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"Independent" in games means the developer controls the project rather than answering to an external publisher: the studio funds it, makes the creative calls, and usually publishes it itself. That's the defining trait — not budget size, team size, or genre. A solo developer and a 30-person self-funded studio are both independent; a small team bankrolled and directed by a major publisher is not. You find these games on sites built around direct developer publishing, such as IndieDB, where developers post news, downloads, and media themselves.

Independent vs. AAA vs. publisher-backed

The useful distinction isn't "small vs. big" — it's who holds decision power and where the money comes from.

A game can look indie and still be publisher-backed, and a game can be visually ambitious and still be fully independent. Judge by who is making the decisions, not by how the trailer looks.

Where to browse independent games

IndieDB organizes independent games by platform and by content type, so you can approach it from whichever angle fits your goal:

• Games — browse the catalog to discover titles and follow specific projects.
• Downloads — get builds, releases, addons, and mods.
• Media — videos, images, and audio posted by developers.
• Articles — headlines, devlogs, reviews, and developer blog posts.

Platform filters on the site cover Windows, Mac, Linux, VR, Xbox One, PS4, and Switch, so you can narrow to hardware you actually own before spending time on a project. The site also lists engines, mod support, and job postings, which is useful if you're evaluating a project's technical direction or looking to get involved.

How to evaluate an independent game before you play

Independent games often release in stages, so the storefront page alone rarely tells the whole story. Work through these signals:

1. Read the devlog. Ongoing posts about systems, art, and mechanics show whether the project is actively developed and what's actually changing. A devlog describing specific upgrades across several systems tells you more than a feature list.
2. Try the demo. A released demo is the cheapest way to test whether the core loop holds up. For example, a fast-paced retro-styled FPS with a public demo lets you judge feel and performance before committing.
3. Check the announcement and launch status. A title leaving Early Access with expanded systems and mod support is a different proposition from one that just entered it.
4. Look at media from the developer. Videos and screenshots posted directly by the team reflect the current build better than a curated trailer.
5. Confirm the download source. Prefer builds distributed by the developer or the platform hosting the project page, and check that the version matches what the devlog describes.

Questions worth asking

• Is the project still being updated, or has the devlog gone quiet?
• Does the demo represent the current build or an old slice?
• Is mod support present, and does that matter to you?
• What platforms are actually supported right now, not planned?

Common pitfalls

Early Access and unfinished builds. Independent projects frequently ship before they're complete. That's not automatically a problem, but you should go in expecting missing content, balance changes, and save-breaking updates. Check the latest devlog date before assuming a build is current.

Demo ≠ final game. A demo is a slice chosen to represent the project. Systems shown in a demo may be reworked, cut, or expanded.

Verifying downloads. Independent distribution means builds can come from many places. Use the developer's own page or the platform hosting the project, and be cautious with mirrors that don't match the official version.

Mistaking "indie" for a quality tier. Independent status says nothing about polish. Some independent releases are more finished than some publisher-backed ones; evaluate each project on its own evidence.

The short version

Independent means developer-controlled, not small or cheap. To find and judge these games, browse a developer-driven catalog like IndieDB by platform and content type, then verify with devlogs, demos, and developer-posted media before you download. Treat Early Access status and demo builds as provisional, and always confirm you're pulling the build from the developer's own distribution point.

HTML (HyperText Markup Language) is the markup language that gives a web page its structure and content. It tells a browser what each piece of a page is — a heading, a paragraph, a link, an image — rather than how it should look. If you want to understand how any website is built, HTML is the starting point: it's the skeleton that CSS styles and JavaScript animates. This explainer covers what HTML is, how tags and attributes work, how a browser turns it into a visible page, and where you can see it in the wild.

What HTML actually does

HTML is not a programming language. It doesn't perform calculations, make decisions, or run loops. It's a markup language: you wrap content in labels that describe its meaning and role.

That distinction matters. When you write <h1>Welcome</h1>, you're not saying "make this big and bold." You're saying "this is the top-level heading of the page." The browser decides the default appearance, and CSS can override it later. This separation — structure in HTML, presentation in CSS, behavior in JavaScript — is the core organizing principle of the modern web.

Elements, tags, and attributes

An element is the complete unit: an opening tag, the content, and a closing tag. A tag is the label itself, written between angle brackets. An attribute is extra information placed inside the opening tag.

