For physical sales, the developer got pennies on the dollar. You needed to find a publisher. Not only would they help with packaging, marketing, localization, a

For physical sales, the developer got pennies on the dollar. You needed to find a publisher. Not only would they help with packaging, marketing, localization, and QA, but they also brought access to the wholesale channel. Ingram and MicroD (before they merged) would not touch you unless you could guarantee a certain volume. And like the book business, there were buy backs for unsold product. I was involved in an Amiga game development deal from 1989-1990 that eventually fell apart and our cut was 18%.