Lots of Nintendo praise from indie developers
Several indie developers were on hand for a special Nintendo showcase at GDC 2015 this week. GamesIndustry caught up with some of the folks behind Never Alone, Don’t Starve, Runbow, and Swords & Soldiers II. Each one had extremely positive things to say about Nintendo – you can find their full words below.
Dima Veryovka, art director on Never Alone
“It was really fast, everything happened in like two weeks. We didn’t have the build and now we already have the build running, and that’s not something we would be able to do without the support of Nintendo. I think it’s really good that they have opened up to independent developers. To be honest, that’s the future. We really want to see the smaller groups [succeed] and the way Nintendo has supported us is tremendous.”
Klei’s Seth Rosen
“Nintendo’s been really great. If you look around this room, seeing all these indies, that’s a good indicator of how dedicated they are to improving the indie scene on the Wii U. And we’re really excited to bring Don’t Starve to it, especially with the GamePad features.”
Dave Proctor, producer at 13AM Games
“We grew up with Nintendo, so did a lot of people and the people who went on to make Sony games. So that’s a big honor, and Nintendo has a real commitment to quality, so when a game is fun they will support it whether it’s their own game or an independent game. We’ve been noticing that trait as we get closer and closer with them.”
“Just playing a build of Runbow, Nintendo saw what it could be and that was just the shot in the arm that we needed.”
“I wave the banner. I can’t not support them after what they’ve done for us, which is amazing for a team and a game that didn’t exist two years ago. If you put time and effort into making your game fun Nintendo will recognize that across the board. With other indies we’re watching them put stuff out on Nintendo faster than they ever would otherwise, and I feel like the tide is kind of turning. Everyone gets a little scared when they look at Wii U sales numbers from two years ago but when you look at them today, I’m ok with 10 million units. That’s an ok platform to be on. That’s punching weight with the other two. What they’ve done is they’ve made people remember that Nintendo cares about fun. They made consumers remember that and they’ve made the industry remember that,” he said.
Romino’s Jasper Koning
“eShop is actually pretty good to indies right now. For the type of traditional, say $10-$15 fairly polished indie game it’s a really nice safe haven from places like iOS and Android, which are crazy crowded, and even on Steam it’s hard to stand out.”
“It’s a well known fact that the Wii U is not the most successful platform out there but at the same time I feel that in our space, or for the kind of numbers that we generally do, we don’t need a platform with a billion users. Even though this game is a lot bigger than the original and took us a lot more time it’s still not like a AAA title where we need to make millions back. I think we’re in a good place.”
“We actually decided to start building this game for Wii U even before the Wii U was out, so back then no one had any idea and then when the Wii U came out and it didn’t do the crazy numbers the original Wii did, we were kind of scratching our heads and wondering if everything was going to be alright. We talked to a lot of indies who had already gotten games out and they told us ‘yeah it’s perfectly viable to stick with Wii U.’ So we’re happy.”
