Perhaps Cinemaware can give those of us that purchased the original Defender Of The Crown on GOG the following for free:

Defender Of The Crown II (Amiga CD32)
Robin Hood: Defender Of The Crown (PC)
Defender Of The Crown: Digitally Remastered Edition (PC)

I'm guessing that they found it easier to just sign up with a publisher who's already on Steam, rather than negotiating everything from the starting point. It has its obvious downsides (as can be seen), but it presumably makes their work otherwise easier.

I think it was mentioned somewhere that Cinemaware being on GOG as a publisher was thanks to fan activity. Otherwise they probably would use some other publisher, like with Wings remake.

Of course having different publishers depending on the title and store makes everything very complicated, as is obvious from the pricing gap between GOG and Steam, the apparently impossible-to-get backer keys, etc.

I can only assume that the profit margin from Steam, even under a different publisher, is relatively so big that it justifies losing full control of their own games.

i really don't understand that part. Why give full control over? the publisher is supposed to the marketing bs etc (what else???) . cinemaware is well known enough they could have published it themselves - i mean what *is* involved with publishing a game on Steam (assuming its only a digital release?) ?.
Is the same problem going to happen with backer keys on the current KS they have up?

From the sound of it Cinemaware has done a shitty contract in order to fast track themselves to Steam. At this moment there's two ways to get in Steam. The first, and the fastest is to have a publisher with relationship with Steam. That pretty much means you're instantly in. The slowest is the joke of a greenlight system, which is as far I see it just a graveyard of vaporware.

I think the current system pretty much allows the publishers to rip off developers, as many want to get in, but the Greenlight system just takes too long. So in order to make at least some money the devs sign bad contracts witht eh publishers who do nothing else but grant them instant access.

I don't know if this is within the (legal) power of Cinemaware to give us these releases but it sure would be awesome!

Be interesting to see what Cinemaware will come up with to balance things out, especially for GOG customers who have already bought the 3 classic releases (Defender, Wings and Rocket) so far.And not only is there a huge financial discrepancy between the Steam deal and here but who knows when and if the other games of the Steam bundle will show up here.No matter what i won't support Steam but it seems that GOG customers have gotten royally screwed on this one.Sure hope Cinemaware finds some way to make it right.

Everything about this situation is incredibly weird. Did Cinemaware not discuss the Steam release with their publishers? Did they have discussions, where the publishers kept nodding their heads and going "Uh huh uh huh" and then they just ignored that and did what they wanted? Well, I hope the situation is resolved in such a way that GOG customers don't feel ripped off, and I hope the low price point on Steam generates enough business to make up for itself.

As much as I want to support Cinemaware here on GOG, I went ahead and bought the bundle on Steam, since this thing isn't gonna be solved anytime soon it seems.

I can say that the Anatology launcher and Amiga emulation is pretty solid...

I was going to grab it on steam also, but have opted to put on wish list for now and grab over the Christmas sale if discounted...(or here on GOG if it is close in price).

I just purchased it on Steam to get the whole bundle as I spent more on Defender of the Crown and Rocket Ranger than the whole bundle cost on Steam.

I feel burned by Cinemaware and won't be wanting to support them much after seeing them charge so much on GOG than Steam.

Ironic the games used to be free on Cinemaware's website and now anyone wanting DRM free versions that were free gets gouged supporting them, or get everything on Steam cheap.

Since when did going DRM free get so expensive?

This is not the Cinemaware of old, and the changes reflect the new ownership. This is actually the third iteration of Cinemaware which started in late 2005. The 2000-2005 Cinemaware are the ones that bothered to license and re-release The Three Stooges for windows, as well as release their old catalog of amiga disk images as freeware. It is safe to say that those days have long passed.

If you read the previous posts in this thread, Cinemaware did not set the price for the Anthology on Steam and when they found out about it, they were not happy. The problem was that they signed a publishing deal with Kalypso and Kalypso made a deal with Steam that Cinemaware felt "has not been the best for Cinemaware or its fans." They "have some ideas for the longer-term to make up for any unhappy GOG customers. But this will take some time."

What is also unfortunate about this dilemma is that, due to many supporting the Steam sale, GOG is also going to pay for it so to speak because the future sales of Cinemaware releases here are obviously going to suffer tremendously.

The bottom line is Cinemaware is responsible for the mess and I doubt I'll see anything out of it.

Why they gave a publisher a blank check to sell their games on Steam is beyond me. I'd think a developer would have had an idea of what the bundle would sell for and that it would be a bundle before handing over the rights to their IP to another company.

^ exactly this ^

How it is, that time and time again, people just sign contracts without reading them (or getting legal advice) is beyond me.

I appreciate it takes a while to negotiate with steam, but the alternative of basically giving your games away for next to nothing (particularly once you take out steam's cut an the publisher's cut) is absurd.