Xbox Live Community Games renamed. Now - Xbox Live Indie Games
Posted by Xander Thu, 11 Jun 2009 17:24:00 GMT
As well as the XNA Creator’s Club Package being updated to version 3.1, one of the changes being brought about will be how Community Games will no longer be titled as such. Instead they will be headed by the title ‘XBox Live Indie Games’.
I’m not quite sure how I feel about this. It does seem to be part of a much wider movement to try and promote the more interesting XNA titles out there with a new User Ratings system which will hopefully give Hexothermic and its kin the recognition they deserve.
However, if this new branding is to include titles like “Clock 24-7” and “Remote Masseuse” then I can’t help but feel conflicted on this, as if this rebranding is simply using the wake of recent indie successes to make the questionable content of the Community Games catalogue somewhat more respectable in the public eye. I don’t mean to suggest any kind of ‘ownership’ of that word specifically, however after all the work from many communities across the world who have given the word such a prestigious weighting behind it, I just want to see it treated respectfully.
So, should we be concerned? Or do you think there could be some other positive to the name change after all?
I’m not too happy with the change, as it seems to imply that Indie is separate from XBLA, and the community games are mostly crap, so in the public eye it’s like “Do I want an Indie game or do I want a good game?”
Of course they’re trying to make more money. Microsoft is a corporation and the people who make community games are still people. Everyone wants more money. A name change like this can’t really negatively effect anything so why the hate? Everything on there is as indie as everything reported on, on this site.
Besides, indie is just a word.
We should absolutely worried. The G4 channel has a segment called Indie Games, but it’s hardly representative. They post “games” such as the google image tagging game. Blegh. They always end the segment with “Hey, what do you want for free?” Suggesting this is the best indie games have to offer.
And now Microsoft is pawning off these games as all “indie”? We’re getting a bad rep.
They will own everything, eventually. It’s only a matter of time.
Tomorrow there will be 200+ comments.
i agree with glial gamer :)
although i don’t own an xbox so this doesn’t really affect me. but from what i gather, calling the community games indie implies that braid, geometry wars, etc., are not indie – which is weird.
Very very good point Paul.
Yeah, it’s safe to say that we’re screwed.
Thanks Microsoft PR.
The fact of the matter is, they are indie games. That’s what’s in there. Why be dismissive of these people when we could instead be getting in touch with them, giving them feedback, helping them learn and grow and hopefully make better games? I agree that it could be confusing because there are games that are technically indie in XBLA as well but to complain about the labeling because you don’t want to be associated with those games comes off as really prickish.
No it’s not prickish, it’s the same reason why I HATE people lumping all flash games together, and thinking of them all as small, viral bloons-like crap casual games.
Lets just say, there have been multiple times where people ask me what games I’ve made, and I mention a bunch of flash ones, and they go “so no REAL games then?” because of the stupidass connotation that they’ve gotten from the mountains and mountains of shit flash games that get released every fucking second.
What microsoft is doing could eventually lead to a similar effect with “indie”.
I mean, right now the public associate indie with good, because the only indie they know really are braid, castle crashers, flow, and world of goo. I.E., quality stuff. Microsoft knows this, and is trying to cash in on it without caring that in the long run it’s gonna completely devalue the term “indie”
If only somebody had trademarked the word ‘indie’, then we could threaten Microsoft with legal action and stop them from using it…
I agree with Casey. They are indie games. Plain and simple.
Glaiel Gamer, what you’re bothered by is stereotyping of a category, not the use of a category itself. Calling them indie, which is what they are, implies nothing but the truth. Saying “They’re all bad because they’re indie,” is something different, which bothers me too.
I don’t think we should reserve a true term like ‘indie’ just for the things we subjectively think are ‘high quality.’ Who’s to say, really?
Just remember Sturgeon’s Law people, 90% of everything is crap, deal with it.
Besides, the opposite effect could happen as well of course, people perceiving the indie brand as something that you can actually play, as opposed to some obscure collection of bedroom programmer shmups.
I don’t really think people should place too much value on the term anyway, with the IGF accepting Pixeljunk Eden and YHTBTR as serious contenders these days.
“Glaiel Gamer, what you’re bothered by is stereotyping of a category, not the use of a category itself.”
Do you fail to see that this is a very likely potential effect of what microsoft is doing to “indie”?
All they are doing is using the term to describe what the term describes. The ‘potential effect’ isn’t their fault.
Sadly, Shoo has a point if we’re talking about strictest definition.
Glaiel is more interested in ‘damage control’ when it comes to the terminology.
I don’t think we are in a position to judge what ‘qualifies’ as indie and what isn’t. But I also don’t want the mainstream people associating indie with ‘another stupid arcade clone.’
Damn, this really is a sticky situation.
This is just a stark reminder that the vast majority of independently developed games are terrible. It’s something we forget on blogs like this, where the crap gets filtered out by the editors, but there really are a million cheap knockoff puzzle games, half-assed business sims, and wannabe space-invaders clones out there, and a lot of them are actually on sale for real money.
Nothing wrong with calling it what it is. It’s just an uncomfortable shock for some.
As was said, 90% of everything is crap. Probably a slightly higher percentage than that in the world of independent software development, where ‘quality control’ is often a couple of the developers friends.
Ya, but it’s BETTER for us if the PUBLIC doesn’t realize that.
