GDN had some time to sit down with Robby Zinchak from Archive Games and talk about their distribution system and their upcoming titles and more. For those that aren’t familiar with the company, Archive Games is a digital distribution system specifically targeting independent games.  It’s available on both Windows and Linux, and allows users to easily download great games with just a few clicks. The games available are largely ones gamers haven’t heard of, so there’s plenty of fresh content to interest gamers who want to try new gameplay and support small developers.

Archive Games is trying to help out small developers while also giving gamers something new.  They are a small developer also, so they know the difficulties of trying to get players to try your game.  They are hoping to connect a strong base of gamers who want to play independently made games with talented independent developers.

[GDN] What was the idea that led to the creation of Archive Games?

Archive Games actually started with a program called "HTUpdate" that I wrote to help me distribute updates to one of my projects.  I ended up re-using that code over a number of years for several different projects, and a few other groups wanted to use the tech for their projects, too.  It ended up being problematic for us to maintain multiple copies of the installer/updater, and for users to use different versions for different projects.  Most of all, there wasn’t much user participation between projects.  With Archive Games, we only maintain one application, users only need to download it once, and best of all they can easily check out all the projects on the network.

[GDN] What kinds of problems face small developers? How will Archive strive to help them?

Small developers face an uphill battle, especially in the crowded PC space.  In this market, getting users to notice and try your game can be nigh impossible.  Archive Games intends to provide a portal for users who are looking for games by small developers -- games users haven’t seen before, games that large publishers have deemed too risky or too niche, games that are hidden gems.  Archive Games will help more users to discover your game, and even provide you tools to aid in its development, such as the ability to easily deploy updates to your game or launch private betas.