Yet, even though Image & Form has faced quite a few hardships to become a successful indie studio, Sigurgeirsson suggests the indie label no longer has a useful meaning. Gameplay-wise it was mostly stable at launch, and it remains that way today. While other games of the time were plagued by framerate drops and bizarre HD Rumble bugs, Dig 2’s biggest post-launch problem was that some users didn’t like its eShop icon. As far as we’ve seen, that effort has paid off. Being indie is about being able to realize your own idea and vision, not spending too little time on details.”įor Image & Form, the internal goal is to make sure all of its games have a “Nintendo” level of refinement before they’re released. “Anything else is sloppy, and not indie at all. “Smaller studios are unlikely to match the game scopes of larger studios, but they should certainly strive to turn their games into all they can be,” he advised.
Sigurgeirsson acknowledged that creators also have an important role to play in surfacing great products, noting that the current indie scene could improve by focusing more on polish. Screenshots like these showcase the Nintendo-like polish of SteamWorld Dig 2. The CEO thinks discoverability is becoming an issue, especially on growing platforms like Switch. It felt so unfair…With SteamWorld Dig 2, we've finally earned the right to charge what's right.”īefore pricing becomes a factor, however, a game has to be seen to make money at all. And yet I was spending more time defending our 20 bucks than talking about the game. Heist came out in 2015 as the highest-rated new 3DS game that year, better even than Nintendo's own games - that all cost at least twice as much. It was as if every glowing review was a stroke of luck or an expression of pity. Time and again, I was discussing why we, this preposterous indie studio, had the gall to charge $20 for our game. “When we released SteamWorld Heist at the same price, it was different. “The perception of value can be annoying and downright unfair, or at least I think so: often you can define a studio as triple-A by the cost of its games rather than the quality of them,” Sigurgeirsson said.įrom Sigurgeirsson’s perspective, these issues made it difficult to promote Image and Form’s previous game, SteamWorld Heist : SteamWorld Dig 2 is selling quite well for just $20 across all platforms, but, for Image & Form, the idea of equating cost and value hasn’t always worked in its favor.
From pricing to discoverability, CEO Brjann Sigurgeirsson spoke with Player.One about why that label can be destructive.
SteamWorld Dig 2 is one of the best indie games on Nintendo Switch, but the leader of its development team at Image & Form Games has grown frustrated with the “indie” qualification.
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