The beauty of the WeAreDevelopers World Congress is seeing developers from every corner of the industry come together and share their passion for programming. Back in summer 2025, at our Berlin World Congress, game legends John Romero (Doom, Quake) and Warren Spector (Deus Ex, System Shock) sat back to reflect on their time in the industry, and what it’s taught them.
As this fascinating fireside chat is featured in today’s Dev Digest, it’s the perfect time for us to take a look at what developers - whatever they work on - can learn from the world of indie games.
how to stay creative, finish what you start, and keep your integrity in an industry that often pushes the opposite.
Balance Pragmatism with Innovation
The world of indie games is known for being experimental, with developers at the cutting edge, pushing the limits of hardware and software.
Now even if this is a little romantic, it’s quite different to how we would describe software engineering more generally, which tends to be thought of as structured and slower-paced, particularly outside of the San Francisco “move fast and break things” scene.
Romero and Spector say this is a benefit and a challenge for indie game developers. Romero says they may have more room to innovate than developers working elsewhere, but need to learn when they should take a pragmatic (and probably less exciting) approach to move things forward:
At the beginning, success is just finishing the game (…) Even a small one.
Every developer reading this will have found themselves tinkering with tiny details for hours with no major progress, and while it’s important we stay curious to experiment, we should not let it get in the way.
Spector echoed the same sentiment:
People ask me all the time what they can do to get into the industry. Finish something.
The sooner you release something, the sooner you can learn from real feedback, and in some ways it’s comforting to know this is a challenge developers face in all areas of tech.
Creative Coding Matters
The rise of AI has impacted us all. With co-pilots, MCP and agents now fairly commonplace for developers everywhere, the way that we learn to code - and write it - has changed significantly.
For Romero and Spector, AI can assist us, but it’s still important to know how to write code, a skill that you can develop by experimenting, and building things for fun.
Whether it’s creating a side project, contributing to open source, or joining a hackathon, they keep your problem-solving instincts alive in a time when AI makes challenging them less likely.
Why not try to find a space in your week to work on something weird, personal or fun? It’s not time wasted, and at the very least you’ll have something interesting to add to your portfolio.
Find the Right Culture
Romero reminded the audience that the early games industry was built almost entirely by “bedroom programmers.” Teams were tiny, flexible, and fearless, and this was the way they liked it.
The game industry was created by indies (…) Publishers were one or two people… all the big franchises came from someone working at home and sending it to a publisher.
This isn’t much different to the scrappy startup way that tech startups work today. Small, fast-moving teams where you can experiment freely and see your fingerprints on everything you build. But, from a developer’s perspective, that freedom comes with trade-offs - unpredictable schedules, shifting priorities, and fewer guardrails.
Larger companies, by contrast, offer stability and structure, but can limit creative input. The key is knowing which environment energises you, or works for you, and saying no to those that don’t.
Of course the job market can make it difficult for developers to be too selective about the roles they apply for (unfortunately), but Spector says finding the right fit is important, and he’s “always been willing to walk away”. It’s not stubbornness, it could be the difference between burning out or thriving, so knowing what works for you shouldn’t be overlooked.
Indie games are often seen as the rebellious cousin of mainstream software, but their lessons apply to every developer. Balance pragmatism and innovation, stay creative, find the culture that fits for you and you’ll survive and thrive in tech.
Be sure to watch the video in full below, and let us know your thoughts on the subject on socials.
