Fake Portal – Supporting Indie Game Developers
Posted on August 20, 2025 by Aywren
I know that this past year, I’ve talked a lot about buying digital media, my overall dislike of the direction gaming companies are going, and a discontent with supporting large subscription methods (especially those that stack ads on top of your sub). There’s no doubt that I have a love of small indie games and indie developers, which have created some of my favorite games.
Lately, I’ve been watching a few folks who speak out against large gaming and entertainment corporations who are slowly taking away the consumer’s right to own what we buy. One such YouTube creator, the Real Life Fake Wizard, has a large channel of videos that address many of the topics that have been bothering me lately.
Not only does he provide education on these topics, but he takes to conventions where he often talks to gamers, game shop owners, and game analysts about these topics to bring back the voices of others. Not surprisingly, there’s a lot of folks that feel the way I do, especially those who have known more than just the digital era of gaming and entertainment.
While I don’t always agree with everything Fake Wizard says, I do vibe with much of it. Not only does he reiterate to vote with your wallet by not supporting the companies that are raking over consumers, he suggests that an alternative is supporting the little guys by buying indie developers and their games.
The problem is, with so many games releasing every day of the year, it’s not always easy to separate the shovelware (often times AI slop now days) from the gems. How do you find the good games out there created by the little folks who have so much passion for their projects?
That’s where the website – Fake Portal – comes in. It takes its name from the Fake Wizard, and is his self-funded project whereupon he seeks to provide the gaming community with a free resource that will help highlight awesome indie games you may never have heard of.
From the site itself:
The Fake Portal is a resource that will help gamers find fresh, new games from indie and small-team developers that they otherwise might have had a hard time discovering elsewhere.
Our vision is to create a resource that increases discoverability for video game creators, while also empowering gamers to play new games.
The site should be launching soon, and you can sign up for an email list that will provide a reminder and info on site updates. I wanted to wait until the site released to write a post about it, but I was inspired by Fake Wizard’s newest video, and decided to share the news. Once Fake Portal launches, I’ll be right there looking through indie games, and will probably blog about it again.
It just encourages me to think that by supporting the small developers, I can hopefully fund games that are truly loved by their makers, rather than encouraging big companies to continue their path to lining their pockets.
I do want to note that I don’t think all developers who work for these big companies agree with what the corporates do, or that they don’t have passion for the games, despite some games being designed to milk every last nickel and dime they can from the consumer. It’s rough being a creative in this day and age, especially if you are truly passionate about your projects, but still need a pay check.
Still, if I’m going to vote with my dollar, it’s going to be for physical games and primarily indie games. Hopefully this site will flourish and become a beacon for these small gaming developers – I look forward to surfing the games and learning about some I’ve never heard of before!