Stardock sold Impulse

[zespri]

In case you haven't heard yet.
http://www.joystiq.com/2011/03/31/stardocks-brad-wardell-talks-about-selling-impulse-to-gamestop/

I wonder what it means in terms of policies as to what games are accepted to impulse and what are not.

[x4000]

Yep... we're wondering that, too.  My fervent hope is that the key folks from Impulse will remain with that platform as it makes the transition between companies.  If they do, then I have hope that this will turn out well.  If they don't, then it's anybody's guess, because it won't be at all the same platform in any real sense.  It could work out even then, there's just no way of knowing anything in advance of that sort of scenario.

[TechSY730]

I don't know anything about Stardock. But what I have seen, over the past few years, corporate buyouts have been far less painful for the consumers than they used to be. It seems like the modern business world has figured out how to keep quality and support to a good level even with something as big as a "change of hands"

Of course, I could be wrong, this could turn out to ruin Impulse, but my worry about that is far less than it would of been if this happened like 5 years ago.

So don't hit the panic button quite yet. 

But then again, it seems like you already are taking the cautious yet calm approach to this, so it seems like you really didn't need me to tell you that. 

[eRe4s3r]

You must have missed how Oracle bought Sun and basically annihilated everything Sun worked for the past years in 1 month, including Open office which has lost its entire developer community and is now basically Libre office http://www.libreoffice.org/

Impulse already wasn't relevant (compared to Steam or GamersGate or d2d) nor financially viable (they wouldn't have sold it otherwise). This means things will change drastically since Gamestop wants to make a profit. And they will want to compete with Steam. This means, DRM to get the big-name companies on board and strict regional licensing and pricing deals. And integration with Gamestop retail and resale systems.

Don't see how this could be anything but a bad thing for Indy devs (and for stardock for that matter)

[x4000]

I will just say that Impulse was our #2 distributor behind Steam.  Vastly larger than D2D or GG for us.

[eRe4s3r]

true, which is why I think this is gonna be a great loss for indy devs   

[TechSY730]

You must have missed how Oracle bought Sun and basically annihilated everything Sun worked for the past years in 1 month, including Open office which has lost its entire developer community and is now basically Libre office http://www.libreoffice.org/

Impulse already wasn't relevant (compared to Steam or GamersGate or d2d) nor financially viable (they wouldn't have sold it otherwise). This means things will change drastically since Gamestop wants to make a profit. And they will want to compete with Steam. This means, DRM to get the big-name companies on board and strict regional licensing and pricing deals. And integration with Gamestop retail and resale systems.

Don't see how this could be anything but a bad thing for Indy devs (and for stardock for that matter)

Wait, are you saying the OpenOffice or LibreOffice now has the devs? Or do they both lack a community now and now there is no good open source office suite?

[eRe4s3r]

The OpenOffice devs moved to Libre Office - is what i meant. After support from Oracle died off they split the code and moved on. Personally i was using GoOO but that was made obsolete with Libre Office anyway.

[wendyWILL]

Thanks for sharing the infor

[x4000]

Libre Office, eh?  That is indeed good to know, I'm still using regular old OO, so that would be good to switch to.

[Sunshine!]

I don't trust GameStop.  Their business model is in complete opposition to everything that Impulse was, I believe, in that GameStop is largely mass-market and makes a significant portion of their money from reselling games at ridiculous prices.  Not quite sure how this is going to influence an online retailing option for them, since GameStops are generally limited by floor space for what they can stock (hence the shift towards reselling). 

That being said, I didn't use Impulse that much because I felt the general style of the games being offered through the Impulse store never really fit me, but I have used it in the past and have enjoyed my time with Galciv, as an example.

[Echo35]

I don't trust GameStop.  Their business model is in complete opposition to everything that Impulse was, I believe, in that GameStop is largely mass-market and makes a significant portion of their money from reselling games at ridiculous prices.  Not quite sure how this is going to influence an online retailing option for them, since GameStops are generally limited by floor space for what they can stock (hence the shift towards reselling). 

That being said, I didn't use Impulse that much because I felt the general style of the games being offered through the Impulse store never really fit me, but I have used it in the past and have enjoyed my time with Galciv, as an example.

I agree. I'm worried GameStop is going to ruin it. Impulse is how I found out about AI War, so their model of indie games nad games that would otherwise receive little attention is great.

[BobTheJanitor]

I've never used any DD service except Steam, so I can't say I'll be missing anything directly even if they run this into the ground. That said, I sure don't want competition to dry up and Steam to start charging ridiculous prices and have no need to run their crazy sales. So I hope that Gamestop doesn't screw this up too badly.

[Sunshine!]

How much control does Steam actually have over the prices of the games they sell?  I imagine they get a cut, but from everything I've heard, the game creator/publisher sets their own price and can determine the timing of their own sales (though they may be contractually obliged to certain sales?)  Either way, I don't think Steam losing competition in digital distribution is going to cause too many problems on our end, but it could cause problems on producer's ends if Steam starts demanding higher cuts of all sales.

Then again, if Steam, as a monopsony, can practice some form of price discrimination with regards to those wanting to distribute through steam, it should be able to operate with higher profits will still maintaining its current price scaling for indie games/big budget games, especially since the marginal cost of distribution of those games is essentially 0.

[BobTheJanitor]

Steam is pretty hush-hush about their pricing structure, and from what I gather everyone that sells through them agrees not to spill the beans as well. But from what I understand, they work with developers to set a good price point. I'm sure the big budget studios just say 'you will charge this,' and leave it at that. But indie studios get some back and forth with Steam on what would be the best point to set in order to sell copies. I don't know if the big sale prices are handled by Steam asking the developers if they want to be in a sale, or the developers asking Steam to put them in, or if it works both ways. I do know that devs get a much more healthy cut of sales by selling direct through Steam than they would by going with the traditional boxes-in-stores model. I'm sure Steam gets a nice pile of money as well, though.

Valve has been pretty fantastic about not being evil and abusing their massive market share, but the potential still exists. They have a lot of good will built up, but Gaben suddenly deciding he wants to go live on a tropical island and selling the whole shebang to Evil McEvil and Sons, Ltd. could make things turn real bad real quick. So I'm not worried about the lack of competition right now, but it never hurts to have a backup plan just in case.

Realistically, all distribution is going to go to the direct download model eventually. Barring some unforeseen circumstances that stop the steadily increasing bandwidth availability that has been a constant for the last decade or so, it's going to get to the point where people who want to go somewhere and buy a hard copy of a game will be seen as weirdos. Music and movies are headed in the same direction. So I only expect competition to increase, as long as the industry is smart enough to read the very obvious tea leaves.