FreeGameDev

See:
"You indie game will flop and you will lose money"
http://positech.co.uk/cliffsblog/2017/0 ... ose-money/
Also see presentation: http://positech.co.uk/cliffsblog/

Money quote:

This is a WINNER TAKES ALL market. You are either in the top 0.1% of indie game developers, or you are unemployed, with an expensive hobby where you make effectively free games.

Has some basic calculations and is more of an opinion piece... but I guess everyone here knows this already

Also interesting: https://youtu.be/y4a7K-I-F5s

This is true of almost all industries that rely on audiences - acting, sports, etc. There's plenty of indie developers who find their niche and tick over with it. There's plenty aiming high and crashing and burning. Then there's the few who strike the right chord and hit the big time.

PUBG just proves it if you look at the stats: http://store.steampowered.com/stats/

It is not only the most played games, but almost the most played games even if you combine all other games on there together. The weird fact about this is, that it is not even the best game, production quality is relatively cheap, like an average indie game and it does not have much content yet and is not even in it's final release, yet it is still over 30 times more successfull in player counts than the best game with the highest production quality which is GTA 5.

I think it is just a flaw in the algorithm, since things that are "popular" get promoted more, which makes them more popular, which gets them promoted more. Youtube and other social media work that way as well.

Yeah, marketing wins over quality, for sure, it just has to be "good enough" well, I guess that means it runs mostly.