Are video game companies like Bethesda, Rockstar etc companies that just publish other companies games? Or is Bethesda over there grinding to make ES6 and Fallout.
I’m confused because I know a different company made doom eternal but Bethesda has its name on it.
In: Technology
Publishing companies tend to be different companies to developers, but publishers can sometimes own development studios (which often get the publisher’s name attached to them). Publishers are basically a middleman – they buy distribution rights off the studio (often in the form of funding the game’s development) and then they sell the game on at a higher price than they paid to get the right to do that. Some publishers keep their own development studios so that when they think they find a money-making opportunity, they can shove a bunch of money into one of them and say “go make this”. However, doing this doesn’t stop them looking for other development studios to enter business with. Why only make money off your own in-house development when you can also make money off development studios you don’t own?
Also should be noted that these corporations aren’t really solid blobs of capitalism like we can sometimes think of them as. They’ve got all sorts of different employees in them, so while the developers in Bethesda are working the crunch time on ES6, the executives are out figuring out new games to make and studios to fund.
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