Why on EARTH would I pre-order from UBISOFT!!!

[Letum]

So Ubi don't get any profit from team sales?
Do we know that Ubi are not handling DD?

[CharveL]

1C gets a bigger piece of the pie from Steam.

Steam won't expire your copy.

Unless Steam is late out of the gate that's where I'll be getting it from.

[Blackdog_kt]

Developer = maddox games
Publisher = Ubi in the west, 1C in the east

The 60:40 or 70:30 deal is between steam and publisher, not the developer.

Maddox games is not self-publishing, they are using two publishing companies, so they are not the ones getting that 70%.

Conclusion?

Oleg and his team will probably not get 70% of your money if you buy it on Steam because Oleg =/= 1c.

It's the company that has the publishing rights on Steam that will and who knows, it could just as well be Ubi as it could be 1C. The Maddox games team (the actual developers) will get whatever cut of that 70% their contract with the publisher specifies.

If you do the math you'll see that in such a case it's actually better not to publish in multiple platforms in a layered manner, but in separate versions. Let's assume that Ubi and 1c are getting a 30% as well. With such a deal we'll have:

30% to Steam
30% to Ubi or 1c (whichever has the rights to publish on steam)
40% to Oleg's team

That's more than half the price of the game not going to Oleg's pockets.

If they did a completely separate version for Steam and a completely non-steam version through regular retail and digital download, it would be better. For the steam version you'd have a 70:30 in favor of Oleg's team and for the non steam versions you'd have a 50:50 or 60:30 or 70:30 between Oleg and Ubi/1c, depending on the region and agreementes. Since publishing only on retail tends to give a bigger cut to the publisher, i just went with an arbitrary number, it might be 60:40 in favor of publisher, who knows.

What i'm trying to say here is that just because 1c gets more money by selling on Steam (if it's 1c that's selling there and not Ubi), it probably doesn't mean that money is going to Oleg's pockets, so supporting the developer team is not a solid reason to buy from Steam until we know more details about their deal (if we ever will). In fact, the combined cut of Steam and Ubi/1c could be upwards of 50% of the game's price.

Depending on the financial agreements between Oleg and Ubi/1c, it might actually be better for the developers if you ordered straight from a single publisher.

For example, if Ubi and/or 1c get 50% for every order in their online shop, but they also get 30% for every Steam copy (on top of Steam's 30%), it's actually better to order directly from them depending on your region:

splitting it 50/50 is better than having
game price - (30% for steam + 30% for publisher) = 40% for Oleg's team

Until we know more about the way everyone involved gets his cut, saying that buying from Steam makes Oleg more money is just the same as saying that buying from Ubi does: both are pure guesswork.

[TheGrunch]

Haha! Great minds think alike! I just made basically the same post a few hours ago in the Poll about Steam users thread.

[kimosabi]

Can I order the English version from 1C? I like 1C better.

[The Kraken]

The only thing we know is that the publishing situation must be complicated between Ubi, 1C and Steam/Valve. Quite likely there's some complex contract involved about who is allowed to publish which version at which time - otherwise I don't see how the game wouldn't be shown at least as a "coming soon" title on Steam.

I'll gladly wait until that clears up though, I'm on vacation anyway during the release week

[Rainmaker]

ubisoft SUCKS. period

[Sven]

Originally Posted by kimosabi

Can I order the English version from 1C? I like 1C better.

Maybe, but I think 1C publishing only for Russian customers.

[Blackdog_kt]

Originally Posted by The Kraken

The only thing we know is that the publishing situation must be complicated between Ubi, 1C and Steam/Valve. Quite likely there's some complex contract involved about who is allowed to publish which version at which time - otherwise I don't see how the game wouldn't be shown at least as a "coming soon" title on Steam.

I'll gladly wait until that clears up though, I'm on vacation anyway during the release week

I hear you. The thing that drives most people impatient and we have all this bickering among ourselves (we're all guilty of that and i'll be the first to raise my hand and admit it) is that this complicated situation between different publishers and platforms results in a slow trickle of information on matters relating directly to our ability to purchase the title.

On the other hand, even if the level of conversation can descend to some low standards and we're all getting repetitive from time to time, all this impatience is still a sign of enthusiasm about the title so it's not all bad

I'm lucky enough to have a relative studying in the UK, so i managed to get an order for the collector's edition placed. Then i'm going to be biting my nails until it arrives: will it be misplaced if it's shipped via mail, or will my relative forget to put it in the baggage before going to the airport to return back home?

[David603]

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

Developer = maddox games
Publisher = Ubi in the west, 1C in the east

The 60:40 or 70:30 deal is between steam and publisher, not the developer.

Maddox games is not self-publishing, they are using two publishing companies, so they are not the ones getting that 70%.

Just to be clear, Maddox Games is 1C: Maddox Games, owned (at least in part) by 1C. So there will be a predefined scheme to share profits between 1C and Oleg, and this will stand whatever platform the game is then published on.

Based on the article Novotny posted, in a boxed copy sale via Ubisoft the revenue will be split about 60% Retail store, 25% Ubisoft and 15% 1C/Oleg.

Download sale via Ubisoft will probably go something like 50-60% Ubisoft, 40-50% 1C/Oleg, assuming the deal for sharing profits is the same between Ubisoft and 1C/Oleg.

Sale via Steam will however go 30-40% Steam, 60-70% 1C/Oleg, with Ubisoft out of the loop because of 1C's policy of retaining the download release rights for their games.

To sum up, Oleg gets the most money from a Steam sale, might at best get a similar/slightly lower amount from Ubisoft Download, and gets a fraction of the amount from a boxed copy sale.