Kepler Interactive is making some big promises. Coming from the people who brought us the Kowloon Nights fund, and backed to the tune of $120m by Chinese tech firm NetEase, it’s claiming to have constructed a new model for independent game development: a major publisher co‐owned and run by (currently) seven developers – A44, Alpha Channel, Awaceb, Ebb Software, Shapefarm, Sloclap and Timberline Studio. At a time when self-publishing is on the rise, alongside a surge in indie developerpublishers, it feels that the model’s benefits need some unpicking. It turns out that we needn’t have looked any further than Kepler’s reveal trailer.