Why Indie Games Are Beating Triple A Devs

Find out why some of gaming’s biggest failures are actually more important than the hits. We head to the World Video Game Hall of Fame to get schooled by the masters.
Click to Subscribe: bit.ly/SUBSCRIBE-TO-WAYPOINT
Waypoint | waypoint.vice.com
Twitch | / waypoint
Facebook | / waypointvice
Twitter | / waypoint
Podcast | bit.ly/WaypointRadio

[@tiagocosmos]

Indie games are (mostly) driven by passion, a strong desire to bring a good experience to the person playing, whereas AAA these days is about making as much money as possible, holding gamers in captivity with battle passes, nickel-and-diming them with cosmetics, DLC, where their games start to feel like WORK, and worse, work you have to pay to do instead of getting paid. It's easy to see where the fun is at, and for me, it's indie games.

[@CptBlaueWolke]

Indie games aren't any different from AAA. That isn't as obvious because indie don't have big marketing budgets and most indies are worse then AAA. Source? Was game tester in a big company with several games tested a day primarily indies. I would say over 70% are very low effort and boring as fuck. 20% try to be good but lacking knowledge, and over 9% are decent but have no reach. Among the fractured 1% are the few pearls which drive the whole perception of "indies are better then AAA" expectation. It's exceptionally rare to see a well performing and successfully indie Dev beyond a hobby which pays less then an illegal part time job way below of half the minimum payment in most countries. Many are only fine with it because they make games for fun first.

[@manologamerss5801]

​@@CptBlaueWolke Being around in the LISA community for a while (And even having been helped some Russian guy in developing of two games) you're looking in the wrong place. Of course if you go to Falafel simulator, or some other quickly made game like that you're going to get shit. If you go to a community which provides a lot of knowledge and resources to anyone looking to contribute to the mass of quality, free games that the community has to offer, then you can actually get good indie games. And if not, just Google. People tend to lie a lot less about the quality of indie games as opposed to the overhyped releases of AAA games.

[@ezdelicades5554]

@@CptBlaueWolke compared to what? Almost 85% in my estimation of triple A games being absolute garbage in the recent years 💀. Yeah indie games may look boring for you but this is simply aesthethics but as long as there is fun then thats alright. It looks like you are asking too much of an Indie game when it is INDIE 💀 it literally is what it is. Atleast its fun to me, Bro a 2D open world sci fi game called Starsector versus a lidl ass star citizen game 💀. Indie games are made by amateurs 💀 and yet they are more fun than your professional ah triple A dev products. 💀💀💀 We can agree to disagree here.

[@shloprop4751]

Indie devs have creative freedom, while triple A devs really dont have tht because the companies are afreaid to try something new

[@CptBlaueWolke]

Well you invest millions in a decade where you would get nothing in return. How would you react? On the other hand only very few indies are truly successful and among that many today are actually payed by the companies which make AAA games today.. not so indie anymore.

[@anotherpeasant]

I cant believe they didn't have Half Life in the Hall of Fame. In 1998 there weren't games with that level of story telling and interactivity. But thats not Valves contribution to history. The fact they released developer SDKs, supported their community, and even going as far as to support thirty party developers. Before Half-Life, modding was a niche. After? Modding became a mainstream affair. You could buy a copy of Half-Life for $60 and you had access to a plethora of free games made by fans. It became so big that PC World and other gaming magazines would have cover features, and even ship the mods out on the CD with the magazine. I spent a huge chunk of my life involved with the Half-Life modding community and I have nothing but fond memories and learned many skills. No Half-Life means no Counter-Strike. Without CS, do eSports develop? Do countless kids get into development young, and then take those skills and make careers from their teenage hobby? Would we even have indie games without the support that Valve gave their fans in that crucial period in gaming history? Gabe and Co took their Microsoft money, their vision, and their love and now they're the leader in digital distribution.

[@alrightmark]

Criminally underrated channel. Thank you for the thoughtful journalism!

[@thegrandnil764]

There were a huge amount of innacuracies, and it seemed like it wasnt well researched

[@plop4493]

This is a really interesting video, especially the discussion during the last third regarding good video games sometimes going unnoticed. I feel like it totally applies here, with the plethora of video game related content/journalism that stuff like this flies under the radar. Good stuff Waypoint!

[@perrymanso6841]

That rarely happens.

[@paige99]

That is THE most glorious flattop walking around today. I'm in awe. Just beautiful.

[@jerrygomez3825]

😂it is badass

[@Shinzon23]

You learn more from failure than success after all and quite a few of these failures later went on to become cult classics

[@DjDizzy216]

The thoughtful content and high production quality is baffling when I see this video's low view count. Talk about a hidden gem. It showed up on my feed and I'm glad I clicked it. It definitely surpassed expectations.

