Malfador Machinations hits Strategy First!

[Phoenix-D]

Civilization is an exception. A decade long extremely well-selling exception..

[Gandalf Parker]

Wolfman77 said: Bottom line though is, unless they overspend on advertizing the game will make more money going retail.

That will probably be true but it doesnt always make it a good move. Some games going retail dont REALLY reach more of the correct audience than it would just being mentioned in magazines that target the same niche as the game.

Also more money doesnt mean more for people like the developer. Retail means a much longer wait fro profits and a much smaller slice of the overall pie.

There are other pros and cons to the change which makes it a possibly good thing for THIS developer and THIS game at THIS time. But I would for example not have considered the same action to have been a good thing for SEIV to have done, nor is it necessarily a good thing for SEVI. Luckily it seems that Aaron knows that.

[Hugh Manatee]

Question, will Dungeon odessey ever hit retail? I always wanted to buy it, but it was lower on the list then SESF or SE4G, and last I checked it was only available for download....

CRAP! It doesn't even appear to be downloadable now....

[img]/threads/images/Graemlins/Cold.gif[/img]

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Hi, Wolfman. *Waves*

From the movie?

[Wolfman77]

Gandalf Parker said:
Also more money doesnt mean more for people like the developer. Retail means a much longer wait fro profits and a much smaller slice of the overall pie.

Good point, Gandalf, having a retail store trying to make money off the game as well might cut into profits some, but then they will probably also raise the price to cover that. If you get a smaller piece, cut it from a bigger pie.

As far as the longer wait for profits, were you talking about longer development times to get the bugs fixed, eliminating (or at least reducing) the need for patches, or were you refering to something else.


No, narf, I just like wolves alot

[Fyron]

With retail, the publisher has to wait quite some time before the store sends any profits from sales back to them. The publisher essentially rents shelf space and has to wait until sales are made before any money is sent to them, rather than selling all of the units to the store and being done with it. Then the developer has to wait for the publisher to start sending royalties, depending on the minimum profit margins specified in the contract.

[Atrocities]

TO: Greedy Bastards
FROM: Currupt SF Greedy Bastards
SUBJECT: Pie Borken up:

CONFIDENTIAL DOCUMENT: DO NOT SHARE WITH MALFADOR!

Assume the Pie is = to 100%.

76% - Strategy First Development costs / other.
04% - Strategy Firsts Associates
11% - Strategy Firsts hidden costs and fees that shall never be disclosed.
08% - Marketing Cost incurred by Strategy First.
01% - Reportable profit

Now take that 01% and assume that it is equal to 100%

50% - Strategy First
30% - Lost do to cooked bookes and currupt SF accountants.
10% - Overhead reinbursment costs.
05% - Legal Fees
04% - Cost over runs.
01% - Malfador Machinations Profit. (NOTE: Will be paid in the year 2396. Will not accure interest.)

Additional Note: Malfador owes us Gas money! Deduct that from their 01% profits.

[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

[Wolfman77]

There's no doubt the guys in the middle (Strategy First) control, well pretty much everything I guess. Is there any chance that, if Star Fury doesn't work out with them SEV won't be released by them? I haven't heard that they have a contract for SEV yet, unless I missed something, which I do quite regularly

Does anyone have concerns that it might turn into a subscription based online game? I don't know much about who Silverstar Holdings is but the line "fee-based electronic game businesses" kinda bugs me.

[Fyron]

Wolfman77 said:
Does anyone have concerns that it might turn into a subscription based online game? I don't know much about who Silverstar Holdings is but the line "fee-based electronic game businesses" kinda bugs me.

For SEV, no concern at all.