Evolve PR thought that, from the perspective of small developers/publishers and games press, the new, invite-only E3 sucked hind wind. Well, a small developer begged to disagree: none other than Alex Seropian, Bungie Studios founder, former CEO, and after seeing his baby safe within Microsoft's environs, now in charge of his new baby Wideload Games.

In an interview with The Armchair Empire's Omni, he mentions the thought that the old E3, for all the excitement it brought to the industry, was a "huge drain" that did not, from a developer's perspective, "serve any purpose whatsoever." While he didn't mention Evolve PR's contention that the old E3 was better for networking and publicity, Alex argued that the old E3 simply evolved (or devolved) into "one big strokefest for the publishers to see who could make the most noise."

It generated a lot of buzz in the industry but as far as translating into how good a game is, it seemed to have zero effect – if anything a negative effect. And in terms of translating into sales, I don’t how you could possibly justify the expense. I think that’s why it’s gone away.

It's rather... interesting to compare E3 into, er, male urinal envy... or a pissing contest. We will be... un-graphic about this and interpret Alex's statements to be a commentary on the hype-and-noise factor of old-E3, the very factor ESA cited as the reason for "downsizing" the event.

Time will tell whether the new E3 will fulfill its purpose and be worth the ride for the developer. On the other hand, the invite-only restriction still means that covering the new "fest" will still be a pain for the small press.

It's not that easy to create a game, think of how hard it is to get somebody to publish it. Not everybody would take the risk to publish a game from an unknown developer. A newly formed independent publisher called Gamecock Media Group, from the founders of Gathering of Developers (GoD), have these small devs in mind. Gamespot was able to score an interview with Harry Miller, co-founder of GoD and Gamecock along with Michael Wilson.

According to Miller, they formed the new company under the same principles as the old one (GoD was acquired by Take-Two Interactive). They will focus on fresh ideas and indie devs. With GoD, they were newbies to the industry and enticed developers by offering them stock. Now, Miller says they "hope to be a little smarter and do a better job." They are aiming to be pro-developer in terms of letting the game engineers keep their IP (intellectual property), when other publishers open options to either acquire the company or the IP. According to Miller, in all their deals, the devs get to keep all their IP. They plan to have them keep the IPs to keep the games stay the same.

About the name, Miller explains that it just means that they want to take the backseat when publishing games. He added, that they "do advertising and promotions, but it's their [developers] name in the highlight and we're in the background. And that's how it should be. So our name is silly because it doesn't really matter."

Gamecock is "well funded" and most of the projects are funded by the founders themselves. They aren't film financing anymore, since movies mostly have good solid release dates. Distribution-wise, they are confident that they could get their games on the shelves.

They have already announced their line up for this year: Fury by Auran, Insecticides by Crackpot Entertainment, Mushroom Men by Red Fly Studios, Hail to the Chimp by Wideload Games, and Hero by Firefly Studios.

As pervy as this may sound to some, the truth is, we're really not being silly here. We're going to try to do our best to type this down despite some of us here being worried that we may get complaints related to political correctness.

Wideload Games, has recently announced that they picked Gamecock Media Group to publish their next title Hail to the Chimp, which is a self-proclaimed impossible-to-classify party game based on politics in the animal kingdom. The game is set to be released in spring 2008 for next gen consoles.

More stuff from Gamecock after the Jump!