how you meant for them to come across.

Nononono---you're misunderstanding. It's not about having a bad faith argument. It's about accepting that one can't craft a perfect post that won't cause some confusion.

Like: I compared the bulk the indie scene to flash games. It doesn't matter what the actual context was, or what I meant, or how well I'd clarify my position. There would always be some people skimming the OP who'd just interpret the post how ever they want and assume I'm trying to insult their favorite game or something. Like: I could give a list of 10 indie games that I'm not referring to, and someone would pull up an 11th. I could say I'm not trying to be insulting, but someone might be insulted anyways because of a difference in perspective.

So, rather than spend an hour attempting to craft a horribly convoluted post in the vain effort of pleasing everybody, instead you just write what you think is a reasonably clear post, start a discussion, and clarify later if necessary. It's not about bad faith. It's about realizing the limitations of discussions on forums. Otherwise, it become almost impossible to have any kind of meaningful discussion.

And as far as respect goes...well. I'll admit I'm going with a bit of a "winging-it" attitude. This is an international video game forum, and so I'm trying to be a bit more causal than formal. So I'm not exactly spending several hours editing everything in MS Word to make it perfect, nor am I trying to be overly political in my thoughts.

Think about it: You're basically giving me the 3rd degree because my original post wasn't clear enough, and admitted that attempting to be more specific would have probably been in vain. You keep trying to steer this into me being some kinda bad actor, and I'm not sure why. But it's also what I mean: I think I was pretty clear that attempting to clarify in the OP wouldn't have helped much. And you're kinda proving my point by taking this and constantly leaning into "Aha! You're arguing in bad faith!" Like, no.

Also, do you really think this topic is that toxic? It seems to me that there's some real stuff to discuss here, such as how the nature of personal game development goes.


P.S. Please don't pull the "I'm a game dev card" on a discussion forum. You're basically saying that people can't have opinions on indie games that you don't like, because they're not a developer themselves. That's kinda a jerk move.

 

[meatbag]

I've posted on enough video game forums to know when certain things will get misinterpreted no matter HOW CLEARLY you state your case

Well, to be frank, your OP isn't all the clear to me, and your subsequent replies have been more about complaining about shovelware than actually talking about Flash games or indie games.

Please don't pull the "I'm a game dev card" on a discussion forum. You're basically saying that people can't have opinions on indie games that you don't like, because they're not a developer themselves. That's kinda a jerk move.

No, they're not saying you can't have an opinion. They're saying your opinion, or at least how you stated it, has not felt respectful thus far. Those are two very different things.

EDIT: Actually, @slide's has an excellent post in the first page of this thread that seemed more like what you were trying to say, put in a more eloquent manner.

 

[Ozeiyo]

Kinda but flash games were hunter-gatherers and indies was the discovery (?) of agriculture

 

[blondkayvon]

P.S. Please don't pull the "I'm a game dev card" on a discussion forum. You're basically saying that people can't have opinions on indie games that you don't like, because they're not a developer themselves. That's kinda a jerk move.

Step 1. Post a reductive overarching take about indie devs and indie games that is inflammatory.
Step 2. Indie dev lets you know they’re offended by your inflammatory remarks while still engaging you in a respectful manner (even though you’re not owed this kindness).
Step 3. Call the indie dev a jerk because of… reasons??

 

[Mekanos]

P.S. Please don't pull the "I'm a game dev card" on a discussion forum. You're basically saying that people can't have opinions on indie games that you don't like, because they're not a developer themselves. That's kinda a jerk move.

well someone is a jerk in this thread, that's for sure

 

[Arrietty]

Agreed! I would add that the freeware scene and the romhacking scene were the other major pillars of the mid-2000's indie movement that along with Flash led to the modern indie renaissance. There was heavy overlap between all three, of course.

rom hacking/fan games were literally what got me into indie dev this is very true

 

[Tailzo]

Generalising indie development as comparable to ‘flash games but not free’ or ‘adolescent game development urges’ seems like beyond a hot take, it’s just insulting.

I agree. And despite developing "stuff" with Macromedia Flash in my teenager years myself and later learning Adobe Flash and Animate as part of my education, I do not think Flash games can be compared to indie games of today. Sure, I did my best, but free was the most anyone would pay for the level I reached with those tools.

Today I still illustrate and animate a bit at work, but developing games is far too big of a task for me in my limited free time.

 

[Earthbounder]

I love indies. Some of them rank among my favorite games of all time, others sit at the top of their genres as far as I'm concerned, and a few have been my personal GOTYs in recent years.

Yet, I was going to defend the OP by saying people are being too harsh on him because there's a large gap between the post's content and the topic's title, even if I disagree with both.

But then I read slander aimed at Tunic and that's something I can't accept. That's one of the greatest games of all time. You're on your own OP, good luck.

 

[JazzPotatoes]

There was a clear distinction in quality, professionalism, and length between them and let's say "professional" games. Case in point: Think of all the cheap stick figure games that probably took a single day or two to make! Sort of like the difference between amateur fanfiction and a professionally published book.

