RE: Indie Games on Xbox Live

Am i the only one who thinks that the vast majority of the indie games just aren't any good? I don't mean to come off sounding like a jerk, but if you really do sit down and look through the Indie channel on Xbox Live, 99% of the games available are simply not good enough to justify purchasing.

I've bought a half dozen indie games over the past year, and none of them were enjoyable for more than a minute or two. They usually end up feeling like some sort of technical demo or proof-of-concept proposal from the designer, rather than feeling like a fully enjoyable game.

Obviously, there are fantastic indie games out there. But they are the rare exceptions. The average quality bar is just so low... It's not even a matter of price. Even if the games were free, I still wouldn't play most of them because I have Halo, Mass Effect, Alan Wake, Limbo, Bad Company, Assassins Creed, Trenched, and a dozen more EXCELLENT games competing for my TIME.

I think that the indie game scene is going through a similar struggle as what indie musicians have struggled with for years. As a musician, it can be really tough to convince people to spend money on my indipendantly released album. Even if I only charge $5 for a full length CD, the fact remains that most people would rather go home and listen to CDs from their favorite bands. At least with music, an Indie album is pretty close in sound quality to a full-budget studio album, unlike the production values of an Indie game vs a full budget title.

I think the Indie community is full of many fantastic, talented, and creative people. But all games, regardless of price, are competing for our spare time. Given the quality bar of the average indie title, I'm really not surprised that they get such low billing on the dashboard.