Games published by Adult Swim at risk of removal in the next 60 days. EDIT: 4 games getting removed!

I think so, we just passed the last one on March 1. So it'll be on April 5 if my calendar is correct.

It still isn't to any advantage for a publisher to just promote with nothing to gain if a dev can walk out at any time and go independent again without some repercussion from a contract. At any point of business it's likely any party is trying to gain something otherwise one party is just doing charity, the publisher has to gain something too. If people could just use it to promote their game for a month and walk away, they would, because then add maybe 30% income from the game.

As for the publisher failing the dev, that's not right. Just because those are the numbers, in the end the game just wasn't that interesting. If you look at the publishers next game which is published by a much lesser known publisher "Alliance", it only has 13 reviews, so going by the same measurement I'm assuming around 300 copies sold. So just by going with the WB publisher they sold 5x that amount. From my pov the publisher did their job, the game just wasn't there or launched against something too competitive. It's a low poly very simplistic point and click 2d puzzle game in a 3d environment. It's not a very complex game, doesn't offer a lot of replayability and the graphics look pretty flat. The game also seems to have a length of about 2 hours. Not saying it's a bad game, but those results are to be expected.

As for the dev not knowing they have to give up so much, that's either ignorance or bullshit. They are given a contract, and the contract outlies what the terms are. If the dev just signs stuff without reading then he can't blame the publisher.

To add to this, I wouldn't recommend going with a publisher or sending out review copies to anyone if what you really want to do is make great games and enjoy them with others and you are bothered by others using you. But if you want to make more money, it works, although some of that goes to the publisher, but you will still make more than you would by individually putting your game out there. There are very few exceptions where this is not the case and those unicorns are not a standard. You even have many youtube channels who try and make years of dev vlogs to promote their game in order to replace a publisher but again, that's not enough to replace publishers.

Also as I already mentioned, this dev likely can list their game again on steam as I don't see WB DMCA'ing him for putting it for free on his own site, but they'd have to maintain the steam page and of course pay the fee to put it up on it. However, I don't think this is worth it to this dev as in 8 years he sold enough to maybe make like 7k for himself. After steam fee, publisher fee, tax, that's what he'd be left with, this not including refunds since the game is only 2 hours, so people can maybe finish even earlier and refund before that. Maybe less than 1k a year and that amount going down every year isn't worth to this dev especially now since they'd be going independent and they'd be worse than the 5x less with the "Alliance" publisher, estimating maybe actually in the lower hundreds of dollars.. So I doubt this dev signed all their freedom away, as again they're giving it for free on their own website, maybe just to keep it preserved in time. I respect that and I understand why he wont go through the effort of bringing it back on steam on his own name, it's not a very successful game. Cool to have for free, I mean nobody can complain there.

I've mentioned above how the dev's newer game with a much lesser known publisher got 5x less reach, which to me makes sense, indicating the reach would be even less would the dev go fully independent, and I've also mentioned that this game probably went under the radar because it isn't some hidden gem. 2d view in a 3d environment with low poly assets with a flat tone to it and 2 hours of content for $12.

I don't see why the publisher should keep the game up indefinitely and from what I'm seeing the dev is free to do as they wish since they are offering it for free on their own site, so technically, they could relist it on their own if they wanted but mentioned how it doesn't seem to be worth it for the dev. So is the publisher at fault? Should the publisher pay the dev 3 billion dollars(obviously a joke) for the dev to relist their game on steam so the community feels happy or something? I'm curious what's your take on this. They told him the game is getting delisted as it's likely not bringing them any money in. Chances are the dev isn't going to relist it as it's not bringing him any money in either. I can't blame them for that but I appreciate the dev making it free on his site. Or what people wanted was for WB to tell the dev to make the game free and keep it up so they can get a +1? I don't see the problem here.

As for not paying royalties to devs, if the game gets taken down, what's there to pay I agree with that too. I'm certain they paid what they agreed to however. It probably saves them time too from sending this dev a $20 check every month. If it was your business too linked to a company that makes millions, you'd want to make it less complex for an amount as little as $20 a month too.

As for the game being in HB that's likely how I got it too.