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Ludo Atlas · Indie Survival

Positioning: the 44 profiles' experience in Indie Developer Profiles, turned into your own income-and-expense sheet, path ladder and decision rules. Indie development is not just "making games"; it is a set of methods for continuously running yourself. Companions: Production Handbook (how to finish) · Live-Ops & Growth (how to sell well) · Legal, Patents & Competition (how to sign the right contracts) · Resources (tools and ecosystem entry points). Disclaimer: this is a summary of experience and does not constitute financial or legal advice; for figures and policies, verify against the latest situation in your own location.

1. Survival Model Overview (Mode First, Ideals Second)

Mode Cash prerequisite Time prerequisite Main risk Who it suits
A. Part-time mode A day job / stable income 10–20 hours per week Timeline stretches 2–4×; motivation drains Developers making their first complete commercial work (the safest option)
B. Savings mode A 12–24 month runway of living expenses Full-time Runway burns out before the work is done People with a proven finishing record who can self-manage
C. Hybrid project mode Contract work covers living costs Full-time (time split in half) The original project gets squeezed by client work People whose skills monetize (programming/art/TA)
D. Ecosystem-support mode Sponsorship / advances / grants Full-time or part-time Dependent on external rhythms and contract terms Long-term projects (simulation/tool-oriented); people with an existing fan base

Selection principle: for a first commercial work, default to A; only consider B/D if you have shipped something with healthy numbers; C is "war feeding war" — keep an inviolable time block for the original project (such as every morning).

2. Finances: Runway and Budget (Run the Numbers First)

2.1 Runway Math (Savings Mode)

Item Calculation Notes
Monthly expenses Rent / food / commute / insurance / phone ≈ the real cost level in your city Don't fool yourself with an "extreme frugality" version
Social insurance and income tax Freelancers must pay these themselves (policies vary by region) Ask your local social-insurance office in advance
Development costs / month Tool subscriptions + outsourcing reserve + expo/travel One-off hardware counted separately
Buffer Total runway × 1.3 Illness / accidents / overruns are the norm
Runway (months) (total savings - buffer) ÷ monthly expenses 12–24 months recommended; under 9 months, full-time is not advisable

2.2 Project Budget Template (Pre-Launch)

Category Reference share Notes
Outsourcing (art/music) 20–40% Decides how well it sells; the most worthwhile money you'll spend
Tools/software 5–10% Compressible with a good free stack (see §3)
Expos/events 5–15% Offline exposure, as needed
Store asset production 5–10% Capsules/trailers (the biggest lever in Live-Ops & Growth §2)
Contingency 10–20% Store review delays / hotfix needs

2.3 Revenue-Expectation Discipline

  • Zero revenue before launch is the norm; the first month usually carries the bulk of the year's revenue (Live-Ops & Growth §6), so don't budget on a "breakout hit" curve.
  • Forecast in three tiers: floor (recoup your costs) / median (enough for the next title) / ideal (don't plan on it).
  • When the first payment arrives, do three things first: set aside tax → top up the runway → seed money for the next title.

3. The Earn-More, Spend-Less Toolbox

  • Free development stack: engines (Godot etc.), art (Krita/Blender/Pixelorama), audio (Audacity/LMMS), office tools (Feishu/Yuque); for the full list see Resources §1-§2.
  • Free assets first: use free assets throughout prototyping (Kenney etc., §5); replace only the assets that are "confirmed to stay".
  • Outsourcing timing: consider outsourcing when "your own quality/speed" becomes the bottleneck and asset volume exceeds 30 items (process in Production Handbook §4.3, Art & Audio Handbook §6).
  • AI savings and red lines: AI pays off most for concepts/placeholders/batch assistance; for AI disclosure and copyright red lines on shipped assets, see the AI Workflows Handbook §8 and Legal, Patents & Competition. Cost-cutting must not cross red lines.
  • Time savings: keep a fixed weekly "deliverable" cadence (Production Handbook §7) and bill yourself in "completion", not "hours worked".

4. The Path Ladder: From Jams to a Flagship Title

Rung Form Timeline Acceptance criteria Usual outcome
1 Jam / toy A small prototype (48 hours to 2 weeks) Days / weeks Run the full "release" loop once You either get hooked or quit
2 Free small game A complete small game released for free 1–2 months Strangers finish it and leave a comment 90% of people stop here (and that's perfectly fine)
3 Commercial small game A small piece priced at $1–5 2–6 months Make your first sale; run the whole pipeline end to end Confidence and process muscle
4 Flagship title Your "signature work" 6–24 months Recoup your costs + a word-of-mouth base The decisive battle that sets your career direction
5 Long-term / IP Live-ops / sequels / series Years A stable audience and repeat purchases Becoming a studio, or an IP
  • Ladder discipline: don't skip rungs (going straight to 4 is one of the biggest killers for beginners; see Pitfalls & Anti-patterns); each rung adds exactly one more variable over the last (release channel, pricing, community, outsourcing).
  • Staying at 23 and shipping steadily is a perfectly respectable way to live. Finishing matters more than fame.

