5 Things To Make Your Indie Game Stand Out (ft. CodeMonkey)

Summary

At Gamescom, Hugo, known as Code Monkey, highlighted two indie games that caught his attention: a polished tower-defense game with card mechanics, made by students, and a pixel-art platformer with tower-defense elements. The games’ titles were unclear in the subtitles; the second may be called Tiko.

Advice for Indie Developers

• Make time for marketing. Set aside a fixed part of your schedule—for example, one hour in an eight-hour workday. Try different formats and platforms, such as short videos, TikTok, Reddit, and Twitter. Repeat the approaches that get a response.
• Give familiar ideas a distinctive twist. A game can use roughly 80% familiar genre conventions and 20% fresh elements. This can make it easier for players to understand while still giving it something memorable. Highly original concepts may offer greater rewards, but they can be harder to explain.
• Filter player feedback. Consider who is giving the feedback and decide what fits your vision. You can adopt some suggestions, ignore others, or use a useful insight in a different way.
• Prototype before over-planning. Rather than writing a lengthy design document, Hugo prefers a short outline and a quick prototype. Testing helps reveal which mechanics are working and what to change.
• Start with small games. They offer faster learning and more opportunities to find a successful idea than spending years on a single project.
• Match the project to your goals. A hobby project can take as long as you like. But if you’re pursuing a living from games, weigh development time against the sales needed to earn a return. Stories of success after years of development can create survivorship bias, since less successful projects receive less attention.

Featured Gamers and Sources

• Hugo / Code Monkey — Guest and Unity educator.
• Overload — Channel and interviewer.
• Games mentioned: An unnamed card-and-tower-defense game made by students, and a pixel-art platformer with tower-defense elements, possibly called Tiko.