23 Jun
2004
23 Jun
'04
5:39 a.m.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Doc Shipley" <doc(a)mdrconsult.com>
To: <General(a)mdrconsult.com>
Sent: Wednesday, June 23, 2004 12:45 PM
Subject: Re: Modern Electronics (was Re: List charter mods & headcount... ;
.
There's another huge problem with game development. A guy I work
with in AZ had a new game engine and story plot on the boards, had
tested it running in Linux, and were ready to port to mainstream
platforms. His group found that to gain access to what they needed to
run on XBox and/or Windows, they had to sign developer contracts that
would effectively prohibit sale of their game on any other platform, and
gave Microsoft considerable control over pricing, target market, and
even content and development of the game itself.
Michael told me that the only upside to the MS terms was that Sony's
terms were much *worse*.
Doc
I think all the console makers try to get games as exclusives, Nintendo
pioneered this trick over 10 years ago.
Console makers have final say on what gets sold, so developers cant flood
the market with crap like the games that killed the Atari 2600.