Doujin games are videogame software created by amateur Japanese programmers and appear primarily on the PC platform. The line between doujin and “real” companies have become blurred in recent years, with the increasing quality and prevalence of doujin teams. Many western releases post-Cave Story have tried to ape retro-styled doujin. The seperation between “doujin” and ”freeware” is somewhat artificial but useful, since the outputs of East and West bedroom coding scenes are distinct by style, popularity of genre and approach.
See The Shareware Scene.