Inside BIC 2025: The Indie Spirit in Busan

BACKND

10 Sep 2025 — 5 min read

Busan Indie Connect Festival 2025 – Impressions and Takeaways

Written by Game Business PM : Nick.L, 10 September 2025

Event Overview

Busan Indie Connect Festival 2025 (BIC 2025) was held from August 15 to 17 at BEXCO Hall 1. The slogan this year was “Match Your Indie Spirit”, highlighting the unique values and energy of indie games. Alongside the offline showcase, the online festival ran from August 8 to 29 through bicfest.org, offering not only exhibitions but also stage programs, livestreams, business matchmaking, and the annual awards. By now, BIC has firmly established itself as one of Asia’s leading indie game events.

Exhibition & Program

This year, a record 592 games from 41 countries were submitted, with 283 titles selected for the final showcase—making it one of the biggest BICs ever. As expected for an indie-focused festival, the exhibition hall was mainly designed as a B2C hands-on zone where players could try out games directly. On the main stage, developer talks and Live Indie streams were hosted, while contracts and side events took place throughout the venue.

Interestingly, outside of BIC’s main venue, a separate developer conference called the Busan Indie Wave Conference was held on August 14, adding even more depth to the week.

Meet BACKND at Various Game Shows

This year, BACKND once again joined BIC 2025 with its own booth. Through the booth and a variety of meetings, we had the chance to meet game developers face-to-face, introduce how BACKND can support online/mobile game server development, and also listen directly to their thoughts and challenges.

BACKND regularly takes part in major events such as G-Star, GDC, and Gamescom, so if you’re ever curious or have ideas you’d like to share, we’d be more than happy to welcome you at our booth anytime.

That said, this article will focus less on introducing BACKND and more on my personal impressions and takeaways from BIC 2025.

Online Festival Performance

BIC’s online festival also delivered strong results. Viewership jumped from 920K last year to 1.24M this year—about a 35% increase. Game downloads exceeded 13K, up more than 10%, while total page views hit 110K. Most notably, the Steam sale page racked up over 2.2M impressions, marking an astonishing 1,800% surge compared to the previous year. These figures highlight the event’s growing global presence.

Highlights

The biggest charm of BIC was still the hands-on experience. Being able to play a variety of indie games, chat directly with developers, and share feedback on the spot is something only an indie festival can offer. The combination of offline and online access made the event much more inclusive, with online engagement greatly amplifying the experience. BIC truly worked as a cross-border meeting place for global players and developers alike.

Room for Improvement

That said, there were some letdowns. Business matchmaking felt underwhelming despite decent numbers on paper—the space wasn’t even half full across the three days. Another issue was platform diversity: over 90% of the showcased titles were PC-based. While this trend isn’t new (PlayX4 showed the same), it still left me wishing for more variety.

The scale and pacing of the event also raised questions. The exhibition was fun, but did it have enough content to fully justify three full days? Ticket pricing added to the mixed feelings: general admission rose from ₩10,000 to ₩15,000, and the online ticket—valid for three weeks—was priced at ₩20,000, which felt steep. The lack of differentiated pricing between adults and students was another downside.

Final Thoughts

BIC 2025 has clearly become one of the largest celebrations of indie games. The event stood out for its global reach, online growth, and the unique chance for direct player–developer interaction. Yet, for BIC to keep moving forward, it will need to address its challenges: strengthening business impact, broadening platform diversity, and rethinking operational efficiency and pricing.

Behind the flashy numbers lies a set of issues that must be solved. How well BIC responds to these challenges will define its future as the flagship indie festival in Asia.