http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/JamesCoote/20130911/199985/Indie_Collective_Summary.php
Sony
Microsoft
Nintendo
Even chasing after the same group of developers, the personalities of each company shines through, like Nintendo and getting games 'localized', which tells me they expect a Japanese localization eventually for Western games, or MS's implication they would rather have seasoned vets than newcomers. And the push for Windows 8 app for newcomers just to get 'known' was a bit odd. Sony doing the same for Vita makes a bit more sense since the Vita is a known quantity, while nobody really knows how Windows 8 app store will work on the XBox One.
Edge Online was also at ICS. Posting selected quotes:
Sony
MS
In the end, if you're developing a game, its up to you to see what you can pay for upfront costs for devkits and licenses. As a consumer, all I care about is getting more good games to play and hopefully these new policies will provide that.
Sony
[...]
One thing mentioned, when asked about Sony's motivations for reaching out to indies was that Sony had always been a B-to-B type of business; somewhat implying that they viewed indies as closer to consumers than other businesses. Which is probably fair enough when you consider many indies don't have teams of lawyers, marketeers and PR people, and in many cases, aren't even incorporated.
Another area highlighted as of particular importance to Sony was the idea of "credibility" of a game developer. This idea that it isn't necessarily the number of titles shipped or size of team, but how genuine and credible they think you are in terms of ultimately, being able to come up with the goods. This extended to indies spending time networking, going to events, getting their face out there, so that Sony know of devs from more than just a few tweets and emails.
This point was extended when (somewhat controversially), it was suggested indies do their own PR, rather than rely on a company. Drawing on this idea that the indie game dev is the most important asset (after the game itself), when it comes to selling the game.
Other things included the emphasis on Vita (there were a couple of free Vita's being given away during the talk). Presumably, since Sony have had some success reviving the Vita's fortunes by turning it into a sort of indie platform, they want to continue that. And also perhaps might prefer unknown devs to start there and prove themselves, so as to reduce the number of "My first games" appearing on PS4.
[...]
Microsoft
This was very much more about the process of getting onto Xbox One, and the speaker from Microsoft, Phil Waymouth, made the point a number of times that while him and his team heard this stuff every day, it was easy to forget not everyone else had heard about it. So his mission was very much to help educate people about that.
Microsoft have come under criticism that maybe their ID@Xbox campaign looks a bit rushed and "me too" ish. And reading between the lines about the above, you can see why Microsoft have been somewhat irked by that accusation.
Meantime, the process itself was presented as a simple 1. 2. 3. step affair: Initiate Contact -> Pitch Game -> Publish, though each step in itself appears to be complex and involved.
The point was made that creating games was hard! And this was also reflected when I checked out the ID@Xbox site after the talk, which talks about professionalism and has a sign up form where you can list all the titles you've shipped, how many years experience you have in the industry etc.
As with Sony and the Vita, the hint from Microsoft is that Windows 8 apps are a good way to prove your self in terms of quality and the "credibility" factor that Sony spoke about. The idea that you're a known quantity to Microsoft if there is an app or two that you can point to on the Windows 8 app store.
[...]
Conversely, I was very excited to see Microsoft address the problem of discoverability head on (something I feel passionately about). Microsoft analogised themselves as providing the easel, paint brushes and gallery for the game dev "artist", and the gallery seems to learn from the mistakes of app-stores past: Single store (no ghettoized XBLIG/XBLA marketplaces), and for curation, a mix of hand-picked "spotlight" featured section, and using technology in the form of trending and a recommendations engine.
Other mentions went to the fact they fully support IAP and f2p/freemium models, but they also use the wholesale model. As an indie, I wasn't really aware of this before, but it was explained quite well, and makes a lot of sense when you think in terms of the legal and tax aspects of selling games.
[...]
Microsoft seem like they want to make a distinction between indie and Independent developers, with their preference very much for the latter. But that they can't say that out loud.
Nintendo
Arguably the most interesting of the three talks, it was prefaced by the event host describing how once upon a time, it was not uncommon to travel all the way to Kyoto in Japan and actually meet with Nintendo bosses in person. The point being, things had come along way since then and the company was changing. It was also noted that many of the things mentioned in the talk were not being discussed openly (or at least not under NDA) until very recently. While I appreciate it kinda sucks to then have someone like me splurge it all out over the internets, hopefully, this will assist other indie devs and Nintendo themselves in opening up.
In fact, I was lucky enough to have a chat with one of the Nintendo reps during lunch, and the way it was put to me, going back to the motivation behind companies doing these talks, was that in the last generation, Nintendo had broadened their customer base and the spread of demographics (casuals, women etc). Now the intention was to do a similar thing for their developer base.
