Octopodes: “Microsoft will not allow independent developers to self-publish their games on Xbox One”
More on point, you’re right that MS can do what they want with their own platform and that XBLIG probably wasn’t very profitable. They can do what they want, but what they’re doing is making a platform that isn’t for us. Which means a lot of us will simply ignore them. I think Sony and Nintendo are right to embrace indies. Indie games are quickly rising in popularity and sales. (Braid used to be an impressive seller, now tons of indie games dwarf its initial sales.) And I’d wager that they’re going to continue to grow. Just look at how games like AntiChamber can sit on the top sales spot in Steam for a week. Sony, and to a lesser extent Nintendo, are making sure they can profit from this, and I think they’ll be rewarded for it. If not purely in sales, then in good will from the community. (Which leads to sales and platform adoption.)
That’s the nail of the head for sure. What we’re looking at is a very simple divide in the marketplace. Platform exclusives used to mean “Studio Properties.” In the very near future, this will be replaced with something that has more to do with what kind of esoteric experiences (your) platform provides over the competition. (We)[http://blog.mutinous.com] just signed up for one of the big Indie console networks and hope to be moving toward shipping to it later this year. In all of our talk about being on the console, I can’t remember a single time where we talked about it in terms of how much revenue it would generate for us. It’s about being there, being accessible to that segment of the audience and just like all of the other platforms out there; getting butts in seats (thanks tony.)
Would Microsoft have engendered a huge amount of good will from the development community at large by supporting indie game devs through self-publishing (vis. The App Store?) absolutely. Would the big publishers prefer that we never be able to release another game on a platform they are also on? Ask the guys that work indie developer relations in the Origin division at EA. Oh… right..