The Czech game industry has a long history, though it wasn't until fairly recently that their indie scene began to blossom. Matej Jariabka of Gamifi.cc, the independent Czech studio behind The Great Wobo Escape, currently available on Android and headed soon to PC on Steam, talks about the how that history has led to the current state of today's indie game development scene and where his studio fits into it.
"Game development in the Czech Republic started around the year 1984 with text adventure games and smaller puzzle games," says Jariabka. "These two genres were dominant in the late 80s and early 90s. In the late 90s, more and more companies began to produce games -- most popular were humorous adventure games, strategy games, and puzzle games.
"At the end of the 90s, bigger and better-known game companies started with the development of 3D games, mainly shooters and tactical shooters," he continues. A company called Illusion Softworks created Hidden & Dangerous and later became 2K Czech, going on to develop the first two Mafia games. Bohemia Interactive, developer of Arma and DayZ, was founded in 1999.

Jariabka goes on to list a number of smaller studios in the Czech republic including Amanita (Samorost, Machinarium), Dreadlocks (DEX), and Keen Software House (Medieval Engineers). "Most of these are less than 10 years old and started on waves of mobile games and Kickstarter -- I guess the two best things that happened to game devel...