Microsoft today announced a new initiative to let any game developer create and sell games on its Xbox platform without having to go through any of the company’s preexisting channels. The Xbox Live Creators Program, as it’s called, is designed to let an indie team or solo developer take a retail Xbox, which doubles as a dev kit, and use it to create and self-publish the title to the Xbox marketplace. Prior to today, developers had to part of an established game development or media company, or they had to apply through Microsoft’s ID@Xbox indie game program to receive self-publishing capabilities.
That are a couple of stipulations involved with the new
program, which remains in a preview stage for now until it opens up to
the general public soon. For one, the game you’re making must be a
Universal Windows App, so that it can run on any Windows 10 device and
not simply the Xbox One. Microsoft also reserves the right to remove
your game from the store if it has “harmful or inappropriate content,”
as the company won’t be binding any devs with nondisclosure agreements
or concept approvals.
The program isn’t free. There’s a one-time fee to that
ranges from $20 to $100, and it’s unclear right now how Microsoft plans
on charging some developers more or less than others. Even then, unless a
developer joins the ID@Xbox program, they won’t be able to enable
online multiplayer for the Xbox version of the game or access the Xbox
achievements feature. The Creators Program does let you still access
Xbox’s leaderboards and party chat features. In one potential downside,
games listed through the program will be kept in a separate section of
the Xbox Store, which could limit their exposure to reach as wide an
audience as ID@Xbox titles.
“With the Creators Program, anyone can integrate Xbox
Live sign-in, presence, and social features into their UWP games, then
publish their game to Xbox One and Windows 10,” Chris Charla, director
of the ID@Xbox program, wrote in a blog post.
“This means their title can see exposure to every Xbox One owner across
the Xbox One family of devices, including Project Scorpio this holiday,
as well as hundreds of millions of Windows 10 PCs, and millions of
folks using the Xbox app on mobile platforms.”
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