BRW has a look at the growing local game development industry from the business side of things, showing some alternative approaches that developers here have made to score game development deals. It mentions Krome's self funding of King Arthur when the original publisher cancelled the game, IR Guru's film-like financing approach to their Heroes of the Pacific title, and Perception's payment of license and self funding for Stargate. Managing Director at Perception, Ben Lenzo, had this to say about the traditional publisher/developer arrangement...
"Getting paid on a milestone basis simply does not work, because there are too many elements out of your control. Having control of the intellectual property gives you a little bit more leverage with these guys [publishers], so you can negotiate the deal a little bit differently."
The article also mentions that the Games Developer Association of Australia is pursuing tax concessions for the game industry, like those received in the film industry, to enourage more growth. The GDAA also have the BRW article in PDF format which you can download at the following link!