Indie game designer spent three years and $180,000 making a masterpiece | Hacker News Reader

Indie game designer spent three years and $180,000 making a masterpiece

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"Games these days are designed so that people finish them. They have a big story and you’re supposed to able to get to the end if you just sit down in front of it long enough…and I object to that on some level,” he says. “If games are supposedly presenting a challenge to the player, then they should be truthful about that challenge and they shouldn’t spend their time lying to the players."

Now this is the kind of news that should be on first page of HN.

To be honest I wouldn't have even tried this without knowing its story, but I just played the trial and think its fantastic - I love how it doesn't tell me anything, its for me to explore and understand on my own! After playing that, I realize I actually hate tutorials in games, games don't have to baby sit me.

Not sure if I'll be buying it, I generally just play CoD4 or GTA a few times a day to get some adrenalin pumping if I'm working at home, not sure when I'd play this, or if I'd get a little bored after a while.

Definitely buy it. I played some of the purchased content this week. Seems worth it because the gameplay changes and twists so much throughout.

I love how it doesn't tell me anything, its for me to explore and understand on my own!

Free Play, in Ender's Game by Scott Card.

All fun and games until someone loses an eye.

Then it's hilarious

Oh, the subtext...

How did an "indie game designer" get $180,000 and the time over three years to make this? There is more to this story than just "a smart, brash nerd with a dream can make the best video game ever..."

" Funding the project with money earned from working on experimental PS3 Cell-processor gaming projects for IBM, Blow began coding Braid in December 2004." http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=194727

It seems like Braid is and still-is a high-demand game mercenary. Regardless of how it was funded, I think the fact he conceived and created a game mostly by himself in an industry where teams of creative individuals with multi-million dollar budgets struggle (death marches) to ship games is remarkable.

"The Art Of Braid: Creating A Visual Identity For An Unusual Game" by Braid artist David Hellman http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3753/the_art_of_braid_...

The full link on Gamasutra is here: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3753/the_art_of_braid_...

This way you don't have to keep hitting next.

Jon Blow has been in the games industry for years. For a long time he wrote a regular column (called "Inner Product") in Game Developer magazine and has worked as a consultant on some pretty high-profile games.

"Indie" makes it sound like he came from nowhere in a sort of rags to riches explosion, but he has been around for a while and knows the industry well.

The game's storyline involves a protagonist who recently made some mistakes and broke up with his "princess", and needs to change some things in the past to fix this.

My guess is that this "fantasy" storyline is autobiographical. The dude probably had a bad breakup and got over it by sitting in his basement for 3 years making a great game. I feel like drugs may have played a small part in the design as well.

True, that's the story I would love to hear.

This sounds eerily similar to Chronotron:

http://scarybuggames.com/2008/05/chronotron/

Its exactly like Mario, just with a different (nicer) skin (and music!!) and time warping abilities.

Braid is sort of similar to both of those, but also very, very different. It certainly has its own identity.

video of game: http://www.gamespot.com/xbox360/action/braid/video/6194163/b...

Inspirational. This is the sort of game I've been waiting to play.

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