Ask 10 MMO gamers what an “indie MMO” is, and you’ll likely get 10
different answers, but the answer that most can agree upon is that an
indie game is one developed by a studio not funded by a major
publisher. Indie game developers seem to be quickly gaining ground in
the MMO marketplace. Events like the Independent
MMO Game Developers Conference
attract longstanding industry
leaders like Richard Bartle, co-author of MUD, the first multi-user
dungeon, and Brian “Psychochild” Green of Meridian 59 fame. And while
we often hear gamers comment that AAA titles seem to be regurgitating a
lot of the same old same, we just as often hear them talk about the
creativity, passion and freedom engendered by indie developers.



Could indie development studios represent the future of MMO gaming?



CCP/White Wolf, developers of the thriving space-themed href="http://tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/43">EVE Online,
and Hi-Rez Studios, at work on the spy-fi href="http://tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/926">Global
Agenda, which is currently undergoing various phases of
closed beta, are two prime examples of indie dev studios making waves
in the MMO gaming space. CCP has managed to grow a player base of over
300,000 devoted subscribers for EVE Online--a respectable feat for any
gaming studio. Hi-Rez has won pre-release accolades from the press ( href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/70629">including Ten
Ton Hammer) and fans for its stunning performance at recent
events.



We talked with Todd Harris, executive producer of Global Agenda, and
Nathan Richardsson, Executive Producer for CCP Games, about the freedom
and the challenges inherent in developing an indie MMO. And although we
talked to these two gentlemen separately, they often echoed one
another’s sentiments.


Indies Find Their Niche



There seems to be a trend among industry insiders and gamers alike
linking indie MMOs to niche markets--smaller segments of the gaming
populace that aren’t catered to by MMO behemoths like href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow">World of Warcraft,
Warhammer Online,
and Aion.
Are niche markets essential to the success of indie MMOs? Does a
smaller budget and design team always relegate a game to the "niche"
corner? And is that problematic, or is it advantageous?



In terms of a niche marketplace, EVE Online may not be the household
name World of Warcraft has become,

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Nathan
Richardsson, Executive Producer, CCP Games

but it certainly stands tall as an indie success story. CCP’s Nathan
Richardsson approached the topic of niche markets from the viewpoint of
an established MMO.



“We think this is more down to what meaning people draw from the
word niche,” says Richardsson. “EVE [Online] is
frequently called a niche game, yet we have 300,000 paying subscribers.
In terms of the world as the marketplace for EVE, 300,000 is nothing
and could easily be referred to as a niche. [But] we simply cater to a
very specific audience and this usually defines the game and its
direction. MMOs are traditionally a very long-term time investment and
you tend to be more selective in your decision on what you might end up
spending years on. So no, niche markets are not essential [to an indie
MMO’s success] but there is nothing wrong with starting out with a
smaller team, targeting a very specific audience and growing the game
organically with your playerbase.”



“By definition a niche market is a segment that is currently
underserved by the mainstream providers. So, to serve that audience a
developer typically needs to deliver something really different and
innovative vs. just more of the same thing available elsewhere,” says
Hi-Rez Studios’ Todd Harris. “With a big budget there could be a
temptation to cover up stale gameplay by shoveling out more content or
simply pumping up the marketing hype. However, for an indie developer
such as Hi-Rez Studios, the game must stand on its own merits and we
find that liberating.”



Richardsson would seem to agree. “This only becomes problematic if you
try to reach a massive audience from the get-go and that’s usually [the
case with] the failures we’ve seen lately, which are different flavors
of a proven model. Except it’s a proven model which requires much
larger initial investments, has higher risk and you’ll often see that
people migrate back to their previous MMO where they have a lot of time
already invested. Why invest more time somewhere else if the game is
relatively similar and your friends aren’t necessarily playing with you
anymore? Figure out that solution and you’re on to something.”


Limiting or Liberating?



Indie games face a number of challenges, but “challenge” is in the eye
of the beholder. What one person might see as difficult--smaller
budget, smaller staff, smaller target audience--another might see as
advantageous.



Todd Harris says that two distinct advantages characterize Hi-Rez
Studios in its development of Global Agenda: gameplay focus and release
mentality.



“Given that Hi-Rez Studios is self-funded,” he says, “we were able to
spend the necessary time and resources up

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Todd
Harris, Executive Producer, Global Agenda

front toward developing fun and addicting core gameplay. We were able
to playtest throughout the process and iterate the game based upon
feedback from players, rather than having to appeal to or convince
external investors who in all likelihood would not be gamers. For us,
fun gameplay is the top priority.”



Release mentality is something else altogether. We’ve all heard stories
of developers rushed to release unfinished games due to pressure from
their publishers--Vanguard, which was initially developed by Sigil
Games Online and funded by Microsoft, went indie for a brief time, and
was eventually sold to Sony Online Entertainment, stands out as one of
a few notorious examples.



