“If you want to go on XBLA, you have 2 options: find yourself a retail publisher or get published by Microsoft."
I think it's here that we see that Microsoft has decided to pledge their allegiance to publishers above developers. There is simply no reason why a digital-only release should be required to have a publisher. It's absurd and only serves to make the process longer, harder, and more expensive.
Perhaps that wouldn't be so bad, but the second option, to be published by Microsoft, comes with a list of unreasonable demands. That's the reason why Machinarium is not on Xbox. The developers went to Microsoft first, but they didn't want to split profits with a publisher and Microsoft declined to publish them, supposedly because Machinarium wouldn't be an exclusive. The whole thing is ridiculous. The game ended up on the PS3 simply from Microsoft's actions.
