Devolver co-founder says large-scale game dev "crushing under its own weight a little bit"

simple@lemm.ee to Games@lemmy.world – 92 points –
Devolver co-founder says large-scale game dev "crushing under its own weight a little bit"
gamesindustry.biz
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I wish we had more small publishers. It's so rare to go into a store now and see a $20-$40 title from some rando. Cheap enough that I can go "Oh, that's interesting looking I'll grab it". Limited Run is great and all, but there's no magic when you pre-order something 8 months out.

The return on indie games (if there even is a return) is already vanishingly small for 99% of releases - printing and distributing physical copies would just be pouring even more money down the drain.

Oh no doubt. It's a shame too. We saw the death of the mid-level developer long ago.

When I go to cons I try to buy any smaller self-published titles I see, but wish the market could support smaller devs while remaining consumer-friendly with a "coop" publisher. An entity that can eat a loss while still finding gems that would be lost to time if stuck on a digital store.

That isn't to say that smaller titles are dead. Currently I look out for stuff published by Soedesco, GS2 Games, Team17, Microids, EastAsiaSoft, etc etc.

I feel that a mid level developer either evolved into a triple a behemoth(or merged) or died out. It's really sad.