Today, Microsoft announced their XNA Game Studio Express program, “a new product which will allow indie developers and students to develop simultaneously on Xbox 360 and PC, and share their games to others in a new Xbox 360 ‘Creators Club’”. It sounds great. Essentially, anyone who can cough up the yearly fee (less than $100), will be able to create games for the Xbox 360. This will allow any indie to develop games for the 360, with very little overhead costs for licensing tools/dev kits/technology. Already, Garagegames have announced that they already have ported both their 3D and 2D engines to support the XNA Game Studio Express platform.

I think this is another excellent move on Microsoft’s part. They have already opened up the gates for indie development on the console with the advent of their Xbox Live Arcade (XBLA) service. Small game companies can already create games for the Xbox and have them distributed digitally on the Xbox. This new offer only widens the gates they have already opened. While the details for distribution are a lot more murky (there are 4 sets of conditions before someone can even access your binary), you can certainly bet that Microsoft will use this to both attract and market upcoming talent, and little known titles. I fully expect Microsoft to eventually create a new area in the XBLA marketplace where people can purchase some of the better titles created through this program by indies.

What’s really ingenious is that once again, they have trumped Sony. As you will all remember Sony has already announced their plans to make available a certain amount of tools for homebrew developers:

“Because we have plans for having Linux on board [the PS3], we also recognize Linux programming activities… Other than game studios tied to official developer licenses, we’d like to see various individuals participate in content creation for the PS3.”

Of course, I may be reading into a lot more into that than there really is, but it sounds to me that Sony also wants to make an effort to appeal to indie developers. After all, it’s become obvious that a publisher (like Microsoft) can make a great deal of money by offering cheap games for download. It would be an obvious avenue for Sony to follow as well. Sony does have the added advantage of the coolness factor involved with programming with the Cell Processor. I can already imagine the ads: “Do you have what it takes to handle the awesome power of the CELL?”. And I have heard a fairly strong rumor that Sony would actually make the Cell accessible (with some restrictions) to homebrew developers. Of course, that’s just a rumour.

Getting back to my point…I applaud Microsoft for taking a strong stand in supporting the indie community. Obviously, they stand to make a pretty penny from any successful indie title, but it would also be well deserved. Microsoft is really moving in the right direction, appealing both to the mainstream and the fringe. I hope Nintendo and Sony both follow in Microsoft’s footsteps.

Posted by Raoul on Tuesday, August 15th, 2006 at 10:56 am.