That’s a good summation, Mike. Glaiel, I totally understand why you don’t want people making assumptions about indie games because of poor associations. However, I think the need to get over stereotypes lies with the individual who would make such a stereotype, not the source of the poor associations.
I dunno, it does strike me as dishonest behaviour to children the public in such a manner. In any case, there isn’t anything that can be done.
The problem isn’t the amount of crap, the problem is the poor browsing and rating facilities and the generally bad way MS have organised their digital store.
Amazon is full of crap, but nobody complains about it because its infrastructure allows people to find what they like!
Oh yeah - in addition to the name change, one feature they’re adding is the ability to rate games, so that the good stuff and/or sort by popularity should float to the top, while the crap gets buried. Theoretically.
Bunch of angry nerds getting angry at stupid shit.
From a public point of view, the name change is much needed.
I believe it was meant to be the idea that that the CreatorsClub Community itself wouldn’t directly police what went up or not (within reason), they would be there to advise fellow members as to the quality of a title if it was requested. And you see with the iPhone, the lower the barrier to entry to having your game/app hosted in a “offical” capacity, the more exposure you get to people using it as a way of finding their feet by creating their first attempt at little pong & space invaders clones.
If the name change and the introduction of a in-dashboard ratings & sorting results in a increased exposure of the better quality titles on the service; And if it helps premote a better sense of ownership of the quality of the games that some people put onto the channel then that can only be a good thing.
Ratings don’t work. Look at Yoyo Games. Even the crap is high rated there. -_-
I’m with Glaiel on this one. Terms can develop a de-facto meaning completely different from their dictionary meaning. Indie gaming is a hard term to pin down, but it has come to mean something.
This move by MS isn’t a lie as such, but it’s very misleading. It would be like labelling one rack in a record store with “good music”. Amounts to an implicit statement about all those other racks, doesn’t it?
I think it’s honestly Microsoft trying to make Community games seem more appealing because “Indie” is becoming more of a trendy term to use. I’m still a little concerned if this is going to trickle down into a negative public image of “indie” and thus possibly threaten the sales / image of full-time indie devs.
bateleur: your comparison doesn’t make any sense, because “good” is a term that directly states the quality of the music. It’s a word that exists solely to imply quality and nothing else.
This puts the people who make games for XNACG on the same playing field as everyone else, and what’s wrong with that? As usual, the individual curation of quality will help spread the word on the highest-quality games, and there’s no reason that there shouldn’t be good indie games on Xbox Live that haven’t gone through the crazy certification and corporate bullshit that is XBLA.
I think the renaming is less to do with trying to pass off the junk that’s on XBLCG now as “indie” or good, but rather to try and draw more consumer interest and to encourage more developers who can produce good titles to look at the platform. As is there are a lot of talented devs who scoff at the platform, so the renaming is to try and help drive more consumer interest and, thus, bring more high quality devs and games to the platform.
It’s a win for consumers (who get more games), it’s a win for devs (who get more money), and it’s a win for Microsoft (who strengthen their developer and platform base, as well as making a little bit of money).
I also don’t think any of this will affect people making the next Braid or Castle Crashers. Those are games that stand on their own and don’t need some label to sell them.
Besides, “indie” shouldn’t be some exclusive club that someone gets to decide who belongs and who doesn’t.
From the perspective of an Xbox LIVE Community Game (Xbox LIVE Indie Game) developer, this is a huge positive change. When I talk about my game and have to physically say “xbox live community games” it sounds ridiculous and you have to get into explaining the community aspect, which matters little if at all to the gamer. If I could instead say “indie games” section on xbox, I don’t need to waste time explaining what “indie” means, and it helps indicate we are, in fact, an indie game studio. Not only is this a good move, I fought for this in the xna.com forums against Microsoft MVPs and xna.com moderators. I can’t believe it happened, but this is a good thing. Why? It means Microsoft is listening, and chooses to listen to game developers (and gamers) over forum moderators and MVPs when adjendas clash. Go ask any gamer not already in the know, “What is a community game?” And then ask them what an indie game is. Another huge problem this solves is that XBLCG (XBLIG) games receive little marketing, and this name change lets us market ourselves more easily, without the burden of explaining some unintuitive and cumbersome name.
Bottom line, if you care to read the xna.com forum thread that started this all, is “community” is the word the XNA team wants developers to hear, and “indie” is the word they want gamers to hear. Since the problem is (or has become) getting word out to the gamers, not the developers, this move was brilliant.
Seems perfectly reasonable to me. The public are already aware that there isn’t a magic Indie goose that shits gold, believe me - they’re still willing to accept the chunky nuggets of lovely when they do pop out of the backside of Indie.
The games are Indie (with incredibly scant exception), I’m extra happy with it as branding aside, it lays down a pretty clear message of what XBLCG is actually for. That’s a top bonnet thing, that.
Nothing to be threatened about at all. For all its flaws and crap flooded, I love that XBLCG exists. It’s not the redheaded stepchild of the Indie scene that’s somehow steeped in poo, it’s just a reflection of the realities outside (as Dominic says above) of the filtering places like Tigs provide.
@Casey>
Definitely nothing wrong with that. The point of my example was that by describing one small subset of their game range explicitly as “Indie” they’re implying things about the rest.
That most of them aren’t? It’s not entirely inaccurate is it?
Man. Think of what this will do to googling “indie games”.
