LOS ANGELES - Movies and music from small, independent creators push the pop-culture envelope with fresh ideas. Now, game developers are set to do the same with a wave of low-priced - and often offbeat - titles on the new online video-game system networks from Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony.

The major game companies' commitment to the "indie" movement will be evident at the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo, starting here Tuesday.

Alongside the big-budget sci-fi epic sequel Gears of War 2, Microsoft will be touting independently developed games available for download via Xbox Live later this year: an art-house take on Mario-style games called Braid and the comic animated battle game Castle Crashers. On the way for the Wii via its online Shopping Channel: the whimsical puzzle game World of Goo.

But the show stealer may be Flower, a PS3 game for Sony's PlayStation Network. In the game, "you play as the wind, flowing across the field, picking up flower petals," says Kellee Santiago, a co-founder of ThatGameCompany, a seven-person Santa Monica developer. "You are changing the environment as you go, trying to create a harmony between the elements of the urban and the natural."

As the game industry marches into an expected $21 billion in sales this year (compared with last year's record-setting $17.8 billion), conditions are ripe for an indie-game breakthrough. Combined, the Xbox 360, Wii and PS3 are in 25 million U.S. homes, and each console can connect to the Net.

All three console companies are nurturing bite-size games that can be made faster and cheaper than blockbusters such as Halo and Grand Theft Auto. The games are less intimidating to players and typically range from $5 to $10, compared with $40 and up for major titles.

"This is kind of like the YouTube of games, with low barriers to entry," says Michael Pachter, an analyst with Wedbush Morgan Securities. He estimates the indie game market could reach $1 billion in the USA in several years.

Says Geoff Keighley, host of Spike TV's GameTrailers: "More and more it seems like the indie game scene is where you'll find the maverick pioneers poised to become the next legends of game design."

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