[@perrymanso6841]

This video just hits around the bush and vaguely responds anything...

[@GWynnSF]

Just wanted to say thanks for making these. I recently discovered the series and think you're doing a great job here. Keep it up.

[@Navaron3]

Yeah this video showing up was a pleasant surprise, really good and an interesting thing to know more about.

[@Ftwiiner]

I wasn't expecting this video to show up on my feed and I'm super glad I clicked on it. Very informed and interesting look at why audiences are pulled towards certain games. If Hades is chicken soup, Gimme some more of that good soup

[@SV33381]

🙄🙄🙄😂😂😂😂😂

[@brandongovreau9218]

imagine a video game that takes inspiration from both NES and game boy but it's 3D and pixel art and it's a first person shooter multiplayer puzzle platformer horror game that's also a ARG

[@CptBlaueWolke]

Congrats you described the difference of indie and AAA

[@RickySama240]

I believe the reason why Indie game devs are doing better than AAA devs these days one important factor that makes a good game, and that is to make it as fun as possible. For the past decade AAA devs that use to have that passion and curiosity have switched their mentalities to "what is profitable" than "how fun this game can be?" And this is just sad seeing most if not all of the devs that i enjoyed follow fall into this business practice.

[@alexanderackerman3807]

I think there is a bad quantity vs quality problem in many modern triple a games that is never talked about

[@MySpottyGirlfriend]

The fact that gta v and skyrim are still some of the best games available on current platforms says it all. My first gaming system was an amstrad cpc464 and indie games were popular then,indie games have always been popular really

[@fp8575]

I remember playing Azure Dreams for PS, it's a game that had little fanfare released by Konami, but one of my favorite games of all time. Still have only talked to less than a handful of people that played it. As much as there are great indie games there are also AAA games that go way under the radar.

[@maevethefox5912]

the Strong Museum is such a delight to visit. I strongly recommend anyone who has kids, or was ever a kid, go check it out.

[@JamesTHammond]

Sander Krogsether? What's that mean? I had to slow the video down to even catch the text.

[@pattyofurniture8579]

Is this a reissue? Because Austin ain't been a host on Waypoint Radio in a minute.

[@ShowerSkeleton]

Yeah, Reset is a series that they filmed when Austin was still around. I think it was exclusive to some Vice subscription but thankfully they've been slowly rolling out all the eps on KZbin

[@ScenarioCommunities]

Such a great combination of people in the panel.

[@criscase6632]

Shadowrun for the SNES would be my pick for the hall of fame

[@Jultri0]

very nice. love waypoint

[@andrewjiles359]

the chicken soup analogy was really good lol

[@sacredsecrecy9620]

Dude looks like he spawned straight out of a 90's sitcom with that silly haircut 😁

[@Divergence]

You know what I love about indie studios compared to triple AAA. Indie studios actually listen to feedback.

[@zhili4638]

Dude they are both very different experiences. I love Dead Cells and Hades and have spent tons of hours on them but when Zelda TOTK, or next Souls game from FROM comes out I'm dropping everything to play them. Nice "fake news" video though. This is video is equivalent to the meme ... "You and I both love Dead Cells, and we both hate Forespoken, however... we are not the same."

[@AmoniPanala]

This video needs way more views, way more likes.

[@comedylyfe2113]

I want to make my indie studio, but how?

[@pubgacc2792]

Is this the guy from vice news?😮

[@Littlefighter1911]

15:06 You could do it, it's just that no one told you how, because they kept it somewhat secret and the internet was not at the same place it is currently. Like search engines and so on weren't that optimized. Nowadays you can just download an 6502 assembler, a sample project, an emulator and get going. I'm pretty sure the WDC 6502 assembler was already free to use of owners of the CPU and many people knew how to defeat the lockout chip. China was booming with a homebrew scene and famiclone computers. The only left to know is, how to obtain something like a "Bung Game Doctor" back in the day. It's this knowledge that was once hard to obtain, not the tools.

[@tecpaocelotl]

I got recommended this video. Vice, even if you can't go to North Korea again, this is fine.

[@jamespaguip5913]

Warhammer video games are doing really good example vermintide 2, total war Warhammer and maybe space marine 2 if space marine 2 come out

[@54ximmortals74]

Don't forget command and conquer Classic PC

[@zovni]

Please do more of this content instead of the "hanging out and talking about pizza" inane streamer crap.

