Self-supporting in Seattle.
Seattle, the town that brought us diverse cultural artifacts ranging from Kurt Cobain to Frasier has another movement to add to its repertoire: independent games development. To celebrate this phenomenon, Jake Kazdal, founder of Haunted Temple Studios (creators of Eurogamer Expo favourite Skulls of the Shogun) invited a bunch of local game developers to strut their stuff in the first Seattle Indies Expo.
The rationale for why Seattle has such a thriving indie scene is disappointingly devoid of mystery. "Seattle's got so many ex-Bungie, ex-Valve, ex-Nintendo, ex-Microsoft, ex-whatever," Kazdal notes. When asked why so many of them leave their cushy jobs to go indie, the answer's just as simple. "A lot of them are getting laid off," Kazdal bluntly replies.
Rather than dwell on this, Kazdal remains optimistic. "There's finally valid distribution for this stuff," he adds. "With iPhone you don't need a publisher. People can just take a chance. Steam has been great for that stuff and that's in Seattle too. With Xbox Live Arcade, Xbox Live Indie Games, and PlayStation Network this is a mainstream thing now. It's not mainstream in the sense that it's going to topple Modern Warfare 3, but its big enough that people can say, 'f*** big games. I want to go do my own thing.'"
Source: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-07-28-seattle-indies-expo-round-up-preview
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