I’m with Sigvatr on this one. It’s very rarely often you see him post around here and I love his ability to create controversy and chaos. Listen to this man, he knows what he is talking about.
frankly this suck, the community service is an utter piece of garbage because the lack of any quality check, and the user rating scares me as well
Yup, I agree.
We should stop calling things Indie because there’s crap being made in its name!
Oh wait…
Eclipse said: “frankly this suck, the community service is an utter piece of garbage because the lack of any quality check, and the user rating scares me as well”
There most certainly is a quality check – the Peer Review process…as a Peer Reviewier you absolutely have the right to reject a game based on its quality.
Would you rather the alternative – Microsoft policing game submissions? (Which will never happen because that would open a huge legal can of worms). The last thing Microsoft wants to have is a bunch of lawsuits from Indie Developers cyring that Microsoft prevented them from shipping their game due to quality or some other “subjective” measure.
The entire service is designed to be operated by and (for some) profited on by the Community. That includes the Peer Review process, and now also includes the User Ratings process.
What the heck is “Clock 24-7” and why should we care?
“All they are doing is using the term to describe what the term describes. The ‘potential effect’ isn’t their fault.”
Yeah, let’s give corporations carte blanche to do whatever the fuck because you’re a child who doesn’t understand culture or sociology or psychology.
I bet you think fashion mags have nothing to do with how we form our standards of beauty, too.
i wonder if the term “indie” for games will eventually lose popularity due to over-saturated use? much like the term “indie music” simply became a definition of a contemporary subculture of music.
marketers catch on to popular words and start applying them to things that really have nothing to do with the words original meaning. then people start losing faith in the word and start coming up with new words to define their projects.
maybe we should call them alternative games or maybe new wave games or… oh wait…..
@Beachlog Actually, in the peer review process you don’t have the right to reject a game based on quality. There are usability guidelines that must be followed but if you just go “this game sucks, no XBLIG for you” that’s not allowed.
I think that this isn’t a bad thing. It’s just another distribution medium for games that were essentially indie to begin with. There have always been “bad” indie games, so why can’t the XBox call their indie games indie? If I search for Indie games on google I’ll probably get bad games also! The stand out titles are still going to be the ones that get “real” attention, whether those games are on XBox or PC or whatever platform.
Wait a minute, did you guys decide what indie means while I was away from the Internet? :)
Was the game produced independently from a major studio, even if a major studio distributes it? (what the major game studios are isn’t even delineated yet - arguing about this could take days) Then it’s indie. Any other definition is strictly what you bring to the table. Indie games are great, indie games are raw, indie games are polished, and indie games suck - just like real games!
Not this again.
I don’t understand. Some people are bothered because indie games are being labeled as indie games? It’s unfortunate that not all the Xbox live community games are gems, but that’s just the reality of the situation. Not all indie games are gems, plain and simple.
have any of you ever even seen 90% of GM and MMF games? have any of you seen all the crap indie games on the interwebs? HAVE ANY OF YOUR FIRST GAMES BEEN CRAP BUT YOU WISHED TO SHOW THEM OFF ANYWAYS?
we dont own the word, and the word is being used appropriately. oh yeah btw, flash games are branded badly because of what theyre made on moreso than what they are. ALL flash games run pretty slow, and generally flash isnt seen as a game making program to most.
@Quazi
Thank you for proving my point about flash games
this is almost as bad as debating over what “art” is.
Stop mixing up connotation with definition.
“indie” isn’t a name. “indie” isn’t a title. “indie” isn’t a club. “indie” isn’t a brand. “indie” isn’t a genre. “indie” isn’t a style. “indie” isn’t a theme. …
An “indie” game is a game that was developed without dependence on third-party publishers (PERIOD).
Sorry, I just hate when clearly-defined words lose their meaning.
the debate is not “what is indie” it’s what will this do to the connotation of the word when microsoft associates it with shit.
As has been mentioned multiple times.
That should equal more awareness, which is absolultely good news, and perfectly harmless. People who choose to take notice can make a decision on whether or not the games are good or not, just like we do everywhere else. And my opinion is, it’s a mix of good and bad, just like everywhere else.
We can all relax. :)
Microsoft aren’t the ones associating it with shit though, man.
Let’s put this in simple terms.
The XBLCG or whatever MS want to call it is a place specifically designed for Indie folks to develop for the console and have some fun, possibly making some money to boot.
Given that the XBLCG is designed for Indie Games it makes perfectly logical sense for MS to label the service “Indie Games” because, well, it contains… wait for it… Indie Games. Huzzah. Much needed clarity for the service, something the public can actually understand and something that canny developers can use to their advantage.
The fact that a portion of Indie devs put shit up is neither here nor there because with or without MS, you’re going to get a great big fat pile of shit from certain segments of Indie developers - some deliberate, some as learning experiences, some because they don’t know better and some for the pure shits and giggles of it.
There’s plenty of hidden gems in there if you go a searching and more on the horizon. Just like there is here and every development community around.
And that’s fantastic. That’s precisely what should happen.
But heck, go right ahead and start policing what can and cannot be described as Indie and who can and cannot use the term Indie to relate to stuff because you’ve got personal issues with some of the content.
It’s not going to make a damn jot of difference to the indie scene (which funnily enough doesn’t just exist in the realms of TIGS as much as I adore this place and what comes out of it and happens around it - you’re a talented bunch but not a majority y’know), the public’s perception of the indie scene or cock all else in the short or long term.
