Please introduce yourself

My name is ohNussy, and I’m an independent game developer.

I am currently 41 years old and live in Osaka.

The developer name is Nussygame and currently offers games such as Buriedbornes, Buriedbornes 2, and B100X.

Please give us a brief overview of your career so far.

Before making a living as a solo game developer, I worked for a small game developer in Osaka for about 2 years, where I served as both director and technical manager.

Nussygame was launched in January 2015 and continues to this day.

Basically, I am the only one in charge of development, management, and public relations.

What is your favorite game?

Diablo 2

How did you get started on the path of solo game development?

I started making games in 2001.

I won a prize of 30,000 yen for a game I made with RPG Maker 2000.

I started seriously thinking about starting development as a solo business in 2014.

At the time, I was working for the game developer mentioned above, but the game I created in a week during my free time over the New Year holidays, called B100 (the prototype of the current B100X), was well-received and had approximately 100,000 MAU in the month of release.

This was the direct trigger for me to feel that I could make a living as a solo game developer.

What is the most fun moment during game development?

When a user “breaks” my game in an unexpected way.

It’s a really exciting moment, but I need to find a balance…

What is the most difficult moment in game development?

When a fatal problem occurs due to unexpected reasons, such as “I can’t play the game” or “My purchase is not reflected.”

I can’t stop feeling nauseous until the problem is resolved, so I take anti-nausea medication right before any major releases.

How much revenue do you make solely from gaming (average monthly sales)?

Monthly sales vary greatly depending on the title’s update status and timing, so it’s hard to generalize.

Approximately, Nussygame’s cumulative revenue from its launch (2015) to its fiscal year 2024 is expected to be approximately $1 million.

Please also tell us about the revenue of the single game title that holds the most weight among them.

I won’t go into specific numbers, but more than half of the cumulative total so far is due to Buriedbornes1.

How many titles are you monetizing?

Currently, the 3 titles Buriedbornes1, Buriedbornes2, and B100X are the main sources of revenue.

The revenue ratio for each title also varies depending on the period.

Buriedbornes1 has the highest sales, but there are months when other titles grow.

Please tell us about the software and environment you use for development.

• Windows 11
• Unity
• VSCode

As for Git, I have multiple repositories on a NAS or server and push to all of them.

Previously, I used Unity Build Automation, but due to the slow build speed and cost considerations, I recently switched to batch building in a local environment.

What aspects of development do you pay particular attention to?

Reusability.

Since individual development means there is a lack of time resources, it is important to make sure that feature development doesn’t take too long.

What aspects of the user experience do you pay particular attention to?

To make them feel like they can “break the game.”

I am very conscious of providing points that make you feel like “if I do this, my strategy will change dramatically,” such as constructing builds and discovering combos.

This often leads to imbalance, but personally I think that being “fun to play” is several times more important than having a perfectly balanced game. No matter how well balanced a game is, if it’s not fun to play, players will stop playing.

What is your favorite part of Buriedbornes (hereafter referred to as BB)?

A dark fantasy post-apocalyptic worldview.

I’ve always loved the concept of the end of the world, and this is the thing that best embodies it.

Of all the titles released so far, which one is the most memorable?

DeckDeDungeon2

The poor gameplay experience was an issue, so I made major balance adjustments, but users could not keep up with the rapid changes in card performance every week, and the player population decreased. This decrease in the player population was the deciding factor that made it difficult to continue the title.

The final balance itself was not bad (in fact, it received a generally positive response from users who interacted with it after the online update was completed), but the lesson I learned was that “gradual balance adjustments made over a short period of time are a bad move that causes extremely strong stress for continuing users.”

What do you think was the trigger/reason for BB becoming popular?

About a year after the release, word of mouth spread on anonymous message boards in Korea, which became the starting point for an increase in the number of users and sales worldwide, which continued at that level for several years.

A few months before this review occurred, I increased the language options from just Japanese and English to about 10 languages, and I believe this was definitely the catalyst.

Even now, about half of the sales of Nussygame titles come from outside Japan, so I believe that multilingual support is essential and have implemented it.

What do you think makes BB different from your other games?

BB, especially BB1, is the simplest of Nussygame’s titles.

Complex games offer more options and can be more fun to play, but at the same time they place a greater mental burden on the user.

BB1 has a low barrier to entry, so I think it’s become a game that will be played by a lot of people.

