with all the discussion about Concord as a symptom of how deeply fucked up AAA games are right now, just a reminder that we're also living in a golden age of outstanding indie games made by passionate developers who really care about their games being unique and fun and interesting - ThreadSky | a Reddit-style client for Bluesky

crosscouloir.cc • 202 days ago

with all the discussion about Concord as a symptom of how deeply fucked up AAA games are right now, just a reminder that we're also living in a golden age of outstanding indie games made by passionate developers who really care about their games being unique and fun and interesting

Comments

crosscouloir.cc•202 days ago

wow uh this is kind of blowing up, as it happens I am also an indie developer making a game I really really care about and it has a demo releasing in about 3 weeks and it would mean so much to me if you gave it a try <3 https://store.steampowered.com/app/2920010/Comet_Angel/

literallynustiu.bsky.social•202 days ago

wish you the best. did you make it alone or with a small team ?

crosscouloir.cc•202 days ago

I made it solo, the only other big contributors are my three voice actors. I had some smaller contributions from an editor and a couple other devs who helped with specific areas of code. And a few other people are credited for assets like sound effects, fonts, and icons.

literallynustiu.bsky.social•202 days ago

Oh great, sounds like a lot of work. How much time did it take to make the game and when did you start learning gamedev?
Ill try to make time to try the demo looks interesting.

crosscouloir.cc•201 days ago

I started learning during the pandemic, but I'm also a professional programmer with about 10 years of experience writing business software. This is my 4th game project. Producing the demo took around 10 months of working on it in my spare time, since I have a day job.

literallynustiu.bsky.social•201 days ago

cool. sometimes i wish for a 2nd pandemic just for the free time I had. I was too young to care about anything but LoL rank 😭 personally barely started 4 months ago. Hope your game is gonna do well🙏🧘‍♀️

antyytna.bsky.social•202 days ago

its not just indie, AA and tbh even AAA to an extent is in its best era since the 6th gen

AAAs releasing singleplayer only games all the time to success is kinda crazy to me as someone who grew up in the 7th and 8th gens

crosscouloir.cc•202 days ago

it's interesting that you point out the huge gulf in quality between singleplayer focused vs multiplayer focused AAA games. I don't play a lot of AAA but it does seem like the more traditional singleplayer games have had more luck than super monetized live service attempts

antyytna.bsky.social•202 days ago

tbh the only one that's really struggling is Sony and that's bc they want every single singleplayer game to be a GOTY winner

it feels like soulslikes are the next big AAA thing with Sekiro and now Elden Ring inspiring stuff, Resident Evil is back in full swing, final fantasy 7 rebirth, etc.

simbanala.bsky.social•202 days ago

i hope sony never pivots insomniac to being a gaas studio. thankfully spiderman 2 sold well and if they deliver on wolverine....

pankraru.bsky.social•202 days ago

The Sweet spot for games right now is between $20-40 The only 2 $60+ Games that I feel have been worth it in the last 10+ years are The RE4 Remake and BG3.

There are so MANY Good Indie games out there right now.

kougeru.bsky.social•201 days ago

I haven't seen any "unique" or any truly "interesting" indie game in over a decade. The last one was Terraria. Everything I've seen since thing, especially the hyped up stuff has just been knock offs of older, better games from years prior.

crosscouloir.cc•201 days ago

Some games I'd recommend looking into are Slay the Princess, Until Then, Balatro, Doki Doki Literature Club, Unpacking, Ultrakill, Outer Wilds, Dead Cells, The Long Dark, Undertale, Needy Streamer Overload, Celeste, and Papers Please. This is filtered through my biases but I think these are 1/2

crosscouloir.cc•201 days ago

relatively unique games are not clones or knock offs of anything but play with their genres in interesting and creative ways.

rxtgirl.bsky.social•201 days ago

i think theres been a large lack in innovation from indie games, theyre mostly made just to be a combination and improvement of all the things their developers love. i dont see that as an issue, but its different.

darthroacho.bsky.social•202 days ago

Star Trucker released today and it's a great Space Trucking sim. Needs a little tweaking in some areas (battery usage) but I can't wait for more of it.

