The Curse of the Indie Game Developer

When it comes to great feats of coding, it’s hard to match the difficulty, creativity, and sheer audacity of building a modern computer game entirely on your own. Ambitious, yes. Lonely, definitely. Crazy — well, let’s just say that you won’t get far unless you manage to ignore the obvious impossibility of the task. I started reflecting on single-developer games again after some controversy with a neat little project called <a href="https://store.steampowered.com/app/867660/NYKRA/" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">Nykra</a>. At first glance, Nykra seems to be a rare indie game unicorn. The game has plenty to boast about — gorgeous pixelated landscapes, atmospheric music, and an enigmatic sci-fi story. From the outside looking in, Nykra inspires that irresistible curiosity that makes the pre-orders line up. After a multiyear development process, Nykra crossed the hardest barrier of all, going from intriguing demo to actual released product. But it didn’t take long for the rough edges to appear. Almost immediately upon release, players started reporting a litany of bugs, crashes, corrupted save files, and — worst of all — a final level that was left deliberately half-finished. The developer responded with <a href="https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/867660/view/3060751829368207461" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">meandering</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/ENDESGA/status/1506797384801521668" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">apologies</a> that left the most important question — is this ever getting fixed? — floating in the air. (The final answer appears to be “partly, but some problems will be there forever.”) <a href="https://medium.com/young-coder/the-curse-of-the-indie-game-developer-9473f6cba5a2">Visit Now</a>