Jim Sink (Microsoft) - Getting your game on Xbox Live Arcade

I’ve attended a few lectures like this in the past, most notably the one at GDC 07, so I wasn’t sure whether there would be anything new to report from here, but I was pleasantly surprised. Not only was there updated information, but Jim went into so much detail that I’m glad I recorded the session – I wouldn’t have been able to keep up scribbling notes, especially since he didn’t use slides. If you’re serious about trying to get a game on the XBLA platform, I suggest you read the following very carefully and thoroughly. I’m going to apologize for the lack of any real structure – having no slides to highlight the sections of his talk, I’m just going to write it up as he delivered it.

What is an Xbox Live Arcade game?

The one thing to remember about XBLA games that Microsoft loves to see is: pick up and play, easy to learn, hard to master. This pretty much defines the core of an XBLA game.

XBLA isn’t the best place for a 1st person shooter. Microsoft is really on the lookout for more unique game play experiences, especially ones that focus on bite-sized game sessions of 10-30 minutes. Longer sessions are okay, and some genres like turn-based strategy or board gaming do require it, but in other cases any long game play should only be in addition to short sessions.

Social experience is key. The Live service puts you in connection with all of your friends and you must leverage this. The best example would be Uno, which no one at Microsoft believed would be such an incredible hit. Their guess to its success is how it makes use of the video chat capabilities of the Live service. With the exception of classics like Castlevania, multi-player is required in your XBLA game.

Cooperative games are plus, however non-combat play is an even bigger plus.

Retro titles can be common, but well-known retro only is the only chance of being accepted. If you’re a fan of some old Neo Geo game that was released only in Japan you will want to reconsider submitting it to XBLA. In addition, retro titles need to look like they belong in a 360, adapting to the possibility of widescreen and upgrading the graphics. There are exceptions, of course. You really can’t mess with games like Castlevania, Marathon, and Doom. Not only that, but retro ports should also include new levels and game play. Microsoft does not consider XBLA a bargain bin for old titles.

XBLA games used to be limited to a 50MB download, which has since been increased to 150MB. Still, that doesn’t mean you should leap to take advantage of this size increase. There are still people who will be unwilling to sit and wait for a 150MB game to download versus a 30MB game. Still keep your content footprint as small as possible, there’s no reason to push the limits.

A good balance of original and existing IP is a great advantage.

Don’t just consider competitive online multi-player, but think also of multi-player on the couch, and not necessarily co-op play either. One thing Microsoft would love to see more of is asymmetrical multiplayer, which means to allow players of various skill levels to compete against one another. So for example, setting the handicap in a golf game or like in Guitar Hero, letting people battle on different skill levels.

Making your game stand out

Several quick notes on how to make your game stand out from the crowd.

Compelling use of peripherals – like Uno’s use of the video camera
Chat, online voice – make your game interactive with other users, not just played by other users
Compelling use of achievements – let achievements help to drive your game play
Original ideas for downloadable content – let DC expand your game’s experience

Publishing forecast

To give you an idea of the current state of affairs in regards to the XBLA platform, there are around 102 games released at this time, however there are also about 80-100 that have been approved and are in various stages of release. Currently the Live team is releasing 2 games per week. That number is expected to rise as the number of Xboxes out there increases.

Getting onto XBLA

There are two ways to get your game onto XBLA. One is through a 3rd party publisher, and the other is directly through Microsoft. Neither way has any great advantage, it’s just two ways to achieve the same goal. Working through Microsoft is the route that many (if not all) indie developers will take, whereas going through a 3rd party publisher is a method for established studios in the industry. There are four Business Development Managers that work with indies to help get their games published by Microsoft, whereas the 3rd party publishers (like Activision, EA, etc) all have Account Managers from Microsoft who bring their games to the table. An approval commission of around 15 people from all areas of Xbox development within Microsoft will then review the game. Is it fun? Does it raise the bar or nudge the needle in innovation? Will it perform well utilizing key aspects of the service? No single one of these is a deal -maker, you want to have all three. Although Microsoft will take chances on a game they believe in , even if they fear it might not sell well, as that is one of the purposes for the XBLA platform.

One thing Microsoft will do is keep a wall between indies and 3rd parties to keep game ideas from being duplicated. Business Developers who are working with you will not see any 3rd party contracts. If you and a 3rd party submit similar game ideas and Microsoft decides to go with yours and after its release the 3rd party claims you stole their idea, there won’t be any legal issues since you and your contact in Microsoft never saw the 3rd party’s similar design. Microsoft gets similar game designs more often than not.