Nintendo admitted that wiiware hadn't exactly been perfect, but that they were really starting to get there with the current eShop. Off-device eShop browsing was mentioned as being in the pipeline, though like much in the talk, it was "when it happens / but I can't talk about that".
As for being featured on the eShop, there are no paid featured slots, with everything being selected by the editorial staff. The permanent indie feature slot on the store was highlighted. Interestingly, there was a suggestion that niche games were a favourite amongst editors.
IAP and freemium / f2p were all fine, and unlike Microsoft, the eShop worked on the agency model. Too much manipulating of the prices though, and/or attempts to game the system were deemed "inadvisable".
Another point raised was that there was no minimum threshold before developers get paid. That was interesting for me when comparing it to my experience on OUYA, where there is a $150 threshold before they pay up.
In fact, much of the Nintendo talk seemed to be aimed at clearing up what they had identified as common developer misconceptions. No exclusivity requirement, and no requirement to use specific bits of hardware. Working from home, they had recognised, was fine, so long as there were reasonable guarantees that you didn't leave your door unlocked and wide open for anyone wandering down the street to poke their head in and knab your Wii U devkit.
On the subject of the devkit, Nintendo made the reasonable point that, as much as they were willing to make things financially easy and provide as great an assistance as possible for free, the devkit pricetag, represented a reciprocal serious committment on the behalf of the developer.
Process wise, Nintendo made no pretensions about their eight odd steps to get games from inception to sitting on the store. Sign up to their dev program, get a devkit. Then after that, quite some emphasis was put on getting an internal game code / id number for your game. Without having gone through the process myself, I interpret that as being the starting point for your game competing with others for internal marketing resources and attention within Nintendo. That it enabled the Nintendo rep championing your game to fight for its cause.
Now here, more than anywhere, I might be guilty of reading way too much into what the Nintendo guys were saying, but the message was that although you can get a game code any time, the earlier in the development cycle you can get your game on Nintendo's internal radar, the better.
Another strong signal I got was that after QA and Price Setting, came the point that localisation was highly recommended. Again, without wanting to over-emphasise things, it seems this step is one that corporate would in the past have insisted on. They might drop it for indies, but the impression I got was that if you want to work with, rather than against the system, it would be better not to skip it.
As for the "which flavour of the month bit of tech should your game use if you want to sell to us as platform holders", the answer was Miiverse and off-TV gaming. Admittedly, I have never heard of the latter, but fortunately, the emphasis was on Miiverse. This was covered in quite some detail, with particular pride shown by the Nintendo guys about how developers could interact with their fan base, and customers/players could, through the miiverse, discover what was trending or what their friends were playing through a more organic feeling, human-face recommendations engine.
[...]
Even chasing after the same group of developers, the personalities of each company shines through, like Nintendo and getting games 'localized', which tells me they expect a Japanese localization eventually for Western games, or MS's implication they would rather have seasoned vets than newcomers. And the push for Windows 8 app for newcomers just to get 'known' was a bit odd. Sony doing the same for Vita makes a bit more sense since the Vita is a known quantity, while nobody really knows how Windows 8 app store will work on the XBox One.
Edge Online was also at ICS. Posting selected quotes:
Sony
How to sign up: Sony has four separate routes into getting published on a Sony platform (PS4, Vita or PS3). Publisher and Developer Relations is the main route in. XDev works with indie studios in return for rights over their IP, in return for creative support and marketing – this is the route Media Molecule took with LittleBigPlanet. Strategic Content (Ahmed’s team) funds and publishes games that fill gaps in Sony’s portfolio or are politically desirable. Playstation First is an academic initiative run out of Sony Worldwide Studios. For Europe, you should sign up at either companyregistration.playstation.com or sonyxdeveurope.com. For more advice, tweet @shahidkamal. For America, Adam Boyes’ team handle kit loans, funding and support third-party developers.
Potential problems: Getting approved as a developer still isn’t guaranteed, especially for unproven studios. If you do get approved, devkits are free, but you’ll still have to pay for Unity Pro (around $1,500) and a variable price for the specific Unity-PS4 or -Vita licence, which could be rather large. You will also need to get your game age-rated, which again costs money.
What did the indies think?
Most indies were impressed by Ahmad’s talk, though it was lighter on detail than the later ones. “From a presentation perspective, Shahid stole the show,” said Des Gale of Altered Gene. ”I loved his Mario rendition on the guitar at the end and out of the lot of them his presentation was the least salesman-like. I liked his focus on overall game dev rather than just game dev on Sony… I suspect that my lack of reply about my latest game submission is more down to sheer volume of applicants rather than not wanting my game. But still, I haven’t heard anything from them in three months.”
