http://indiegames.com : For indies self-publishing on PlayStation 4, here's what to expect

tbulford

Not sure if anyone has posted this link cant find it on the forums.

Its of interest if you looking towards PS4 development in the future. Still not sure what the dev kits will cost.

http://indiegames.com/2013/07/for_indies_self-publishing_on_.html

EvanGreenwood

It looks like they really are going to make it very easy to put a game on PSN and PS4.

I like that they're going to be choosing games to promote... hopefully our South African games will score highly on the "objective quality" meter and our games will benefit from the full weight of the Playstation Twitter account (which is the source of promotion mentioned in the article... though I really hope there is more to Sony's promotion than that)...

As far as Free Lives goes, I'm a little bit apprehensive that the openness might create a XBox Live or Appstore environment. It really depends on how they promote games and how they arrange the store.

My concern is that if there is a deluge of not very good titles then the consumers might get burned, and the price of games might get driven down like on the Appstore, or freemium might be far more viable than paid (I'd really like to sell paid for experience personally).

But I don't know if these are real concerns. As much as openness really works for PC, I'm not sure it's always that good a thing on consoles. I think because it's easier to find information on games on the internet (on PC) the negative effects of openness are avoided on PC... but openness on a store where users have to rely on a few screenshots or developer made videos, in order to avoid the terrifying dangers of crapware, isn't necessarily as good for consumers... or developers.

I mean I think Sony could go too open and unwieldy (and it be a little like XBox Live), but I wonder how much Sony are talking about "openness" when really they intend to only promote a tightly curated selection who then make a lot of money while obscure games make next to nothing.

But I'm not really sure. Although I do think Sony are very capable of stuffing something like this up.

But I do really like the idea of even prototypes being able to be distributed on PlayStation. Even if it can't be an adequate source of income, getting a game into living rooms is something I'm super keen to do.

Is this news from PlayStation being read as positive news in Indie spheres?

dislekcia

Well, remember that XBLA and XBLIG are two very, very different things. XBLA was closed, required devkits and publishing through either Microsoft Game Studios or a 3rd party publisher due to limited "slots" each launch season. XBLA also got front-of-dashboard marketing and promo love from Microsoft most of the time, depending on the game and Microsoft's sales expectations.

XBLIG, on the other hand, was open as anything, didn't require a devkit (so worked on retail hardware, which was awesome) but didn't get any promotion or visibility on the dashboard, so nobody knew about it. That's why it turned into a pile of sludge - there was no signal boosting of quality games by Microsoft, so it just turned into a race to build gimmicky games as quickly as possible so that their meagre returns would cover the costs of development. That's why Avatar Minecraft Massage Controller shit is what sells there the most.

If Sony are going to be promoting quality content, then I think that's a good way to prevent the cesspool problem. It might get a bit like the App Store after a while, but there will definitely be a window of opportunity if you've got a quality game ready to go on it close to the launch of the PS4.

tbulford

@BlackShipsFilltheSky I remain cautiously optimistic about the possibility. I haven't heard much from the other indie guys about the announcement good or bad. I think a quality assurance model is good for both the developers and the consumers, as long as its about the end users getting a good product. Seams Sony are happy to give free feedback on indie products I would be taking them up on that offer, better to have there eye on it for free. I cant think why you would want to skip that step.

@dislekcia Not sure we would be able to have anything ready in time for launch I cant find anything about dev kits yet (did someone else pick that up am I blind/lazy?)

At least there is a potential open door for local developers, if they don't turn around and do the territories thing they already have on there mobile platform. After all if we have to publish to Sony mobile from the UK right now who is to say we wont end up with a similar issue for PS4 its solvable of course but the extra step really can be a pain.

EvanGreenwood

Yeah, it wasn't entirely the "openness" aspect that made me worry about the possibility of an XBox Live situation.

It was also that when the Sony guy mentioned marketing he only mentioned twitter and the PlayStation blog.

Which I don't think are nearly as powerful at selling games as promotional space on the front end (like XBox Live Arcade games got).

So the worst possible interpretation sort of sounds like they could be describing Xbox Live (plus one tweet and a blog post).

I'd feel a bit more confident if they say specifically that games that Sony thinks are of good quality will be advertised in some way in their store UI. It seems a weird omission when talking about marketing indie games.

Though I think it might be implied...

dislekcia

Sorry, when you say "Xbox Live" do you mean XBLIG? Because Xbox Live is this totally different thing that people pay for, but Microsoft also uses it as the first part of its two different downloadable games services, so it's hella confusing...

EvanGreenwood

Doh! I'm actually properly confused about XBox's terminology.

I meant the place on the XBox marketplace where indie games go when they aren't accepted onto the Arcade.

Is that "XBLIG" ... Which stands for "XBox Live Indie Games" I presume?

Does that mean people have to pay a subscription to access them in the first place? (i.e. they are behind an XBox Live paygate)

dislekcia

Xbox Live = the online part of the 360's offering, comes in two flavors.
Xbox Live Silver = free version of Xbox Live that everyone that has an account with Microsoft has access to, allows friends lists, chat messages, etc.
Xbox Live Gold = paid version of Xbox Live that you have subscribe to, allows multiplayer access between games, think it adds party and voice chat support, blah.

Xbox Live Arcade = downloadable games service that has N "slots" per year/season/thing, needs devkits to work on, requires publisher, Monaco, Dishwasher, Geometry Wars.
Xbox Live Indie Games = downloadable games service that allows people with Creators Club (or whatever it's called now) membership ($100) to publish XNA-based games to hidden storefront on 360. No publishers or devkits. Super Rumble Massager 3000.

XBLIG isn't where XBLA games that don't make it go. You have to use XNA to be able to work on XBLIG and, barring a couple of games like Schizoid early on, there's very little support for XNA from the actual devkit side of things. If you don't secure an XBLA slot, you're not going to start developing for that platform, end of story.

EvanGreenwood

Thanks!... it sounds like all the information I knew, just laid out with enough demarcation that finally allows me able to communicate the various relationships that XBox has to indie games with the correct names.

Yeah... I guess I knew that XBLIG games can't be XBox Arcade games (because they require different frameworks, and the submission process is entirely different)... but such a system seems so anti-indie that somehow in my brain couldn't process it.

I meant indie games on XBox that aren't XBLA. I didn't mean that XBLIG games can ascend to be XBLA games, because obviously they can't.

I'll be more careful with my Xbox proper-nouns in future.

tbulford

Thanks for clearing all that up @dislekcia although I say clearing up with a bit of a frown sounds more complicated then I would have wanted. We looked into XBLIG but XNA was already end of life and it didn't sound like a good opportunity.

I guess we will have to wait and see what PS4 actually ends up doing. A little front page love for a good game would be awesome, but if my guess is right, a good game would be measured off how well its doing. So the titles that get attention earlier on will climb faster. I doubt it would be "We tested this game and REALLY like it", So we pushing it up the ranks for our players.

Ultimately though I feel the best time to get on board would be right at the start. Fewer titles fewer eyeballs but if you can get the early attention perhaps you can hold it as the platform grows. I am looking forward to hearing what the SDK and publishing requirements are.

dislekcia

Yeah, your best bet to get featured anywhere isn't to go through something like testing and hope that someone likes your game, it's to go out and make contact with the platform spokespeople and sell them your game so that they'll want to feature it as a positive thing for their users :)