I'm just going to highlight this specific quote and respond, because even this one snippet is just stuffed full of incorrect assumptions about how game dev works.

Games with stick figures are not inherently easier to make than other forms of games, and you can't rig together a game using stick figures in a day. Animating a stick figure is still a time consuming endeavour, because you still need to work on walk cycles, run cycles, jump animations, the whole lot.

And the logic running behind the curtains doesn't care whether you're using a stick figure sprite or a character sprite: you still have to ensure the game logic is fully developed and functional, which can involve thousands and thousands of lines of code or script or logic expressions.

Stuff like this is why people are snippy with the premise of the thread, I think.

 

[Dizzle]

Nononono---you're misunderstanding. It's not about having a bad faith argument. It's about accepting that one can't craft a perfect post that won't cause some confusion.

Like: I compared the bulk the indie scene to flash games. It doesn't matter what the actual context was, or what I meant, or how well I'd clarify my position. There would always be some people skimming the OP who'd just interpret the post how ever they want and assume I'm trying to insult their favorite game or something. Like: I could give a list of 10 indie games that I'm not referring to, and someone would pull up an 11th. I could say I'm not trying to be insulting, but someone might be insulted anyways because of a difference in perspective.

So, rather than spend an hour attempting to craft a horribly convoluted post in the vain effort of pleasing everybody, instead you just write what you think is a reasonably clear post, start a discussion, and clarify later if necessary. It's not about bad faith. It's about realizing the limitations of discussions on forums. Otherwise, it become almost impossible to have any kind of meaningful discussion.

And as far as respect goes...well. I'll admit I'm going with a bit of a "winging-it" attitude. This is an international video game forum, and so I'm trying to be a bit more causal than formal. So I'm not exactly spending several hours editing everything in MS Word to make it perfect, nor am I trying to be overly political in my thoughts.

Think about it: You're basically giving me the 3rd degree because my original post wasn't clear enough, and admitted that attempting to be more specific would have probably been in vain. You keep trying to steer this into me being some kinda bad actor, and I'm not sure why. But it's also what I mean: I think I was pretty clear that attempting to clarify in the OP wouldn't have helped much. And you're kinda proving my point by taking this and constantly leaning into "Aha! You're arguing in bad faith!" Like, no.

Also, do you really think this topic is that toxic? It seems to me that there's some real stuff to discuss here, such as how the nature of personal game development goes.


P.S. Please don't pull the "I'm a game dev card" on a discussion forum. You're basically saying that people can't have opinions on indie games that you don't like, because they're not a developer themselves. That's kinda a jerk move.

The problem isn't that you didn't articulate yourself perfectly. The problem is that you come off as extremely arrogant.

Guess what? I also didn't particularly like Tunic. But if I was gonna share that, I wouldn't in a million years use the phrase "creatively bankrupt" because I'm not an asshole.

If people keep "misinterpreting" your posts as rude, condescending, or ill-informed maybe at a certain point it's time to ask "wait, am I the problem?"

 

[Maronic03]

Look, I enjoyed the Fancy Pants Aventure games when I was in middle shcool but.............................no.

 

[Aether]

(P.S. I hated Tunic with a Passion. I could go on a huge rant about how it's a mostly creatively bankrupt indie game that rides on one single gimmick to make itself interesting, and it's emblematic of the problems most mid-tier indie games have. But that's another topic.)

Since i still want to play it, yould you slightly expand without spoiling to much?
There definitely is a breed of indie games that are all flash with little depth, but from what i have read and seen tunic did not seem like such a game.

 

[Hailinel]

Nononono---you're misunderstanding. It's not about having a bad faith argument. It's about accepting that one can't craft a perfect post that won't cause some confusion.

Like: I compared the bulk the indie scene to flash games. It doesn't matter what the actual context was, or what I meant, or how well I'd clarify my position. There would always be some people skimming the OP who'd just interpret the post how ever they want and assume I'm trying to insult their favorite game or something. Like: I could give a list of 10 indie games that I'm not referring to, and someone would pull up an 11th. I could say I'm not trying to be insulting, but someone might be insulted anyways because of a difference in perspective.

So, rather than spend an hour attempting to craft a horribly convoluted post in the vain effort of pleasing everybody, instead you just write what you think is a reasonably clear post, start a discussion, and clarify later if necessary. It's not about bad faith. It's about realizing the limitations of discussions on forums. Otherwise, it become almost impossible to have any kind of meaningful discussion.

And as far as respect goes...well. I'll admit I'm going with a bit of a "winging-it" attitude. This is an international video game forum, and so I'm trying to be a bit more causal than formal. So I'm not exactly spending several hours editing everything in MS Word to make it perfect, nor am I trying to be overly political in my thoughts.

