N+ Developers Talk Smack About XBLA, Gamers Freak Out

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March 22nd, 2008 posted by Link in Rants, Xbox 360

Gamasutra recently posted an interview with N+ developers Metanet Software and Slick Entertainment discussing some of the difficulties they had during the game’s production, most notably, some griefs with Xbox Live Arcade. In response to the backlash they’ve received from the community, Metanet has posted an article in their defense on their own site. Is this all overblown, or does Metanet actually some something worthwhile to tell the community?

It’s true that Metanet claimed “Xbox Live Arcade is full of shit.” And frankly, I think it’s crazy to argue with them. There are over a hundred games on the service and I probably only own four or five. Where gamers might feel one way about the service, seeing it as a cool new way to get games, developers feel differently. Microsoft recently changed the royalty rates on XBLA to a point where it’s very difficult for indie developers to publish their own games. Microsoft takes anywhere from 35% to 70% of a game’s total revenue depending on how much they put into localization and play testing. Metanet isn’t happy about the change because it completely changes their plans for the future. It’s basically forcing independents to get publishers, even for online distribution, which violates the whole reason XBLA was made in the first place.

Metanet cites a scenario where one of their own pitched an “arcade melee combat racing” game, but it was shot down because XBLA has too many racing games. Wait, so they let Yaris through but this isn’t even going to get a chance?

I think Metanet is absolutely correct. WiiWare isn’t much better because Nintendo forces developers to incorporate the Wii’s various features (waggle controls) into their games before they can pass qualty control.  The general consensus I’ve heard from independents is that PlayStation Network is the best console solution right now because they offer the Havok physics engine for free and they’ll publish pretty much anything (although they also require you to use their controller’s various features when it’s possible). XBLA is way oversaturated, but it’s a shame that Microsoft is trying to solve the problem by increasing royalty rates and denying potentially good games the right to being published through their service.