Curated Indie Publisher Database — Last Updated 9-Oct-2025
Table of Contents
- Overview
- Open vs Curated Publishers
- Budget, Revenue, and Publishing Metrics
- Publisher Tables - Curated & Open
- Data Source & Methodology
- FAQs & Community Notes
- Raw Data Dump (Curated & Open Sheets)
- References & Tools
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Overview
Curated database last updated on 9-Oct-2025. This list began as a personal resource and has been tidied for wider community use. It is NOT exhaustive and focuses on publishers that fund premium PC/Console indie titles. Publishers that invest solely in AAA, Free-to-Play (F2P) titles, or do not fund development are excluded. Contributors are encouraged to add data to the open sheet, with data periodically transferred to the curated sheet on a quarterly cadence.
There is a curated sheet and an open sheet. Please contribute to the open sheet. Do NOT change the structure of the spreadsheet; make a copy and edit your own version. Data from the open sheet are transferred to the curated sheet every quarter. To stay informed about new funds and publishers, the author regularly shares news on indie publishers and investors and invites readers to join Patreon for updates: https://www.patreon.com/seyedhn.
Contact channels:
- Discord / Twitter / Reddit / Bluesky: seyedhn
- Email: seyed@unifiq.com
- Quality gamedev content on Reddit and a newsletter via https://eepurl.com/hJDPT1
Data provenance note: Lifetime/Average/Median Revenue, Games Published, Class, Release Dates data are courtesy of GAMALYTIC, which provides API access to their platform data. See: https://gamalytic.com/about for more details.
Budget definitions and guidance:
- $$$: $1M+ budget games
- $$: Roughly between $250K and $1M budgets
- $: Less than $250K
- Communication levels: ★★★ (replied with a decision), ★★ (assessed but no decision), ★ (did not assess)
Budget, Revenue, and Publishing Metrics
The document references several key metrics tracked by GAMALYTIC and used to profile publishers:
- Lifetime Revenue ($) – total revenue across all games published by the publisher.
- Average Revenue ($) – mean revenue per title.
- Median Revenue ($) – middle value of revenue across titles.
- Release dates (First / Last) – earliest and latest release dates for games published by the publisher.
- Classes: AAA / AA / INDIE / INDIE-PLUS – qualitative tiers describing typical project budgets and production scales.
- Budget ranges (as above) – indications of typical project budgets.
Some publishers emphasize narrative and quality, while others focus on scalable production support with marketing budgets. This section notes that the GAMALYTIC dataset is used to provide the revenue context behind each publisher, and to help developers assess fit for pitching.
Data source and semantics: The “GAMALYTIC” data page provides the classification and metrics that accompany publisher entries. See https://gamalytic.com/about for more context and methodology.
Open vs Curated Publishers
The spreadsheet distinguishes two public-facing data surfaces:
- Open Sheet: editable by community contributors. The goal is inclusivity and rapid updates from the community.
- Curated Sheet: edited by the author. Ensures quality control, consistency, and curation of entries.
Update workflow: data from the Open Sheet are reviewed and transferred to the Curated Sheet on a quarterly basis. This approach allows community contributions while preserving data quality in the curated core.
Notes on governance and transparency: the descriptions accompanying publisher entries aim for clarity and openness about submission guidelines, and many entries flag whether they fund development budgets and the scope of their investment.
Publisher Tables - Curated & Open
The dataset includes a wide range of publishers organized by country, with fields including Website, Pitching Guide, Pitch Submission, Publishing Contact, Steam Page, Gamalytic Page, and high-level data on revenue, release dates, budgets, and communication, among others. Examples include Paradox (Sweden), Coffee Stain Publishing (Sweden), Focus Entertainment (France), and 505 Games (Italy), among many others. The tables provide a snapshot of publisher activity, including:
- Publisher name and country
- Official website and goals for pitching and submissions
- Key publishing contacts and Steam developer pages
- GAMALYTIC publisher pages and high-level financials (lifetime revenue, averages, medians)
- Budget guidance and communication quality indicators
- Top-selling titles and Steam tag profiles
- Descriptions of publishing focus (e.g., indie/AA/AAA, strategy, adventure, simulation, etc.)
The curated section emphasizes the most consistent, top-tier indie publishing partners and their stated preferences for project scope and quality.
Below is a representative subset of the kind of structured entries you will see in the dataset (formatted for readability; the full dataset contains many more rows and language variants). Each entry presents a publisher’s core data points as well as a narrative description of their publishing preferences and notable titles.
- Paradox Sweden — Country: Sweden — Website: https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/our-games/discover — Pitching Guide: https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/contact/pitch-your-game-to-paradox — Pitch Submission: https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/contact/pitch-your-game-to-paradox — Publishing Contact: Daniel Grigorov, Nils Brolin — Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/developer/paradoxinteractive — GAMALYTIC Page: https://gamalytic.com/publisher/Paradox%20Interactive — Lifetime Rev ($): 1.1B — Avg Rev ($): 14.8M — Median Rev ($): 809.0K — Class: AAA — Budget: $$$ — Communication: ★★★ — Top Titles: Cities Skylines, Crusader Kings, Stellaris, Hearts of Iron, Victoria — Genres: Strategy, Simulation, RPG
- Coffee Stain Sweden — Country: Sweden — Website: https://www.coffeestainpublishing.com/ — Pitching Guide: - — Pitch Submission: https://coffeestain.com/publishing — Publishing Contact: - — Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/developer/coffeestain — GAMALYTIC Page: https://gamalytic.com/publisher/Coffee%20Stain%20Publishing — Lifetime Rev ($): 584.9M — Avg Rev ($): 39.0M — Median Rev ($): 3.2M — Class: AAA — Budget: $$$ — Communication: ★★★ — Top Titles: Valheim, Satisfactory, Goat Simulator — Genres: Action, Indie, Strategy
... and so on for hundreds of publisher rows across multiple regions.
