How to find a publisher

#1 You'll need a game, first, in all likelyhood.

--Eric

#2 Why not publish through GarageGames? :)

#3 Can't beat a 65/35 deal. And they split marketing costs with you too.

#4 Xtreme Games at http://www.xgames3d.com/ will produce your games with a 50/50 split of the profits. Sometimes it finds another distributor for your game, and then gives you half of what the other distributer gives them. That may sound stupid, but they'll likely find a better distributer than you will.

Also, in garagegames faq, it says that they 50-65%, not always 65%.

But, how do you go about having garagegames publish a game anyways? I can't find anything about it except in the faq (I can't even find any games they've published). I'm looking for alternatives to xtreme games (since my game is almost finished) because I want to try to find out which I'm best off with.

I've also thought about distributing it myself (probably with help from ASP - http://www.asp-shareware.org/ ), but that causes all sorts of problems with paying taxes and stuff. Also, I don't really know anything about selling video games.

Anybody know anything about any of this?

- Steve Fletcher

#5 To have GarageGames publish your stuff, your first stop is probably going to either be Jeff Tunnell or Jay Moore. GarageGames isn't going to be publishing everything that comes along - they have decided to get pretty choosy about what they publish (A good thing! As long as you are one of the people they select for publication, that is ;-)

Garage Games is building a sort of 'brand' here, so, they are selective. Thier distribution is online sales only, plus burn I demand is something they plan on offering last I heard. You'll still have to do most of your own marketing from what I understand - most of the marketing support you will recieve from GG is indirect marketing as they build thier 'brand'. However, they also have some added functions - bug tracking, the ignition library, etc. And your percentages change based on if it's a Torque based game or not (for Torque based stuff, you get a higher percentage the last I knew.)

There's other routes, of course. Be careful in selecting a publisher, and a strategy here.

For online publication, you'll want to use a third party company to handle your sales. I use RegSoft, but, I've also heard good things about DigiBuy. You COULD get your own merchant license, etc., but there's a rather heafty investment involved there before you are ready to accept credit cards (the most important purchasing option.) The advantage to online sales - it's CHEAP to get into it. You need a webpage, and an account with a third party company that handles online sales. Your per-sale profits are HIGH - you only loose about $3.50 or so, depending on your channel, per purchase. For a $20 game, this can't be beat. For a $40 game, wow - that's a huge percentage in your pocket per sale.

The downside is no glossy box on the shelf, you have to do all your own marketing and branding, etc. A huge undertaking, but, it can still be worth it if you are offering the right product with the right marketing behind it. (I've yet to get the marketing part right ;-)

Then there's talking to real-world publishers. Totally different game. First off, your best bet is to find an agent. They take a split, but, they have the connections, and know what deal is gonna go best for you. Really, it's worth your time. I did one better, and happened to have a friend that was an industry vet at doing this, so, I hired him as the agent for it, for a fairly small percentage. Right after that, within two days, he emailed me and told me the two most likely groups to work with me from the angle I wanted to go with marketing wise on the product, and how we need to go about it. Wonderful :-)

However, if you decide you don't want to go with an agent (really - recondsider. It could be worth your time. Your comment about taxes being a problem reveals that you don't know what you are about to get into just yet ;-), then you'll have to start making connections on your own. I did - I've got a whole list of email contacts of people I've talked to over the last two years or so who are THE person to talk to about getting my games published (no, I'm not sharing, make your own list ;-)

The best bet for building up your own list like this is to first track down publishers who already have products that are within the genre that you are trying to push. Find 'em, and start diggin' around to find who to talk to. It may take some work.

The largest publishers won't talk to you, short of holding a gun to thier heads. They already own development studios, and more than that, they already own the Intellectual Property to the stuff they are selling. Unless you've got something so hot that it looks like it's going to sell millions just based on being in a box on a shelf, these guys aren't going to deal with you.

Instead, it's time to build up a reputation. My favorite comment about the game industry was that the were "a bunch of in-bread motherf***kers." The meaning was, a publisher like the big guys won't touch you unless you have a published title. But, if you don't already have one, how do you get one?

Start looking down the foodchain a bit - value pubishers, etc. There's a lot of smaller publishers. Find ones that work within your area, and attack :-) I don't know what you are plannin' on pushing, so I can't recommend one for ya - but, then again, it's a decision that you best do on your own anyway ;-)

As for your comment about taxes - taxes are trivial. That's what an accountant is for. Get yourself one if you think you are going to make much money at all. It's a good investment, and good book keeping will tell you a lot about the status of your company with very little effort on your part. And, if you are new at this completely, well, I always recommend the following book, usually available at Barnes & Nobles, Borders, etc.: "Owning and Operating a Business In (x)" (where (x) is the name of the state you live in. Each one is specific to your state - very nice.) A good resource of a lot of stuff, including some stuff that might also help you make your decision about online sales -vs- talking to a publisher.

Hope that helps ya a little. That's pretty much a 'standard spiel' when someone emails me a question about publishers, how to make money, etc. ;-) (I get a lot of 'em.)

#6 Oh, and one other thing - you might want to have another person to do editing for you on all your emails to publishers. I do - my spelling tends to suck, and I'm pretty windy. You need to attempt to look as professional as possible. 'Plz.' and similar stuff doesn't fly well with most publishers ;-)

I'm half picking on you here, and half serious - if you are looking into something like this were you will need to be presenting a very professional face, why not start posting the same way? That way, when it comes time to start talking to publishers, you are already practiced in the art of handling email conversations in a professional manner. Plus, PLEASE is only a couple of letters longer than plz - typing like you are inside of a game is never a good idea. Use full words, proper phrasing, etc. This helps improve the likelyhood that people will take your question seriously. :-)

#7 Wise words, Davis. Though, I want to add one more comment. The publisher who made the Simon the sorcerer games, among others are looking for new original games. I think they're looking for adventure games, but might as well be others too.

Here's what they said:
"Adventure Soft Publishing is looking for new products to put out on their 'MEAN' label. If you have a game that you wish to publish please send it to us for evaluation. We guarantee to get back to you with a response as soon as possible. We would typically offer a standard profit sharing package to prospective partners. We have no plans to provide funding or large guaranteed sales figures although we are happy to fund translation, voice over and some minor costs for an appropriate product."

Check this site for more info: http://www.adventuresoft.com/publishing.htm

I think my company will go self-publishing though, since I got a great offer from another company. =)
I'm also going to sell it at many online stores.