MS
NintendoWhat’s changed: Every stage of signing up, certification, updating, Visual Studio, patching, testing, re-certifying, tools, market statistics, licensing, and release will be free on Xbox One. There will be one marketplace for all Xbox One games, with no indie ghetto, which apparently will be alphabetised. As Phil said, “You could be up [on the Xbox One store] between Forza and Halo… if your game begins with G.”
How they’re helping: Registered developers get two free devkit Xbox Ones. If you publish through Microsoft Studios, you also get your Unity license paid for. Microsoft’s Spotlight editorial team will be curating games on the marketplace, allowing for more discoverability, alongside their recommendations engine. All developers will get access to exactly the same tools, whether it’s a triple-A studio employing 500 developers or a lone developer working from home.
How to sign up: You can sign up at xbox.com/id. Once you’ve done that, you submit your game information (through a game concept form) and get a title ID, go through certification and testing, then publish your game to the Xbox Games Store.
Potential problems: A track record will help you to get approved. Microsoft says that it hopes that anyone with an Xbox One will eventually be able to develop games – but at the moment, the consoles don’t support this, so this is firmly theoretical PR talk. Microsoft also won’t publish objectionable content – but they wouldn’t be drawn on whether that was just adult content and emulators or political content as well. Unity, of course, is the preferred development tool for most indies (because of its ease-of-use and multiplatform capabilities) and, again, the Xbox One licenses for it will be expensive – but Waymouth was clear that Visual Studio Express is free and that developing a 64-bit C++ DirectX 11 Windows Store app is a great start for developing for Xbox One. It’s also worth noting that Microsoft wants to retain distinct price points – so it’s unlikely that there will be any 99c games on the platform – and is taking a wholesale model to the marketplace – so you set the price you sell your game to Microsoft at, and they choose the sale price for the public. However, this doesn’t preclude free-to-play games, season passes or in-app purchases. You will also need to get your game age-rated, at your expense.
What did the indies think?
During the session, there were questions about Microsoft’s track record on the Xbox 360 of not always delivering on promises – notably with Fez and Super Meat Boy. As Byron Atkinson-Jones of Xiotex Studios, who organised the event put it: “The cost of Unity deployment to the Sony and Microsoft platform worries me a lot and at this point in time it rules out using Unity for games I make on Vita/PS4 and Xbox One. As a one man developer that presents a huge risk as I now either have to spend a significant amount of time and cost making a cross platform C++ framework or I simply make games that are exclusive to each platform. Yet the sheer fact that as an indie developer I can now write games and get them published on Vita, PS4 and Xbox One is frankly phenomenal and it’s not one I’m going to pass up.”
How they’re helping: Although they aren’t giving away devkits for free, like their competitors, the cost of a Wii U kit (about the cost of a high-end gaming PC) includes the Unity License you’ll need to develop, which is probably worth way more than the cost of a kit anyway. “We’ve paid Unity to cover all the licenses that we think you will still need.” said Valiente. You can also develop for the Wii U in HTML5.
How to sign up: If you want to develop for 3DS, sign-up at warioworld.com – but you’ll need to be able to develop natively. If you want to develop for WiiU, go to wiiu-developers.nintendo.com. Theoretically you need a proven track record to sign up, but Valiente indicated that it wouldn’t be a huge barrier if you didn’t, and that Nintendo had already approved plenty of inexperienced developers. The key contact at Nintendo for signing up is Tim Symons. Once you’re signed up, you can apply for Title IDs for your games. Once you’ve got your ID, you go through testing, then you set the price, release date and eShop assets for the game. Then you’ve got ten days to launch.
Potential problems: Nintendo are in a tricky spot as far as indies are concerned. First, the Wii U is failing (and is increasingly being withdrawn from supermarket shelves) so isn’t an attractive market overall. Secondly, sales of anything but firstparty games on Nintendo platforms have traditionally been negligible.
The back-end technology for developers didn’t sound wonderfully developed, either – developers’ daily reports will now arrive as Excel spreadsheets, but it sounds like they will still only be paid quarterly. Similarly, if you want to be a firstparty developer or sell your games in Japan (rather than just the US and Europe), then the process is a lot longer – seven or eight months – and you will almost certainly need to visit the Kyoto head office.
What did the indies think?
The indies in the room were wowed by Nintendo’s turnaround. “Nintendo have reversed their opinions about indies expressed a few years ago and were endearingly frank about their process for indies, which may seem slightly obtuse but I know indies are enjoying working with them,” said Rob Davis of Playniac. Des Gayle of Altered Gene added: “Going from personal experience, Nintendo have been great about getting indies onside by recognising that game development in terms of geography and demography has changed. The biggest and most welcome response is the removal of the registered office restriction.”
In the end, if you're developing a game, its up to you to see what you can pay for upfront costs for devkits and licenses. As a consumer, all I care about is getting more good games to play and hopefully these new policies will provide that.