In short, it’s a perfectly acceptable name to call a service that features Indie games, which is precisely what the XBLCG is.
Chances are this will damage general opinion of indie games, but shouldn’t decrease the actual quality of indie games, so I’m not that worried.
This reminds me of a point in time when comics gained credibility and started being called graphic novels. I’ll just quote Alan Moore now…
“The problem is that ‘graphic novel’ just came to mean ‘expensive comic book’ and so what you’d get is people like DC Comics or Marvel comics — because ‘graphic novels’ were getting some attention, they’d stick six issues of whatever worthless piece of crap they happened to be publishing lately under a glossy cover and call it The She-Hulk Graphic Novel….”
this should not happen simply because it’s not true. Microsoft doesn’t know what it means to be indie. This is just another attempt made by the corporations (i.e, the very thing we’re fighting against) to conquer and make a profit off of the indie devs.
As has been said before, the name change was asked for by the community and the new name is (almost) perfectly descriptive of the content. It seems like people are arguing that these aren’t indie because there are things like clocks and massagers on there. Surely the argument should be against the use of the word “games” if anything, though the majority of things on there are games.
It also seems that people are worried about the word indie being stereotyped, when that’s exactly what those people are doing with the content on there by continually singling out things like the clock. Sure, there are some things on there that I don’t agree with, but there are also a lot of good games, and I don’t think anyone has the right to say that you can’t use a word because they don’t like some of the games that are being produced. It seems a bit elitist to encourage indie development, but only as long as they’re indies you approve of.
Guys, Microsoft will be using the word “indie” accurately. If you want to get angry at anyone, get angry at the people that produce the dreck on xbox that you think is giving indie games a bad name.
@sqrrl: I really hope your viewpoint isn’t a common one in the indie community. That’s some messed up stuff right there.
The more I think about this the more I am convinced this is really good news.
The name change should really increase awareness while the ratings are a good step towards highlighting the good things on the service. It needs more good content though, that is an inescapable fact.
Seems fine to me. I think a lot of you guys are just nitpicking. The rabid protectionist attitude seen in the community over this single word is amazing.
@Beachlog: lawsuits to microsoft? that made me lol hard. Microsoft can do whatever they want to do, they can even choose to leave out of the service games that uses the color red if they want to. The peer review process is done by xna community members, basically the very same assholes that upload such crap on the service. At least i hope user ratings will put crappy games down a pit and expose more the cool stuff
Alex May wrote:
In effect, it’s our brand. The difference is, we can’t just sue Microsoft. ;-)
How is it your brand? And who are you referring to when you say “our”? Can you explain this to me?
Look, ‘independent’ is a word. It’s an adjective. It describes what you are and is an indicator to the methods used to develop your game, i.e. you did it without relying on anyone else. Microsoft is changing the name of their channel to reflect that. I honestly don’t understand the problem. You guys should be happy about this.
you guys are being just as bad as tim, if not worse because your trying to protect an adjective, a word used to DESCRIBE something. and it is being used properly, indie as someone said, means independantly developed. those games, no matter how crap they are, are indie.
Am I too late for the fagdance?
We are NOT just like Tim. Tim is trying to monopolize a NOUN.
Seriously though, if worse comes to worse and the word “indie” is ruined, we’ll just have to pick a new word. Just like any other business would have to once the word they’ve been using becomes overused and meaningless.
Henceforth all indie shall be referred to as
shwy.How can you look at Halfbrick and Quantum Squid (and like 30 others) and not consider them [solid] indie squads? There’s also a ton of crossover titles from current established indie developers. Sounds to me like people are creating opinions without really understanding or knowing about the platform or it’s content.
“Some people are bothered because indie games are being labeled as indie games?”
to repeat: no, but it is somewhat bothering that the indie games for the xbla are not labeled indie games – i.e. the only games microsoft is labeling ‘indie’ are the ones that aren’t good enough to get on the xbla. this will lead to a perception among xbox users that braid, geometry wars, etc., are not indie games. i’d be fine if they labeled both the community games and the xbla games indie games, instead of just half of them.
here’s an analogy: let’s say the imdb decided to name any movie that was never shown in theaters ‘indie’. while this is technically true, it leaves out those indie movies which have been shown in theaters, giving the perception that indie movies are less polished than they actually are, and that if a movie will just get good enough, it’s no longer indie. similarly, the perception this will lead to is that if an indie game just gets good enough, it’s no longer an indie game.
@Paul:
But Yaris is on XBLA and isn’t indie at all.
To your example: Labelling independent films as such does not implicitly state that any other film is not independently made.
@Paul:
Also, it was the request of the community to label them indie games, which they are. Should they be denied the opportunity to have their own games called indie, just because indie devs can also get games on XBLA?
I think the derogatoryness of the term comes from the “-ie” ending.
I say just drop the word indie all together. It just cause confusing. The lines between indie and non indie games are blurring anyway. You can invent yourself a new label if that will make you happy.
Glaiel: There is a lot of crap on XBCG (XBIG), but its unfair to completely dismiss the platform because of it. There is some pretty good stuff on there and there will be more in the future. You’re doing the same thing as someone saying “all flash games are crap and not real games” and therefore assuming Closure (for example :)) is crap by association.
