There is a story on C|Net talking about the ability for 'everybody' to start creating games on the Xbox. This process is being rolled out in stages, the first being get a kit and join a club where you and the other club members can play with each other. Each other's games, get your mind out of the gutter..
Overtime the company hopes to evolve to a general, more open, code it, share it, etc, type ecosystem.
"With the hobbyist release, the software giant is hoping to lay the groundwork for what one day will be a thriving network of enthusiasts developing for one another, something akin to a YouTube for games. The company, however, is pretty far from that goal."
I generally view this as good news for people wanting to get into this biz. It is especially good news to see Scott Henson driving this process at Microsoft. Scott was one of the original Developer Relations Evangelists from the good old days and knows the value of an ecosystem as good as anybody in Microsoft today.
If you were somebody like, say, Steve Lacy, you might view this an opportunity knocking. Should be interesting and might just the thing to get me to upgrade my Atari 800.
Do not fall into the trap of thinking of the XBox as being a game platform. Wearing sheep's clothing does not make one a sheep.
The XBox is a high-bandwidth, low-latentcy, parallel processing monster -- a super-computer in a plastic shell. Opening the system to third-party developers allows this platform's power to be unleashed in other markets.
Here's an example. The architecture of game consoles (XBox, PS3) is ideal for digital electronic music synthesis. These consoles are (1) more powerful (2) less expensive, and (3) easier to use, than anything made by Yamaha, Roland, Korg, etc. They offer standard USB interfaces, so any modern controller keyboards can plug right into them -- no muss, no fuss. All they need is music synthesis software, and opening up these platforms makes the emergence of such software inevitable.
Another attractive feature of the game console as a platform is its low rate of software piracy, compared to the PC. Assume that game platform's rate of software piracy is one tenth that of the PC. In effect, that multiplies the installed base of the game console by a factor of ten, when a third party makes a platform-targeting decision. That means that a game console platform can be a profitable deployment target for non-game software at a much lower installed base than the PC. Actually getting paid is a strong attraction. (That's one reason why software developers in China tend to target cell phones instead of PC's.)
This development is likely to disrupt the electronic musical instrument industry's leaders. Yamaha has an acoustic instrument business to fall back on, but Roland and Korg are probably among the walking dead. The game consoles will eviscerate their markets for electronic music synthesis hardware.
Creative destruction, indeed.
Posted by: Jim Plamondon | September 13, 2006 at 05:43