5. The Full Map of Funding Sources (Ordered by Accessibility)

Source Suitable stage Key points Watch out for
Early access sales (Steam EA) 34 The most realistic "funding": let players' money feed development Fits systems-driven games; use with care for narrative games
Savings / part-time income All stages of A/B The cleanest cash flow Do the runway math (§2)
Contract work / commissions Mode C Programming/art skills monetize directly Keep a fixed time block for the original work; don't take contracts that eat over 40% of your time
Crowdfunding (Kickstarter/Modian) Early 4 Needs a demo + video + community base; don't over-promise on rewards Low success rates; heavy fulfillment pressure
Ongoing patronage (Patreon/Afdian) 5 and long-term projects Fits the "watchable long-term" model (Dwarf Fortress / Sokpop) Requires a steady stream of visible output
Publisher advance 34 Traded for revenue share and terms; read the eight must-check clauses in Legal, Patents & Competition §5.1 first Net-revenue definitions and IP ownership are the core of the negotiation
Platform support programs 4 Console platform incubation (e.g. ID@Xbox, Sony's China Hero Project), GWB and others Limited slots; binds certain platform rights
Local industry support 45 Cultural-creative and game-industry policies in some cities Go by the latest local policy; don't distort your project for a subsidy

6. Publishing Decisions: Quick Reference

  • Self-publishing vs a publisher: evaluation matrix = revenue share × advance × resources (media/expos/localization) × control (IP/sequels/pricing) × exit terms; when unsure, self-publish a small game first to practice the pipeline.
  • Platform mix: PC (Steam as the base) → console (find a publishing partner / platform program) → mobile (the user-acquisition economy, see Live-Ops & Growth) → mini-games (domestic monetization, see Multi-platform Launch Playbook §6); don't spread your first title across every platform.
  • Demo strategy: a Demo is a marketing asset, not charity (Live-Ops & Growth §2); before joining platform festivals (Next Fest and the like), leave ample debugging time.
  • Pricing: benchmark against the pricing band for similar quality and genre (Legal, Patents & Competition §7.2-7.3); a 10–15% launch discount is standard; low price / high volume vs high price / premium are both strategies — don't end up stuck between the two.

7. Mindset and Sustainability (The Most Easily Underestimated Survival Item)

  • Family and social communication: prepare a "one-pager" for family outside the industry: what I do, why, how long it will take, the financial bottom line, and the failure plan; transparency kills 80% of the friction.
  • Loneliness and burnout: regular social contact (dev communities / game-dev buddies), a stable routine, and at least one day a week away from the project; if you find you "haven't wanted to open the project for two weeks straight", that is a mandatory-rest signal (Pitfalls & Anti-patterns §6).
  • The antidote to comparison: what you see are survivors' breakouts; what you don't see is the silent denominator (Game History / Indie Developer Profiles only record the winners); measure your pace against your own previous version.
  • Positive-feedback design: ritualize milestones (celebrate even a small release); keep a public devlog to collect "someone is watching" signals (Live-Ops & Growth §8).

8. Decision Checkpoints: Continue / Pivot / Cut

Signal Threshold reference (set your own) Action
Timeline over budget > 50% Trigger the feature-cut contingency (Production Handbook §3); re-estimate the remaining schedule
External playtests Two rounds in a row with nobody wanting to keep playing Go back to the prototype layer: fix the core loop or swap the mechanic
Interest exhausted Four weeks straight with no drive Shelve it or shrink the scope; rest first, then decide
Financial warning Less than 6 months of runway left Switch to Mode C (take contract work) or go part-time
Sunk-cost trap "I've been at it two years" is the only reason left Re-evaluate it as a new project: would you green-light it?
  • "Cutting" done right: archive it (code / assets / postmortem), make an announcement (if it was public), and reuse the assets. There are no wasted projects, only failures without a postmortem (Production Handbook §9).
  • Pivoting is not failure: shrinking your flagship title to a 3-scale scope and finishing on time is a mature judgment, not a retreat.

9. Special: Indie Development in Mainland China

  • The commercialization reality: official domestic channels (app stores / mini-game payments / domestic PC platforms) require a game license; so the mainstream route is international PC platforms as the main line + mini-game ad monetization as a supplement + multilingual overseas releases (details in Legal, Patents & Competition §7 and Multi-platform Launch Playbook §7).
  • Ecosystem entry points: the GWB incubator/awards, the indiePlay competition, CiGA events, WePlay Expo, TapTap's indie-friendly policies, bilibili publishing — taking part = exposure + connections + feedback in one (entry points in Resources §4.2, §7.2).
  • Communities: indienova, CowLevel, the bilibili dev zone, various QQ/WeChat groups — finding 5–10 fellow travelers matters more than anything.
  • Costs and cities: living costs vary widely; for savings-mode runway math, always use local figures (§2.1).
  • Policy: some cities have cultural-creative / game-industry support and park policies; go by the latest word from the competent authorities, and don't distort your project for a subsidy.

10. One-Page Action Checklist (Start Today)

  1. Write down your mode choice (A/B/C/D from §1) and your reasons.
  2. Run the runway math: how many months can you burn? (§2.1)
  3. Pick a 3-scale project (not the dream project) and write a one-pager (Production Handbook §1).
  4. Set a weekly cadence: goals on Monday, a build on Friday (Production Handbook §4).
  5. Set up a public presence (one is enough) and start a devlog (Live-Ops & Growth §8).
  6. Check in monthly: budget sheet, risk sheet, mental state (§7/§8).
  7. At every milestone, send a playable build to strangers (not friends).
  8. In the three months before launch, run the Multi-platform Launch Playbook + Live-Ops & Growth as checklists, item by item.
  9. Do a postmortem 90 days after release; whatever the outcome, write the postmortem, settle the books, and decide on the next title.
  10. Remember what history keeps proving (Game History §6): a finished small game always beats an unfinished masterpiece.

All collected in this repository, evolving with the roadmap.