Are Champions and HERO System "indie" games?

[knasser2]

6 minutes ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

My definition of an indie game is one put out by a solo person rather than for a company; self-published.  Like the original Champions game, typed up on pages for edition 1.  Once Hero Games became a company and paid employees it wasn't independent any longer

 

Indie bands still hired recording studios, paid someone to master their tracks, mail out their marketing material. In fact, it was that they did all these things themselves rather than struck a deal with a recording label to handle it all for them that made them Indie.

[ghost-angel]

17 hours ago, knasser2 said:

 

Indie bands still hired recording studios, paid someone to master their tracks, mail out their marketing material. In fact, it was that they did all these things themselves rather than struck a deal with a recording label to handle it all for them that made them Indie.

 

Funny you should mention the band aspect like this - the UK Indie Rock scene actually has to do with Which labels the bands used: not that they didn't use any labels. For a good part of 2000-2010ish "Indie Rock" would primarily refer to Independent Label, a small label not specifically owned by a larger label, especially one of the big 5. DIY musicians really didn't take off (though have always been around) until the rise of Bandcamp, Spotify, and Kickstarters, around 2010 or so.

 

This is in juxtaposition to Alt Rock from the 80s and 90s which was a band that may or may not have had a major label, but was primarily either college radio play or no radio play (as opposed to Format Radio or Top-40 Radio); until the 90s where Alt Rock became a Radio Format of play, making the whole label a moot point.

 

If we want to continue with that bad analogy, I would put Champions in the DOJ Era firmly in Indie Gaming as they weren't one of the big companies putting games out. In that vein IPR is definitely an Indie Label in modern parlance...