Doing it the indie way

So I doubt many of you out there have ties to Activision or EA (among others), which means the first step you have to take is to submit your game to arcade@microsoft.com. They will send you back a concept submission form, which is essentially a template to help you put your best foot forward on your experience. People like Jim (Business Development Managers) will see your game and if they like it take to Microsoft and be your cheerleaders.

How you submit a game to Microsoft will decide whether it gets approved. Obviously if you submit a few sketches and a couple of pages of text describing the game, you’re most likely going to be turned down, at least initially. Only with an established IP or previous experience developing on XBLA will maybe, maybe get you an approval to begin development. Sending in an almost complete game can be great, except if Microsoft doesn’t like several things it’s going to me much harder to make any major changes in the game play. The sweet spot is to submit just a simple prototype that is fun to play and expresses the core feature that makes your game special. Artwork showing how the game will look beyond the demo are bonus as well. If you don’t have a playable demo then a video showing the game play will suffice, although playable prototypes are far more preferred. Once a game is approved Microsoft will hold you to the look and feel – they will not let you release the game until it matches what you showed them in your initial pitch. To help you in this, you will be assigned a producer from Microsoft to oversee the development of your title. The first question the producer will ask however is – can you deliver? Microsoft doesn’t want to fund a team that will peter out after 6 months and never release to Live, they just don’t want to see it happen to people.

If the producer likes you and/or your team, then you will dive into the wonderful world of publishing contracts. Jim did not go into detail here, so if you reach this stage – good luck to you!

Once development begins, make sure you realize what you’re in for. Generally it takes 9 months to a year at least to get an XBLA title released. The reason for this is simple – in addition to development you have to go through certification, localization and rating (covered later).

The XBLA market

So what’s it like earning revenue off XBLA? Well the lovely things about digital distribution is that, unlike retail, you’re not hoping to move a certain number of units in the first week of release or anything like that. In fact Microsoft finds that sales increase in the subsequent months that a title has been released.

The average conversion rate for XBLA games is 14%. This is the percentage of people who buy the game after downloading it for play. This is a very impressive conversion rate. James Gwertzman from PopCap games in his lecture cited a 2% conversion rate of being very good for PC downloadable games. Even crazier is the fact that this number is deflated since the Dashboard includes a feature to auto-download new Arcade games, which factors into the conversion rate. So a large percentage of people may be downloading games in the background and never even playing them, and the rate is still 14%.

Original IP that looks like it should belong on XBLA can see a conversion rate of up to 10-25%, with 400-500 downloads within the first month. Breakout titles, not necessarily hugely anticipated or well-known games, can reach 25-48% conversion rates with over 1 million downloads in the first month alone. After all, we’re talking 8 million Live subscribers here people.

If you’re unfamiliar with the XBLA point system, which player use to buy games, the equivalents to 400/800/1200 points is roughly $5/$10/$15. Microsoft is unsure as to how pricing will move in the future; certainly some games will drop in point value over time before being removed from the service. A 400 point game would be something very simple like checkers or cards. Famous retro titles and games that are exclusively multiplayer would also fit into this category. 1200 point games are huge IPs, very innovative with lots of rich content. Buyers of these games have huge expectations to meet. Everything else would fall in the 800 category.

XBLA game requirements

There are several requirements regarding the development of an XBLA game that you should keep in mind.

Certification – your game will of course be tested so that it does not break the console or any other games released on the service, and that any downloadable content that can be added to the game does not do so either. Make sure you plan for this in your development cycle. It takes time!

Localization – this used to be optional, it is now required. E-FIGS (English, French, Italian, German, Spanish) as well as Japanese are needed in your game. Make sure you have as little text as possible, especially in your interface. Whatever you can replace with icons, do so. If you’re being published by Microsoft, they will aid you in this process.

Rating – all XBLA games must have an ESRB rating to be released, and this is a process Microsoft will aid you in as well. Again, this is another process that takes time so plan accordingly!

Tips for a great XBLA game

Do not hide content visibly

When people pay for a game, they expect to receive the entire experience. If there’s an area of your game you hope to expand in the future, great – just don’t let players know about it! Never, ever include grayed out text or icons that inform the player of some feature that’s not yet implemented or they will be pissed off and feel ripped off.

