New Indie Site Coming Soon (Looking for Material)
by Michael Todd · in General Discussion · 10/25/2005 (6:38 pm) · 19 replies
Hey everyone, I'm putting a site together. (Don't worry its a proffessionaly made site) This site is gonna be unknown as of right now. The www.?????.com link anyways. Its a .com web site, with previews, reviews, demo's, Patches, screenshots , forums. I would like this to be the only place, beginners, and advanced "indie" game developers need to go! Whether its tutorials, or models, textures, demos, and the like, I want it all to be there! Site is owned and ran by me, and will NEVER contain pop-up's or what not.
Im looking for some material to put there. Prairie Games; www.prairiegames.com has given me permission to use there images and the such. What I'm looking for is this.
1) Indie Games
2) Indie Game Demos
3) Any tutorials
4) Textures
5) Models
6) Links
7) Upcoming Releases
8) Updates/Patches
9) Forum Ideas
Anything else you can think of to submit. I'll glady accept it. Ill even do side banners on the main page. If you have any ideas, questions or comments, Please let me know. I have the bandwidth and space to host files. Don't hesitate!
Site should be going fully strong, and online November 1st 2006, no later then November 5th 2006. Thanks a lot
E-mail me with content, questions or comments.
alannasdad2003@yahoo.com
Im looking for some material to put there. Prairie Games; www.prairiegames.com has given me permission to use there images and the such. What I'm looking for is this.
1) Indie Games
2) Indie Game Demos
3) Any tutorials
4) Textures
5) Models
6) Links
7) Upcoming Releases
8) Updates/Patches
9) Forum Ideas
Anything else you can think of to submit. I'll glady accept it. Ill even do side banners on the main page. If you have any ideas, questions or comments, Please let me know. I have the bandwidth and space to host files. Don't hesitate!
Site should be going fully strong, and online November 1st 2006, no later then November 5th 2006. Thanks a lot
E-mail me with content, questions or comments.
alannasdad2003@yahoo.com
About the author
Computer Science Student. Major Game Software Development
#2
10/25/2005 (8:35 pm)
Nov 2006? long time to wait... 
#3
10/25/2005 (8:47 pm)
So you are looking to compete with GG.com? 
#5
10/25/2005 (9:11 pm)
Naked Spider Chicks. Lots of 'em. Mmmmm.
#6
10/26/2005 (7:26 am)
Mmmm... nekkid ZOMBIE spider chicks are way better in bed though... just thought I'd add that.
#7
@ Matt: For someone to directly compete with GG would be a little more involved than having content, as you guys provide your own game engine, as well as publish. :)
@ Mike: Aren't there already a few sites like that already? Making a site with decent content is only half the battle. The harder part is getting it well known and active enough for the community members to participate. I'm not sure how well indie gamers will adopt yet another site, as there are already a few popular ones. Sometimes contributing to an existing internet resource is better than creating your own and competing with them, as things like this fragment the community sometimes.
I don't mean to discourage you. Just contributing my two cents on the idea.
10/26/2005 (1:51 pm)
@Skye: But at what cost? Zombies are way too..."bitey" (if that's a word). Biting can be pretty kinky and all, but if you've ever seen a zombie bite into a skull to feast on the brains, imagine what would happen "down there". :o@ Matt: For someone to directly compete with GG would be a little more involved than having content, as you guys provide your own game engine, as well as publish. :)
@ Mike: Aren't there already a few sites like that already? Making a site with decent content is only half the battle. The harder part is getting it well known and active enough for the community members to participate. I'm not sure how well indie gamers will adopt yet another site, as there are already a few popular ones. Sometimes contributing to an existing internet resource is better than creating your own and competing with them, as things like this fragment the community sometimes.
I don't mean to discourage you. Just contributing my two cents on the idea.
#8
10/26/2005 (2:05 pm)
All of those ideas are already in place here at garagegames. What are you trying to do differently that what isn't already available?
#10
10/26/2005 (2:31 pm)
It's rather ironic that you're asking for material, even though, since you are running the website, you aren't providing anything valuable. So why would anyone want to come to the website in the first place?
#11
Mike i think you should start by research other indie websites and seeing what they offer and how you can build on that. I also think that if you want to provide all the content that you mentioned, you might want to take on some more like-minded people rather than doing it all by yourself.
Id be glad to submit my game to you for you to post.
10/26/2005 (3:13 pm)
Damn you guys are rough. Mike i think you should start by research other indie websites and seeing what they offer and how you can build on that. I also think that if you want to provide all the content that you mentioned, you might want to take on some more like-minded people rather than doing it all by yourself.
Id be glad to submit my game to you for you to post.
