Contrary to popular belief, games don't always need huge budgets and teams of hundreds of worker drones toiling away under the watchful eye of whip-wielding overlords in order to be awesome. The thriving indie development scene continues to give birth to some of the weirdest, coolest, and most innovative games around. Indie Spotlight pulls back the curtain, taking a closer look at the world of independent game developers and the magic they make.



Pixels and Square Waves

When I first met the guys from indie studio Gaijin Games not too long ago, we bumped into each other in a packed warehouse in Brooklyn that was hosting Blip Festival 2009 -- an annual celebration of wild new music being made by artists using homebrew software running on old-school gaming devices like the Game Boy, NES, and Commodore 64. The evening was filled with high energy 8-bit audio revelry cranked out at maximum volume by chip musicians like Nullsleep, Bit Shifter, Bubblyfish, and many others. Gaijin's presence was no coincidence; these guys dig quirky retro-tinged music, and it's one of the core driving forces behind the games they create.

Gaijin Games' ongoing BIT.TRIP series on WiiWare is heavily steeped in the audio and visual aesthetics of gaming's earlier days. Though each BIT.TRIP game is quite different in terms of gameplay and design, they're all loaded with blippy chip-music-inspired tracks that propel the rhythm-based gameplay. Gaijin has also taken to partnering with a different highlighted chiptune artist in every installment, featuring two of the selected artist's songs in the game. "The chip music scene seemed like a totally appropriate flavor for the series, being that our games are inspired by retro games -- the same as chip music," says Gaijin founder Alex Neuse. "In fact, you could say that our games are inspired by music that's inspired by retro games like the ones we're making, so it kind of goes full-circle."


Sick of working for "The Man" and in desperate need of more creative freedom, Neuse set out to form his own independent studio in 2008. After gathering a few comrades-in-arms, he formed Gaijin Games, and the team got to work on its first major project: the six-game BIT.TRIP series. Neuse wanted to create a series that told a story through the most simplistic means possible, in order to let players' imaginations fill in the gaps between the ideas woven into each game.

"It all comes down to imagination. Newer games don't require nearly the amount of imagination that older games required of the player," he says. "I mean, in older games, you could be an eyeball that looked like an olive that shoots propeller beanies, and that was perfectly acceptable. These days, we tell the player what to think/experience too often. With the BIT.TRIP series, we've stuck with the more abstract aesthetic to get people to use their brain glands more -- I believe games are more rewarding that way."

Up to this point, Gaijin has only released downloadable games through WiiWare and other platforms, refraining from producing physical products as part of its green-focused business practice philosophy. "Mostly, we don't want to add trash to the environment," says Neuse, though that isn't the only reason Gaijin sticks with the download format. Manufacturers and distributors can be a nightmare to deal with, he says. However, digital distribution channels present their own challenges, and the audience for that kind of content delivery is still fully developing. As a result, the team is beginning to consider more traditional ways to distribute its games, though the downloadable format will always be a part of the formula.


"I think the biggest challenge is getting a game recognized by enough people to make enough money to move out of the parents' basement. This comes down to the digital distribution channels," says Neuse. "It's very hard to find a game that you'll like in the App Store. Steam is starting to get bloated. Game portals are overrun with crap... it's tough to get recognized. We certainly have a good fan following, but it's hard for us to branch out to new people."

In one recent effort to reach new players that also ties back into the musical nature of its games, Gaijin has begun releasing the soundtracks for each BIT.TRIP game online as download-only MP3 albums. Looking forward, Neuse and his crew are exploring other changes as well. With the first four games in the series already launched, the fifth game -- BIT.TRIP FATE -- is almost complete. FATE is a much darker game that takes players to a sadder place than the other BIT.TRIP installments, Neuse explains, and the team is very interested to see how players react to it. Beyond FATE, the series only has one more entry... and after it's completed, Gaijin plans to move on to something completely different. "We're not ready to share any ideas, but it won't necessarily be retro," Neuse says. "We're very excited to learn new things and to see what the future holds."



Nathan Meunier is a freelance writer and indie gaming enthusiast who likes his pixels jaggy and his tunes blippy. He writes about videogames and geek/gaming culture for GameSpy, IGN, What They Play, Nintendo Power, GamePro, and many other fine publications. See what he's up to at NathanMeunier.com.