Building a personal brand is an area in which I have been involved for quite some time.Becoming your own boss is something not to be taken slightly, since it is bound up with your financial independence. Setting up a studio of your own or even being a freelancer usually also implies to start working from home, and that can be delicate. I must point out that my experience started out a few months before the pandemic when the perspective was completely different from the one we used to live during the lockdown… gosh things changed so fast!.

I cannot talk for other countries, but here in Switzerland -where I live- it is rather difficult and risky to give up a relationship of labour dependency to become self-employed or freelancer, not to mention that working for important companies is a deeply rooted helvetic tradition. Even renting an apartment turns out to be more difficult when you cannot demonstrate economy solvency backed by a firm. Those are aspects of critical importance when making such a decision; to mention just a few downsides.

It is also unwise to do it without establishing an Ltd, so as not to be liable with personal or family assets and properties in the event of any dispute. Among other minor details, an independent worker is considered to be as such when having a portfolio of at least three different clients. So, it is very, very complicated in general terms. And I’m not even talking about accounting, balances, vat, taxes… all kind of things that a solo developer will have to face at one point or another.
Seeking good legal advice is also highly recommended, not only for the common fears that every indie dev usually have (such as infringing copyright laws or being paranoid about protecting their precious IPs) but mostly to avoid missing business opportunities when hesitant to sign a new deal with a potential partner due to the lack of legal knowledge.

The local scene

If we put the focus on the video game industry in this country, there is not much to say: game developing is still considered a minor activity, not so different from an expensive hobby.
Private or state subsidies are hard to obtain. Though some light changes can be noticed during the last five years, this activity is far from having the weight of other branches of arts, like music, dance, theatre or cinematography.
A recent article from the local news paper ‘Tribune de Genève‘ evidences this fact:

Despite their different career paths, Jeremy Gobet and Arnaud Gattlen have joined their efforts to promote “made in Geneva” video games. As organisers of the Geneva edition of the Global Game Jam (GGJ) which registers new participants every year, they hope to draw the public’s attention. Their ambition? To give video games they earned role in the cultural scene. “It is considered as a “lowly noble” sector, some may even say marginal. However, over the last decade, it became the first global entertainment industry. Video games represent the tenth art! Switzerland needs to be aware of that.” (Selini 2020).

In a recent lecture called ‘Were we are+ where we’re going’ at the Ludicious Game Festival in Zurich , Philomena Schwab presented the Swiss situation from a corporative point of view:

 

 

As far as I know, there is only one public foundation that supports the development of this industry, Pro Helvetia, by means of a solid mechanism to meet the real creators’ needs in association with Swissgames, an initiative to promote the Swiss games cluster at home and abroad. Under the umbrella of SwissGames, they organize and support local developers to gain visibility, build relationships with the international games industry and facilitate access to the global market. However, beyond the enormous efforts and the great passion of all of its members, the budget for this huge task is rather limited and there has been a remarkable growth in the number of requests since the pandemic.

I personally know the situation since I have been one of the beneficiaries of this institution, from which got enough financial support to finish developing my first game. They also provided me with specialized coaching carried out by important members of the game development scene in Europe, as Professor Odile Limpach from Spielefabrique on Germany.
Actually his company is always looking for new talents to coproduce games from countries Like Spain, France, Germany, Belgium and Croatia.  Unfortunately, the lack of clear economic treaties between the UE and Switzerland prevented to take those collaborations any further.

Even under this circumstances, I consider myself very lucky and extremely grateful for all of this!

Personal branding is not just having a fancy logo

Reflecting carefully,  I should admit that luck had little to do with it. Many months before submit my project,  I devoted myself to work on my personal brand.
I was not sure if I was going to dedicate to 3D character animation (I have a diploma and some experience in these arts) or video games. Those who advised me said I should not miss any opportunity which also included multimedia or web design. For so many years the game industry has been one of my passions so I thought it was a good option to explore.

Quickly I realized that it was not just about creating an appealing logo or a top notch web page (that I never manage to put it together anyway!). Reality, as I mentioned before, is much more complicated.

Besides from the mindsetting necessary to embrace this challenge, money, time and a well-developed action plan is needed. All this calls an enormous emotional investment on many sides;  not only from who makes the decision but, as in my case, all the family members involved.

Between 2018 and 2020 I also did professional training related to this issue. I have not missed any learning opportunity assisting a couple of practical workshops for those who have ‘given up everything to be independent‘. Throughout this period, I was advised by these professionals to take the advantage of this opportunity to set up my entrepreneurial vision.

But as time went by things got confusing and, at some point, I lost my north. My game and my studio became the same thing. One depending on the other. After a lot of frustration I ended up finding some balance, giving priority to the game completion and later producing a 3D animated short film, for which I associated myself with a talented artist I met when I needed help to create some props for the game.

Both projects were done towards the end of 2020. It was a great accomplishment in itself, but I regret not having the strength or the financial means to take the products to the next stage, short of money and energy. To make things worst, all this turned out to be a double-edged sword which ended up in a bittersweet and stressful experience during the first days of the Covid-19 outbrake.

I found another great source of learning and inspiration about how to create a personal brand having enrolled Allan McKay’s (once again!) masterclasses on his training portal. Although this is not a free webinar, you can find some of its contents on youtube, from a FX / 3D artist point of view, like this one here:

 

Facing the future

It became obvious that if I was going to create a second game I would need a radically different approach in my way of working (something not easy to achieve). It was exactly at this point that I knew about the existence of this MA, so I decided to call time out and reconsider the way in which I was going to deal with the second half of this match.

At least for now I think I have made the right decision. The fact that I am thinking over these issues is a clear sign of it.

Fig 5 – Roguecats animated short a Space Indie Studios production in collaboration with Jordi Torres

This is a work in progress post, more to come soon!

List of figures

Fig 1. Eduqua certification on enterprise creation obtained by the author on 2019.
Fig 2. Filomena Schwab report about the Swiss game industry
Fig 3. Swissgames stand at the Paris Games Week 2019. Photo by the author.
Fig 4. Promotional clip for my studio for the GDC 2020 at San Francisco. Video provided by Swissgames / Pro Helvetia
Fig 5. Space Indie Studios logo. Image by the author.
Fig 6. Roguecats animated short a Space Indie Studios production in collaboration with Jordi Torres.

References

Selini, L.  2020. ‘Le difficile marché du jeu vidéo «made in Geneva’. [online] Available at: <https://www.tdg.ch/le-difficile-marche-du-jeu-video-made-in-geneva-363686178414>
Schwab, F. 2019 ‘Were we are+ where we’re going’ [online] Available at: <https://www.patricioland.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Schwab-report.pdf>