Weaker subscription deals have hit indie publishers, says analyst

Devolver and TinyBuild's difficult year is partially down to smaller deals coming from Sony and Microsoft

[lodossrage]

That's no shock. And as sub-services start to grow, those deals will get even smaller. Partially because the incentive for companies to make said deals will be lessened when they reach their saturation points.

What is sad though is this analyst is saying they're depending on Sony or Microsoft to give them handouts to make ends meet rather than depend on a portfolio of quality games.

[JEECE]

Who could have foreseen this?

[lodossrage]

Yup, and while they push for that "all-digital" future, it'll get worse over time.

[JEECE]

Maybe I'm missing something, but this seems to be about publishers becoming dependent on the subscription model rather than a la carte sales; I'm not sure how digital vs. physical is relevant to this. Even prior to subscriptions taking off, indie publishers like the ones discussed probably sold the vast majority of their a la carte copies digitally anyway, except for some limited editions.

[lodossrage]

True, the developer here (devolver) is mainly digital anyway.

I was referring to the industry as a whole. As corporations push for digital only, the developers' bargaining power will go away along with the customers' buying power.

When I say it will get worse, I'm talking about as these companies get bigger digital gaming footprints and market share, there will be less of a reason to give sweetheart deals to grow their base since the growth will be on autopilot at that point.

It wasn't about physical vs digital per se, more about the fact that these devs will have to get use to getting less over time. Sorry for the confusion.

[ApocalypseShadow]

I said this over and over in the threads. Those good deals would start shrinking. And when gamers got used to their games in a service and not buying their products, they'd be stuck getting less money from publishers as more games hit the services. Then, those publishers would be screwed unless they really have a hit game. And when they try to go back to trying to sell their games, no one's buying because gamers are waiting for Plus or Game Pass to play them.

Too many of us could see this a long time ago. "But but but VALUE." Yeah. It can be until developers get screwed. Then the industry is screwed from losing developers as they close or get bought out from not making money. There's a cost that'll come back and bite many of them because they went for that upfront check instead of selling their games.