For every indie game success story, there’s an unquantifiable number of indie game flops. Balatro, Meccha Chameleon, Stardew Valley–these are the exceptions to the rule; outliers in an overcrowded market.
SteamDB estimates that 18,933 games have been released on the Steam storefront in 2026. That means roughly an average of 72 new games have dropped on Steam every day this year. Over 2,600 of these games have zero reviews. Over 7,600 have only netted 1-9 reviews. Yet, 978 of these 18,933 games have over 500 reviews.
A bit of quick math reveals that 60 percent of games on Steam get no more than 9 user reviews and many get none at all. Meanwhile, roughly 5 percent are breaking the 500 Steam review threshold. But how many of those games in that 5 percent are AAA titles, with deep-pocketed publishers backing them? SteamDB estimates that only 364 of those 978 games are tagged as indies–so, roughly 37 percent. And, yes, it’s debatable if some of these actually qualify as indies.
This is all a long-winded intro designed to justify a statement that anyone with half a brain would have already agreed with: getting eyes on your indie game is a crapshoot. This is why devs often turn to indie publishers for help, but even that comes with its own problems.
Being an "indie publisher" must be the best job in the world. You do no work and just take 50% (or more) of the rev from games talented people spent years of their lives working on. But it's cool cause you're "indie" just like they are!
— Tyler Glaiel (@TylerGlaiel) July 20, 2022
Tim Bender, the CEO of Manor Lords and Darkwood publisher Hooded Horse, has stated that the “vast majority of indie publishers” are “predatory and opportunistic,” and often “basically abandon” games that aren’t immediate hits. Tyler Glaiel, one of the programmers and game designers behind Mewgenics, has also criticized indie publishers for offering predatory deals that result in them taking “50% (or more) of the rev from games talented people spent years of their lives working on.”
So, what’s the alternative for indie devs? Self-publishing. Of course, indie devs aren’t marketing gurus; they’re developers. This is why stories of indie devs getting scammed by resellers hit the headlines every single year. It’s also why devs resort to paying independent creators and influencers for marketing.
Over the past 24 hours, indie devs on X have been rather publicly voicing their dissatisfaction with a YouTube content creator named Clemmy. Clemmy owns and runs Best Indie Games, a YouTube channel with over 190,000 subscribers that “highlights fantastic indie games since they are wonderful (if often overlooked) experiences.”
It all started with a tweet from game developer devoriahub, who posted an unconfirmed breakdown of what Clemmy supposedly charges indie devs for exposure. The numbers might surprise you: $2,228 for a package that includes a YouTube Short, a small minute-long feature in a YouTube video alongside dozens of other creators, a Twitter post, and a newsletter shout-out–and that’s the cheapest tier.
Here is an example from clemmy.
One of the devs that i shared sent me this.
This is crazy.
They also want 380$ for one twit. @IndieGameJoe https://t.co/OqEGeZWMM9 pic.twitter.com/GxN55U5zrb— devoriahub (@devoriahub) September 17, 2026
Several indie devs claimed to be able to corroborate the figures in the replies, and similar figures have previously been posted by other devs on the r/IndieDev subreddit. All of the examples I could find from devs who paid Clemmy for exposure weren’t particularly glowing about the experience, either. “I paid for it last year when it was $177,” stated BitQuest Studios, alongside an image showcasing the meager 1,622 impressions they garnered from paying Clemmy. “My game was even selected to be in the featured games category[…]The showcase also didn’t lead to any wishlist bump. Definitely not worth it in my opinion.”
Indie dev Bag Track Games also wasn’t impressed with their lack of impressions: “Our game was officially selected for BIG Fall Showcase 2026, and I can tell you it’s not worth paying at all, he asked for $200, with tax I think we ended up paying $217. At the end our trailer was dumped among hundreds of trailers in 1 Youtube video with a length of 2-3 hours[…]And then of course, he posted your game in X, Bluesky, and IG as well, but same thing, dumped at once with other game trailers within very short period of time, effectively burying your game from his own posts.”