Nussygame titles are created with the virtual goal of being “something you can play absentmindedly at night when you can’t fall asleep,” but I feel that the systems of the B100X and BB2 are too complex and fall a little short of this requirement.

For this reason, I am planning to move towards a simpler system in my next titles and beyond.

Ideal design is lenticular, simple yet revealing depth the more you think about it .

Please tell us about the mid- to long-term flow and roadmap that you have been conscious of as a developer (such as what kind of titles you plan to create to increase profitability)

I’ve hardly ever noticed it.

Of all the things I wanted to make or thought I could make at the time, I made the most interesting thing.

If I had to say, when I was developing BB1, I was in a situation where it was difficult to continue the business due to the failure of the previous titles DeckDeDungeon2 and B10, and I was thinking that if the next title did not work out, I would stop developing games on my own for a while, so I decided to “go back to basics” and remake the title that I felt was the most satisfying of my previous works (a browser game called B2).

I continued to create things that I found interesting, and as a result, some of them ended up resonating with users.

I’ve only made 2 or 3 titles for the purpose of learning and accumulating technical knowledge. (I wanted to try making a game in a completely different genre than I had made before, so instead of making something big right away, I made something small.)

If your child said they wanted to be a game developer, would you encourage them or discourage them?

This is just my opinion, but people who are the type to create things will continue to create even if people around them try to stop them.

So I’ll stop that first.

My parents also stopped me a long time ago.

And the problem is that my child is now 11 years old and is already the type of person who will create something if left alone.

Recently, when there is something he wants to make, he finds the time he can’t make it painful and says he wants to stay up late.

Even if I stop, I think he will probably become someone who creates something…

What do you think smartphone games will be like in 5-10 years?

Due to the declining birthrate, there will be a limit to how much games that are complete for Japanese people can make in the future, so I think that all titles will need to become more globalized.

However, when they do this, I think they will be unable to avoid the wave of loot box regulations overseas.

Note: This applies to the Japanese smartphone gaming market.

What do you think the overall gaming market (PC/smartphone/console) will be like in 5-10 years?

I think it will be even more chaotic than it is now.

Because the environment is now in place where anyone can develop, new titles are being released on a daily basis, and most of them never make it big and then disappear.

I think that after this situation continues for a while, the chaos will calm down.

Even if anyone is able to make things, I feel that in the future only a select few will be able to make things that can be sold.

There are a ton of works available, such as Switch’s “Game Builder Garage” and “Mario Maker,” but there are only a handful that make you think, “I want to play other works by this creator.”

That’s it.

The video game industry seems to be in decline.What do you think is the reason for this?

I don’t think the games industry is in decline.

	Japan	Outside japan
Mobile	→　Stagnation	↑　Expansion
Consumer	↓　Reduction	↑　Expansion
PC	↑　Expansion	↑　Expansion

… is my impression, and I believe that it is mainly the japanese consumer game market is shrinking.

I think the reason is simply that fewer people can afford to buy hardware.

As for mobile, although there are some titles that are doing well, it seems that they are being overshadowed by rich titles from China and Korea.

If the reason for the sense of decline is news of job losses and studio closures, I believe it is because “the supply is increasing at a faster rate than demand is growing, creating a red ocean.”

What are your future goals?

As always, it is “the ultimate game that continues to provide endless fun to both creators and players.”

I feel that AI has a small degree of potential, but at the current level of technology I am still one step away from infinity.

I think the game that comes closest to that ideal right now is Magic: The Gathering.

Do you have any advice or suggestions for people who are wondering whether to become independent game developers?

Whenever someone comes to me for advice, the first thing I say is this:

“You’d better stop.”

The reason is as I wrote in the question about children.

I repeat, people who are the type to create will continue to create even if others try to stop them.

The impression I get is that such people have already released several works non-profitably or are playing around with creating various things in their own local environments before even thinking about aiming to become a creator.

I also think that for such people, once they know how to make something, the time they spend not making it feels more painful.

I believe that if you ask professionals in illustration, music, or other creative fields, you will get a similar answer.

It’s a slightly different story if you’re doing this as a job in a company, but if you don’t meet these conditions and want to continue creating games as an individual, you’ll have to continue working on game development as a duty, and I think it will be tough for you along the way.

However, this is merely my own personal opinion, almost a biased one.

There’s no need to listen to this opinion, and I think you should still give it a try.

Because people who are the type to create will continue to create even if others try to stop them.

Some people try it out and then transition to that type.

So, just give it a try.

It all starts from there.

