Game Development Thoughts

In the past I have worked in the games industry and I have always had an interest in the indie side of things even If I have never managed to get any of the numerous game ideas I have to a point where I would be happy showing them to the public.

One thing is apparent is there is a difference between game development and other types of development. No I am not going to make an argument that it is harder or anything silly like that. I do agree debugging is probably more difficult in games.

The difference is the culture of sharing how people do stuff. There seems to be a lot more openness in the games industry on a technical level and that is certainly true in the indie scene.

Other types of applications just appear to be more guarded.

Now it could be that I am applying some sort of confirmation bias and ignoring evidence that counters my arguments or it could be that in application development anyone doing the something close to you is a competitor and as such you really don't want to help them as if a customer buys your competitors application they probably won't buy yours.

Contrast this with the games industry where you are really only competitors if you are making the same type of game and releasing in the same 3 month period.  Customers buy lots games. I think this helps to create a willingness to be more open and this seems to hold true on the indie side of things.