Larian Studios - Should Indies Go Retail?

Swen "Lar" Vincke discusses why indie developers should think about retail releases more often compared to only going for digital publishing on his personal blog.

Larian’s distribution strategy can be summarized as follows, sorted by how we prefer a sale to be made.

• 1. Direct Sales – Via Larian Vault & forums. Full control, largest margin, allows direct contact with our players.
• 2. Steam – Reliable, report on time, pay on time and regularly, are very developer friendly
• 3. Other digital sales – Easier than retail, monthly payments, you occasionally ned to yell a bit to get your money.
• 4. Retail in key markets – It’s possible to work with civilized companies that are ok, even if they are stressing for the moment.
• 5. Retail sales in non-key markets – Need to work with either finished goods deals, so sales/messaging can be controlled – be damned sure about who you are dealing with.