Xbox Live Arcade policy changes = bigger risk.

I know a lot of people are excited by the prospect of releasing on 360 eventually. Looks like things are going to get even tougher even after you put up the $100k to develop a title. I Imagine 6%+ conversion rates are hard to keep indefinately.



http://www.next-gen.biz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=10620&Itemid=2

Yep I read this too. Sounds tricky, but is probably better for gamers (just not developers)

Actually, as a gamer, I often find myself buying games which other people have decided aren't particularly good, simply because the games media is so hardcore-centric and some of the genres I like best almost never get a decent review. This really isn't about giving the gamers what they want, it's about what most of the retail sector already does ( not in games, in everything ) which is to dictate what you can have and limit your choices so that you either buy it or go to hell. I can kind of understand it when you have limited shelfspace, but XBLA is a closed shop with limitless shelf space, so I think it's rather greedy to take our choices away from us, but I'm sure there are enough sheep that they won't change their minds.

I'm with Gabriel on this one.

well, Xbox doesn't seem like an interesting platform to dev for any longer!

Why does microsoft need to delist items? It doesn't cost them anything to leave them online. This just stinks of profit being prioritised over all other things.

Why not? The platform hasn't changed, nor has your chance of profiting from it. It's not like you'll be rolling in the dough big time from your XBLA game anyway if most people don't like it, and aren't buying it.

It might. You don't know that for sure.

Hello, Microsoft? What did you think they were? A charity?

I was inevitable that once they got a deluge of games the competition would get more fiercer and expensive to compete with. Was a time that you got a ton of concessions, and the small number of games avaliable guaranteed you a big return on your game. For the first year even the worst performing games were getting more than 10% conversion rate.

Now you all but need a publisher to stand much chance of getting your game released.

Did it ever? I never even considered MS would allow people to develop commercially for it without wanting a HUGE piece of pie (goes for nin & sony too, although not sure about PS3). This is why the consoles are so cheap and the games so expensive!

I would love to see an 'open' console, with completely open standards and licensing, where you only pay for the hardware (not this cheap 'game-sale-subsidised' crap ). Anyone can develop for it and sell on it as with a PC. Personally i would rather pay more for the console, get cheaper games and have the opportnity to exploit it commercially without all the BS. A console like this would be more interesting too, take the Xbox, it is useless until it is chipped (and in not talking about pirate games) then you can run 3rd party apps to turn it into a network media player, an emulator etc.

Never happen though as to make it viable, the hardware either would have to be several years behind to match price, or, almost the price of a PC to be able to match performance. Most consoles are sold at almost a loss and the profit is made from the games. .

I don't think the lone pogrammer has much change of getting games on Live Arcade anyway - that's why they introduced the Community Games. And, having tried a few of the Community Games, I think pretty much anyone will be able to get games on there, even if it's just the simplest of pong clones.

Here's the ones that have been approved already:

http://catalog.xna.com/gamescatalog.aspx

I have to agree with Flamey, Microsoft are a business, businesses chase profits and they dont care who is in the way.

I actually find it pretty amusing how some people kick up a stink regarding profiteering, or how companies shouldnt be doing it.

They are there to make money, they want as much of the pie as the next business, not playing by the rules or making their own is how companies make money... When I had MD Plastering Services I used to ask if people had a quote already, and if they did, I'd beat it.

All part of the game... Get over it!

Ive got nothing against making a profit, i just hate it when market dominators block the way for others to make a profit. I guess it depends how dominant they are in the market. Trust me, if and when you had your plastering service, if a huge corporation of plumbers who had just bought up all your plastering competitors started offering lower than you could ever possibly hope to go, or suddenly released a set of tools that got the job done in half the time (to an all-new standard all customers want), then make you pay a huge fee to use the tool, you'd be out on your arse and you would feel very different... (but thats another argument altogether for another time).

Microsoft will die off eventually, hopefully the next windows will suck more then vista, so everyone has to go Linux.