#12
10/26/2005 (3:19 pm)
Might also be a good idea to register a domain name as well. Not sure if ????.com is really going to cut it... :)
#13
10/26/2005 (5:29 pm)
I have my domain name. Also, no im not trying to compete with anyone or anything. Believe me, I have been all over the web looking for indie game design material. And yout two cents is fine. Your not gonna break my internet heart. Im not gonna deal with just Torque, I'm gonna have everything from Torque, DarkBASIC, FPS Creator, Realm Crafter etc. Also 2D and 3D gaming. Im not trying to make money off of it. Im in the Marines, I get plenty of money. All I'm trying to do is get a great place to go to for intermediate to expert. Sorry about the 2006 part. Its actually supposed to say 2005. That was my bad. Anyways ya'll have a good one! Oh yeah, the reason I wont give out the link is because I'm always adding or taking away from it. So I dont want the user to be looking at something, then poof he reloads the page and its gone. Thanks all!
#14
Don't get me wrong, I think wanting to provide and enrich the indie game dev community is a great thing, but it doesn't seem as if you've thought this through.
I think you need to find some angle to exploit and focus on that as you're much more likely to draw people in that way (like a site focused on BSP stuff - building, editors, tools, tutorials, games/engines and all the associated tidbits). Give people a *specific* reason to submit content or contribute as opposed to your current *I'll take anything* approach. You can always expand to cover other topic areas later. But starting out so broad... just feels as if it's going to be yet another post nuke(ish) portal with nothing that hasn't really been covered before or by someone else.
10/26/2005 (5:29 pm)
I think an indie focused site that covers such a broad range of topics would be really difficult to pull off. It may seem like a great idea to heap every egg in the one basket history has shown that the more specialized sites usually prosper. With a field so big almost everyone has a particular focus or speciality. Artists will mostly hang out at CGTalk or other such artists communities as the discussion on issues related to their craft is usually more pointed. Developers too also tend to stick to the dev focused sites like gamedev.net. Don't get me wrong, I think wanting to provide and enrich the indie game dev community is a great thing, but it doesn't seem as if you've thought this through.
I think you need to find some angle to exploit and focus on that as you're much more likely to draw people in that way (like a site focused on BSP stuff - building, editors, tools, tutorials, games/engines and all the associated tidbits). Give people a *specific* reason to submit content or contribute as opposed to your current *I'll take anything* approach. You can always expand to cover other topic areas later. But starting out so broad... just feels as if it's going to be yet another post nuke(ish) portal with nothing that hasn't really been covered before or by someone else.
#15
10/26/2005 (5:30 pm)
And Thanks Sean for your submission! Sorry forgot to say something about that. Take care Semper Fidelis
#16
10/26/2005 (5:33 pm)
I've already got a lot of materials sent to me via e mails . Its been going good actually. Getting a lot more then I thought. Im not looking to be a #1 site in the world for indie developers here. Im not gonna be a garage games, or The Game Creators, or Game Maker. Its kinda more like for fun. Do it cause its what i like to do
#17
10/26/2005 (10:45 pm)
@Mike: Don't get discouraged by the negative posts that you've seen so far, but also take their criticisms and concerns to heart: what you are trying to do is both noble/interesting, and damned difficult to pull off well. Much of the jaded responses you are receiving are because of the complexity, scope, and limited chance of strong success your idea has--but that's not a bad thing--consider it a challenge instead!
#18
I hope I didn't come off as too harsh the first time. It's just very hard to make resuources that a community will adopt. I've spent over two years developing cross-platform software, online stats database, forums, etc., to contribute to the 3d benchmarking community. Despite the software's popularity and technical success greater than I expected, the community did not adopt to my site/forums very well as far as participation (it's a ghost town). I learned that too many people seem stick to the big/popular sites. As for the small/less popular sites, people tend to take from and not give back.
It's a good start that you have contributors, and I hope you get many more. Contributions and community participation is very important.
10/26/2005 (11:36 pm)
I forgot to say good luck in my first reply. :)I hope I didn't come off as too harsh the first time. It's just very hard to make resuources that a community will adopt. I've spent over two years developing cross-platform software, online stats database, forums, etc., to contribute to the 3d benchmarking community. Despite the software's popularity and technical success greater than I expected, the community did not adopt to my site/forums very well as far as participation (it's a ghost town). I learned that too many people seem stick to the big/popular sites. As for the small/less popular sites, people tend to take from and not give back.
It's a good start that you have contributors, and I hope you get many more. Contributions and community participation is very important.
#19
Also one advice. Try to find games that are created by indie developers but are free. There are a lot of really good games (usually gameplay is good but they are falling with art, sounds...) but still a good games.
10/26/2005 (11:45 pm)
Agree with Stephen completly. It's a lot of work, but if you provide quality information and maybe quality content indie developers will certanly gain from a site like that (altough I agree with the guys when they say that most of this is allready here on GG site).Also one advice. Try to find games that are created by indie developers but are free. There are a lot of really good games (usually gameplay is good but they are falling with art, sounds...) but still a good games.
Blake Lowry