Microsoft will not stop accepting indie games on XBLA, although chances are they will suggest you release your game in on XBIG if it cannot compete with an average XBLA game quality wise. I think the main difference is all XBIG games are indie, not all XBLA games are indie.
I have a bunch of issues with the platform and XNA in general, but being up and arms about this name change is silly.
“ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS.”
When I looked through the window, I could not tell who where the AAA developers and who were the indies….
People are up in arms about a name change someone in marketing made. They should get a promotion because look! People are talking about it! Is it not an accurate name? Are there any non-indies using this service? It’s a much more respectable name if you do publish your games on there since “indie” implies less amateur than “community”. I also see a lot of hypocrisy in calling games on one platform “shitty” when trying to defend another platform’s similar reputation. I would argue that there are EXPONENTIALLY more shittier games on PC but the distribution channel of the internet is much less public facing than XBIG.
Any change in policy is pure speculation based on absolutely nothing but sensationalism. MS is still taking applications for XBLA developer certification from XNA developers and is constantly updating it’s XDK XNA Extensions as new versions are released. No where does it say “Nah go use our community games service”.
These sort of posts are the reason TIGSource is no longer my homepage. I come here to see what people are making - and now half of the “news” is about publicity and image.
If a game is good, whether or not it is indie (or if you are “indie as fuck”) will not matter. People will only care that the game itself is good.
I rarely (almost never) hear anyone refer to Cave Story as a doujin game. They just refer to it as a great game.
Yeah I must admit, the inward-looking ‘I’m so indie…’ attitude I’ve always found hard to swallow… The thread of the same name I found particularly grating, of course YMMV. And I hate MS, so it’s not that…
TIGSource, to the outsider, is in danger of appearing as an insular, self-congratulatory community with this kind of attitude and the proliferation of memes that mean nothing to the average gamer… although that’s just my 2c of course. This is not to say it’s not still a great place full of inspirational people.
On a side note, I found the Langdell saga fascinating, and he quite rightly should stand down from the organisation, but I also think it passed over a threshold into witch-huntery, complete with the hunchback at the top of the tower and plenty of burning torches - and the IGDA lawyer was actually not off the mark in pointing that out.
Too late, Raptor-Owl, too late…
The whole it’s not on XBLA arguement is stupid too. Microsoft has already shown that they are willing to put exceptional community games (or I should say, “indie” games) as XBLA titles. That’s what happened with The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai.
I find it hard to see this whole news post as anything other than “oh no, they stole the word that makes us part of the cool kids group.”
As an indie game developer, if accepted into XBLA, I would not care for the lack of the “indie” label. Find me one upcoming indie developer that would. The complex conspiracy theories in this thread are wrong (my opinion), and the name change comes down to marketing BUT marketing comes down to “let’s describe what we are selling in as few words as possible”, which is not so evil as some of us like to assume. You have any idea the complications in explaining what it means that my game is a community game, to people who do not care? It was a huge marketing barrier and (maybe it worked at first) but would have been a mistake to keep it. Our jobs, as indie developers promoting our own games, just became easier. Which means better games.
As for XBLIG games that suck, most PC indie games suck, but you only hear of the best ones. Hopefully, with the rating system, the same will be true for Xbox indie games. You can’t stop sucky games from being made on open platforms. Be lucky the platform was opened. Some amazing games to come would have never been made without it.
I think I called this a brilliant move by Microsoft, but really it was an obvious move all along.
I mean, indie is not some sort of special club. It’s just a word that means independent, and games made on XNA fit the description. And when it all comes down to it, what matters more is the fact that your game is good, not whether you are “indie.”
Indie shouldn’t be a crutch to verify the existence of you or your games. If a game is good, whether or not it was made independent won’t really matter. People will care more about the fact that your game is awesome and the fact that it was made by a single person or two will be nothing more than a interesting (and trivial) afterthought.
I agree with avoidobject. The attitude around here in TIGSource should be geared more towards making things that we can actually play, not directing attention to the fact that you’re indie and then lashing out at others for “misusing” the term.
It’s not an entitlement or special term of endearment. It’s about as irrelevant as saying that your car is red. Indie just means independant.
Let’s not focus on who or what should be called “indie.” Instead, let’s focus on whether or not we’re making games that are worth playing. Anything can be indie. Indie isn’t just a word that describes awesome games. Awesome games describe themselves. The word indie does not.
Guys stop defending Microsoft. I wanna be known as “that asshole who makes XBL Indie games and helped ruin the name indie”, and I can’t do that if half of you agree that it’s a perfectly reasonable name for the service!
If this keeps up I’ll have to gain infamy by strangling kittens or something. And do you really want that on your conscience?
The funniest part about all of this is people saying “XBLCG are crap, they’ll ruin our image!” when there are 10+ of them that are better than the average games talked about here in their respective genres.
…and 10 out of 300 is better than 100 out of 10,000 or whatever ridiculously horrible good to bad ratio exists in all of independent gaming. The ignorance is understandable since editors here have admitted they know next to nothing about Community Games, so therefore don’t cover them, but still - do some research first.
@Paul:
Nobody is bothered by Microsoft labeling indie games indie games? I’m not sure exactly what you’re saying “no” to. Certainly there are people in these comments who are bothered by that very thing?
