Zee 3

Zee-3 is an online publisher and distributor of video games and other digital products.

Our aim is to publish high quality, original video games, and offer an outlet for products which don't fit into the limited set of genres, themes and marketing profiles demanded by the hit-based mainstream video game industry.

Formed in 2005 by John Pickford and Ste Pickford, Zee-3's primary purpose is to publish and distribute the Pickford Brothers' new video games over the internet, and to license these games for other distribution channels, but we also plan to distibute selected video games, music and similar digital products by other artists.

Based in the UK, we're a small 'virtual' business; we have no staff or offices, no bricks and mortar, just this website, managed by The Pickford Brothers inbetween developing new games.

How it works

At Zee-3 we want to get to know our users, and we want you to get to know each other, so buying a game from us may be a little bit different from what you have experienced if you've ever bought an indie game online before. We don't use third party software wrappers - we only use third parties for credit card payment clearence and high security stuff like that - and we don't send out keys or passwords to unlock crippled or encrypted versions of software you've downloaded from us.

We ask you to register to create a Zee-3 user account, which is completely free and allows you to post on the forums and gives access to some extra areas of the website. Then, when you purchase a product, you account is 'flagged', which gives you access to a download, or to services releated to that product.

There's no danger of losing the product you've bought if your PC crashes or your disk is wiped - you're free to log in and download the software again any time - and you are free to play any online games from different PCs just by logging in with your username and password. You can also identify or play against other Zee-3 users in online games through the same usernames you see on the forums.

You only need one account - one username and password - for all our products and the forums, and we will offer rewards and discounts for users who purchase multiple products.

Why we're here

Zee-3 was formed to take advantage of a new opportunity provided by the worldwide growth of broadband - the ability to distribute digital products online, directly from the creators to the consumers - allowing us to satisfy the demand for novel and interesting new video games, a niche which has become too risky for the mainstream video game business to cater for.

Spiraling development costs have meant that the mainstream video game industry is only intersted in safe bet, sure fire hits - the price of failure is seen as too great to risk trying an original, unproven idea. Unlike the worlds of movies and popular music, the video game industry had set itself up with no equivalent to 'art house' movies, or 'indie label' bands. New ideas and talent were traditionally welcomed in the world of mainstream video games, keeping it fresh and dynamic, but the increased risk aversion associated with the expanding scale of the industry has squeezed out creativity and experimentation, leaving few channels remaining for new ideas to flow into the industry.

We see the combination of small development budgets, low prices and online distribution as a way of cutting out the middlemen of the video game industry (manufacturers, publishers, distributors and retailers, whose needs have stifled innovation and creativity, dictated the limited range of content available, and who have funneled far too much revenue out of the industry to movie companies and sports bodies), freeing creators to take risks, and make good products without having to appeal to a lowest common denominator.

We want to provide an outlet for smaller, quirkier, fun and innovative video games, and a provide conduit for dialogue between game developers and their audience.

Our games aren't going to be blockbusters with mega budgets, or mainstream to the point of blandness. We hope that by cutting out the costs of many of the middlemen, and cutting down on the bloated budgets typical of mainstream hit games, and by channelling the bulk of the revenue back to the creators, we can create an environment where video game artists can make a living and pay the bills by appealing to a worldwide audience - even a small one - of gamers who just want their games to be good, not big, glossy and expensive.

We want to sell good games, at a fair price, to discerning gamers.