Changing the definition still doesn't change how many indie studios are out there. There's been zero evidence here that there isn't a healthy indie market, but plenty that there is.

> Many of the games that later make it to Steam, were originally funded by either one of the platform owners

My account is full of games (including top sellers) with no such arrangements. And I have more access to such games than at any time in history.

These indie companies are no more independent (the meaning of the word "indie") than a person hawking MLM products is independent. They're effective employees of a bigcorp — with all the same danger of being "fired" by their publisher at any time for misbehavior.

> What evidence? My account is full of games (including top sellers) with no such arrangements.

Ignore indie games that have been on Steam for years and years, or that only get published on Steam and no other platforms; these are the exceptions to the rule (despite this set containing some of the largest hits by sales volume.)

While there are studios that sell only on Steam and other low-barrier-to-entry channels, 99% of them don't last more than a year or two, because selling only on Steam is leaving almost all your money on the ground. There's a reason that many of these games don't get support updates any more and won't run on e.g. macOS or Linux after any major OS update, despite originally intending support for those platforms: the studio didn't survive.

And while there are indie studios that eventually take their console-exclusive game over to Steam, it's often still published by the publisher on Steam. Take a careful look at the Steam catalog page for the "publisher" field. If there is one? That's who's making the direct revenue on the game sales. Like the publisher of a book. The "author" — the studio — is only getting a commission.

There are a few indie studios who manage to "earn out" their deals with publishers, and take over their own Steam pages (though not usually their console marketing rights — the platform owners don't like dealing with the long tail of self-publishers, they much prefer well-known bigcorps as marketing partners.)

I once found a rock that turned out to be a fossil. Therefore, all rocks are fossils. That's the logic I'm reading from this.

> Don't look at the game as it exists on Steam > Instead, look at any game that's still console exclusive.

So I should ignore all the evidence that refutes your position, and only look at a limited subset of data that does support it?

Having a publisher doesn't invalidate a companies indie label. Being "indie" has never meant being bootstrapped.

Here's just a small list of games I found in less than 5 minutes of looking.

  - Five Nights at Freddy
  - The Binding of Isaac
  - Hollow Knight  
  - Carrion  
  - Loop Hero  
  - Factorio  
  - Phasmophobia  
  - Frostpunk
  - Valheim
  - Satisfactory
  - Deep Rock Galactic
  - Stardew Vallley
  - RimWorld
  - Terraria
  - Dead Cells
  - Cuphead
  - Among Us
  - Project Zomboid

> I assume by "truly indie" they mean "bootstrapped or invested by neutral/disinterested VCs"

This is such a narrow, HN-ified view of indie developers that I genuinely have a hard time believing this is anything other than satire.