That did happen D4NM4N mate... MD Plastering Services is gone... but it wasnt a corporation, it was the Polish that pulled me under, I went for £150 a day, they want £50! No brainer really who is going to pick up the work. And theres no way I could match their prices, because £50 a day to them is like winning the lottery.

So I moved on, took it on the chin and got a nice little job else where with decent money... But, I'm not bitter, this is life and I have better things to worry about! :D

Like what am I gonna make for supper! ;)

From another perspective, Microsoft is probably taking some measures to reduce the amount of shovelware that appears on XBLA, and prevent the catalog from getting "too large". Granted sales don't always measure "quality" of some titles (ie. okami), but it's a pretty good marker for their audience. From an economics standpoint, it's a metric they can track pretty easily. Especially since XBLA provides a demo for almost every game they publish (which, provided the user downloaded the demo, correlates it's perceived quality pretty well to the sale)

Since when does Vista suck? I find it much easier to use than Linux and faster than my old XP computer. In fact, I love Vista more than XP because it has all the functionality of XP, but looks much, much nicer.

Linux seems to be only used by MS hating nerds who have nothing better to do than rant and rave about how Windows sucks. I don't think I've heard from one person that uses Linux that Windows isn't the worst OS ever and Bill Gates needs to die. You don't like Vista? Fine, use Linux. Just don't continue to bitch about it after the fact!


Trust me, MS is not going to die until Google finally lays the hammer down.

That's a subjective comparison: XP would be even faster on your new computer, simply because it has less work to do to get the same results.

Fun things like extra DRM protection layers and the likes still add overhead and processing requirements to the same basic tasks, regardless of how invisible it might be.

And they add a fair amount of instability.

Vistas successor let it remain in dust ... Windows 2008 is about 10% faster than Vista while beeing Vista otherwise.

Sure. But you could probably easily beat their craftsmanship.

Since forever?

Whether windows is the worst OS ever or not depends entirely on your metric. If the metric is minimum resource usage for doing absolutely nothing, then Windows is by far the worst OS around (followed closely buy MacOS). QNX is the best. If you're talking market penetration, the scale is practically reversed.

And Bill Gates does need to die. No one lives forever.

Contrary to popular belief Google is not Microsofts biggest competitor. Microsoft is. They've become a victim of their own success. They can't sell Vista, because for most people, it doesn't provide a compelling reason to buy it over XP. If they keep throwing away money on stupid things, like trying to acquire Yahoo! and the XBox, pretty soon the shareholders will have had enough.

Can't believe some of you are whining about this.



You mean like EVERY CONSOLE EVER prior to the 360 that wouldn't let an indy developer release something on their precious console? The fact that Microsoft is allowing just that is progress. Not blocking the way. It's amazing how ungrateful people are sometimes. And then blame Microsoft for their evil evil ways. How DARE they let indy developers release games on XBLA!? How dare they try to filter out non-selling titles to allow easier choices for their customers!? Evil I tell you. Evil.

What indie developers?

What on earth are you talking about. No single entity dominates the console market. I was actually refering to something else that someone else said in another post.
If someone even sneezes the words monopoly or 'dominating position' these days, all the fanboys automatically think this must mean an attack on microsoft (odd that).

And yes you are right, consoles have been closed forever, it is nice for everyone to be able to develop for them, if MS have seen an oportunity to commercially and cheaply exploit "indies" (-who are hardly 'indie' anymore) for questionably mutual benefit then fair play to them. Its not as if MS dominate the console market. (yet)

However, i was saying its a shame they are not open platforms like computer software dev, and that goes for all of them. For example, i write a PS3 or 360 game/program and want to sell it/distribute it MY way, through other channels as well as Microsofts's. Can I do that or not? Do i still own 100% rights to it?
If this is alowed (cant be bothered to small-read the huge EULA) then fair enough. If it isn't then if your game doesnt make it to the 'sellable' list whats the point?

> You mean like EVERY CONSOLE EVER

With the exception of the old Atari consoles. I'm sure we all remember the Chuck Wagon game...