In the game industry which is more important? To me it seems like companies who invest the most in their image and the image of their products are more likely to bring in larger profits then those who actually invest in making good products. I believe the best approach for indie developers is to simply release products for free since this would be a huge investment in their image, what are some of your thoughts on this?

I'm going to follow that advice, actually -- I think they tend to work in tandem, and fame certainly makes fortune that much easier.

Yup, selling products in general has a lot to do with brand name. Look at how much absolute garbage is out there in the software world, but yet it sells millions because it comes from a reputable company.

You don't necessarily have to give things away for free to get noticed and establish a good reputation, but you should keep in mind that you really want market share more than profit at first. The shareware approach can work really well for this, but it has to actually be shareware, not unusable-crippleware. My approach to general software is to give people a free product that they can actually use and enjoy without ever spending any money... that gets them regularly using it and talking about it, and then there will be some people who want additional functionality (or even to simply support my product's development), and they pay me for the full or premium version. To apply that to gaming, Wolf3D and Doom are a good example... you got an awesome game for free, so you're having a good time playing it and telling your friends about it, and then you reach the end of the free levels and want more, so you pay for the full version.

Another thought is the huge advertising power of simply having your product in someone's store. I notice a lot of crappy $9.99 software CD's in places like Walmart, Best Buy, etc. Regardless of the fact that most of them fail to interest us, I bet they are still selling a lot better than they would on the Internet. Put something appealing in its place and you could do pretty well. It might be worth looking into a relationship with a software publisher, if you have something that has mainstream appeal.

Quote: I believe the best approach for indie developers is to simply release products for free since this would be a huge investment in their image, what are some of your thoughts on this?

A huge investment, yes, and that makes it entirely inappropriate for most indie devs. Indie's, basically by definition, do not have huge amounts to invest.

99.9% of indie developers can't finish anything, let's alone finish an entire game just for the sake of getting enough attention to try selling a second one.

But hey, if you're rich and have time and money to blow with no risk, sounds like a great idea. Either that or you do as I do, work in a market where your games are inherently free and you get paid by other means (sponsorships & advertising, in my case).