Well, I have yet to hear of an indie game developer who is swarmed on the street by mobs of teen girls... I think we're pretty safe from that. :)

Now the question: "Can I sell a game without selling myself?" Sure. I've bought games without knowing who coded them, and you probably have as well. It's not a requirement to put yourself on display in order to sell your games.

That being said, some form of advertising is recommended. If people don't know about your game, they aren't going to buy your game. Many people go the Facebook/public blog route because it's free and they can generate a small community before even releasing. It works for some people, but not everyone. Do some research on marketing indie games. There are plenty of other ways to advertise besides giving people a window into your life.

- Eck

I've never released a game myself, but in the event I ever do, I totally share your privacy concerns. Especially these days after reading so many horror stories of indie devs singled out for harassment campaigns by various....elements of the gaming community.

I could be wrong, but I imagine the popularity of your game/platforms you release on/method of sale will have a rather large impact on your ability to remain anonymous. If you release yourself on your own website, let's say for donations rather than purchase, I imagine you can remain as anonymous as possible and avoid any/all backlash from people. If you're releasing on Steam, I would think it's going to be slightly more difficult. Doubly so if you have a publisher behind you, as they may have a rather large say in how your game is promoted.

But, I think as a general rule, most public appearances by devs (interviews, articles, game expos etc) are things that are generally sought after by the devs themselves (or their publishers) for more publicity for their game. You can easily choose to avoid these things, though it will be considerably more difficult to market your game as awareness of games is generally made through these outlets.

But, again, this is all just observation on my part, as I have no first-hand experience here. Though, it is something I've given a bit of thought to, as I'm a very private person. I'd love to put my games out there, but I in no way want to put myself out there with them :P

Subject: wanna publish a game, but keep my privacy intact
...What I have ZERO interest in is creating some sort of "public persona" -- either to sell myself, or the game. I want the game to sell itself by having a "product presence" alone. With some sort of "indie dev dude behind it". That's it. No interviews, puleez, except as an avatar for the game, or the game add-on/follow-up....

It somewhat depends on a question of how you want to fund yourself -- successful crowd-funding campaigns pretty much always have a personal component. They're selling the notion that you're not just buying a product, or even funding its development, but that you're funding these *people* to live their dream of developing a product that you'll enjoy. In that sense, the crowd-funding world is a much more personal economy, where the stock and trade is just as much about personalities and reputations as it is great ideas and unrepresented products.

To have a completed product that you can just sort of throw out there to sell, its possible, but hard to be successful. The harsh realities are that no product succeeds on its merits alone -- not products from a lone indie developer, not products from Sony or Microsoft. You need presence (aka Marketing), the big guys can simply buy that, but you probably can't. So most indie devs who get press trade in their story as a kind of currency -- I give you good press, you give me a good story to tell in return. Otherwise, the indie gaming press get's bombarded with largely-anonymous review requests for games in every shade of quality all the time.

My honest advice is that if you're committed to making this game, it would be a crying shame for it to fail not on its own lack of merit, but for your own desire to hide from the limelight. It might be very astute of you to think or to know that you don't want any part of that for yourself, if so, that's a very good thing -- but if that is the case, you might want to consider whether your lifestyle preferences and the demands of breaking out are able to co-exist. So, in my mind, you have a few choices -- If you have your mind set on not just doing this thing, but being successful, then you probably have to re-think the level of media attention that you personally are going to embrace; If just the doing is the greater part of success for you, then by all means do and sequester yourself away from the press -- just be content to accept that you may not find financial or critical success, finally, if you cannot do without financial and critical success and you truly cannot tolerate being in the limelight at all, then perhaps you might want to consider occupations and hobbies that better mix with your quiet life.

All of that being said, you may simply be worrying overmuch about how this endeavor could leach over into your private life, or vice versa. Its terribly unlikely that you'll ever be recognized on the street or find fans making pilgrimage to your door. If you find any success at all there will be fans and haters, of course -- welcome to the internet -- and those things can add to or take away from your emotional well-being, but if you can whether the bluster, its unlikely any of those things will ever really intrude into your 'real' life.