During the 1990s, a new strata of independent film studios and distributors revitalised the Hollywood movie machine. The likes of Miramax, New Line Cinema and October Films challenged the ageing behemoths of the industry and pushed forward offbeat directors such as Quentin Tarantino, Darren Aronofsky and Jane Campion. The decade is widely considered an artistic high point for western cinema after the bloated mainstream excesses of the 1980s. Could something similar now be happening in games?
Certainly, we have a similar setup. The big players of the games business are in various states of creative disarray: Electronic Arts (EA) has been bought out by a Saudi-led consortium, which is likely to lead to more cautious, hit-driven decisions; Microsoft bought Activision and Bethesda and then ordered waves of redundancies; Ubisoft has cancelled several titles and is posting big losses. Those companies are also facing rising development costs, so they’re circling the wagons, focusing on legacy brands and freezing recruitment. It’s hard to imagine any left-field works of genius emerging from this imaginative quagmire.
Meanwhile, smaller developers who are starved of investment through traditional routes, are quietly formulating a counter-economy. Over the past couple of years, we’ve seen the arrival of boutique publishers, set up by successful studios, and designed to support grassroots talent. Kinetic Publishing was formed by the creator of successful indie ghost-hunting game Phasmophobia to support new studios; Outersloth is the funding arm of Among Us creator InnerSloth, launched in 2024 to support idiosyncratic game concepts; London-based Kepler Interactive, formed in 2020, was behind Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, the most critically acclaimed title of 2025. Last week saw the announcement of Inner Pocket, a publisher founded by industry veterans and dedicated to “intimate and engaging” experiences.
There has, arguably, never been a better time for this kind of grassroots revolution in games publishing. Digital distribution via stores such as Steam and the App Store has given studios a global marketplace, while social media platforms are providing comparatively cheap marketing avenues. A decade ago, it would have been costly to show new games and strike deals at big events such as E3 – but now, most titles are revealed via online showcases or through communities of fans on Discord and Reddit. At the same time, developers are able to bypass traditional publishing deals to finance projects, seeking help from regional arts networks and funding bodies, and joining local hubs for support. At the latest Develop Conference in the UK, studio collectives came together, combining forces and sharing expertise.
This isn’t a cure-all. The games industry is still a complex and intimidating market and, with a focus on digital distribution, discoverability is still a major issue for new titles – how do you gain attention, and an audience, when there are hundreds of new titles released on Steam every week? But as mainstream publishers quietly drop more ambitious and experimental projects, there is a growing community of new companies, networks and funding bodies looking to help. As John Buckley, head of publishing at PocketPair, said recently, “We’re going to see more hit games coming from publishers you’ve never heard of.”
Nineties movies such as Sex, Lies and Video Tape, Reservoir Dogs and Slacker emerged from a new Hollywood culture of film school nerds, cheap equipment and funding models only a few steps up from maxing out credit cards – and a growing independent production system was there to support them. For years, chin-stroking critics asked the now-lampooned question: when will video games have their Citizen Kane moment? Now, perhaps the more pertinent version is: what will be the industry’s Blair Witch Project?
