How do I get into Xbox Live?

App2Top: Hi! Suppose there is a developer who has published a small PC game on Steam. And he wants the game to appear on Xbox Live in a version for either Xbox 360 or Xbox One. Who should I go to at Microsoft?

Andrey Ivashentsev:Hi ! He should go to us. Our department is called Developer Experience and Evangelism, and our task is to make the life of developers more beautiful, kinder and more convenient. Recently, as soon as the Xbox One appeared, and it became possible to develop games and applications for it, it passed into our jurisdiction. Previously, this was handled by the corporate Business Development team – special people who were mainly engaged only in Xbox. No one but them had the necessary expertise, and now our department has it, and we started helping developers in local markets.

App2Top: Listen, and on the Windows 10 store – also to go to you, it turns out?

Andrey Ivashentsev: Yes, we are the entry point for all developers. For indie developers and more serious developers. Now, if a company or developer wants to make a game on Xbox, it’s best to start your journey by communicating with our department.

App2Top: What is the best way for a small team with an independent project to go out, on 360 or on One? Because 360 has a very large install base, and One is in the stage of popularization. Where is it better to go?  

Andrey Ivashentsev: Of course, the console, which has been sold for the last 10 years, has won a huge market share. It can and should be developed for it. The problem is that it is currently quite difficult to develop toys for it. Now, for my part, I do not fully understand the logistics of publishing games on 360. On these issues, we are connecting the Business Development team, who have been doing this for the last few years. But there is no examination of the local Xbox 360 software. Of course, we can find it if necessary, but from the point of view of the right audience, we focus everyone on 1.5 billion Windows 10 devices, which include Xbox, mobile and everything else. To do this, we have Universal Windows Platform – a universal application model that works everywhere. On all our platforms.

App2Top: We continue with this supposed indie project. Let’s say we have a Unity project. And we want to release it for Xbox One. How hard or easy is it to adapt the whole thing? How much can it cost, won’t it cost our small studio a pretty penny?

Andrey Ivashentsev: I don’t see a problem here. All major major engines – Unreal Engine, Unity, Game Maker and others – are supported by Xbox One. Unity is something that we love and support very actively. It is free, convenient, easy to learn. Therefore, Unity is now the most popular option in the ID@Xbox program, and a free Unity Pro license is issued to everyone who gets into the program.

Let me tell you a little about ID@Xbox. You can’t just release a game on Xbox One. Imagine that we have a whole market of people who write “Tetris” and “Tic-Tac-Toe”. They all want to break into Xbox One and sell these “Tic-Tac-Toe” in a thousand different variations. Of course, this is not cool for the console ecosystem. The console is an entertainment device of the premium segment, it costs a lot of money and a hundred and so in the living room. When we turn on the Xbox One, we expect to experience a wonderful experience that will allow us to relax and get a small release of endorphin. That is why access to the console is formally restricted and we manually check the titles for their relevance.

App2Top: Exactly your team?

Andrey Ivashentsev: Look, there’s a program. It’s called ID@Xbox and is designed to attract indie developers to the console. ID is an independent developer. We collect cool indie projects from all over the world. They are nominated: there is a special website where the developer fills out a special questionnaire, where he enters links to mobile versions of toys, sketches. If this is a completely new game, then links to the gameplay concept, demo video and alpha version. And the questionnaire will be viewed by real people who will check the game for adequacy and relevance. If someone wants to send “Tetris”, then the probability that this game will take place in our store is small. Of course, I saw some kind of “Tetris” on the console, but probably he was so good that he was more lucky than others.

App2Top: Did I understand correctly that this is such an analogue of Greenlight?

Andrey Ivashentsev: To some extent, yes. This is a pre-moderation, but not in a public form, like Greenlight. In order for you to be able to port the game to Xbox One, you should be given the go-ahead. It’s not very difficult. The game should be cool, unique and original, and not some sad little-developed clone. That is, the game should be liked by someone else besides the girl, mother and grandmother of the developer. Because mom, girlfriend and grandmother are not exactly relevant target audience.

App2Top: I’ve missed the moment now. Who exactly chooses on this site? The Xbox team?

Andrey Ivashentsev: Yes, there is a separate ID@Xbox team that oversees all work with individual developers. They are all centralized in Redmond and in London. One team deals with the Western Hemisphere, the second with the Eastern Hemisphere. Accordingly, we work with the UK to a greater extent and to a lesser extent with the US. Due to the fact that the selection is done manually by living people, it takes some time. And that’s why we’re seeing more and more indie Xbox One games. This number is gradually increasing, and we, for our part, are trying to make sure that more cool Russian teams get on the console.

App2Top: And orient yourself by time? The developer, for example, sent a ready-made project. How long before the answer comes?

Andrey Ivashentsev: If the game is really cool, with unique and beautiful art, with interesting game mechanics that uses a gamepad, Kinect, and anything else, then it can be quite easy and fast to pass. It is much easier to take a good game and release it to the console than to deal with a superficial description of the project at very early stages.

If you write that here, I have a cool game idea, art sketches and two developers in Vladivostok, but there is no build, then this is a completely different story both in time and approach. Because the ID@Xbox program is, after all, an overhead on the part of Microsoft – providing two DevKit consoles, providing licenses for Unity and involving the team at the stage of publishing the game in the Store. And of course, in order for the answer to come faster, it is best to have contact with a local Microsoft.

App2Top: Is there a checklist?

