Ahhhh. Here’s the other half of the self-publishing reversal as I said earlier. From the Retro City Rampage dev:
"I’m very happy to see this. After all of the developers have spoken out, they’re finally listening. However, this is yet another example of them changing policy, but it sounding better than it is when the whole story is revealed. Make no mistake; while this is a great thing, it’s again not the equivalent to what other platforms offer. On PS4, for example, developers can tap right into the system; use every bit of RAM and all of its power. Indies have access to everything that the AAA studios do, from platform support to development and release. The indication on Xbox One is that it’s essentially XBLIG 2.0. Instead of XNA, it’s Windows 8. Windows 8, which is already struggling to gain developer interest, will gain a boost from developers wishing to target the console. However, it won’t be as full-fledged as published games on the system.
After my experience working with them to release on Xbox 360, I have no interest in even buying an Xbox One, let alone developing for it. The policy changes are great, but they don’t undo the experience I had. I’m not ready to forget what I went through. Working with Microsoft was the unhappiest point of my career. Policies are one thing, but developer relations are another.
It’s important to me that consumers don’t see things as black and white. There are still strings attached to this policy change."
Plus, self-publishing and the ability to turn any XBONE into a dev unit will not be ready at launch. Marc Whitten said they are aiming for release sometime within the first year.
I find it curious that no other developer add an idea about the details of the the self publishing and MS did not disclosed it to the press, but a developer that had a bad experience publishing on the 360 was the only one that already knew the details, his uniformed rant is more a sign that the developer relations team at Xbox is not doing a good job, there are a few developers that have nice words about them but there is a bigger amount that complain a lot. Not sure if it is the problem of the overall policy or is just a case of who is the contact within MS.
At this point the self publishing is good thing, the complete details may or may not be that positive and they may or may not be public disclosed, after all we get public disclose on appstore, Windows, IOs an Android, but PSN and even Steam have private details that are not of public knowledge. Sony has a very hands on approach to the self publishing by having a big developer relations team and very proactive, MS initial pitch seems more like a more automated system that can be good for high volume but for this initial year Sony is going to gather much more support with their strategy.
The only thing that could interest me in developing for the XBox One would be C#/XNA support. That won’t happen, though.
LMN8R
3271
They’ve been pretty carefully to message that the “goal” is to offer full access from multiple executives in multiple outlets. Based on their track record so far that feels like a pretty calculated way to make promises they don’t have to keep. As with everything about the Xbox One their refusal to actually detail these programs makes it sound like they have something to hide and everyone is left waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Yeah, we’ll see how good the program actually is whenever it launches a year from now. Sony will have a year of quality Indie releases on their platform before anyone can even start making indie Xbox One games.
People here are far too ready to take the word of poorly informed indie developers as gospel, without realizing that in most cases, they are simply repeating rumors they have heard. There have been several amusing (and completely wrong) points of speculation that have been bandied about, with regards to PS4 vs. Xbox One development. Can’t wait for those NDAs to expire…
My guesses: Xbox One will follow the app store model, $99 will let you develop on a retail kit and they’ll swing the doors open as wide as Apple does (and as wide open as the Windows 8 app store). Sony isn’t going to have an equivalent option to develop on retail hardware (maybe just something like the Mono-powered PS Mobile crap-fest, which they charge $99 for – funny how indies complain about XNA on the 360, but don’t say boo about PSM) – rather, they will seed “pro indies” with hardware and hope that they just evangelize like crazy. Of course, that only helps if you grovel and are cool enough to get actual PS4 dev hardware.
Cyrano
3274
Do most indie games even need the full power of the console? I’ve played quite a few of them on my middle-of-the-line laptop with integrated graphics, and they run just fine.
Brakara
3275
That was my thought as well earlier in thread, which I was lambasted over. Funny how things change in a couple of pages… If anything, it seems like MS will open it up more than even I thought they would.
The PSM environment is supposedly really good, too. And since you’re mostly dealing with mobile developers they’re pretty used to working in a virtual machine to begin with. It’s not like XNA on 360 where you are severely constrained from using the full potential of the platform. PSM can use about as much power as any other Android app.
I think the RCR guy is talking out of his ass and just repeating rumors.
On the other hand, almost every credible rumor about XBONE has come true eventually. Plus, it’s hard to trust anyone from MS at this point when they talk about the console because they’ve shifted policies all over the place and the policies they shift to seem to be as half-assed and off-the-cuff as the policies they had before. Case in point, this indie self-publishing thing won’t be ready for launch anyway.
Yeah, that’s pretty much it. Not many people trust M$'s “goals” that they talk about.
Then they are having so much success with it that they forgot to update their web site for it, which still references the $99 publisher fee all over the place. I would link it except I’m posting from my phone.
Basically, nobody is using it, which is my real point.
LMN8R
3281
If there was actually a reason to be skeptical, sure, it would be reasonable to parse words. But the simple fact is that there’s no actual technical justification for why there would be any such limitations in the first place.
I see a lot of hand-waving on forums by uninformed gamers speculating that since there’s a “Windows OS” and a “Gaming OS”, they must have to directly split available resources in some way. And “of course” indie games would be on the Windows OS side of things, so it’ll be limited. But:
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There’s no information that says how it’s implemented, in either direction, and
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Even if indie games ran as a part of the Windows OS, WinRT APIs, etc. it still doesn’t necessarily matter. Anyone who knows how modern OS virtualization works today knows that there’s no reason any sort of direct split or segmentation technically needs to exist.
Coming back from the damage they caused - entirely of their own making - won’t be easy. But I give Microsoft credit for recognizing the harm and taking real action steps to fix the problem.
Glad the indie policy is but the latest example of this.
Since programming is based on Win8, does this theoretically mean a developer could design a game for Windows8, then have it immediately be applicable to Xbox One with minimal effort? If so, this seems like a win-win to me since everything seems to be cross platform nowadays. I just wish they’d make games to be less gamepad oriented. For instance Far Cry 3. It is a brilliant and fantastic game that only suffers since it was designed for a gamepad and it translated poorly to keyboard/mouse. Have to hit “Esc” to bring up all your menu items then you have to dig multiple menus down to do basic things you have to do all the time (like crafting). This is something that’s super stupid when we have the whole darn keyboard available.
Programming is not based on Windows 8. That applies only to apps and maybe indie games, not to “real” big-budget console-selling games. Multiple operating systems, remember?
Still waiting for them to drop the price, possibly by dropping the kinect.
I can see not being enamored with the Kinect but I would not expect Microsoft to drop it, or the price (since the two go hand in hand). But I give Microsoft credit for moving and moving fast (E3 was a month ago!) to win back hearts and minds. In about a month’s time, they have:
- Dropped the always on requirement
- Dropped the DRM restrictions
- Issued a Mea culpa for bringing this on themselves
- Reversed their indie policy
Stuff I would still like Microsoft to do:
- Would LOVE if Microsoft brought back the family sharing feature they dropped
- Made giving away games (i.e. matching PlayStation Plus) a key feature of LIVE
When I said much earlier in this thread that Microsoft needed to make clear to gamers, developers and journalists that they have a passion for gaming, not just the business of gaming, these are the kind of steps I had in mind. Hope they continue.
