The idea of game development always seems thrilling and full of promise. It often starts with a simple concept, one that you convince yourself is manageable either on your own or within a reasonable amount of time. But as your ideas expand and reality begins to sink in, every game developer inevitably faces the same problem: money.
This issue became glaringly obvious from the start while developing Tales of Grimace. Initially, I planned to handle everything myself, only outsourcing voice actors, which meant my projected budget was almost non-existent. I naively believed that with enough time and effort, I could teach myself to create high-quality parallax maps. After weeks of frustration, I finally realized that hiring an additional team member for development was a necessary investment. But with each new hire, my costs skyrocketed, and my expenses quickly spiraled out of control. This marked the first major hurdle in the development process. At the time, I was working a part-time job about three days a week, and still, I couldn’t keep up with the mounting expenses. So, like many aspiring game developers, I turned to crowdfunding.
Many people have this idealized vision of crowdfunding, imagining that anyone with a dream and a laptop can rally the support—and money—of thousands. In reality, it's far more challenging. Most successful crowdfunded indie games have a long list of investors and industry connections, even if they maintain a narrative of grassroots simplicity. There are exceptions—genuinely independent games that have somehow succeeded—but they are incredibly rare. As you soon realize, the game market is oversaturated with creators just like yourself, all vying for a shot at funding. Unfortunately, no matter how "special" I believed Tales of Grimace to be, it too fell victim to this oversaturation.
Another option, of course, is grants. Many state governments now offer video game grants to help foster a game development industry in their region. I eagerly pursued this opportunity, but to my disappointment, I failed again. There were simply too many other projects competing for the same resources.
Over time, I came to understand that these programs aren’t really designed for newcomers. Their definition of "indie" tends to refer to experienced professionals breaking away from large companies to form their own studios. So, the harsh truth is that sometimes we need to adjust our expectations and accept reality. We often imagine indie games as passion projects, but in many cases, these so-called indie studios have millions in funding. Instead of aiming for an instant breakthrough, we should focus on gradually building up to that level rather than trying to skip the line. Saying this, I am writing this to advertise my new attempt at crowd funding. Perhaps, you can change my cynical outlook and break the pattern of my past failures. So, donate today to support Tales of Grimace! Donate Here: https://gofund.me/8ba494bd
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