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Netflix Pick of the Week: Indie Game The Movie

Indie Game: The Movie is a new documentary from Canadian filmmakers James Swirsky and Lisanna Pajot. Much like the games the film follows, Indie Game: The Movie began as a wonderful idea but limited resources to bring the dream into reality. After a very successful Kickstarter campaign, the creators had secured enough funds to create their new documentary that would follow three aspiring indie developing companies from early stages of development up until the launch of their new game. The film is an interesting watch, especially if you’re a gamer, as you get to see what all goes on behind the scenes of some of your favorite downloadable titles from the last few years and see the sacrifices the developers and their families make to create a game that will not only be a success but that will give the creators a sense of satisfaction in creating something very meaningful and personal.

Super Meat Boy’s Team Meat (Edmund McMillen and Tommy Refenes), Fez’s Phil Fish and Braid’s Jonathan Blow get personal with the audience from the get go by explaining their reasons for creating their respective games and what each of these great games represent to them. You get a real understanding of how these developers went from drooling teenagers growing up in the age of Super Mario Bros. and Tetris like we all were at one time and how they became successful coders, artists and quality game designers. The love of games is never understated throughout the film, and this allows gamers to feel a connection between themselves and the game’s developers that would be otherwise impossible without Indie Game: The Movie.

Even more interesting is watching how the developers react differently to early reviews and sales numbers. Each has their own reactions ranging from excitement that people are loving their game to being disappointed that the concept and execution of the game was lost in translation to simply wishing they could go back to sleep after spending countless hours working on their game. It’s here where you see the sacrifices the creators make when trying to make hectic deadlines, deal with uncooperative business partners and putting their game on display not knowing how others gamers will react to their creation all while working countless hours on the game and removing the majority of social interactions from their everyday life. Some of these awful circumstances stress out the viewer, so you can only imagine what the developers where really feeling at the time the scenes were filmed, but it makes Indie Game: The Movie a better watch for it.

Overall, Indie Game: The Movie is a great film that should be a requirement to watch as a gamer. It proves, while it’s easy to poke fun at and say some games are horrible even with only minor flaws, these games were created from thousands of hours of developers’ time, and they deserve your attention and respect for this reason alone. The film allows you to see firsthand the amount of effort fellow gamers like yourself will put into creating a game and editing small things that you may simply take for granted. Each of the development teams have a great story to tell, and luckily, their games are pretty fantastic as well. Check out Indie Game: The Movie today for an entertaining and heartwarming look behind the scenes of small video game developers!

 Overall: See It

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