[reddragon105]

@ Jay_83 - sorry for sounding weird, i hope this is a clearer way of putting it:
take, for example, a game that i like and a game that i don't (just personal opinion here, so don't take offence anyone!). i like San Andreas, think it's worth buying, so i've bought it. i don't like Need For Speed Underground 2, so i haven't bought it.
now what i was trying to say, is that by not buying NFSU2, EA (the publishers) have not got the £30 from me that they would get if i bought the game. if i went into a shop and stole a copy, the shop would lose money (however much they buy them in for, say £20). however if i made a pirate copy of the game, that would *not* be stealing from EA. they would never make the £30 from me, because i wouldn't need to buy the game because i have a copy. but it wouldn't be taking any money *away* from them would it? they wouldn't lose £30 because i've pirated the game.
but of course i wouldn't pirate it if i didn't like it and didn't want to play it. that's why i said it's only a hypothetical situation. i hope that's a bit clearer.


as for the developers - the average person working on developing a game will work 9-5 and will be paid a salary. they will turn up to their desk every day, do some programming/modelling/testing/whatever, then go home having made their hourly wage. they've made their money regardless of how many copies the game sells.
it's the publishers that pay the developers to make the game. once they've made the game, the publishers mass produce it and distribute it. they make all the profit. if they've paid the developers, say, $1,000,000 to make the game, and the game only makes $500,000, then that's their problem. if the game makes £10,000,000, then it's the publishers who benefit.

that's how companies like EA can afford to buy out loads of smaller companies, so they have the rights to all the games they make, and get these profits. that's why publishers are faceless corporations that make loads of money simply for being the ones who coordinate development, production and distribution. that's why Valve released Half Life 2 over Steam - to cut out the middle-man so that all the money went directly to the developers.

we all care about developers, they're the talented and artistic people who make the games we love. but at the end of the day, they're shafted by the publishers. if they made a game and didn't publish it, they'd make no money at all, so they have no choice but to use a publisher. i suppose that some developers get contracts that give them a lump sum to make a game, then a percentage of the profits, but that would be a tiny sum compared to the slice the publisher takes. i guess some publishers might be nice enough to give their developers bonuses if a game does unexpectedly well, but really the only thing a games success will do for it's developers is give them the right to demand more money from the publisher to develop their next game.