Think about it: You're basically giving me the 3rd degree because my original post wasn't clear enough, and admitted that attempting to be more specific would have probably been in vain. You keep trying to steer this into me being some kinda bad actor, and I'm not sure why. But it's also what I mean: I think I was pretty clear that attempting to clarify in the OP wouldn't have helped much. And you're kinda proving my point by taking this and constantly leaning into "Aha! You're arguing in bad faith!" Like, no.

Also, do you really think this topic is that toxic? It seems to me that there's some real stuff to discuss here, such as how the nature of personal game development goes.


P.S. Please don't pull the "I'm a game dev card" on a discussion forum. You're basically saying that people can't have opinions on indie games that you don't like, because they're not a developer themselves. That's kinda a jerk move.

Your OP wasn't clear because it was a poor argument only further demonstrated by your subsequent posts either not making it clearer or just piling on more bad-faith argument. You are consistently making it worse for yourself.

In short:

 

[BassForever]

I came back to this thread cause I felt I had not given flash developers enough credit in my first post for the impact they had on gaming as a whole. There's no reason to paint a blanket "most flash games aren't as good as most indie games" comment as there was a ton of hard work and effort that went into the best of what flash games had to offer and gave many devs their first experience in the industry. Easy access tools let anyone make a game, and many people despite their best efforts will probably make something mediocre. I feel that's still better for then the alternative where they were never able to try.

 

[thoughthaver]

I'm just wondering when off is gonna get ported to consoles. or maybe some of those stick fighting games.

 

[paranoodle]

Nononono---you're misunderstanding. It's not about having a bad faith argument. It's about accepting that one can't craft a perfect post that won't cause some confusion.

Like: I compared the bulk the indie scene to flash games. It doesn't matter what the actual context was, or what I meant, or how well I'd clarify my position. There would always be some people skimming the OP who'd just interpret the post how ever they want and assume I'm trying to insult their favorite game or something. Like: I could give a list of 10 indie games that I'm not referring to, and someone would pull up an 11th. I could say I'm not trying to be insulting, but someone might be insulted anyways because of a difference in perspective.

So, rather than spend an hour attempting to craft a horribly convoluted post in the vain effort of pleasing everybody, instead you just write what you think is a reasonably clear post, start a discussion, and clarify later if necessary. It's not about bad faith. It's about realizing the limitations of discussions on forums. Otherwise, it become almost impossible to have any kind of meaningful discussion.

Okay, I understand a bit better what you were going for from those first three paragraphs.

And as far as respect goes...well. I'll admit I'm going with a bit of a "winging-it" attitude. This is an international video game forum, and so I'm trying to be a bit more causal than formal. So I'm not exactly spending several hours editing everything in MS Word to make it perfect, nor am I trying to be overly political in my thoughts.

Think about it: You're basically giving me the 3rd degree because my original post wasn't clear enough, and admitted that attempting to be more specific would have probably been in vain. You keep trying to steer this into me being some kinda bad actor, and I'm not sure why. But it's also what I mean: I think I was pretty clear that attempting to clarify in the OP wouldn't have helped much. And you're kinda proving my point by taking this and constantly leaning into "Aha! You're arguing in bad faith!" Like, no.

I don't give a shit about being casual or not - it's a video game forum and people are constantly shitposting here. If I meant formality (or even politeness), I would've said that instead. When I said respect, what I mean is that your posts do not make it feel like you have much respect for indie devs (or hell, Flash devs either, if we want to separate the two) or their work, and that as a result it makes it harder to want to extend you a courtesy that I (and evidently others in this thread) do not feel like you are giving us in the first place.

I'm not giving you the third degree. I was genuinely confused, and genuinely hurt by some of what you said, and I was trying to clear it up in an attempt at good faith, despite at the time not even knowing whether you were even posting in good faith in the first place. What the fuck else am I supposed to do? None of us know what you're thinking, all we have to go off of is what you write.

It's not a gotcha if people try to clear up what by your admission was an imperfect OP (regardless of whether a perfect OP was ever possible or not).

Also, do you really think this topic is that toxic? It seems to me that there's some real stuff to discuss here, such as how the nature of personal game development goes.

I don't think there's inherently anything wrong with the topic, given that several people in this thread added to the discussion in ways that others (myself included) didn't find dismissive or offensive.

P.S. Please don't pull the "I'm a game dev card" on a discussion forum. You're basically saying that people can't have opinions on indie games that you don't like, because they're not a developer themselves. That's kinda a jerk move.

Literally where did I ever say you (or anyone else in here, dev or not) couldn't have an opinion. Feel free to quote me.

 

[Dcubed]

This topic is pretty offensive. Today’s games are not even in the same league as the Newgrounds games of old.

Today’s indie titles are the AA budget games of yesteryear. Your Katamari Damacies, your Monkey Balls, your Oddworlds (quite literally actually!). Hell, many indie games end up having multi million dollar budgets, with some even sneaking into $10 million+.

 

[Irene]

While there is productive discussion to be had about the connection between indie games and flash games, this thread doesn't seem to be made with the best intentions, and has as a result veered off course. Therefore, we are locking the thread.

- Irene, Derachi, Josh5890