I read some stuff where they were trying to be a “publisher” but not really, as in funding but not taking over IP, letting companies make games how they want etc….it could all be marking mumbo-jumbo, but they’re the same guys from Gathering of Developers (G.O.D.) so they might actaully mean it.

Our hope is that (a) we can make a good game and not have to worry about costs up to a point, (b) the publisher will help get us quickly on to the front page of Yahoo, Real, etc, instead of buried in another portal waiting to go YouTube viral, (c) the publisher will ease our transition to other platforms (consoles, handhelds) or even into retail (as they’ve done for other games) if/when that makes sense.

Anyway, we’ll see how it goes. More on that in a few months!

Benjamin C.

But if you’re being funded by someone to make a game that the funder will then own the rights to and do what with they want to, then that seems more like the funder is a Developer and you’re more of a Contractor. I’m splitting hairs, I know. But it seems like all the roles are changing, and perhaps the terms will, too.

Having said that, I’m looking forward to seeing the latest version of your game, Indie!

For instance, Playfirst is a publisher—they paid for the development of Diner Dash, they own the IP rights, they market it.

Kongregate so far has not paid for the development of Flash games, and never tries to control the IP. So I would side with Indie and say that we’re typically not a publisher.

I agree with your basic point though, that portals are the gatekeepers. That’s why we try to be as transparent as possible, and let players decide what belongs on our homepage.

Jon: I always look at Amazon as the example of how the web is different than real life shelf-space. Amazon does not have a limited amount of room, and they’ve put a LOT of effort into matching people up with products that they might be interested in.

I do believe that even if Portals take the Amazon approach (as I believe Big Fish is doing), they’ll be more competition as more games come out. Even though it was relatively easy to get my games onto Portals, None of the big ones ever featured my game on their homepage. It just wasn’t a best seller for them.

I don’t really foresee portals becoming selective about they games they take on, but I can definitely imagine your second prediction -- the development of simple yet effective ways to identify the good stuff. But for a game developer, that will probably come down to considering the marketspace, making a good game, and spending a bit of time to get the word out about it -- same as it ever was.

As the indie/casual space grows to include more and more people and money, portals will become overcrowded and will need to be very selective about the titles they feature. It’s likely that the relationships developed between high-volume publishers and portal sites will win out over once-a-year indie developers when it comes time for the portals to decide. One of the benefits of the indie/casual scene so far has been the ability to self-publish, but as the noise increases portals (and players) will be looking for ways to easily identify quality -- and that’s the role traditional publishers have already played.