Note: The dataset also includes entries for publishers focused on Asia markets, retro game releases, and indie game acceleration programs. There are dedicated sections for government grants, venture capital and angel investments, and game-specific publishing initiatives. The data also covers talk points about marketing, porting, QA, localization, and other value-added services.
Data Source & Methodology
- GAMALYTIC is named as the primary data provider for revenue and publishing metrics. See https://gamalytic.com/about for more information.
- The dataset includes a mix of indie, AA, and selective AAA publishers who fund premium indie projects, with explicit notes about funding budgets and submission guidelines.
- There are separate sections for Open vs Curated publishers and a quarterly refresh workflow from Open to Curated data. This ensures a balance between community input and data quality.
- Several publishers include additional context in their descriptions (e.g., focus areas like narrative, strategy, or co-publishing vs. pure publishing; mention of indie labels like Paradox Arc or The Arcade Crew; notes about funding thresholds such as $500K, $1M+ budgets, or revenue share models).
If you want to understand the data in a practical way, examine the GAMALYTIC metric fields for any publisher you’re considering, then consult the publisher’s Pitch Guide and Submission pages for direct guidance on how to approach.
FAQs & Community Notes
- Why is Annapurna set as Dead? A: A good chunk of the indie publishing team walked out. They are not dead as a company, but are unlikely to sign new games in the near future. See a related article and discussion: https://www.ign.com/articles/what-the-heck-has-been-going-on-at-annapurna-interactive-an-investigation. The note mentions, per contributor input, that Annapurna is refocusing on film.
- Global Top Round seems to be dead. The accelerator and conference stopped in 2023; the core team left around April 2024; they are no longer funding studios. Consider it inactive.
- Could a new date column show when a publisher moved from Open to Curated? The update date is tracked on the first sheet 'Guide' at the top. Curated data is updated monthly or bi-monthly.
- Is Dangen Entertainment trustworthy? Feedback from multiple developers has been positive; as a Japanese publisher, consider cultural and communication differences.
- Will you add new publishers like Alawar? The dataset aims to expand; research and data entry require careful validation. Community input is encouraged.
- What about “QA” tabs or localization services? The dataset includes mentions of QA, localization, and other publishing services; some entries reference a dedicated QA/publishing workflow (e.g., indie.io notes).
Raw Data Dump (Curated & Open Sheets)
Note: The original document contains two large, interconnected spreadsheets—Curated and Open—each with hundreds of rows and multiple columns. The following is a faithful Markdown rendering of the top-level sections and representative rows that illustrate the data structure. The full data export would fill hundreds of rows; for brevity, a sample block is shown here and the full dataset is accessible in the source spreadsheet.
Publisher | Country | Website | Pitching Guide | Pitch Submission | Publishing Contact | Steam Page | Gamalytic Page | Lifetime Rev ($) | Average Rev ($) | Median Rev ($) | Class | Budget | Communication | Top-Selling Titles | Top Steam Tags | Description
Paradox | Sweden | https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/our-games/discover | https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/contact/pitch-your-game-to-paradox | https://www.paradoxinteractive.com/contact/pitch-your-game-to-paradox | Daniel Grigorov, Nils Brolin | https://store.steampowered.com/developer/paradoxinteractive | https://gamalytic.com/publisher/Paradox%20Interactive | 1.1B | 14.8M | 809.0K | AAA | $$$ | ★★★ | Cities Skylines, Crusader King, Stellaris, Heart of Iron, Victoria | Strategy, Simulation, RPG | Highly focused on strategy, grand strategy and 4X games. They have also published building/simulation games. They have an indie label called Paradox Arc.
Coffee Stain Sweden | Sweden | https://www.coffeestainpublishing.com/ | - | https://coffeestain.com/publishing | - | https://store.steampowered.com/developer/coffeestain | https://gamalytic.com/publisher/Coffee%20Stain%20Publishing | 584.9M | 39.0M | 3.2M | AAA | $$$ | ★★★ | Valheim, Satisfactory, Goat Simulator | Action, Indie, Strategy | Indie label focusing on standout indie titles; Valheim and Goat Simulator among top hits.
...Other sections in the dump cover dozens of additional publishers across regions, including Focus Entertainment (FR), 505 Games (IT), Team17 (UK), Devolver (USA/UK), Curve Games (UK), tinyBuild (USA), 11 bit studios (PL), Square Enix Collective (UK), Annapurna Interactive (USA), Behaviour Interactive (CA), Tripwire Interactive (USA), PlayWay (PL), Dotemu (FR), 3D Realms (US), Hooded Horse (SE/UK), and many more. The data rows include publisher country, multiple links (website, pitching guides, submission forms, contact pages), Steam publisher pages, GAMALYTIC pages, and key metrics (Lifetime Rev, Average Rev, Median Rev), game genres, and descriptive notes about the publisher’s focus and approach.
References & Tools
- GAMALYTIC publisher metric resources: https://gamalytic.com/about
- GAMALYTIC publisher pages: https://gamalytic.com/publisher/{Publisher_Name}
- Indie game publishing and funding communities (general guidance, community forums, and market insights)
- Patreon for updates: https://www.patreon.com/seyedhn
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If you have questions, data corrections, or want to contribute new entries to the open sheet, please use the contact channels listed in the Overview and Open Sheet guidelines. The dataset is meant to be a living resource for indie developers seeking publishing and funding opportunities in PC/Console space.