Indie Project Budgets

had a budget of $120k. Both are in the “forbidden zone” mentioned above, as is Angry Birds. We are aiming at three games of the size and scope of these examples and hope to achieve the same level of game design and polish.

In sum, I think it was a brilliant idea of Rovio to invest $140k on an iPhone game. There are only a handful of games of this scope on that platform and most of them were very successful (e.g. Rage, Infinity Blade, World of Goo). The tide of no-budget games drowns most low- to normal-budget outings. Rovio went with a publisher – Chillingo – and allocated the time and talent needed to bring the game into a shape that reduced the risk of investment significantly. In other words: investing $20k in a downloadable game is gambling. With a fitting budget and the right team, you can reduce your risk. I’m sure there’s a business term for this.

Take another grain of salt and apply it to my personal advice, which is:

• It looks like $100k to $140k is a suitable budget for a downloadable indie game.
• It is wise to acquire additional money for sustained support and porting, although you might only need it if you strike gold, anyway.
• There are more articles about sales numbers than about development budgets online.
• Of course, the most important thing is that your budget fits to your game.

PS: This blog was initially published at #AltDevBlogADay.