Wii controllers and the XBOX 360

As reported a few days ago, XNA, Microsoft's .NET development framework for writing games that run on both a PC and an XBOX 360, will allow you to write games that use a Wii controller (a.k.a. a "wiimote")...at least on a PC. That's not too surprising, as a PC architecture is pretty flexible, and it has always been possible to use weird controllers on a PC, assuming someone writes code that responds to them.

It would be nice, though, if you could do the same thing on an XBOX 360. Of course, the XBOX 360 isn't nearly as customizable as a PC. Microsoft tightly controls what code runs on the device, which is what enables Microsoft (or Sony, for that matter) to sell a console at a loss and make all the profits through per-unit license fees on games sold.

This is probably why you can't just upload any old XNA game you might create to an XBOX, or share that creation with anybody you wish. To play your own games on an XBOX 360, you have to be part of the XNA Creators Club, a status that isn't free ($49.00 for four months, and $99.00 for a year). Next, if your friends want to play your creations, they have to be part of the XNA Creators Club, too. I imagine that at some point there will be a process wherein XNA games can migrate from "club" status to a full-blown signed product that anyone can use for a fee (from the FAQ: We are actively working on other ways to allow you to more easily distribute your games and are very excited about the possibilities this will open up for independent game development).

Though I understand the position from a revenue standpoint, I've never been completely comfortable with a strategy that is at such right angles to Microsoft history. Microsoft makes platforms. Windows is nothing if not a massive library of developer tools waiting for the software that will use them. Visual Studio is the leading developer suite. Yes, I'm a Microsoft employee, but I wasn't always one, and used MANY tools and platforms in a work capacity prior to my employment here. I always found them less compelling than the Microsoft offering. Microsoft DOES make good developer platforms.

Why, then, would a company with that platform "DNA" not provide lots of developer hooks into its living room "beachhead" that would enable users to make not just games that anyone can use, but customize the television experience in new and unexpected ways? That's what Microsoft normally does. Windows would be less successful a platform if they had opted to have a strict licensing regime through which Windows applications had to pass, and more to the point, the range of innovative solutions would be smaller because fewer would be inclined to go through the trouble of customizing it.

I'd love to customize some of the XBOX blades with my own code, assuming Microsoft would let me. Of course, I would want network access, both to my home network and the Internet, otherwise such customizations wouldn't be very useful. That would mean Microsoft would need to control what code does in order to prevent arbitrary code from running amok on an XBOX, as XBOX is also a delivery platform for copyrighted content.

However, I'm not advocating binary-level access to the platform, but the ability to write .NET customizations. .NET, like Java, can be sandboxed, which is how XNA games on an XBOX are prevented from accessing the network (at least, at present). Code access security is your friend.

I hardly think a more robust XNA platform would cannibalize game sales. I have been involved in the production of low budget films, and I have seen many of them at theaters scattered around LA. Most theaters still only show big budget films, however, and I see them on a regular basis. People still buy Photoshop, in other words.

XNA on an XBOX 360 is moving in that direction, to be sure, but it is odd that Microsoft, a company known for emphasizing reusability and extensibility (think Automation objects in Office, or IE's early construction as a set of reusable and extensible rendering components) wouldn't have started from that position in the first place.