Open Gaming Alliance expands to cater to indies and new tech

The Open Gaming Alliance is making a show of expanding this week to offer new, cheaper levels of membership for indies and new special interest groups focused on game dev software, game streaming, indie mentorship and VR/AR technology.

You may remember the non-profit game industry trade group got its start advocating for the standardization of PC game as the PC Gaming Alliance back in 2009, and rebranded in 2014 to reflect a new focus on keeping the game industry "open" and cross-platform.

Now the group is responding to tidal shifts in the industry by creating two new membership levels: Professional and Indie Collective. The former is meant for individual game industry consultants, the latter is for indie teams. Both come at an annual cost of $250, which is especially notable in light of the fact that the two extant OGA membership levels, Promoter and Contributor, come with annual price tags of $30,000 and $5,000 respectively.

With these new levels the OGA is also rolling out a new Special Interest Group, the Indie Collective, that aims to offer guidance and support to indie OGA members through (among other things) partnerships with Double Fine, MassDigi in Boston, the Washington Interactive Network and the Montreal-based Execution Labs.

“Not all indies have best practice insight or expertise in the business aspects of the industry," stated Interabang CEO and newly-crowned OGA Indie Collective Special Interest Group chariman Justin Woodward in a press release. "It’s our goal to become a resource for such information, as well as a place where our indie members can discuss the unique needs and issues facing the indie sector."

Alongside Woodward's Indie Collective, the OGA is opening three other new Special Interest Groups: an AR/VR SIG chaired by Tony Parisi, a 'Cloud Gaming' SIG chaired by Intel's Martin Leslie and a Wolfgang Engel-chaired Software SIG devoted to linking up game development software and tool providers with OGA members to discuss support, trends and industry standards.