Andrey Ivashentsev: No, there is no ready-made checklist. There is a questionnaire on the program page where the description of the project is entered. And real, real people should understand from the description of the game that it is cool. That’s all. There is no robot that checks the questionnaire for the presence/absence of a unique idea and an interesting storyline.

App2Top: Clear. Such a question: what gives the appearance in Xbox Live? What things can Microsoft itself guarantee? Will the project be featured? Is there open data on what sales an average indie game on Xbox Live can claim?

Andrey Ivashentsev: Unfortunately, these data are not available to me, because they vary greatly from developer to developer, and our privacy policy does not allow sharing them in interviews.

To understand how this process happens, let’s delve into the technical details. There is an Xbox One and there is an Xbox 360. Getting into the ID@Xbox allows you to be released everywhere. It’s easier and faster on Xbox One. On Xbox 360, it’s slower. The mechanism of feathering and all other things there is less convenient than in Xbox One. When we launch on Xbox One, we have all sorts of Spotlight Sales, there are collections of freshly released indie games, there are sales, – anything. It all depends on what the developer is willing to do to promote his game. We have Games With Gold, where every month a player receives certain games at a discount or for free on a “golden” Xbox Live subscription. Microsoft and an indie developer can agree on a number of special conditions and take the game into the program.

App2Top: What about the fritupley? Does the company support frituplay, on what terms does it work with such developers?

Andrey Ivashentsev: Actually, yes, he supports it. And there are already released games, including within the framework of ID @ Xbox, but there are not very many of them.

In the standard concept of Paid games, you pay a certain amount of money for the game and get the opportunity to play it as much as you want. Then there is the mechanics of the season pass, if you want some buns, add-ons and everything else.

The question about frituplay is the first one I hear from most of our mobile developers who want to go to Xbox One. Most of them now have freeplay titles, and they want to release them in the same format, without changes. And it works a little specific, taking into account the specifics of the audience.

App2Top: How does Microsoft itself feel about this? There are also strong fritupley titles that would be interesting, including for Microsoft’s solvent audience. Is there a threshold? For example, when a company decides to launch two or three such developers, and then takes only premium games?

Andrey Ivashentsev: No, there is no such threshold. At least, I haven’t heard of it. It all depends on the quality of the game. As with any closed ecosystem, what you need to think about when you come to Microsoft to offer a game – will my game help the platform become more popular? Will people play it more often – for the sake of my game? It should be win-win. So that Microsoft also receives value from the fact that it lets the developer into its market, allocates resources.

It is important to have very high-quality titles and make sure that the quality of the game is in the first place, and profitability is in the second. Well, or to have a reasonable balance between these components. Because many people just want to make money from a paying audience, and we, as a platform, want cool toys.

App2Top: Are there many Russian teams going to Microsoft now? Is there a big queue for you?

Andrey Ivashentsev: Yes, a lot of people are coming, and a lot of people are asking how to get there. Last May, the day before DevGAMM, we held a special semi-closed conference in Moscow. It was just a conference about the development of games for Xbox One. About 200 people came to us. Accordingly, this is 200 developers who are interested in having their game published on Xbox One. Probably 80 percent were from Moscow, but about 20% came from all over Russia, from Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Belarus.

We also had a closed-type consultation with some of the leading mobile developers in the CIS, where we privately signed the ID@Xbox program with most of these partners. I can’t share information on the stages of development, but so far none of the Russian participants of ID@Xbox have had releases on Xbox One. But a lot of companies have signed up, of various scales, from large holdings and mature game studios to very small indie developers. The smallest team that I liked consisted of only two people – a designer and a developer. They made the most gorgeous platformer and continue to do it. Let’s see how things will go for them, I really support this project with all my heart.

That is, the program is very democratic. The main thing is to show the desire, to declare that you will make a very cool game. And you don’t just sincerely want to do it, but you can and will. These are the next two steps that need to be thought through in advance.

App2Top: Ideally, you need to have a ready-made product.

Andrey Ivashentsev: Yes, or a reserve of money for development. Because if a person comes from the street, says, I want to make a game, then we have to spend time and effort on him. And then he will take it and do nothing! And also somehow he will be offended with us that we did not help him well. Not the best option, you must admit.

App2Top: Is the company ready to introduce any investment projects now? To attract Microsoft Studios as a publisher, to say that here, here is such an amazing product that it should be taken under your care?

Andrey Ivashentsev: I think that everything can be discussed. You can never say that there is no such possibility at all. I have met only a few projects that could be tried to take under the wing of Microsoft, but this is rather rare. Either they have been under the wing for a long time (we have several Russian studios that make our console games within Microsoft Studios), or they are developers who want to make big games on their own and do not want any publisher. And ID@Xbox is a program just for them.

In general, I love such moments when people come to me and say: “I need a million dollars, and I’ll make you a cool game! I’ll make you a new S.T.A.L.K.E.R., just a little bit in a different setting and a little bit differently. But it will be a cool shooter with zombies and everything else! Just give me a million dollars, or better yet, 10 and Microsoft Studios support.”

App2Top: Come on! Does this happen?

Andrey Ivashentsev: Regularly! You’d be surprised how often this happens.

However, there are also a huge number of cool projects that support my faith in the domestic GameDev. Therefore, if your readers have a good game and it should definitely be on Xbox, I am ready to have coffee with them and discuss options.

Alexander Semenov talked

Deciphered by Irina Smirnova