Microsoft generated a lot of media hype this past week when it revealed it would allow games made for its Xbox One console to be self-published by their developers. While we are still waiting for the specific details of how that will work, an indie game developer claims that Microsoft will expand that effort to the Xbox 360"s Xbox Live Arcade.
FarSight Studios, the maker of game titles like The Pinball Arcade, sent out a newsletter this week which, according to Polygon, revealed Microsoft"s upcoming publishing policy changes as far as releasing XBLA games. The Pinball Arcade was first released for that platform in 2012 but because of Microsoft"s requirements FarSight needed an agreement with a third party publisher, which it got with Crave Entertainment.
However, Crave Entertainment shut down operations later that year and as a result, The Pinball Arcade was removed from the Xbox Live Arcade Marketplace. In this week"s newsletter, FarSight stated:
Microsoft has just announced that indie developers (like FarSight) can now self-publish on Xbox Live Arcade instead of being required to find publishers for their games ... This means we can bring The Pinball Arcade back to the 360 ourselves, and also opens the door to an Xbox One version of The Pinball Arcade in the future!
FarSight claims that Microsoft will officially change its XBLA publishing policies in August. So far, Microsoft has yet to admit to such a change. Polygon got a statement from the company that said simply, ""We have not announced any changes to our publishing policy for Xbox 360."
The Xbox 360 does have a way for small indie game teams to self-publish their creations via the Xbox Live Indie Games channel, but very few games have been launched successfully from that platform due to Microsoft giving that channel little to no publicity. Microsoft has already stated that it will ditch both the Xbox Live Arcade and Xbox Live Indie Games labels for downloadable games made for the Xbox One.
Source: Polygon | Image via Microsoft