dotmirai.bsky.social•201 days ago

we all love indie games!

lowreswargaming.bsky.social•201 days ago

Literally, all my favorite games from the past ten years that where recent releases from those years have been indies, with very few triple A exceptions. Any favorite triple A games I did favorite, came out before then.

bigmoisty.bsky.social•200 days ago

Gaming is cooked until 2025

simbanala.bsky.social•202 days ago

there are so many indie games that are both good and go under the radar. like they made another cat quest game and fuga melodies of steel 3 is coming and .... etc. like, billie bust up looks really neat-o.

crosscouloir.cc•202 days ago

little kitty big city is such a banger

simbanala.bsky.social•202 days ago

i like how we are in an era where small developers can make games starring cats because there was always a lack of that kind of game.

saijun.bsky.social•201 days ago

The best games I've played in 2024 have been indies.

I'm genuinely surprised that a singleplayer indie game released in 2021 is still getting (free) Big updates after 3 years.

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saijun.bsky.social•201 days ago

It's a shame that not all indie developers can be so passionate about their projects...

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zoomzeta.bsky.social•202 days ago

Yeah, but we are also living at an age where many game developers have been loosing their jobs en masse...

danfriedz.bsky.social•202 days ago

It's crazy how good some of the stuff coming out is.

Semirelated, it's probably not really Indie but steamworld heist 2 is amazing and I don't really see anyone talking about it.

thx3188.bsky.social•202 days ago

i keep hearing about this being the second big collapse of the industry but it's being said by people who ignore that it was really only Atari and mostly limited to the US and pretend it had nothing to do with the Famicom/NES/home computers making the Atari obsolete

crosscouloir.cc•202 days ago

idk about a collapse but I think AAA companies are going to have to seriously re-evaluate their product strategy and development model if they want to survive past the point when they can pull the wool over investors' eyes

down10.bsky.social•197 days ago

To be honest, it will take some clearing out of the executive class. The people who make and play games know what is good, and the boardrooms don’t seem to be in tune with that, because they are constantly chasing profit.

practicingbushiho.bsky.social•200 days ago

THANK YOU

People become bleak so easily, but there are and always will be at least 100 great small scales games for every large scale AAA trite-fest.

SUPPORT SMALL DEVS!! ALWAYS! 0/

litwavesstudios.bsky.social•202 days ago

I totally agree

echidnabeans.bsky.social•202 days ago

And also AAA devs are very passionate about their work too!

crosscouloir.cc•202 days ago

At the level of the individual contributor this is super true, I don't want to take anything away from the programmers, artists etc working on these AAA games. I just wish the VPs and execs felt the same way!!!

applegreen.bsky.social•202 days ago

I'm worried about how golden it really is when it's also now inching close to "making a good game isn't enough, you ripped 10 other games off without knowing" territory.

People don't wanna hear it but the indie market is oversaturated and it has never been harder to get your foot in the door.

kasiamotyl.bsky.social•200 days ago

I guess outstanding indie games made by passionate developers have existed all the time? Rather all games back then could be considered indie by modern terms - it's quite easier to fill up all the 64KB? Monty on the Run, Deflektor - name them!

philomela.bsky.social•202 days ago

Hear, hear! 2022-24 might be the best run of indie games ever. No idea if the industry will take anything from that, though.

crosscouloir.cc•202 days ago

I don't think any of the big players are paying attention (see Xbox cutting Tango Gameworks) but "big budget indie" and "AA" games have been killing it and I think we'll see them continue to perform well, with games that are smaller in scope but easier to make and highly polished

lorechaser.bsky.social•200 days ago

I went to https://itch.io to take a look at some stuff there because normal games have gotten so stagnant. Bought a psx1 style game about dream for 10 bucks. Amazing.

becomingcaptain.bsky.social•202 days ago

You are 100% right!

Btw, I am happy to see a familiar face here 🙂

crosscouloir.cc•202 days ago

Oh hey didn't know you were on bsky! Good to see you here!

becomingcaptain.bsky.social•202 days ago

Just opened my account, I decided to branch out of Twitter, so here I am... On ?Twitter?