I do understand your point, but I don’t really understand the problem. True, some of the better, technically indie games won’t be labeled “indie,” but I find it unlikely that will create a negative association with the word. Indie is already a commonly-used, commonly-known word, because of movies. The actions of one company won’t change anything
But, even if damage was somehow done to the word indie, would it really matter? Couldn’t people still release good games on other platforms, and not call them indie?
Again, games like Braid (or even The Dishwasher) being on XBLA doesn’t make them not indie. If anything, Microsoft making them available as part of the main service is proof of how good they are, not any indication of their “indie”-ness.
And like I said in the case of Dishwasher: Dead Samurai. Microsoft gives great games the chance to stand on their own as XBLA titles. But in doing so, it doesn’t strip away their indie status (which again, isn’t some kind of title and doesn’t really matter in the first place).
Please don’t tell me this is the first sign of Tigsource becoming the Pitchfork Magazine of Independent Games.
It doesn’t matter what they call something, or if its on XBLA or XBLIG. If it’s a game made by a single person or small studio published independently and not by a big name company, it’s an indie game. That’s there is to it. I don’t see how you can dilute the word indie or have it mean anything else.
And their community games are indeed indie games whether you like them or not. And so are games like Braid. Both are indie no matter what Microsoft refers to them as.
i think you guys are confusing the argument by saying it’s about words – it’s not about words, it’s about perceptions. connotations rather than denotations. nobody is arguing that they aren’t indie games or should not be called indie games. we’re just worrying a little that taking a set of games that millions of people commonly perceive as terrible games (even though that’s not universally the case) and call them indie it will not be good for how most people view non-mainstream games and may make the general gamer public less inclined to try out non-mainstream games if that’s their first and only impression of them. this has nothing to do with wanting to keep the word or whatever.
I wasn’t aware that you had to apply for “indie” dev status and if you used XNA and XBLCG you were excluded from membership. What is this, the Indie Game Police? I don’t work for anyone but myself. I wrote a game. I got it released on the XBox 360. I have released an indie game. I am an indie developer. That MS have changed “Community” to “Indie” because they felt it would help both them and us hard-up indie devs is to be aplauded. WE get most of the take for paid downloads, not MS, so the more attention the channel gets then the more sucessful good indie games will become - only an elitist or a rotter would complain about it.
words are so fucking meaningless nowadays. Every time an article comes up about “art” or “indie”, people start arguing about definition in order to counter the people who are arguing about perception, which is pointless and only serves to muddle the playing field because definition is extremely subjective while perception is more cut-and-dry.
Gay means happy after all, but if I call you “gay” I’m certainly not calling you happy.
Ahh, as it’s kind of steering this way I have to reassure our readers that any kind of personal tone in this post is entirely my own thought and in no way representative of TIGSource as a whole.
This aside I think my worries have been eased thanks to some discussion here in the comments and in tigurk. I’ll keep an eye on things just to see how the XBIG service progresses and I really look forward to seeing the more worthwhile titles earn greater success for it.
I will also try to check out more of the XNA titles available on community games, but given that currently no games under the service are available for free (In fact it isn’t allowed by the service as it stands) I would have to work from free trials or actually choose which ones to buy and review like any regular consumer would. Which complicates things.
I’d also like to thank Stegersaurus and Mike Doucette for their input as XBCG/XBIG developers, though there may have been others I don’t know in here. It’s very much appreciated.
Don’t thank me! I’m threatening to strangle kittens!
Also, for notable XBLCG developers in this thread, you missed arrogancy who just released the obama-fighter style game “Angry Barry”. Just givin him his fair dues and props ;)
ok, my bad, I thought the entire xbox live collection was going to be labeled indie. nevermind, this actually sounds like a pretty good idea right now
This is not meant to be a plug (it’s not my site), but for those who are unfamiliar and think all of these games are total bunk, check out www.xblcg.info, - take a look at the top 20. Or check out some review sites. Maybe even play some if you can - they all have free demos. 2009 has seen some great releases.
@Paul Eres: But if a game is exceptional on its own merits, it doesn’t really matter if its “indie” or not. People didn’t play Braid because it was an indie game. People played Braid because it was an exceptional game that could stand on its own.
And the Xbox Live community games aren’t all crap like people seem to be assuming here. Just like on the PC, there are bad games and really good games.
If you want to make something that isn’t associated with crap, make a game that stands out from the rest. Something that goes beyond just being another indie game that people will enjoy playing no matter what its labeled as.
This is silly at best .
If you pretentious twats want to stop indie games being associated with the poor quality on XBLA then write better quality games and put them up. The only reason anyone links quality to a name is because of the quality of the product. A lot of people think indie games are crap, and they thought that LONG before Microsoft came into the picture. End of story. Only you indie devs can fix the image that their products get.
Exactly.
It’s not even worth reading through all of these comments. It’s just people spewing the same arguments for each side.
I think we should focus less if the “xbox indie games” name is appropriate or not and more on the fact that the service is populated by amateurish content and not by indie games. Focus on the difference from “indie” and “amateur\hobbist”, the problem is not microsoft using the term, because xna was born for that, is the fact that the service is full of crap that can damage the name of indie gaming
IceNine don’t be silly, PC has indie titles that at the moment xna can only dream of, the tig database is full of awesome games and they are almost ALL FREE, and xna has like 1 game that doesn’t suck but it’s neither that good every 50 entries and you actually HAVE TO PAY FOR. Every indie PC commercial game is lightyears away from xna “indie” games.