This caught the attention of Indie Game Joe, a video game marketing consultant known for posting about indie games, free of charge, on his socials. “It honestly feels to me like this model targets vulnerable, first time indie developers who don’t have much marketing experience yet,” stated Joe in an article post on X. “You spend years building a game, you get close to launch, and you’re terrified nobody’s going to see it[…]So when someone with a big name tells you you’ve been officially selected and quotes a massive audience number, I really cannot overstate how easy it is to believe this is your big break.”
“There’s no price list anywhere on the website, none at all,” Joe continued. “You only find out what anything costs once you’ve filled in an enquiry form or pitched him your game by email. And what comes back leads with a table boasting a combined audience of around 306,000 across YouTube, X, Facebook and Instagram[…]But when the median post is only pulling in 30 to 50 likes and a couple of thousand algorithmic impressions, charging $380 for one single tweet is completely disconnected from what you’re actually going to get back for it.”
If you're an indie dev considering paid packages from ClemmyGames (Best Indie Games), here’s my take.
This isn't an attack or a pile-on, just an honest breakdown of real pricing, data, and experiences shared by fellow indie devs https://t.co/hIPRb5xUDN
— Indie Game Joe (@IndieGameJoe) September 18, 2026
Joe also pointed out a completely separate issue with Clemmy’s marketing: disclosure. While some of Clemmy’s posts on X do carry a “#ad” mention, buried in the replies, the majority do not. Likewise, I couldn’t find a single example of a YouTube Short on his channel that explicitly disclosed whether it had been paid for.
Perhaps this simply means that the majority of these posts aren’t sponsored. After all, we have no idea how many developers have taken Clemmy up on his offer to advertise their games. To that end, I reached out to Indie Game Joe to ask how many developers have contacted him about Clemmy.
“Over the last few months it’s been somewhere around 20 to 30 developers messaging me privately about their experiences with Best Indie Games showcases and paid packages,” stated Joe. “And on pricing itself, other devs sent me the same rate card asking $380 for a single tweet, on posts that were routinely pulling under 40 likes and 400 real views. So this isn’t one or two isolated complaints, it’s the same pattern coming from dozens of developers who felt misled by big follower numbers that didn’t match the actual reach they got.”
I also asked Joe to clarify how his own business operates. The skeptical among you may wonder if someone named “Indie Game” Joe might stand to profit off of shining a light on Clemmy’s business model, considering that Joe offers consultancy packages to indie devs “for free” through his own website: “In reality I’ve barely done any paid consultancy off the back of it. The odd bit of advisory work for a couple of larger studios, sure, but almost everything on that site, the case studies, the games I helped with, was done completely for free. Anyone’s welcome to message those devs and check that themselves.”
“I make games with my best friends for a living – that is where my income comes from,” continued Joe. “Back in 2015 myself and my friends started our studio, Digital Cybercherries, together, we’d worked on Contagion back in 2013 before that. Since then we’ve made Hypercharge: Unboxed, which got to number 2 on the global Steam top sellers list and is out across PC and consoles now, and I led the design and marketing on our horror game Don’t Scream, which went massively viral.”
This leaves us with a very unfortunate conclusion: There’s too much competition in the indie game market, and devs feel like they’re getting screwed over by publishers, scammed by resellers masquerading as reviewers, and paying out the nose to content creators for exposure.
I get emailed by, no exaggeration, over a dozen indie devs and publishers every day–and in the grand scheme of things, I’m a nobody, so god knows how many indie games end up in the inboxes of well-known journalists and content creators. But when less than 2 percent of indie games are eating up the overwhelming majority of Steam’s engagement-based pie, how are indie devs going to reach audiences when they have little to no advertising budget? Especially when what little they can spend might result in barely any return?
I don’t know the answer. In fact, I’m concerned that there is no answer. When compared to AAA titles, the scale of indie games’ investments may appear tiny, but said investments carry a larger, more individual risk. Every published game is a gamble–indie devs are just the only ones betting their own savings.
