Steam Early Access is a way for independent developers to get their games out to people as soon as possible so that the community and the developer can work together to make game better. There is a lot of debate in the industry regarding this model, however that is beyond the scope of this article. The big question is, will early access work on the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One?
Electronic Arts have their own early access program on the Xbox One but is limited when one compares it to Steam Early Access. So will a proper early access model work for the PS4 and Xbox One or is such a model possible in the first place? In a recent interview, GamingBolt raised the same question to Free Lives Games’ Richard Pieterse and Evan Greenwood.
“Early access on consoles at all is news to me. I think there’s a couple problems with early access on consoles. Firstly console users are a bit further removed from the developers of their games, there aren’t easy ways for console users to communicate with developers.”
“I don’t think console users tend to browse forums and post feedback on their consoles, so early access there may be less about collaborating with users on the game. And secondly, it’s harder for console users to find out about games before they buy them, so users might be more likely to get burned by misleading storefronts.”
The developers definitely make a valid point. The consoles have a very closed eco-system and it will be difficult to have such a system on PS4 and Xbox One. Will this change in the future? Only time will tell but for now it’s looking extremely unlikely.
But what are your thoughts on the matter? Do you think Sony and Microsoft should start thinking about an early access model for their games? Sound off in the comments section below.
Free Lives Games are currently working on Broforce, a hypermasculine action hero-style commando game due for the PS4, Vita, Windows and MAC sometime this year.