Your trial is more important than your game

If no one likes your trial, no one will buy your game. Hence you should put even more thought into your trial than into the complete game itself. There is an art and science to the trial experience. The producer assigned to your project will help you with this, but there are several things you can keep in mind.

First is that you have 5 minutes to make an impression on players trying your game, so you have to put forth the cool stuff quick, either fun gameplay or unique content – preferably both. Don’t give them too much, or they’ll be satisfied and not have a reason to purchase the full game. Don’t give them too little, or they might not get hooked or realized the game’s full potential.

If your game is hard to play, a trial won’t fool anyone – so don’t make your trial hard to play either. It will hurt your conversion rate and turn off other people who won’t even bother to pick it up once they hear from their friends how terrible it is. One way you may accidentally create a hard trial is by assuming familiarity with rules and controls. Don’t try and save time by skimping on explaining in detail how the game is played.

Don’t port straight from PC

Microsoft is not interested in a direct port from PC to XBLA. Take a look at your game, and then take a look at the features XBLA offers and how you can integrate them into it. The two most obvious are achievements and downloadable content. If you can’t factor these two things into the XBLA version of your PC title you won’t stand much of a chance. Other things to consider are the widescreen resolution, multi-player support and the ability to change controls to accommodate the game pad.

Fast load times

There’s really no excuse for slow load times on an XBLA title that is downloaded to the 360’s hard drive. However if for some reason you do need to pause an load content, do so before the player actually begins playing the game, like when they’re jumping from the game menu into the game itself. If you have to load content during game play, make the load screen interactive somehow. Don’t just black out the screen and put a little spinny circle in the corner.

Frequent auto-save

Games like action side scrollers or other fast-paced genres should have some sort of auto-save feature that the player can enable. Even games that play slower should still auto-save the player’s progress as they complete each level. No one wants to die and be sent back far enough to lose 30 minutes worth of progress. That may not seem like a lot, but you need to remember that these games focus on short play sessions. Power outages may also disrupt play.

Timing is everything

XBLA, like any other market, is affected by releases of other titles for the same platform. Don’t forget that players can also purchase game discs to play, not just download off XBLA, so don’t have your game released at the same time as Halo 3, because that’s all people will be playing on their 360’s, which is the same machine they need to use to play your games. I doubt Microsoft would let you do this anyways so I’m not really sure why Jim mentioned it.

Quality before quantity

XBLA games don’t need huge play experiences. 3 hours of play time? Sure why not? That’s not bad for five bucks. You don’t have to include 100+ modes of play in your game, it’s not better because there is more. Focus solely on making your game fun.

Leverage achievements

Achievements are the most incredible thing to come of the Live experience. Even Microsoft was taken aback at the popularity of them amongst the community. Remember this: people will buy your game just so they can earn achievement points. Yes, it’s true. In light of this knowledge, make sure that your achievements are actually achievable!! Your game should award the player with an achievement of some type within 5 minutes of play time, getting increasingly difficult afterwards and being available in both single and multi-player modes. XBLA games are limited to 10 achievements totaling no more than 200 points. It’s okay to have one (or maybe two) achievements that you think no one could ever get (like the SmashTV achievement of making it through the entire game without saving – people have done it) for people to attain and wear like a badge of honor.

Just don’t make all of your achievements like that!

One awesome use of achievements Jim suggested was to upsell your demo. At the end of the demo congratulate the player and inform them that they just earned an achievement and all the have to do to get the points is purchase the game. Remember: people will buy your game just so they can earn achievement points.

Plan ahead for downloadable content

Understand that you cannot create any downloadable content that changes the base code of your game. This is a big no-no as your game was certified to work with the platform and changing it may result in breakage, which means you either need to re-certify or be smart and plan ahead by leaving hooks in your game that you can attach expansions onto without having to modify anything. Or hide the content in your original executable and have it be unlocked (remember – no gray text!). Data-driven downloadable content is the best kind

Be ready for unexpected popularity

You never can tell if your game is going to be a runaway hit title, and neither can Microsoft. So be ready. Have a community website set up for people to pour into should your game turn out to be hugely popular. If you’re working through a 3rd party you can usually receive support from them for it, but you stand to reap more benefit by doing it yourself.

Game Studio Express is ready for prime time – use it

With the release of GSE 2.0 and support for multi-play, it’s now a viable way to develop games for XBLA. TorqueX beat it to the table in terms of XNA development, and Schizoid is almost set for release, but 4 winners of Microsoft’s Dream.Build.Play contest which use XNA GSE were offered publishing contracts as well.

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