Here's a simple example:

<h1 class="page-title">Welcome to My Site</h1>
<p>This is a paragraph of text with a <a href="https://example.com">link</a> inside it.</p>
<img src="photo.jpg" alt="A description of the photo">

Breaking that down:

A few things to notice. The <a> element uses an href attribute to say where the link points. The <img> element has no closing tag — it's a void element, because it holds no text content. And the alt attribute on the image provides a text alternative, which matters for accessibility and for when the image fails to load.

How a browser reads HTML and renders a page

When you visit a URL, the browser receives the HTML as plain text and works through it in a defined sequence:

1. Parsing — The browser reads the markup top to bottom and builds a tree structure called the DOM (Document Object Model). Each element becomes a node in that tree.
2. Applying CSS — Stylesheets are matched against the DOM to determine how each element should look.
3. Layout — The browser calculates where each element sits and how much space it takes.
4. Painting — Pixels are drawn to the screen.

The key insight is that the HTML you write is not the page you see. It's a set of instructions the browser interprets. Two browsers given identical HTML will produce nearly identical structure, but their default styling and rendering details can differ slightly — which is one reason developers test across browsers.

How HTML, CSS, and JavaScript divide the work

A typical site uses all three languages, each with a distinct job:

• HTML — structure and content. "This is a heading. This is a list. This is a form field."
• CSS — presentation. "Headings are dark blue, 32px, with 16px of space below."
• JavaScript — behavior. "When the user clicks this button, load more content."

You can build a perfectly readable page with HTML alone. Add CSS and it becomes visually designed. Add JavaScript and it becomes interactive. The same HTML can be restyled completely without touching its structure — which is why the separation is worth respecting rather than inlining styles and scripts everywhere.

Where to see HTML in practice

You don't need any tools to inspect a page's HTML:

• View source — Right-click anywhere on a page and choose "View Page Source" (or press Ctrl+U on Windows/Linux, Cmd+Option+U on Mac). This shows the raw HTML the server sent.
• Developer tools — Right-click an element and choose "Inspect." This opens the live DOM, which may differ from the raw source because JavaScript can modify it after the page loads.

Comparing the two is instructive. The raw source is what the server delivered; the inspected DOM is what the browser actually built. On a JavaScript-heavy site, they can look quite different.

A note on where this fits

HTML is the entry point to web work, but it's rarely used in isolation. If you're learning to build for the web, expect to pick up CSS and JavaScript alongside it. If you're simply trying to understand how a site you admire is put together, viewing its source and inspecting elements will show you the HTML structure directly — and that's often the fastest way to connect the abstract markup to a real page.

The web (World Wide Web) is a system of interlinked documents and resources, accessed over the internet using browsers and identified by URLs. It is one service that runs on top of the internet, not the internet itself. This explanation covers the core building blocks, what happens when a page loads, and how to tell "web" apart from "internet," "browser," and "search engine."

Web vs. internet vs. browser vs. search engine

These terms get used interchangeably, but they describe different things:

A useful analogy: the internet is the road system, the web is one type of traffic that travels on it, the browser is your car, and a search engine is a directory that tells you which roads lead where.

Email, video calls, and many mobile apps also use the internet but are not the web. Email, for instance, relies on its own protocols (like SMTP) rather than web pages.

The core building blocks of the web

URLs

A URL (Uniform Resource Locator) is the address of a resource on the web. A typical URL has parts that each do a job:

https://www.example.com/products/item?id=42

• https — the protocol (how to communicate)
• www.example.com — the domain (which server to contact)
• /products/item — the path (which resource on that server)
• ?id=42 — a query string (extra parameters)

HTTP and HTTPS

HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) is the set of rules browsers and servers use to exchange requests and responses. HTTPS is the same protocol wrapped in encryption (TLS), so the data can't be read or altered in transit. Most sites today use HTTPS, and browsers flag plain HTTP as "not secure."

Browsers

A browser turns code into the pages you see. It sends requests, receives files (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, images), and renders them into a visual layout. It also manages cookies, caching, and security warnings.

Web servers

A web server is a computer (and the software on it) that stores web content and responds to requests. When you visit a page, your browser asks a server for files, and the server sends them back.

