Neon Doctrine co-founder Iain Garner took to Twitter to criticize Sony over its PlayStation Store discount policies, communication (or lack thereof) with indie developers, and the costs associated with having games featured on the PS Store that puts smaller studios at a disadvantage.
Garner penned a lengthy thread shedding light on Sony’s backend processes, but didn’t actually name the company, choosing instead to call it ‘Platform X.’ However, it’s pretty evident that he’s referring to Sony. A portion of the thread reads:
So here is a thread about Platform X. I will not be defining Platform X but it’s the operator of a very successful console and does not have Games Pass! Platform X gives developers no ability to manage their games. In order to get promotion you must jump through hoops, beg and plead for any level of promotion. And a blog is not as good as they think it is. Wishlists have no effect, so all your personal marketing means nothing to Platform X. All that matters is their evaluation. How is this evaluation done? Dunno, they don’t share that, nor will they share the value they ascribe to my game.
BTW, you cannot even do a launch discount without their approval and it is ‘very limited.’ That’s right…. You can’t do the thing that ever other platform does meaning the Platform X owners will always get the worst deal! Oh but don’t worry. There is a way to guarantee you get featured! All you need to do is spend a VERY reasonable minimum of 25,000 USD to get featuring. Oh and then 30% of your subsequent earnings…. Bargain!
A number of indie developers jumped into the conversation and corroborated Garner’s claims. Kotaku reported that Microsoft has a similar payment scheme for featuring games on the Xbox store. However, indie devs say that Sony’s issues go beyond the payment scheme.
In a separate statement to Kotaku, Garner criticized Sony for marketing PlayStation as an indie-friendly console, but having policies that contradict its messaging.
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