The Xbox Live Arcade was the beginning of the modern indie movement, a sort of marketplace for smaller developers to be able to sell their games directly to customers without having to compete for eyeballs with bigger, obviously better marketed AAA releases.
Xbox Live Arcade was retired by Microsoft on the Xbox One, unlike on the Xbox 360 and the original Xbox, where it was a hub for all digital only games- but bringing the brand back could help the Xbox One gain an edge over the PS4, says former Microsoft executive Greg Canessa.
“[Microsoft] could make some very easy decisions and bring back a brand that gives a point of real differentiation versus their competitors in the console space,” Canessa said. “It would help balance out the advantage that Sony has right now.” Adding it back to the Xbox One would be extremely easy, he said.
Canessa is probably a bit biased here, since he was the creator of the Xbox Live Arcade to begin with- and while having a dedicated marketplace for indie and digital games will probably help Microsoft’s standing with indie game developers, with whom it took a bit of a beating thanks to Microsoft’s hostile policies towards them earlier this generation, it would hardly balance out all the advantages the PS4 has over the Xbox One.
Still, it is something to consider- and Microsoft would be well advised to look into this as a possible course of action.
