The thing is that (mainly) men buying shoot 'em ups etc in stores is NOT my target market. My target market is women over 35 that download puzzle games.
Generally in stores, the people buying puzzle games are women 30+. The only difference is by being on store shelves you get massive exposure to millions of people in your target audience while they are in a buying mood. The major department stores here in the US are WalMart, Target & KMart. Each chain has thousands of stores around the country. Each store pretty much carries the same games by indie developers and there are only 3 or 4 publishers who are getting these games made by indie developers on the store shelves. Most of these games are puzzle games.If you can find my old post about marketing games, I list some of the publishers you should contact that deal with indie developers. It will also give tips on how to research your market. With the many forum purges, it may not be around.
you can expect is really small, like 10%, whereas on the web you could sell it yourself and get around 90% (after costs),
You are assuming you would get the same number of sales and the same exposure as you would in a store. On store shelves you would be exposed to millions of people in your target audience, while they are in a buying mood. You get less of a percentage in profits, but you get more sales and make more money. If selling stores is the correct way to go, I'm surprised that more developers on this forum (and others) aren't going on about it all the time.
its not the correct way to go, it is a way to go and a way that would generate far more profit than what you are getting now. I am not surprised, I have seen only a small handfull of games (yours included) released in the Blitz community that had ANY commercial potential.