What happens when you load a page

1. You enter a URL or click a link. The browser reads the address.
2. DNS lookup. The domain name (like example.com) is translated into an IP address so the browser knows which server to contact.
3. Connection. The browser opens a connection to that server, using HTTPS if available.
4. Request. The browser sends an HTTP request for the specific resource.
5. Response. The server returns the requested files and a status code (for example, 200 for success, 404 for not found).
6. Rendering. The browser parses HTML, applies CSS for styling, runs JavaScript for interactivity, and draws the page.
7. Follow-up requests. The page may request additional resources — images, fonts, scripts — before it's fully loaded.

If any step fails, you see an error: a DNS failure means the domain couldn't be resolved; a timeout means the server didn't respond; a 404 means the server responded but the resource wasn't there.

Where the web fits in everyday use

The web is what you're using when you:

• Open a site in a browser to read, shop, or log in
• Follow a link from an email or message
• Use a web app (a service that runs in the browser rather than as an installed program)
• Watch a video embedded on a page

It is not what you're using when you:

• Send or receive email through a mail client
• Make a phone or video call over the internet
• Use an installed mobile app that talks to its own servers

Those still depend on the internet, but they don't require a browser or web pages.

Common confusions, cleared up

• "The web is down." Usually a specific site or your connection is down, not the entire web.
• "I found it on the internet." If you found it through a browser and a URL, you found it on the web.
• "My browser is the internet." The browser is a tool for accessing the web; the internet is the underlying network.
• "A search engine is the web." A search engine is one website among many that helps you navigate the web.

Quick reference

• Web = linked documents and resources accessed via browsers over the internet.
• Internet = the global network that carries many services, including the web.
• Browser = software that requests and displays web content.
• URL = the address of a web resource.
• HTTP/HTTPS = the rules for exchanging web requests and responses; HTTPS adds encryption.
• Web server = the machine that stores and serves web content.

Understanding these distinctions makes it easier to describe problems accurately, choose the right tools, and follow technical instructions without mixing up the layers.

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) is the language that controls how a web page looks and how its content is laid out. HTML defines what the content is (headings, paragraphs, links, images), while CSS defines how that content appears — colors, fonts, spacing, sizing, and where each element sits on the screen. You use CSS any time you want a page to look intentional rather than like a plain document of stacked text.

The three roles: structure, presentation, behavior

A useful way to keep web technologies straight is to separate them by job:

CSS is not a programming language in the sense of loops and logic — it is a declarative style language. You describe the result you want, and the browser figures out how to apply it.

How a CSS rule is written

A CSS rule has two parts: a selector that picks which elements to style, and a declaration block that lists the styles to apply.

/* selector: p  |  declarations inside { } */
p {
  color: #333333;
  font-size: 16px;
  line-height: 1.5;
  margin-bottom: 1em;
}

• p is the selector — it targets every <p> element.
• color, font-size, line-height, margin-bottom are properties.
• #333333, 16px, 1.5, 1em are the values.
• Each property–value pair ends with a semicolon; the whole block is wrapped in { }.

The word cascading in the name refers to how the browser resolves conflicts: when multiple rules target the same element, it follows priority rules (origin, specificity, and source order) to decide which one wins. That is why a later rule or a more specific selector can override an earlier one.

What CSS is commonly used for

• Color and typography — text color, background color, font family, size, weight, and line spacing.
• Spacing and sizing — margins, padding, width, height, and gaps between elements.
• Layout — arranging elements in rows, columns, grids, or flexible containers (Flexbox and Grid are the modern layout systems).
• Responsive design — changing the layout based on screen size using media queries, so a page works on both phones and desktops.
• Visual states — hover, focus, and active styles for links and buttons.
• Borders, shadows, and rounded corners — the decorative details that shape a page's look.

Three ways to attach CSS to HTML

1. External stylesheet (most common) — a separate .css file linked from the HTML <head>:

   <link rel="stylesheet" href="styles.css">
   

   This is preferred because one file can style an entire site, and the browser can cache it.

2. Internal stylesheet — a <style> block inside the HTML <head>. Useful for a single page or quick testing.

3. Inline styles — a style attribute directly on an element, such as <p style="color: red;">. It applies to that one element only and is hard to maintain at scale, so it is generally reserved for one-off cases.

How CSS fits with the rest of a page

When a browser loads a page, it reads the HTML to build the document structure, then applies the CSS to compute how each element should be displayed, and finally paints the result. JavaScript can run alongside this to change styles dynamically — for example, adding a class that CSS has already defined. This separation is why the same HTML can be restyled completely by swapping stylesheets, and why CSS is one of the three core technologies of the web alongside HTML and JavaScript.