Sony has announced a new $20 million, three-year investment plan that will see more PlayStation Network exclusive games released from both first-party studios and independent developers.
The financial support will, in part, be put into the company's Pub Fund program, first announced back at the Game Developers Conference in 2009, that strives to help independent developers publish their games via the PlayStation Network.
As part of the fund, developers keep the game's IP and choose the pricing, while SCEA helps with the game design and marketing plans for the title.
Several upcoming titles are set to benefit from the new investment plan, including Eufloria, Okabu, Payday: The Heist and Papo & Yo.
Brandon Stander, director of PlayStation Network marketing at SCEA, noted, "PlayStation Network is poised to deliver an enviable line-up of exclusive and imaginative games this year, with highly anticipated first-party titles like thatgamecompany’s Journey and PixelJunk Sidescroller."
"We’re doubling down on PlayStation Network software, and under this additional investment over the next three years, we anticipate a steady flow of high-quality titles that can’t be found anywhere else."
No comments? Really? Not even one? I haven't seen a single publisher acknowledge the importance of small independent developers like Sony is doing by setting up this fund. I think it shows great vision from their part.
I recently saw a GDC Keynote presentation from Satoru Iwata in 2005, and one line stuck with me: "Big game companies are getting bigger by consuming smaller ones."
This strikes me as a surprisingly accurate statement, especially in the console space, and will only be more relevant as games continue to increase in size and complexity. Fans demand a constant stream of games from publishing houses, and as games increase in complexity, they also increase in development time. Having several studios and several games in development at the same time is essential to a publishers success.
Successful development studios are created from the passion and creativity of individuals that love the industry and want to try something innovative or better than the competition. They need money and funding to create experiences that have the potential to be successful in the highly competitive console market. Sony is making a great move here by securing great relationships and helping studios grow. Microsoft is not doing enough (publishing on XNA already requires a strong, stable team, with few exceptions, and the Indie Channel has not been the success it could have been). I can't really comment on Nintendo (don't really know much about their business strategy), but aside from Retro and Team Ninja, I don't know any development studio that ever received funding or help from them.
Props to you Sony, I'm rooting for your future success.
So by choosing their selected studios for which they will allow to (I imagine) develop freely on their PSN platform, they're doing more than with XNA which allows anybody to make a game for the platform?! I'd prefer if they would allow anybody, not just whoever they pick, to have free access to the platform to develop games even if it's just for practice or tests.
I second Samuel's commendation. Sony is doing a lot of stuff right business-wise these days. The PSN Outage was a huge let down for fans, but Sony more than made up for it with the Welcome Back program.
This article makes me curious: Who can we contact about this opportunity?
I recently saw a GDC Keynote presentation from Satoru Iwata in 2005, and one line stuck with me: "Big game companies are getting bigger by consuming smaller ones."
This strikes me as a surprisingly accurate statement, especially in the console space, and will only be more relevant as games continue to increase in size and complexity. Fans demand a constant stream of games from publishing houses, and as games increase in complexity, they also increase in development time. Having several studios and several games in development at the same time is essential to a publishers success.
Successful development studios are created from the passion and creativity of individuals that love the industry and want to try something innovative or better than the competition. They need money and funding to create experiences that have the potential to be successful in the highly competitive console market. Sony is making a great move here by securing great relationships and helping studios grow. Microsoft is not doing enough (publishing on XNA already requires a strong, stable team, with few exceptions, and the Indie Channel has not been the success it could have been). I can't really comment on Nintendo (don't really know much about their business strategy), but aside from Retro and Team Ninja, I don't know any development studio that ever received funding or help from them.
Props to you Sony, I'm rooting for your future success.
This article makes me curious: Who can we contact about this opportunity?