General News - GameStop Launches Publishing Division

mcvuk reports that GameStop has launched a publishing division called GameTrust aimed at serving the smaller developers. They have signed up independent developers Ready at Dawn, Insomniac, Frozenbyte and Tequila Works and are looking at 20 others.

US retail giant GameStop has launched a publishing division called GameTrust.

The firm has signed new games from well-known independent studios including Ready at Dawn (The Order: 1886), Tequila Works (Deadlite, Rime) and Frozenbyte (Trine). The company also announced in March it was working with Insomniac (Ratchet and Clank) on a new game called Song of the Deep, which is due in the summer, but at the time the firm said this was a one-off project.

GameStop has since changed its tune, with VP of Internal Development and Diversification Mark Stanley telling MCV the firm is in discussion with 20 other developers.

In total, the company intends to launch between five and ten games every year.

The new publishing division acts more like a games label (think Curve, Koch, 505 Games or Team17) as opposed to EA or Activision, with developers retaining full rights to their properties and GameStop having no involvement in the creative side of development.

"There is no cookie cutter offer," explains Stanley.

More information.

Ain't that Obsidian's savior then?

Sorry, had to. I don't think Obsidian would ever go Order1886.

@Joxer

I hadn't thought about it but now that you mention it devs like Harebrained Schemes could benefit from the extra financial support. Especially for the extra spit and polish which would take there games up a notch.

It still feels too shady to me.
I'm kinda not convinced. A new publisher, great. Full rights and developers holding IP, fantastic.

But a publisher with vague plan of serving smaller indies sounds like "let's skin small fish alive before Steam or Origin strips them of 30%".
Maybe I'm just too paranoid but there is no word on how small or not big these developers should be, there is no word what platforms we're talking about (for all we know it can be web browser casual garbage) and the most important thing to me is not mentioned: what kind of products are targetted, ate those proper games, MMOs or DLC-o-ramas.

Still a better publisher than EA and a better love story than Twilight for that matter. ☺

Obsidian has already become buddy buddy with Paradox and they don't need other publishers.

It seems to me Gamestop is trying to transition, considering that retail for electronic games is a dying business. I personally never thought much of their stores, though there is no denying they're successful. I see no reason they'd be any better a publisher than EA. They've always been profit oriented and I'm sure they'll squeeze developers for every cent they can.

Hmm, Insomniac is making a few VR games set to show up exclusively in the Oculus store. It's interesting to see them also going with GameTrust. Hopefully they will use GameTrust for future VR games so they don't have to shrink the potential customer base.

P.S. Putting 'trust' in the name really just makes me think about whether or not I should trust them.