A friend sent me a link to NO-ONE IS GOING TO BUY YOUR GAME, described by critics as “the most pretentious itchio submission ever made”. While I do agree with the “manifesto” on some regards, I do think the sarcastic commenter was right: this is way too pretentious for its own good, to the point it ends up contradicting its own mission statement.

So I wanna talk about this manifesto a bit, and then give my own twist on its mission statement.

I’d recommend you go read it regardless, even if you’ll disagree with it its good to work that critical thinking muscle.

Anywho, the manifesto’s ostensible goal is to combat the capitalistic idea that every hobby needs to necessarily turn into a business. That “making it” means “making money from it.” This is most bluntly stated in the title of section 1: “THE DREAM OF SELLING GAMES IS KILLING THE DREAM OF MAKING GAMES”.

However, this manifesto also conflates “no one will purchase your game” with “no one will play your game”, ironically reinforcing the belief it sets out to combat - that games only exist as products to be sold. This can be seen in section 6, titled “YOU MUST MAKE YOUR GAME EVEN THOUGH NO-ONE IS GOING TO BUY IT”, which discusses no one playing your game:

It is your duty to the next generation to show that the commercial videogames are an anomaly, a systemic flaw, a rounding error. They are drowned out by a vast, unspeakably dense landscape of shitty, flawed, imperfect videogames that no-one is ever going to buy.

I’ve bought and played many dogshit games on steam. I won’t name and shame them here, but I’ve played games with heart and soul that were so rough around the edges I had to leave the developer a very critical review, and in a few cases refund the game. I’ve also played many free titles that were an absolute joy, positively world-changing, which I will name and praise here: We Become What We Behold, Mike Shadow: I Paid For It!, This Is The Only Level…

“Dogshit games” and “games no one is going to buy” are two different categories, and conflating the two implies to me that the author still primarily sees games as objects of capitalism to be given a pricetag.

There’s multiple sections in this article (like section 4) which rebel against the tyranny of… uh, good game design practices. Like that you do not need to have “good controls” or “a tight core gameloop” or “a reasonable learning curve”. Which like, you should? You really should have all of these if you can, just to make your players have a better experience. It once more states that “you do not need these things because you are not trying to convince anyone to buy your game”, implying the only reason you’d ever want someone to play your game is if they’re buying it.

There’s much to discuss about whether games should always be made for the enjoyment of their audience, or exclusively for the enjoyment of their creator (the beginner’s guide is an entire game about this debate, which I suspect the author played right before posting), but there’s nothing wrong with wanting people to enjoy your game. I’ve made plenty of free games out there with zero intent of making money off of them, but I still wanted people to enjoy them. I iterated and reiterated and tried different strategies so people would have fun in it. I’m not convincing anyone to buy my game, but I do want them to play my game, that’s why I made it in the first place. Not as a way to (in my least charitable wording) jerk myself off to how smart a designer I am, but just to spread joy in the world.

Nothin’ wrong with that.

If you want to convince people that their game doesn’t have to exist within the confines of capitalism, you can’t exclusively discuss the game from within the confines of capitalism.

So, what do I say?

I do agree with the fundamental idea that you don’t need your game to be marketable. Thinking about what games sell rather than which games will be enjoyable results in a very, very bland gaming landscape. What “sells” is dictated by trends, and trends are volatile and unpredictable, so you really shouldn’t worry about them. Make something fun, something you are proud of, and just put it out there.

You don’t need your games to be perfect, because I assure you, they never will be. I spent literal years redesigning a board game from scratch several times over, and I still felt the final game rules could use a little more tweaking. Make something you think is fun, something that might not be for everyone, but will have an audience of one (1) insane person who’ll be begging you to add more to the game.

That one person could be you. They could be a stranger. They could be a friend. But make the game for one person. And make the game as perfect as it can be for that one person.

If all goes well, more than one person will find your game, and they’ll love it too. You will have found an audience of similarly insane people who think you’re god’s gift to gaming and tell their friends to try out this cool new indie title they found.

If not? You have made one person happy. And that’s more than enough.