Here we go again...
It seems that somewhere out there, someone poked the "indiegames don't get any press" bear again, because I woke up to a handful of comments gesturing towards that matter. I wrote about the whole mess back in 2022 and my opinion hasn't really changed, so I won't re-litigate the whole debate here again.
However, I did stumble over a bluesky post that I took issues with and it's bothering me to such a degree that I need to put down some words, just get them out of my head. I also don't want to be a reply clown, or try to explain a very specific issue on a platform that is not suited for specificity.
I'm also not directly linking to the post, or posting a screenshot, because I don't want to give the person who wrote this any shit. I have the impression that she genuinely cares about smaller games and I don't want to cause any weird misunderstandings.
I am however quoting it:
this is a particularly funny year for the "press should cover indies more" convo to pop up again because as far as I can tell we've reached a point where press coverage has zero effect on sales anymore so idk, be free indies, worry about things that actually matter like steam nextfest placement.
I'm not even disputing the claims here, or the way it is phrased, my main issue here is that this post expresses a certain degree of ignorance that you occasionally find with folks who work in those parts of independent game development that actually make any kind of money.
I've written about this weird grab bag of material realities that exist within independent videogames a few times already and this is another example how even though I'm technically part of the same industry, my material reality is just completely different.
Sure, if you have a game that manages to access already established audiences, or if you're part of a studio that can leverage this, or have any other means to address your players directly, getting press coverage these days probably doesn't make all that much of a difference.
The financial argument brought forward only makes sense, if you look at games that make significant amounts of money anyway. I live in poverty, just getting $100 extra once or twice per year is huge in my situation. Sure, selling one additional copy of your game is nothing in the grand scheme of things. It wouldn't help me get out of poverty, not even close. But it could help me with being able to pay my yearly utility bill in February without being overly anxious about not starving for the rest of the Month.
The second aspect that botheres me here is purely emotional. I have no real idea what it feels like, when you put something out into the world and see it be either completely misunderstood or discussed in a way that you don't like. What I do know very well though, is putting a lot of energy and care into something, only to have it met with almost complete silence.
This past weekend, I saw that someone wrote about their impressions with Virtue's Heaven and it genuinely improved my mood. It is nice to see someone trying to actually understand what you were attempting, regardless of whether or not they enjoyed it in the end, or if their interpretations fit your intentions. I don't know if that post was responsible for that one copy I sold last week, but regardless of that, it was just nice to see.
So I disagree. Getting coverage matters. It might not matter much, but it can still help.
A closing note here:
Isn't this all kind of sad? I don't even mean my personal experiences this year, but this notion that if you're making games, you shouldn't bother reaching out to people? Apologies for doing a "back in my day" thing, but I remember 10-15 years ago, how often people repeatedly said that even if the chances for coverage are slim, you should still try to reach out to the press, because you never know? It feels like everyone is exhausted and has given up. I don't really have any answer here. I don't think that yelling for specific types of coverage helps all that much, because where is that supposed to come from? At the same time, I understand why game developers are frustrated and honestly, some game writers are pretty arrogant in their reactions towards that, which I also don't like. But then again, I understand how they too are struggling immensely. Maybe the problem really is that everyone feels somewhat responsible for everything, when really none of the people who are actually hurt by these debates and who are yelling at each other have much, if any control over these things.