Post by leafo in Itch.io Notice 2. There are many distributors coming on Itch.io now.

Viewing post in Itch.io Notice 2. There are many distributors coming on Itch.io now.

Hey, thanks for your feedback.

But it is still weird to see many distributors hang around Itch.io

There aren't that many publishers on itch.io. Plug in Digital and 4EversGames are actually related companies, the second started by someone who originally worked with Plug in Digital. They just moved their business over.

We don't encourage publishers or seek them out. We always try to get the original creator of the game to post. In this case, the two accounts above only provide Steam keys for their products, and we would much rather have people uploading DRM free versions of the games.

Sometimes developers are hard to convince though, since they don't have the resources to put their game on another platform. In those scenarios, a publisher may be the only way to get a certain game on the platform. We're not going to ban publishers since there may be people who want to support itch.io by buying a certain game, and a publisher may give us more opportunities for that. If we feel like there are too many publishers getting in the way of the developer's content though, we may change our stance.

We haven't added any special code for publishers, but I think in the future it would be useful to make it clear that they are not the developer of the game, if you're worried about people being confused who they are buying from. Additionally, I'm worried about how they're selling DLC, since it's not clear at all that you have to own previous content. We'll need to get in touch with them about it. Thanks for reporting it.

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whiteblack6 years ago (4 edits)

Sorry leafo, I didn't have too much time to reply soon.

It seems like these days itch.io player already knew this issue often.

https://itch.io/t/169922/is-it-appropriate-to-sell-just-a-steam-key-with-no-down...

And you are right and wrong.

First, you should correctly name they are distributor not publisher.

These developers have their own publisher (usually themselves) and they corporate with these distributors Plug in Digital and 4EversGames let them set the market.

There are not many distributors on itch.io indeed, only two as I saw, but they are too often making sale, and care nothing about the store page and further support (such as update news, dlc and main game that are only published on Steam for people)

In this 2017 holiday sales, it is the first time I feel that these distributors set the sale for long time already, and put so many sale titles (almost 16, and no different introduction and details), the most important problem is that their huge amounts are reducing and threatening in every section visibly.

That means when the players want to see some indie game made by hardworking individual developers, will have to pass through these big company' stuffs.

I have discussed this with Mini Metro which is one of the game distributed in itch.io, and the publisher told me that they will soon cancel the corporation and do it by themselves.

Itch.io should be careful on this issue, at least there are many possible way to try, such as creating a Distributor section for every distributor, and for those who only sell their products as only Steam key, that is something conflicting itch.io main idea.

I just found your word in an interview with Rock, Paper, Shotgun, which is the itch.io original motive that seems be breaking now:

"It gives you the ability to design a custom page where people can download, play or purchase your games."

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/04/23/steam-itch-io-digital-retail-intervi...

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