[listic]

IMHO, gaming industry is not very lucrative as a whole. As a rule, releasing a succesful project doesn't guarantee that you willl have funds for the next one. Therefore, teams developing games can hardly be called startups.

Anyways, I think you are better off collecting and reading individual articles in specialized press i.e. Gamasutra, Kotaku etc. If you want to read about the making of past titles, seek postmortems.

As far as I can understand it, gaming industry and innovation went searate ways. You are either (a) making multimillion-dollar blockbusters and bound by capitalists and IP holders, or (b) try to do whatever you want with your friends with nearly zero chance to be noticed by the industry or consumers.

There is a certain line of thought about computer games (here we're talking variant b, or underground): Games are a new art form in its infancy. Really, think about it: game can do (kind of) what music and cinema can, and more: it is interactive! As other art forms, it is looked down at and tries to copy other, more recognized art forms (as cinema was looked down upon compared to theater and tried to imitate it). Therefore, adherents of this line of thought say, we must experiment and we should find expressive means unique to such art form as games. If you want to learn abouut this approach, I suggest you start here: http://tale-of-tales.com/ it's home of Tale of Tales, Belgian developer of art games. The site is rich in content and contains many links to other like-minded sites.

[listic]

Here for example are the postmortems of games that can be considered classic:

Baldur's Gate II (2001) http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3084/baldurs_gate_ii_t...

Diablo II (2000) http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3084/baldurs_gate_ii_t...

The above games can be reckoned classic. Here is a thorough review of the game Pathologic (2005), a brave experiment of the underground kind, just fortunate enough to be finished, published (in Russia), but not much more, (i.e. no decent English translation, original team seems to be no more):

Part 1 http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008/04/10/butchering-pathol...

Part 2 http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008/04/11/butchering-pathol...

Part 3 http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008/04/12/butchering-pathol...

[lacker]

You are either (a) making multimillion-dollar blockbusters and bound by capitalists and IP holders, or (b) try to do whatever you want with your friends with nearly zero chance to be noticed by the industry or consumers.

The gaming industry is changing though. A lot of iPhone games have been successful on a smaller scale. There are also several promising social gaming startups like Zynga and Playfish. And there have been a lot of game startups out of China getting funding based on virtual-goods business models. All this stuff is pretty interesting and offers the potential to make a hit game without working for EA.

[listic]

Nice to know. Would you please name the startups from China or point me to articles about them?

Also, electronic distribution (i.e. Steam) may free indie developers from the shackles of publishers.

[lacker]

Here's a list of game & "virtual world" companies that got funded in 2008.

http://venturebeat.com/2009/04/26/second-revision-game-and-v...

Notable in that list from China are 9you and G10. Also from China there is tencent a.k.a. QQ (curious that their company names are all combinations of numbers, letters, and english words) which is not a game per se but they are making a lot of money selling virtual goods.