[@Littlefighter1911]

15:30 That's what's making me appreciate the old games more. Today a game is all about art and marketing. Back then, the limits of the computers were much more obvious and required careful management of the resources. This is why current game development is much less forgiving. You have a few exceptions, where a great art style can mask the fact you're using a custom engine, that's not as capable as Unity or Unreal Engine. (Like in Hades or NieR: Automata) But these are rather exceptions than the rule. You're required to either make expensive assets that fit your vision, or buy assets in a common style to make it fit. (Like these "polygon" models or "cartoon" style models). And not just that, but audio is also very important nowadays, with some games completely relying on it. (Among Us without sound is only half of the game, as you don't even hear the silence of the ship and and footsteps). It's just so hard to compete with newer games and the value of "just making a game" has gone down drastically, because it's just so easy now. Programming is even less the focus of a game now and most of it is iterating through different game designs fast in a find to find something that sticks.

[@crimson-foxtwitch2581]

Hades uses the Forge rendering framework, a renderer that’s been used in a lot of AAA custom game engines. I actually had to look up if Supergiant used Unity or not reading this comment, but I suppose that both Hades and Nier Automata use their tech because they’re well-matured 360-era game engines that their devs were used to.

[@Littlefighter1911]

@@crimson-foxtwitch2581 Ok, I admit, I only looked into Transistor and Bastion, and they used the XNA framework (nowadays only maintained by the community as "monogame"). I assumed that Hades would use the same code.

[@crimson-foxtwitch2581]

@@Littlefighter1911 for Hades, Supergiant rewrote their entire game engine from scratch in a new language *mid-development*

[@Vyllsauce]

I think a lot of games that release now a days lack simplicity

[@cobraspottedwolf8791]

Sim city on SNES for hours and hours

[@brandongovreau9218]

if Microsoft Activision Blizzard deal goes through I want to see Doom Slayer added in as a new character for world of Warcraft as well as Master Chief from Halo and add both space and hell to the world of Warcraft and also make a Diablo Doom crossover MMO RPG first person shooter platformer game creator

[@McGomezAddams]

Yes

[@jamespaguip5913]

It’s funny how people think indie or double AA games are bad by the fact the indie and double AA games are doing better than triple AA games.

[@aaronatkinson177]

Yeah 😂

[@jamespaguip5913]

@@aaronatkinson177 it’s just facts indie games are just better than triple AAA games

[@shb4200]

Host did a hella good job

[@blackpiston]

Today was a tragic day for many gamers R.I.P Technoblade

[@panmajin6895]

From what I remember, stardew valley was made by one person. And it's one of the best games I've played(combat SUCKS tho)

[@darkfog360]

Untitled goose game haha. Idk y but i loved that game.

[@sideshowbob5856]

"Something this good" for some but not for me... Neither amongus or minecraft or anything that looks bad visually. At age 33 and in 2022 watching video games comming out that looks like games from the past 40 years it's just not for me. And yet yesterday i played medievil 2 on a emulator and ff7 being one of my favorites... but still if i wan't old style look games i will just grab one of the old good ones but i'll not even give a chance to any of these new trend and bad looking games unless they really look good visually. Visual is not everything and a good visual can have a bad content but visual it's the start.

[@kikkukun]

Odd seeing the Thief reboot get described as 'great' but other than that a pretty good video

[@Sagegabs]

There is simething over your head

[@Littlefighter1911]

20:00 Make me king, as we move toward a new world order.

[@Crazywhitie]

I hated Hades til my Son Got really Good at it.. Then I became a Beast at it just to try and beat him.. LMAO ,, Note: he is still better :(

[@mikerochburns4104]

Not bad, over 4 minutes before misogyny was mentioned.

[@themightybunghole1088]

Heart

[@gamergate2.0andbooks]

Triple a games aren't bad there always going to be bad games

[@SticksAandstonesBozo]

Mom farts.

[@tc4423]

I never thought of Bejeweled as a "womans game" or to be too "flashy." Buddy, you got some issues.

[@Cruelty-Torture]

I believe he was saying that in the video as an example of how some people reacted to bejeweled initially. Not that that was his stance.

[@shadcovert1160]

Just like same like on is it. And for a city I thinking same it. Because and.

[@mandyogilvie686]

529 like

[@leonivitchify]

People

[@christianvincentcostanilla8428]

Focus Just your old car Your high school buddy And a neatley diet cornsirup flooding the eastern seaboard

[@captaindestruction9332]

I dont get why people drum up the sympathy for devs over crunch. I get that it’s frustrating and sucks but its a part of having deadlines. No other industry has this sympathy from the consumers for crunch like game devs do. What is the person working on a report/project for the oil and gas company thats under crunch different or not worthy of sympathy? Oh whats that? You only have sympathy for game devs? Lol It’s ridiculous the double standard.

[@christianvincentcostanilla8428]

Just like the honest trailer the evil dead movies And the man with no name trilogy It mark the rise of : anti-Heroes

[@robsaber9174]

Missed a lot of important titles from the 90s....poor job on game history my guy...

[@perrymanso6841]

This video does not answer the question in the title at all. And tbh, is not a really complicated answer...