Toge Productons is giving back to their indie roots with the Toge Game Fund Initiative, a financial assistance scheme to help indie game developers publish their games.
The sponsorship goes up to USD 10,000, and includes consultation and mentorship, project management assistance, as well as testing and feedback for game projects.
In their website, Toge Productions also explains some of the frequently asked questions about their funding. Firstly, Toge Productions says they will not be looking for repayment on the funding, so don’t worry that the assistance is tied to any kind of sales goals.
Similarly, the developer-turned-publisher isn’t looking to buy out your IP, either. According to the website, developers retain full ownership of their IP upon accepting the grant, although Toge is offering to publish the game to consoles upon completion if the developers so request it.
Realists may wonder what Toge Production gets out of this. According to them, the only catch of the Toge Game Fund Inititative is that Toge Productions would get the right of first refusal to publish any games developed using the money from the fund. While that sounds scary, all it means is that Toge gets to decide if they want to publish the game first, and if they don’t you’re still free to find another publisher.
All you’ll have to do to get your indie game supported is to head over to the above website, then pitch your game idea to set up your deal with them.
While not offering financial support, Nintendo previously announced a similar mentorship scheme for publishing games on their platform. This included dev kits to help optimize games for the Nintendo Switch.