[Gandalf Parker]

heehee. Fairly good breakup.

I have no idea of course what kindof contract Malfador has. But there are definate pros and cons to retail. After a developer finishes a game, with Shrapnel it gets marketed faster, you get wonderful forums, online support, and tons of publicity (yes you do, they have a full timer person who makes sure that everywhere which has any channel for accepting such info, gets it), hmmm and lots of other stuff Im a bad boy for forgetting. BUT retail which gets it in front of more people, will involve more packaging, a longer time to the shelf, corporate red tape, and more marketing. The difference between publicity and marketing is that publicity involves hours to get it done while marketing involves money to get it done.

Now IF a developer has a large following and a good sequel then they MIGHT get a contract like Atrocities painted. But from what Ive read its often a "pay us back what we laid out first and THEN we can call it profits". Even then its partial on the profits but thats the long gap that most of them face, is paying back the costs of going retail, packaging, marketing. With the added headache of having to trust their bookkeeping since its harder to check from the developers side than an arrangment like Shrapnels is.

Check out some of the back conversations on the net between publishers and developers. One that comes to mind is GalCiv and StrategyFirst fairly recently. Apparently Brad (who I thought had a larger than average in-demand public until this windows version blew it) had a pay-first contract with them. His blowups and accusations were.. well.. Ive seen conversations of people who left Shrap for various reasons and none of them seemed to feel the need for spewing like that. Just an observation.

Gandalf Parker