Microsoft: We will show studios the way with Natal

A large majority of the world’s game publishers have teams working on Natal-based titles, according to Microsoft.

Robbie Bach, Microsoft’s president of its entertainment and devices division, told The Financial Post that such a volume of third-party Natal projects was indicative of the platform holder’s unique business approach.

Bach stressed that Microsoft has a different business model to Nintendo when it comes to motion control, with a specific focus on “third-parties making money.”

Said Bach: “We designed our system for third-party publishers. We use our first-party business – Halo, Alan Wake and those sorts of things – to show people the way and drive innovation.

“We have something like 70-80 per cent of the world’s publishers already doing Natal-based games. Our first-party studios are very focused on this We want Microsoft to show the way and then we want the breadth and power of the ecosystem from our partners to bring lots of new ideas, new innovations, new concepts to the marketplace.”

“Nintendo, and this is no disrespect, just has a different model. They make most of their money through first-party games that Nintendo produces. That’s their business model, and it’s a great business model, it’s just different, but it makes it hard for third-party publishers.”

Project Natal is set for release this year, despite the fact that a disproportionately small amount of information is available on Natal games themselves.

But Bach stressed that the firms are on board. “Part of the reason we showed Natal at E3 was that we wanted third-party publishers to know that it was real and that we wanted them to have development kits and get them working on it,” he said.