DIYgamer

Where are Our Indie Games Sony, Nintendo?

Late last year, Microsoft announced a new program that was designed to give indie developers a spotlight in the world of console development. It was an area that didn’t require extensive certifications or ratings requirements. I am, of course, speaking about Xbox Live Indie Games. While the service has put out a few non-games (you can read our take on there here) it has overwhelmingly been a positive force in the world of indie gaming. No longer were indie games tied to the PC and all of the negative side effects that come with it. Unfortunately, neither Sony nor Nintendo have been quick to follow suit and both’s primary consoles are without any strong indie presence.

Now I’m not saying that the Wii and Playstation 3 don’t have any indie games. In fact, both systems have more than a few on their respective download services. However, both have hefty certification processes and ratings systems one must contend with that makes it still pale in comparison to what the Xbox 360 offers.

Both Sony and Nintendo each have a unique opportunity to expand indie gaming in ways the Xbox 360 can’t. While the 360 has made the first step they are lacking two great things that would make indie gaming truly a great experience on both the Playstation 3 and the Nintendo Wii: free online play and motion controls, respectively.

When Nintendo first launched it’s system almost three years ago there was much talk and discussion about how developers would utilize the motion control scheme. Some doubted it would ever amount to much while other dreamed of the best, most kickass games of all time. The reality fell somewhere in the middle, actually.

As it turns out major publishers were (and still are) a bit wary of developing anything truly revolutionary with the controls. This has created a sort of void for great motion controlling games. Something that the indie crowd could definitely fulfill. Let’s face it, if there is one group of developers who truly push and expand any given genre, it’s the indies. They’ve done it with damn near every genre so far and they can do it with motion controls as well.

The Playstation 3, on the other hand, has a different but equally promising take on indie development. Currently there aren’t many indie games on Xbox Live that feature any sort of online play. There may not be a specific reason for this, but if I had to choose one it’d be that the number of people who could play your game online would shrink by a sizable amount given the fact that to play online you need to pay a monthly/yearly subscription. The PS3 doesn’t have a pay model for online gaming and as such it could prove to a boon to online indie gaming.

Of course, even with those things, Xbox Live Indie Games isn’t even near perfection. There are ways that each company could actively pursue indie developers and probably come out on top, despite Microsoft’s early push. The first thing that comes to my mind is they could, you know, try to actively market the channel; something that Microsoft painfully neglects.

In the end, though, we are still stuck with one console, out of three, that allows for the easy development of indie games. It’s a very sad reality given the possibilities that could be wrought by Nintendo and Sony actively jumping into the fray, but one we’ll have to live with until either of those two companies sees the advantage in stepping up to the task…