I’m still working on my own stuff after 6 months, alone with 2 cats as my company. And I love it. I have never had this much fun and I never enjoyed work this much when I was actually own someones payroll.
The freedom you get from running your own show does move mountains when it comes to learning new things or refreshing old skills. It also does make me a lot more productive, since there is not this constant bombardment of voices and opinions.
Autonomy, Mastery and fun.
After looking a bit at the business end of things, I must say that it’s complexity and difficulty is hidden behind paperwork and is not really challenging at all. It has a lot of dinosaur mentality latched onto it, traditions, handshakes and signatures that are reminiscent of the Victorian era, where you have to dress and act the part to be taken seriously by most.
All in all, there is nothing stopping small groups or individuals from making their own games.
Another component in the mix is marketing, and approaching people with what you have and to get their attention. The cheapest way to market anything, is to rely on social media and viral schemes, but so is just about everyone else. How to get the attention of people that everyone is trying to get the attention from. If your creation does not create a chain of rumor/talk events among the social circles, you are most likely not breaking any ground and you are beating your way to the front like desperate salesmen at a third world flea market. That is what most traditional marketing tactics come down to in my opinion.
But people are not only interested in what is being sold, they are also interested in how it was made and by whom. We love reading stories about individuals or groups in positions that we might find ourselves in, and see them actually make something of it.
What large corporations lack in giving their employees, is Autonomy. Which is what small groups are full of. When the access to utilities and markets is just as approachable to individuals as it is to corporations, things will start to disperse. People seek out smaller units where their input could be memorable and defining.
The size and complexity of groups for creating any sort of product has been made very small, thanks to all the improvements to technology and decades of engineering efforts.
Educate yourself, save a little money to get some software licenses, basic hardware and make something interesting.
As for recent development, I spend the last two days making procedural geometry and camera effects. I can now place my basic navigation nodes to be rendered, with their unique pieces connecting one another, all defined in scripts.
There is now a blur effect for the screen when transitioning from one machine to another. Looks like you are diving into something.
I am also making music and musical parts at night. You can hear samples of those on my SoundCloud profile.
Anyway, I am just going to continue as usual.
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