How to build a supportive community around your game - Philomena Schwab GDDG17
6Countless games are created every day by independent game developers. Most of them will fade and be forgotten, not due to a lack of quality but a lack of visibility. Building a community around your game in development is an excellent way to connect with people early on. Having a loyal fan base is not only beneficial for the financial success of the game, but provides the developer with constant feedback and can serve as a great motivator to push through the tough times of development. This talk in based upon the experience I made with our game "Niche - a genetics survival game". Topics include exhibitions, crowdfunding, indiedev collectives and Steam Early Access.
Philomena Schwab is a game designer from Zurich, Switzerland. Recently she co-founded her own game studio Stray Fawn Studio, which is currently developing the desktop games Niche - a genetics survival game and Nimbatus - The Space Drone Constructor. Philomena wrote her master thesis about "Community building for indie game developers" and founded the nature gamedev collective Playful Oasis. As a chair member of the Swiss Game Developers association she helps her local game industry grow.