“In any public company there is incredible pressure around
quarterly earnings and invariably that does affect when products get
released,” says Harris. “Since Hi-Rez Studios is private and
independent we have the luxury of releasing Global Agenda when we feel
it is ready.“



Tales of shaky relationships between developers and publishers are not
uncommon in the MMO gaming space. A href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/73369">recent lawsuit
filed by Turbine, developers of href="http://ddo.tentonhammer.com/">Dungeons &
Dragons Online, is
bringing developer/publisher relations to the forefront by calling DDO
publisher Atari onto the carpet for, among several things, weak efforts
in the European distribution of the game. Independent
developers may face challenges, but building a mutually beneficial
relationship with a publisher isn’t one of them.



“The negative stories you always hear of publisher pressure, battle for
creative control, last minute changes, death marches and so on…I think
you only hear the bad stories and the good stories don’t percolate as
much,” says Nathan Richardsson. “Today, I think independent funding is
preferable so that interaction with a publisher is not started off by
begging for money. [For an indie MMO developer] … how you monetize does
not affect your potential to make a great game, regardless of team
size. What’s important is that you live within your means and make sure
you have time to finish.”



To MMOG developers, Richardsson says, “If your concept is valid, the
scope of your game is solid, you have a strong business case and you
have common sense about how you are going to run your company, then you
will get investor interest. Then you can start negotiations with a
potential publisher after that from a more even standpoint.



“Better development processes, best practices and an even playing
ground, where you are partners and it’s not a one-sided relationship
will allow you the creative freedom you need to take calculated risks
in creating your concept.”



To Market, To Market



You might say that an MMO is only as good as its marketing
strategy--even the most solid, entertaining game can’t become a success
if no one has heard of it. How do indie studies bring their games to
the forefront on a limited marketing budget?



Hi-Rez Studios relies on word spreading from gamer to gamer. “For
Global Agenda our favorite form of

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Global
Agenda takes aim at their market via word of mouth and
positive
press.

marketing is word of mouth from
people who have actually played the game,” says Harris. “We took the
game to E3 and were thrilled by the reaction. The folks at Ten Ton
Hammer were kind enough to award us ‘ href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/70641">Best Gameplay
of E3,’ and those complementary
first hand accounts go a long way. So, after E3 we took the game to
QuakeCon; now Dragon*Con and PAX, and we're planning additional shows
to follow. Basically, we’re taking the game on tour so people
can experience the gameplay for themselves alongside the development
team.”



EVE Online, however, is an established game, so CCP’s current marketing
employs a recruitment strategy that relies on existing players. “You
pay your customers to sell the experience they chose,” says
Richardsson. “Each of our customers is valuable to us, and if we can
give a person free game time for finding a buddy to play with, or an
affiliate partner or fansite some money for each person they refer to
us who becomes a customer, it creates a very organic growth of friend
networks. It’s a mutual partnership where we reward each other for
mutual benefit. Later, you can supplement that kind of program with
banner ads through CPA deals, AdWords, email re-activation campaigns,
newsletters and other offers to let people come back and try out for
free after an expansion is out.”


Shaping the Future



The future for independent developers seems poised to break wide open.
Middleware platforms such as href="http://www.multiverse.net/index.html">Multiverse and
Big
World Technology
 seek to enable
developers to get into the meat of development without reinventing the
wheel and starting from the ground up. But do these platforms
represent
the most direct route to success for indie developers at this time?



“I think it’s great that we’re seeing Multiverse, Metaplace and quite a
few others going into this space, decreasing the barrier to entry to
making games,” says Richardsson..”And we also have also things like
Gaikai removing
the barrier to entry of
games created outside of extensive toolsets like Multiverse.”



“I’m currently on the Gaikai side of the fence as I fear that games
created on platforms will have a certain homogenous feel to them,” he
adds. “Later, their toolsets will evolve to address that, but the
danger [right now] is always that you end up with complexity instead
and then have that same barrier again. I think the concept is solid and
there is something beautiful around standardizing a lot within game
development, without eventually ending us up with the Nth iteration of
the internet.”



“For Global Agenda,” Harris says, “given our goals of high-end graphics
and fluid, fast-action combat, Unreal 3

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Global
Agenda employs the Unreal 3 engine.

was an excellent engine choice. However, I’m enthusiastic about the
potential of new tools and platforms to make MMO development even
easier in the future. I think we’ll see a viable MMO
development platform emerge, but it will take some time. It’s
challenging enough to build a robust, supportable platform for a single
MMO game let alone a platform that anticipates the needs of future
games by multiple developers. So, game developers are rightly cautious
about using a platform until it has some history of shipped games. But,
once a platform proves itself with a successful game, other titles will
follow.”



And what about open source? We live in a world where many software
developers of tools and applications from, image editors to word
processors, are making their source codes more accessible ("open”) to
outside developers and individual code monkeys. We asked if an open
source MMO (there are already a few relatively unknown ones in
existence) could prove viable in the future.



“Absolutely,” says Richardsson, “especially after we get a more mature
gaming-centric middleware industry and more defined generalized
components of tech which [developers] can utilize emerge. We use open
source extensively ourselves--except of course we remain in creative
control and don’t open up the game itself.



