Can developers and publishers actually afford the nextgen!

[Andrespetmonkey]

foxtail said:

Andrespetmonkey said:

There almost definitely will be a bigger focus on digital downloads, and if SONY, Microsoft and Nintendo make their stores more open (like steam), the middle man gets cut out and more studios won't need publishers. Cheaper to distribute and bigger profits for developers.

You'll still need publishers for marketing & advertising (at least for bigger games as it can get expensive).

The games with the biggest budgits will need to be marketed the most, the games with the biggest budgets will also have publishers. Games being sold digitally won't need to achieve as many sales to be successful and therefore won't need much marketing. The way these games are promoted is on the store, and since PSN/XBLA should have a much larger presence and be of much larger importance if a larger focus is on digital downloads, many more people will be on the stores, seeing these games.

Again, look to steam. It's full of indie games and games publised by mid-tier publishers, the first thing you see when you open steam is new games that are available and deals on games. This is how you promote indie titles or titles on a smaller marketing budgit. It works very well for them.