Among the goals of the first ever Grassroots Game Conference, organized by Philadelphia Game Lab and hosted across the city over the weekend, was to celebrate the sector's successes and inspire others to join the party. The panel discussion “Starting Your Own Indie Game Studio,” held inside Elaine C. Levitt Auditorium at Gershman Hall, went a long way in achieving those goals. Two representatives from each of three of the most successful independent videogame development studios in the region showed up to talk about their respective paths. Represented on the panel were Cypher Prime, Final Form Games, and Island Officials.
Topics discussed during the two-hour event ranged from each studio's humble beginnings to financial and work struggles to their different development strategies and much more. A series of questions from the audience rounded out the session, which was moderated by Fishtown's Chris Grant, editor-in-chief of videogame publication Polygon.