It’s been 4 months since I suddenly quit my day job and become an indie. Time has passed so fast since then, Its quite happy to see the progress over 4 months, but I guess its too early to share the game I’m working on, I will leave it to another post! here are the things I’ve learned. And the things you need to prepare if you planning to start your career as an indie.

Clear your goals.

Developing a game is not an overnight task. It involves lots of planning, trial and error. It always better if you do most of the planning ahead of the development. In my case I did most of the planning before I quit my day job, So what I recommend is before you jump into the development, make sure you have a big picture of the final product and clear estimation of how much time and effort it requires.

Fail early

Failures are very common for indies, so be ready for that, but failing early is smarter than losing several years of your life! Make sure to implement the game idea as a prototype and do lots of play-testing. It may save you lots of time and money.

Indie vs resource management

I can’t see much differences between being an indie and playing a ‘Resource Management Game’! The key is to get the maximum of your limited resources and produce the best product. What I learned so far is working small and follow simplified processes are helped me a lot to go the extra mile by using my limited resources!

Be your boss

Yes! It’s fun! Lots of freedom! But believe me, it’s not that much easy unless you plan the day carefully, After I quitting the job, I enjoined the freedom as much as I can. As a result, I wasn’t as productive as I expected. That was the time I think about a more suitable project/time management approach. There are lots of project management tools and method out there. The most important thing is finding the best one matches for your lifestyle. I choose scrum and Jira. No matter which method you choose it should help you to increase your productivity day by day! The purpose of this article is not to explain scrum implementation, so I will tell you it on another day. “Scrum for Indies”

Be prepared to change!

Change is part of human life and it’s BIG part of indie life. You know what I mean. You may have to throw away most of your hard work. Just keep in mind “Practice makes perfect !”

Love your failures!

Love your failures coz they are the best teachers you’ve got! As I said earlier, fail fast and learn fast. Don’t be scare to fail, it gives one more chance to start over. Whenever you fail, do a postmortem! And start again it with a confidant!

Be humble!

Always listen to your audience, let them criticize your game. Make decisions not based on your ego but based on what benefit to the game.

Never give up!

It’s always too early to give up on the gaming industry. Making games are hard. There is no magical formula for success in games. It requires lots of hard work. One good thing is opportunities and possibilities in this industry keep growing, So if you are an indie, don’t give up. Sooner or later you will find the way. Best is yet to come.

Enjoy the journey!

It’s your life, spend it the way you like. Do something makes you proud of, Help fellow indies kindly and light up the night, learn from your own mistakes and be someone better than yesterday!

Praveen L