How to Negotiate With Game Publishers

you know sometimes people are like oh we need you know millions of dollars for this game even if it looks amazing or i'll be like okay yeah that's probably not for us just because it's too big um or if it's too small then that's also kind of interesting right like it's like oh this game is gorgeous and you're only asking for what how this much yeah that's interesting right but if anything that'll probably generate more conversation and you know that usually warrants a reply yeah i think more times than not dude especially with my audience um just because i know they probably think like me uh they're they feel like imposters they feel uh they're self-deprecating is that the word self-deprecating so they they feel small and so what they do is they under value their project and again guys i'm talking about me i just know you guys follow me because we're all very similar and you know that the problem with that is obviously like there's a lot of publishers out there who'll be like sold i'll give you 20 grand for 60 you know and that's that a lot of people might fall for that because they're thinking well i can quit my job and i'll be able

to work for six months uh barely making it by but at least i can make my game you know yeah yeah i mean it's it's important to price correctly uh and and it is it is an art pricing a game uh and pitching it to the publisher is is definitely art it is it is a lot harder than than it sounds but also you know it takes experience oh if i'm being honest i've been on the other side of the table i still am on the other side of the table in a lot of ways we have a very large dev team internally and we're working with other publishers as well and you know from my experience you just kind of have to take it one step at a time you know it's kind of like your first game you you get some peanuts at best maybe just release it by yourself for free uh your second game finally you you know you get noticed by something something small and then you know they're able to you know give you some ramen fun uh and then i mean maybe the third game now you're looking at okay cool maybe i can try to like improve my style of living a little

bit you know by by your next couple games now you're now you're you know you're you're the director you're the creative you're an author that's able to go out there do the thing and and actually generate a profitable a strong value not only for yourself your family and also for the publishing partner and they're able to now trust you and just you know throw you money because they know they'll be able to make that money back so it really is kind of a step-by-step process you can't get there overnight roman isn't built in a day yeah so it's it's just a matter of knowing where you are on your career path and being realistic about um you know what your needs are as well yep i mean to i'll tell my audience guys i got screwed over the first time i worked with a publisher and it screwed over is is probably not the right word because it wasn't illegal but that's that's the thing is it doesn't have to be illegal for it to be awful to in a lot of publishers will will screw you over and like for me we didn't have a schedule with the first deal i ever

signed uh there was no schedule um and there was like not even a projected deadline and so i i had to buy that game back and and it was a big pain um so i just want to encourage my audience like you were saying z you've gotta you've gotta take it one step at a time and and and you know get as much resources as you can and this channel is one of them um but ultimately it takes time to figure out exactly what you should price your game at and i'm still figuring that out because sometimes i'm like is this a million dollar game or is this a hundred thousand dollar game or is this a 60 000 game like i have no idea and so what i've learned to do is reach out to the people who i've worked with in the past so reach out to you on discord reach out to kevin uh who's one of your business partners um reach out to um the ceo at armory games says hey man what do you think about the budget of this game so it's really it's guys it's just about

building obviously a thick skin but also building up experience like actual experience and knowledge about how to price out your game and it's really hard to know it's and also another question i have is like like how do they know if if they're reaching out to a publisher that makes massive big budget games or they're reaching out to a publisher that does smaller games like do you do you feel like my audience should only reach out to certain publishers that are within their budget in their head or should they reach out to all of them so so i have i have a complicated answer here and this is actually one of the advice that really i wanted to share so i'm glad that you brought it up um definitely recognize the fact that every publisher has their own business criteria you know like i mentioned earlier serenity forge is about doing meaningful values driven emotionally impactful games so you know know that however it doesn't mean that you shouldn't pitch the game as well i think the trick here is really to be realistic about it

understand what they're looking for and also shape your pitch to fit what that publisher would be looking for kind of like how when you're applying for a job you know like you have a certain number of number of skills you have a you have a few different jobs that you would be happy with you have some jobs that are your dream jobs but you know you're going to be shotgun blasting your resume to a few different places different positions and you're gonna have probably a rewrite your cover letter your objective on your resume every single time right or or rather you're supposed to um and when you do that you know you'll be like oh i'm really excited for you know marketing specialists too at this company because my marketing background is very strong i have a strong passion for it and then for another one it's like oh i really want to do operations manager three because i really care about operations like you want to change it up a little bit so do the same thing also for when you're pitching games and it's not a lie what you're saying is i will craft this game to your benefit not only will i craft the pitch like because you're saying change up the pitch but you're also saying look if you

guys want something to meet your needs i'll do that for you as long as you fund this game for me yeah so so that's that's that's definitely a part of it there's also um there's also a um i'm guessing as all developers are uh there are certain parts of the game that you're also unsure about right like if you're absolutely sure that this is exactly the game that you want to make you don't want any words of advice or any feedback then yeah i mean you probably don't want to lie right like to the publishers and tell them it's actually an mmo however there are certain parts of the game that you're probably like well i guess i could turn into so and so and and make it still work and still be really happy about it yeah if that's the case then don't be afraid to be upfront about it because then publishers are able to find ways to fit that project into their portfolio you know maybe a player is coming in here and they're like okay we need to fill one more mmo spot and this game looks really good but unfortunately the devs are insisting that it's single player so we can't sign it well we're gonna have to go some sign

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