Indie Arena

The Indie Arena is a community for the independent game developers in the German-speaking countries of Germany, Austria and Switzerland. To us independent means that the games were built with a high degree of creative autonomy. That doesn't mean that our members do this alone or that they do exclusively that. But it means that they are involved with creating the game itself (for example: designers, coders, artists etc.) whether as hobbyists or professionals.

How can you join?

The community is active on Discord. To join us there simply visit discord.indiearena.de. However there's also a special "Professional Indie" role with access to some of the more sensitive channels. If you are interested, then read on.

Our Rules

Every community needs a few rules. Here are ours:

• Be constructive: As a member of the Indie Arena it's important that you always remain constructive. Bring your personal touch and your perspective, be open and direct but always be friendly.
• Don't be a dick: This one's pretty self-explanatory. But still: Don't attack, taunt or insult other members. Don't post inappropraite content or otherwise violate the goals of the community.

Violations will be responded to with a public warning. A second warning brings with it a timed ban. A third warning leads to a permanent ban.

Who meets in the Indie Arena?

The Indie Arena is designed for independent game developers with some experience that are based in Germany, Austria or Switzerland. Additionally the community is also aimed at supporters of the indie scene to provide a direct exchange with the developers. If you are unsure if you fit, read on.

Developers

Independent means that you build games in creative autonomy. That doesn't mean you need to do this alone or that your team only does that. We also don't care if this is a hobby or you earn money with it but it's important to us that the games you make come from your heart.

Game developer means that you're involved with creating the game itself. If you're a game designer, coder, writer, visual or audio artist then that clearly applies to you. Disciplines like community management or producing are also very welcome.

Experienced means that you or your team has completed and released at least one game. We don't care how big or small the game is, as long as your own creative ideas can be seen in it. This is less about 20 years of professional experience but rather about you being familiar with game development.

If you are interested in the "Professional Indie" role, then get in touch with the admins via Discord. When you do, please provide some information about you, your studio and your games. That way we can get a clearer picture of you and your skills. We'll try to get back to you as soon as possible. Though in reality this might take some time since all of us are pretty busy building games...

Supporter

The Indie Arena is also open to friends of the indie scene. If you're supporting the scene and you can help us reach our goals, let us know. We have event organisators, curators, journalists and other supporting forces in mind.

Who might not feel at home?

New Developers

If you are new to game development, then the Indie Arena is not the best place to start. We provide only very little technical help. Instead we'd recommend you look for one of the many online forums for hobby developers.

For example there's german-language ones like ZFX or Spieleprogammierer.de. We're sure that the people there can help you better than we could. And once you've built a game we'd be happy to welcome you here.

Publisher, Recruiter, Service & Middleware Provider

The Indie Arena supports and fosters independent game developers, which sometimes means we discuss sensitive matters - for which we have some closed channels. You can still get in touch with everyone via the public Discord server.

We're also open for cooperations with the Indie Arena itself. Please get in touch with the admins. We're looking forward to hearing from you.