Nintendo may be looking into early access for games on its consoles
It looks like Nintendo may possibly be joining the ranks of Valve and Microsoft in providing its own early access program to match the Steam Early Access and Xbox Game Preview programs.In an interview with Polygon, Damon Baker, head of Nintendo of America's third-party relations and indie development, stated that they were "exploring options and capabilities" of early access games:
It looks like Nintendo may possibly be joining the ranks of Valve and Microsoft in providing its own early access program to match the Steam Early Access and Xbox Game Preview programs.
In an interview with Polygon, Damon Baker, head of Nintendo of America’s third-party relations and indie development, stated that they were “exploring options and capabilities” of early access games:
“We don’t have anything to announce, but I can say that we’re certainly exploring options and capabilities… so anything is possible. I guess the important part of it is we’re very conscious of it and definitely looking at it.”
This comes as part of Nintendo’s increasing focus on indie developers which was debuted at E3 under the title of the “Nindies at Home program” which offered nine vertical slices of independent games to the public for free. Those that downloaded the demos will then be given a month to purchase the title at a 15 percent discount.
Early Access games have been a double edged sword for Valve, with some developers breaking promises to fans, and others outright lying about the product that was promised with the Steam Early Access program, so Nintendo is undoubtedly taking notes on how their own system might work