The truth is that the xna service is flooded with crap, just follow Oddbob’s XNAplay blog to see it with your eyes. The worst thing is not that games are bad, but a lot of them are reskinned tutorials, pong clones, massage games and so on.
I agree with DrMistry’s comments. If the name change gets more coverage and more purchases from consumers thats more support going to people making games for the platform. If you don’t want to develop for Xbox, or you don’t like XNA, then don’t pay attention to it, but for those people who are having a crack at it this is probably going to help them. Just because YOU don’t like MS/XBOX/C#/DirectX/kittens doesn’t mean everyone is the same,so stop raining on their parade and the opportunities they have chosen to take, and get back to making your own stuff…
@Eclipse - the internet is flooded with crap, so what? Find the good stuff and ignore the crap. There’s more than 1 good game on the service, but maybe you just didn’t bother to look that hard so you can justify your rants. As for “Every indie PC commercial game is lightyears away from xna indie games” - I call B.S. It’s absurd absolute statements like that which show your bias. Maybe when you learn to discuss the issue rationally you’ll be taken seriously.
I’d ignore Eclipse; he’s probably just trolling. That statement was too ridiculous to be taken otherwise.
I follow the xna service from the start, and there are very few good games. Internet is surely “flooded” with crap too, but on the web you don’t have something like an unique list where to get games that mixes crap and good games, on XNA you have that. Why an user needs to spend his time searching for underexposed and underrated games on xna community service when he can spend the same ms points on xbox live? Xna is a good service, in the hands of a bunch of lamers. Also that’s my humble opinion, XNA doens’t have games of the weight of Aquaria, World of Goo, Immortal Defense, Noitu Love 2 and similar, because developers knows that you can possibly do more bucks with a massage program or a shameless reskinned racing game starter kit. You feel hurted from my words because you developed something for the service? you shouldn’t if you think your game is not crap
I agree with Eclipse to an extend: while the best XBLIG games are not crap, they are not as good as our cave story or world of goo or knytt or a lot of other games on the TIGforums.
One can hope that the rating system will improve the situation, by first showing the best rated games to the public. And thus encourage the devs to make better games.
“Our” Cave Story, etc….what does that mean?
And Eclipse, you’re backpeddling from “every Indie PC commercial game is lightyears away from XNA games,” to, “the very best of the best independent PC games that were in development for a year or more are better than the first games for a service that has been out for 6 months.”
1) Yes, most of the Community Games are crap. Some awesome stuff, but there is a shit ton of “HD Clock” and the like. 2) Yes, it’s going to tarnish the idea of what “indie” means. 3) They’re still indie games none the less, if indie means “independent”.
I’m just glad I’m finally moving away from consoles and PC’s, and getting back to arcades like I used to be.
Suddenly being indie requires to have certain production values. I bet one day those little community games will say: “We don’t like those indie games with their proffessional artists, abundance of resources, both time and money, and an established community like those AAA titles. We like our little games we just make for fun and to entertain a small amount of people. Many times, it will entertain only 1 person. To seperate our little games from the established indie games, we will call our games tinie games.” And from this day, the tinie gamers were born, a new and fresh kind of gamers which didn’t find place at either the AAA or indie games establishments.
i’m not talking about production values :) i’m talking about making something for passion against making something to take some bucks, i don’t see how a peggle ripoff or an arkanoid clone can be something that’s not made to make a bunch of fast bucks. Even worse the case of a “remote massage” clone, or a reskinned starter kit. Those developers should feel ashamed for selling an xna tutorial as it’s their own game. If for “production values” you mean that it needs to be something that’s not a 2 hours coding crap so yeah, it needs that for me
anyway i’m a bit tired of reading random anonymous dudes, the discussion is interesting but it should be done on the forums, there are always too much “flame baits” in the comments section nowadays, so for who’s registered, let’s meet there
As if the “big” indie games were not made to make big bucks.
Oh and by the way, I have played some “two hours coding” games that will beat many top selling indie titles in the fun department.
Eclipse. Everyone has to start somewhere. Not everyone is out for the fast buck and you know full well I’ll call out those who are. Some people are just learning and dipping their toes in the water. I wouldn’t suggest anyone buy that particular stuff, but y’know, it’s perfectly alright.
Sure, the crap outweighs the gems on there. That makes it approximately no different than anywhere else and it’s a very immature service right now.
It’s what, 7 months old? The fact that I’ve got somewhere in the region of 40 recommended titles in my list so far (not all recommended by me, admittedly) is pretty good going IMO.
Having seen some of the stuff up and coming, the future’s looking funky.
RobF said <”Some people are just learning and dipping their toes in the water.”>
When i used to learn programming I’ve never tried to sold my shitty pong clones.
arrogancy said:
Well no, Cactus’ games are even free, Knytt is a free game. They’re like that because they were made by love and even if they’re little pearls they still didn’t felt to sell them, XNA games aren’t even on par with indies free productions, and many times they’re worse than the average flash game on newgrounds.
And it’s not because the service is not mature, it’s because it has no control. If on a side it sounds like a great thing, in a world populated mostly by morons a service like that that works is almost utopic. I really hope user rating will clean it a bit, but i’m not too confident in that because if you can rate only a game that you bought you will almost surely rate it good, and if you can rate games that you didn’t even played the service will be flawled too.
