Limited Run Games

Limited Run Games, LLC is an American video game distributor based in Raleigh, North Carolina and a division of Mighty Rabbit Studios. The company specializes in the release of digital games in physical media, with the games being sold on their website. The company, founded by Douglas Bogart and Josh Fairhurst, was based on the preservation of video games, as well as catering to players who prefer physical discs and cartridges opposed to game downloads. Limited Run Games releases games exclusively on their website, and deliberately creates small print runs. With this, the team maintains a pledge to refuse creating reprints of past titles, even if there is high demand. The company name itself is a reference to this business model, as their games are available in a firm, limited printing for a short time.

Business model
Being attached to Mighty Rabbit Studios, the company's first two releases were both in house productions, in order to test the market and see if there was demand for physical releases. However, the company did hint before release of their first game, Breach & Clear that their first official collaboration was in place (which would go on to be a printing of Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty!). Limited Run Games began expanding to projects with other developers following the success of these two in house test games.

In order to attract developers, Limited Run finances all costs of a game's print run, and handles all other necessary steps. In return, the developer is charged with the same fee asked by digital distributors. Additionally, titles are released exclusively through their website as mail order titles. Fairhurst says this is done in order to "minimize incurred costs and maximizes the end revenue for our developers."

In 2016, Limited Run Games primarily released games for the PlayStation family of systems. This was due to communication difficulties with Microsoft and Nintendo's minimum order quantities for games being "too high." However, according to an interview, Douglas Bogart expressed interest in publishing for the Nintendo Switch, saying "It's looking very positive and we hope to have our first title out this summer [2017], fingers crossed!" In April 2018, Limited Run released Thimbleweed Park as their first physical release for the Switch.

The PlayStation Vita is the system Limited Run considers their most desired for physical games, citing a strong attachment between the console and their fans. Co-founder Douglas Bogart has commented on this, saying "It seems like all of our Vita fans are probably the most diehard, so anything we can do to help them; they seem to be extremely supportive". As fans of the Vita themselves, Limited Run has called the system "the Dreamcast of this generation" and "the underdog console of the eight generation...it has a small library but there's not a lot of duds on it. What's coming out for it is really good."

Every title Limited Run Games releases comes with a complimentary sticker and post card, with colours of the sticker and design of the card being dependent on the specific game. More recently, games have begun including instruction manuals, reversible cover art and other goodies (for example, Oddworld Stranger's Wrath HD included playing cards and a fold-out map along with reversible cover art and a limited variant cover). Beginning in June 2017, the company transitioned from post cards to complimentary trading cards, citing a drive to remain unique as other distributors had begun to offer post cards with orders as well, such as Signature Edition Games, though they would continue to include the bonus sticker.

Personal computers
Alongside physical copies for PlayStation systems, the company has also released collectors editions for certain personal computer games. These do not include a disc copy of the game, opting instead for downloadable Steam vouchers alongside physical content. Units produced figures for games released on a PlayStation console also are kept separate here, and only the number of PC copies manufactured are listed here.