civ3team vs infogrames

[Qnuc.dk]

somebody want to explain what the difference between

- game distribution
- game company

obviously
distribution manage the selling/support/copyright protecting
company make games and have the copyright

but somebody have more insights about the relationship/management?


i.e.
The designers note issue, who's responsible for this?
Or now the issue with German translation



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Just seems like a lot of ppl diss talking distribution or game companies without knowing the basic issues or responsibilities

[wotan321]

somebody want to explain what the difference between - game distribution
- game company

Its sorta like a musical act...... the band makes the music, and the record company prints up the records, ships them, and sells them to retailers.

The developers write the code, the distributers put them on CDs, box them up real pretty, market them, and send them out on trucks/boats/planes.

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

One thing you were off base on is copyright. In almost all cases, the publisher holds the copyright, not the developer, at least from what I have read.

Granting developers intellectual property rights over their creations was ostensibly one of the founding tenets of Gathering of Developers, before they were (gulp) bought by Take 2.

Dan

[Shiva]

Re: civ3team vs infogrames

Originally posted by Qnuc.dk

The designers note issue, who's responsible for this?
Or now the issue with German translation

The note issue is the publishers venue since they decide what goes on the disk (and in the box).

As for translation I think in this case its also on the publisher since infogrames is out there shooting themselves in the PR foot real well for everyone to see.

For the most part a publisher controls everything (to the point of firing a developer if it doesnt like whats going on, and handing the project over to another developer) when it owns the rights to a title, as it does in this case. Just how hands on they are depends on the publisher. It also would depend on just what the contract between the two is.