“XNA games aren’t even on par with indies free productions”
Yea, a LOT of stuff that makes money isn’t on par with Cave Story. I don’t understand this statement at all. Just because there are a few prolific games that were distributed for free, that means that we as indies shouldn’t try to sell the results of our passion because they may not measure up to the most famous free games in the scene?
You sound a lot like the flamers on Gametrailers who respond to videos with “This should be free” and “I’ve seen better graphics in flash”. Why do I have to undervalue my work just because another developer valued theirs at $0? Why is flash talked about as if it is some inferior development platform?
If you don’t LIKE a game and don’t value it, don’t buy it. Maybe something, someday will reach your standards of quality and you’ll pull out that wallet.
Eclipse, there are no games even close to Cave Story’s dev time on the 7 month old CG right now. Again, why do you insist on comparing the most outlier independent PC game to all of CG?
I think, frankly, it’s a lie to call them “games” at all. It was a lie when they were community games and it is a LIE now. In what way is the XBOX FIREPLACE a game, indie or otherwise?
On the other hand, there are some wonderful games on there: Hexy Trench, Hexothermic, and others (these two are only 200 points, too). They just need to cut out the idiot stuff. Who needs a clock radio for their XBOX? Apparently, a lot of people…
“And it’s not because the service is not mature, it’s because it has no control.”
Because there’s so much quality control on PC games…
@arrogancy: who said Cave Story? Don’t start saying things i never did please :) check my posts because i never mentioned Cave Story… also what that means? Cactus does awesome games in matter of days, 7 months are a lot of time for an indie developer, even in a single month you can do a small but nice game if you focus on an idea instead of trying to rip off people selling a reskinned starter kit.
@N: PC Games aren’t sold all in a single service, luckly. They works how the things works in other markets, you don’t have to sell your game side by side crap like xbox fireplace or remote massage, so don’t do stupid comparisons! it would be perfect if it worked as things on PC works.
Seeing as you aren’t going to stop marketers from trying to steal every image they can to sell their shitty products, and as there’s no legal protection for ‘things that are important to you,’ I believe the only recourse is street justice.
Where’s Mayor Mike Haggar when you need him?
@Eclipse: Based on what you said that wasn’t a stupid comparison. You simply said the problem was a lack of control, which is a trait of PC game dev as well. Only now are you tacking more onto that by saying it’s the combination of lack of control and the fact that it’s all a single service. It’s easy to say someone made a stupid comparison if you keep changing your position.
I guess I just don’t see the reason for any of this hostility. Why does it matter what they’re calling the games on Xbox LIVE Indie Games? Sure it’s weird that you can release a calculator and call it a game, but is that really going to end the world?
And if you don’t think there are enough good games on Xbox LIVE Indie Games, go ahead and make the next World of Goo and put it up there. Then there won’t be that problem.
@Eclipse
You’re right, someone else said Cave Story. You mentioned Aquaria (over a year, correct?), World Of Goo, Noitu Love 2 (which was made with gamemaker, lessening dev time, which was STILL extensive), etc. So, same point.
Cactus? There are a lot of games on there as good or as better as Cactus’ stuff - the “small but good” games that you mentioned already.
Your positions keep jumping all over the place as well - everytime you’re cornered, you make a new jump.
My point is that there are plenty of games on CG as good as the average game highlighted on Tigsource, and that over time, you’ll see games that are as good or better than the best as it goes, and that “it’s full of apps” or “not as good as any of the games featured here” are really ignorant statements. Understandable ignorance, but still ignorance. At best, it’s hyperbole, at worst, trolling for a reaction.
“And Eclipse, you’re backpeddling from “every Indie PC commercial game is lightyears away from XNA games,” to, “the very best of the best independent PC games that were in development for a year or more are better than the first games for a service that has been out for 6 months.””
trivia: immortal defense, which he mentioned, was made in 6 months.
They can call it “XBox Bumfuck Fantasy” for all I care; I just want to know WHEN I will be able to access the service from New Zealand, and find out for myself if any of the games are any good or not.
“trivia: immortal defense, which he mentioned, was made in 6 months.”
Just for the record - no one has said that the crap items on XBLCG took 6 months. All references to amounts of time were for the service from what I can see. If the various massage games and such took more than a couple weeks I’d be surprised and only that long because it was more than likely that the developers didn’t know C# or the XNA Framework. I could turn out the crap stuff in a matter of hours.
If you guys are going to do comparisons, make sure both sides are equal, otherwise you just end up looking silly (well, sillier).
This marks 131 comments on a post that is honestly about the mere word “Indie”.. a post that is now ECLIPSING all the actual positive posts of indie games and events.. ones that have been given a fraction of the attention this one is getting….. I know because i come here a lot.
:(
Well the games can’t be THAT independent if Microsoft can block me from accessing them, can they…
Anthony Flack, what does that got to do with anything? Those games are indie, because of their developement process. If BFG decides to sell games at 7 dollars and gives the developers no other choice, does that make their games not independant?
Yeah. I kind of think that it does mean that.
If you are beholden to your publisher, then it isn’t really an independent game in any meaningful sense. If BFG is dictating terms to the developer, then the project isn’t independent. Other people are telling you what to do.
Now, we are an independent DEVELOPER making an XBLA game, self-funding and self-publishing. But I don’t feel like the game itself is independent - we have all kinds of restrictions and ultimately Microsoft is the gatekeeper who will decide when, how, and in what form the game will be released.