I attended Game Market West in Fremont, California, this morning, and the event was tremendous fun. For the gamer in me, this was an exciting shopping adventure, a chance to buy something off the beaten path. For the game designer in me, this was a delightful way to release a game.
Reflecting on the event, Game Market West feels like the start of a trend, one long overdue here in the United States. Japan has had Tokyo Game Market for about a decade, a place where game designers can take a design — often with just a few copies, and sometimes handmade — and sell it to the gaming public. Many of the wildly popular titles these past couple of years got their start at TGM. While sales never felt like the point, they came naturally for many of the titles. That’s what happens when such an astounding outlet for creativity exists like it does in the Japanese game markets.
I’ve been publicly hoping for something similar here in the United States for quite a while. Game Market West this morning felt like a massive step forward towards that happening. Put together by Johnny Chin (who is himself an accomplished trick-taking designer, and who also writes the newsletter over at BGG’s Trick-Taking Guild), this Bay Area event allowed producers of small-batch games a chance to sell them. The event was attended by about 200 people, and as somebody who released a game there, I can attest that it was a fantastic meeting point between game creators and game buyers.
There will be another Game Market West this spring. And Daniel Newman of New Mill will be hosting an Indie Games Night Market this December at Pax Unplugged. So it does feel like the start of a broader movement towards encouraging indie games in the United States.
The rest of this post will be some insights from this morning, some hopes for the future, and some thoughts on the release of the game I designed for today.
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Game Market West: Are indie game markets coming to the United States?
I attended Game Market West in Fremont, California, this morning, and the event was tremendous fun. For the gamer in me, this was an exciting shopping adventure, a chance to buy something off the beaten path. For the game designer in me, this was a delightful way to release a game.
Reflecting on the event, Game Market West feels like the start of a trend, one long overdue here in the United States. Japan has had Tokyo Game Market for about a decade, a place where game designers can take a design — often with just a few copies, and sometimes handmade — and sell it to the gaming public. Many of the wildly popular titles these past couple of years got their start at TGM. While sales never felt like the point, they came naturally for many of the titles. That’s what happens when such an astounding outlet for creativity exists like it does in the Japanese game markets.
I’ve been publicly hoping for something similar here in the United States for quite a while. Game Market West this morning felt like a massive step forward towards that happening. Put together by Johnny Chin (who is himself an accomplished trick-taking designer, and who also writes the newsletter over at BGG’s Trick-Taking Guild), this Bay Area event allowed producers of small-batch games a chance to sell them. The event was attended by about 200 people, and as somebody who released a game there, I can attest that it was a fantastic meeting point between game creators and game buyers.
There will be another Game Market West this spring. And Daniel Newman of New Mill will be hosting an Indie Games Night Market this December at Pax Unplugged. So it does feel like the start of a broader movement towards encouraging indie games in the United States.
The rest of this post will be some insights from this morning, some hopes for the future, and some thoughts on the release of the game I designed for today.
Continue reading →Share this:
Like this: