How much does the average indie game make?

According to ALCOR, the average junior indie game developer in the US in 2022 earned $40,500, with mid-levels earning $55,500, and seniors earning $69,000.

How many sales does the average indie game get?

The median game earned just $1,136 lifetime; 68% of all titles released in 2019 generated less than $10,000 to date; 91.5% of all titles earned less than $250,000; 96% of all games generated less than $1,000,000.

How much does the average indie game production cost?

What Is the Development Cost of an Indie Game? An average indie game will cost between $50,000 and $700,000 to make, from start to finish. A single developer usually makes titles that cost around $50,000 and take up to a year to finish.

How much is the average indie game on Steam?

According to his SteamSpy data, the median ("middle", not average) price of a game on Steam is $5.99; for comparison, the median price of an indie game on the platform is $3.99, and the median price of an indie game released on Steam in 2017 is $2.99.

Do indie games make a lot of money?

According to VG Insights, only 15% of all solo game developers take home more than $100,000 annually. VG Insights also reported that only the top 5% of indie games released each year make over half a million dollars each, and the average game only makes $13,000.

How Much Money Do Indie Games Make? [2021]

Is it profitable to make indie games?

According to Game Developer, those indie teams that “made it” receive on average $4 million in revenue per game, which makes an impressive indie game developer success salary. Obviously, not everyone gets such a goldmine.

What indie game genre is most profitable?

Most Profitable Genres For Indie Games

The most promising genres in terms of earnings are RPG, strategy, and simulation. They are followed by adventure, action, sports, and racing games, which are worth choosing only if you are completely confident in your idea.

How long do AAA games take to make?

But for games in the AAA category, it's a good assumption to say that they take something between 3 to 5 years to develop. This can be a lot more if the gameplay or assets need to be done from scratch, or if the assets are already there from the previous year (like they do with Call of Duty).

How much money does a AAA game cost to make?

AAA games are the big-budget games that large studios and publishers typically make. The average AAA game takes about four years to develop, with an average cost of about $80 million and higher. But this amount can vary significantly depending on the type of game and its level of complexity.

What percentage of indie games are successful?

Yes, only 3% of indie developers ever make more than $1m, but that's still over 1,500 indies who have done so. Let's see what they do that others don't.

What genre of game sells the most?

Most popular video game genres worldwide 2022, by age group

Shooter and action adventure games were the top two video game genres across the globe in 2022. Shooter games ranked as the most-played gaming genre for virtually all age groups except for online users aged 45 to 54 and 55 to 64 years, where it ranked second.

What is the highest selling game genre?

Our most recent data shows that gamers are locked and loaded when it comes to shooter games. In Q3 2022, shooter was the most played gaming genre, with 57% of consumers saying they played at least one shooter game in the past 12 months.

Do game devs make good money?

Game Developer Salary by Years of Experience

The average salary for a Game Developer with 7+ years of experience is $123,343. The average salary for <1 year of experience is $132,500.

Is it profitable to make games?

Game development is a lucrative industry that now dwarfs film and music. With broader access to tech platforms and devices, people, of all ages, are getting into video gaming, and the game development industry only continues to grow.

Is it worth becoming an indie game developer?

Some of the most captivating and innovative video game experiences have come from passionate and dedicated indie developers. So to say that small game projects can't be good is a lie. However, as an indie developer you'll never get the chance to work on the biggest projects in the industry.

How much RAM do you need to run AAA games?

For gaming, 8GB is considered the baseline for AAA titles. However, RAM demands are increasing. Red Dead Redemption 2, for example, recommends 12GB of RAM for optimal performance, while Half-Life: Alyx requires 12GB as a minimum.

Can a single person make a AAA game?

Can one person make an AAA game? Making an AAA game alone would be incredibly difficult, as it takes hundreds of people to create an AAA game . However, Bright Memory is made by a single developer and is the closest game on this list to a AAA studio quality video game.

Why AAA games are better than indie?

A larger budget allows AAA studios to invest in cutting-edge technology and head-hunt top talent in the industry. They have the resources to create more polished games with more features than most indie games.

Which game income is best?

PUBG Mobile was the top grossing game in 2021, with $2.01 billion revenue.

Who is the richest indie game developers in the world?

Mojang. It's the big one. With over 200 million copies sold, Minecraft is not only the best selling indie, but the best selling game ever, at least at the time of publishing. As of the end of 2021 they had a mind-blowing net worth of 1.7 billion dollars.

How do indie games succeed?

Spend a lot of time on marketing and community building.

Ultimately, this is the key to success. Everything else is a waste of time if you don't nail this. None of the top selling indie games did it without a great marketing strategy.

How fast can you make an indie game?

Creating an indie game can take anywhere between a matter of days and a number of years. With indie games, coding experience and budget will be the biggest influences on a game's development cycle. Here's a few examples of quality indie games all made within vastly different timeframes: Cuphead.

Do indie game developers pay taxes?

Indie developers and other people who work on games for a living face all kinds of interesting income tax and small business formation issues that more traditional businesses simply don't: not being geographically bound, relying on alternative funding, long periods of time with no income, and having multiple options ...