What advice would you give to people who are thinking about becoming independent game developers, or who are just starting out?

This advice is geared towards beginners and does not overlap with the previous section.

• “Make it small” –
  if possible, I recommend making it in a day, but if not, in about a week.
• “What you create should be made public and evaluated.” –
  Unless you become someone who can complete your work, you will not be able to perform on stage.
• “Accept criticism.” –
  Never stop trying to find out what you lack.

I wrote the exact same thing in an article I wrote about 10 years ago .

This belief has not changed since then.

From a practical standpoint, do you think it’s too difficult to aim to earn 500,000 yen per month(= about 00) within 10 years, starting from zero experience?

I don’t know.

I REALLY don’t know.

The market situation is too chaotic to say one way or the other.

It may be possible if you have a unique sensibility and something that stands out, but it all comes down to whether or not the person truly has that ability, so I can’t say anything until I see what you’ve created.

If you aim for a buzz, you may see some success, but it’s only momentary, so I don’t recommend it if your goal is to maintain a certain level.

For reference, it took about 15 years from 2001, when I made my first game and received money for it (30,000 yen), to Buriedbornes1, when I reached the level of earning 500,000 yen per month.

Until then, I had been making about one game a year, although the frequency varied.

Since I was just making them as a hobby, I never once considered those 15 years of development a chore.

However, since games have been made for various platforms, including browser games, since before the smartphone game market emerged, the term “indie game” had not even been coined when I was making them (we called them self-made games in japan internet), so the situation is completely different from today.

When I look at what you’ve created, I might be able to say something like, “If you intend to carry on making things like that for the next 10 years, that might be a bit tough,” but that’s about all I can say.

I can’t say, “You can do this.”

I’m aiming to reach 300,000 yen per month in about 3 to 5 years, and then I’ll become a full-timer and aim even higher. Is this a reasonable schedule?

If you are thinking about embarking on a solid policy of “building up and increasing, developing what is likely to sell, and specializing in it,” I feel that it would be better to aim for apps rather than games.

If you insist on a game, I would recommend that you make it multilingual. (To find out which languages you should support, check the languages that famous games support.)

And instead of thinking, “I’ll think about it after I’ve gained some experience and honed my skills,” think carefully about “what kind of game do I really want to make right now?”

I don’t know of any successful cases of someone who says, “I’m planning to make a game, but I’ll decide what kind of game I’m going to make later.”

If you were to start over as a game developer, how would you set your financial goals and get started?

Assuming I was to start from scratch while maintaining my current development and management capabilities, I would aim to return to the current level (around $100,000 per year).

However, since this premise itself is not very realistic, I feel that the answer to this question would not be very helpful.

When I started Nussygame, there were already people who had been supporting me since I started making games as a hobby over the previous decade or so.

I believe that I cannot ignore the fact that these people drove the number of users and sales immediately after the release of each title and helped nurture the titles.

And the person who asked this question probably won’t be training in a hobby for another 10 years or so.

I have said this many times before, but the market and situation are completely different now than they were when I was in.

So I don’t think there will ever be anyone else who goes through the same experience as me.

Everyone will have different assumptions about what 0 is.

So, it probably won’t be of any use.

I don’t have much programming experience and I’m new to C#, how should I learn it?

Please read this. (Japanese, so please find the similar book using your language)

These days, it’s easy to do things like “I want to do this” by using AI.

However, you can’t learn concepts such as architecture and philosophy, such as “how to design the project as a whole,” by self-study, and you can’t even think of asking AI to do it.

Summary

According to a survey by Game Marketing Media, the following statistics have been confirmed. (Estimates from externally available figures)

	Steam	GooglePlay	AppStore
Total titles released in 2024	18949	About 59000	About 50300
Titles that generated revenue of $500+	About 10.6%	About 1.6%	About 2.1%

With countless titles being released every day, all titles other than the ones you released are your competitors.

In fact, all other entertainment is also your competitor. (For example, there are many people who don’t play games themselves, but just watch streamers play.)

The amount of disposable time available to each person is limited, and the entertainment industry is currently in a fierce battle for that piece of the pie.

How many people will choose your title?

With a line of similar titles, does your title have a reason to be chosen because it’s your title?

In this current situation, I can’t even tell you, “You should try game development.”

You should definitely give up.

There are plenty of ways to earn a stable income in more solid genres, so please consider those again.

But still… people who are the type to create will continue to create even if others try to stop them.