Look at the vast majority of successful indie games on Steam produced by, say, no more than five people. They're basically all labors of love, the missing niche game that they wanted to make and play.

I can't think of a single independent success story that involved someone doing careful market research and engineering a product. There's a reason only big companies take that approach.

> dynamics of virality

'virality' is a very ... particular thing to be clinging to. many things 'go viral' then fall off a cliff.

It's especially difficult when the game you want to play is probably out there, but impossible to find because it's buried by tons of other crap. So do you build the game only to find that the one you're looking for was there all along, then have everyone call you a copycat?