“But often when projects start from passion, and the strategy behind
their development is to use open source, a

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CCP makes
use of open source for EVE Online.

certain mentality will end up in the games themselves, allowing the
game to be open source end to end, including [outside contributions] to
game design and features.



“We already have much more complex technological components in open
source and creative arts open source that started a long time ago.
These two can marry and I would not be surprised that the next
disruption in the industry comes from there.”




Making it Big



Where will indie developers take the industry? In a world where we see
independent film makers score hits with indie movies, and recording
artists occasionally make it big on an indie label, the notion that the
next success story in massively multiplayer online games could come
from an indie studio doesn’t seem at all far fetched. In fact, it may
just be a matter of time.



When Ten Ton Hammer asked whether the “next big thing” might come from
an indie developer, the responses from both Richardsson and Harris were
a resounding yes.



“It will most definitely come from an indie studio…however you want to
define an indie,” predicts Richardsson. “The next disruption to the
gaming industry is yet to come and it will be a total surprise to all
players.



“What I personally fear the most is that it isn’t going to be [created
by] CCP, of course, but the way to be prepared and able to react is to
constantly push the envelope…to pursue excellence in whatever form you
determine that applies to your game. Finally, be fearless about
change…[an act] which in some cases can be thought of as stubborn and
ignorant, but we prefer ‘fearless.’”



Harris is equally (and almost identically) enthusiastic when asked if
an indie could hit it big. “Most definitely,” he

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In the eyes
of many gamers, Global Agenda's looking good.

says. “Since independent developers tend to take more risks one can
already see innovative features, new genres, and entirely new hybrid
game types emerging. Within our own title, Global Agenda, we are
working to combine the action combat of a shooter... plus the character
advancement of an RPG... plus the context of a massive persistent war
over limited resources involving hundreds of territories and tens of
thousands of player agents. The concept is different enough that some
argue about whether or not it should even be called an MMO because it
doesn't fit the standard mold. Others might call it niche, but
we think of it as rather grand.”


The Definition of Success



We asked both our developers how they defined success as an indie
studio. Richardsson had much to say about the success of CCP/White Wolf
and EVE Online:



“[Success is] when you have launched your game, you are attracting the
audience you were targeting, you keep on growing for long sustained
periods of time and you have (good) food on your table to feed your
family. This inherently means your company is profitable, and you
certainly don’t need hundreds of thousands of people playing to achieve
that.



“I would personally add to that benchmarks like having financial room
to maneuver and grow effectively so you can withstand and react to
unforeseen circumstances (Iceland economy anyone?) and, in the end,
being respected by your players and peers.”



For Harris, whose game is still in development, the answer was simple:
“Success is a thriving community of players with passion for the game.”


From a Gamer's Perspective

We asked our community to weigh in with their thoughts on indie
developers, and they were as enthusiastic about the prospects of indie
MMOs as the developers themselves.


" style="font-style: italic;">One thing I like about indie in
general, not just MMOs, is that they can work on their own fresh ideas.
They do not need to cater to what the big suit at EA, or Blizzard
thinks would turn over the best dollar per man hour. They are more free
to be creative and try out things others may not have not done, due to
it not fitting the profit margin mold."
style="font-style: italic;">


- Reavi



"Indies are more apt to
pursue their dreams, rather than to focus mainly on profits. That's how
innovation happens
."



- Dobry



"I love indie
developers; they have the freedom to make the game how
they want it without others hanging over them and trying to shape the
game in to something it's not meant to be
."



- Metal



"I think indie
MMO's are the next step for the industry. The potential
for changes in design and the increase in competition in the market can
only be good things in my mind. Engines such as Multiverse, BigWorld
and others allow for a content developer to do a lot of the end product
design and allow them to focus not on how the source code works but
instead how their game plays
."



- Seriphis




The Times They Are a-Changin'



Right now, it's fairly obvious where the masses gravitate in massively
multiplayer worlds--giants like World of

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EVE Online
is a prime example of a game that successfully serves a very specific
market.

Warcraft own the MMO gaming space. But in the wake of WoW's success
we've seen mega-studios with vast financial and marketing resources
fall flat. While developers generally play their subscriber numbers
close to the vest, it doesn't take a trained eye to see that much-hyped
supergames like Funcom's Age of Conan and Mythic's Warhammer Online
probably fell short of their goals, if not in initial sales, then
certainly in subscriber retention.



Has the age of the mega-funded triple-A MMOG passed? One need only look
to EVE
Online, an indie game which has grown its subscriber base exponentially
to
over 300,000, to get a sense of what the future may hold. The
underdogs, with smaller budgets and smaller teams, have grander dreams,
and a sensible approach, whether by design or necessity, to bringing
those dreams to fruition.


To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our EVE Online Game Page.

Last Updated: Mar 29, 2016

About The Author

Karen is H.D.i.C. (Head Druid in Charge) at EQHammer. She likes chocolate chip pancakes, warm hugs, gaming so late that it's early, and rooting things and covering them with bees. Don't read her Ten Ton Hammer column every Tuesday. Or the EQHammer one every Thursday, either.

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