Microsoft’s Greenberg On Gold, Kinect, Xbox In Japan, And First-Party Publishing

We talk to Microsoft Xbox product director Aaron Greenberg about the future of Xbox Live (and the recent Gold subscription increase), how quality control will help avoid shovelware on Kinect, the growing presence of Xbox 360 in Japan, and Microsoft’s first-party publishing policy.

Game Informer: Xbox live has grown substantially in the past couple of years in terms of features and functionality. Because some of the features are inherently free elsewhere – Facebook and Twitter for example – or already require a subscription fee as found in Netflix, can you provide any insight into what prompted the recent Gold price increase? Is there a way to break down the annual fee?

Aaron Greenberg: Well, first, we think of the service as a whole and so there are multiplayer or social experiences that are Gold in nature such as party mode and multiplayer gaming and those sorts of things are Gold. But with that said, we don’t think of it in terms of those components, we think of it as an entertainment service as a whole. There is a percentage of people who pay for gold. There are some people who only use it for communication and interaction. Some use it only to download arcade games.

GI: So it isn’t something Microsoft can compartmentalize or break down further?

Greenberg: No. I think honestly what has happened is that we have added so many new things over time. Our focus is always on adding more value to Gold. So that is why over the years we have added new things. If you pay for the Gold membership you get more stuff. But yes, we don’t really think about it that way – in terms of what is Gold and what is Silver.

GI: Along the same lines – improving and augmenting Xbox Live has been a huge focus as of late. Do you think that the service has all the bells and whistles it needs right now? Or is there any new functionality you would like to see just over the horizon?

Greenberg: We’ve been pretty aggressive in adding new features and functionality. Obviously we started with multiplayer gaming and we added entertainment – movies, TV shows, music, social networking stuff – and now to add sports with ESPN. And on top of that, what people don’t realize, is that a lot of our team is dedicated to making those features work with Kinect. So controller-free entertainment and video chat with video Kinect, all of those things are part of the Live experience and being a Gold member. We are going to continue to innovate every year, however. We want to keep surprising people. The team never stops with new ideas in what they want to do. It all comes in time. This year ESPN is the big thing. I think you will see the design of the dash and the navigation will improve, even controller-based, and all the controller-free experience – that is the high level stuff that most people will notice.

GI: Speaking of ESPN, what is the status of the ESPN Live feed technology?

Greenberg: It's coming and it's unbelievable. For us, if you are sports fan you will have to have the service because you can’t get it anywhere else on the TV, in HD, in the living room. It's a perfect fit for us and we are excited to have this exclusive partnership with ESPN whether it's out of market games you want to watch live, or highlights from Sports Center, or just to catch up games that you missed with the on demand feature. There are thousands of games from ESPN.  Whatever you are a fan of, it will be there.

GI: So there is still a focus on maintaining and innovating Xbox Live, but has the meat of Microsoft’s attention shifted to Kinect? Once Kinect launches, will there be regular firmware updates to maintain and improve the service?

Greenberg: Yes. We think about Kinect as another platform investment on the same level of Xbox Live, where we spent a number of years really dedicated to developing the service and adding new functionality over time. Kinect is another big bet from us in that way. We think it is a game changer. We think it will bring new and innovative and compelling games and entertainment experiences that have never been explored before. It takes quite a bit of manpower to do that and we are going to commit to adding new functionality over time.

GI: With any type of new technology – as we saw with the Wii – there is the potential for the service to be inundated with shovelware with companies trying to capitalize on the hype associated with it. Is there a standard Microsoft is setting in terms of quality control to combat this? Is it even a concern?

Greenberg: It is something we are being very thoughtful about in managing the portfolio. We have fifteen titles at launch and we feel that that is the right amount of titles. You aren’t going to see six of the same games or that sort of thing. You may see a couple of the same – a couple sports games, a couple of games that are similar in what the do but are unique enough – but yes, the quality is very much key and we have a team that manages that. If you look at the stuff that we announced at Tokyo Game Show, we are very focused on having unique and quality games by innovative creators built exclusively from the ground up from Kinect. That is our approach and what makes us different than allowing people to just dump a bunch of games onto the service.

GI: Speaking of the portfolio of games announced at TGS, it seems that Microsoft is making an effort to showcase titles that will appeal to the core gamer – as opposed to the more casual titles announced at E3. Is this the case?

Greenberg: Yes. What we have here in Japan is that there is a whole bunch of talent that has a history of making core games and loves making those types of games. And they have come to us and said that they want to make experiences for Kinect. And so to have people like Inafune or Suda51 come to us and want to make games for Kinect, that is a great benefit for core gamers, absolutely.

GI: As long as we’re on the subject of Japan -  because of the success of the Xbox 360 across North America and Europe, is Japan still seen as a coveted territory? Or, because Nintendo and Sony have the advantage of being native, is there a saturation point that you would be satisfied with in terms of market share?

Greenberg: Thinking about our history in Japan, it goes back to when we launched the original Xbox. We were a new competitor in the market. Sony and Nintendo obviously are here and have a deep history and relationships with third-party partners. With the original Xbox we didn’t even sell over a million units here in Japan. So we were in the market as newcomers and really just learning a lot. This time we have massive support from third-party publishers and we’ve already sold almost 1.5 million units in Japan. At the same time we are also seeing Japanese publishers focusing more on the global market. And they are looking to us for that success since we have a larger global install base than the PlayStation 3, and Xbox Live and digital distribution make us very attractive. So being present in the market here is important to us – we know it is very competitive – but it is really about having great Japanese content from creators here to share with consumers all over the world.

GI: Do you think that Kinect will help bolster sales in Japan because of the social nature of the platform?

Greenberg: We’ve had a very positive response at the show so far as this is the first time that Japanese gamers can play it ever. Yesterday we had more than thirty Japanese broadcast companies come to the show and play Kinect. That is unprecedented. To have people who don’t typically cover games come out and say “we think this is interesting and our consumers should know about it,” that is a big deal. Also, what is unique about Japan, is that people of all ages play video games. Adults and seniors buy and play games in addition to the group that we traditionally think of as gamers. We think Kinect is perfect for that market as well.

GI: Switching topics, does Microsoft consider the Game Room a success? Will you continue to support it in the future?

Greenberg: That is a good question. I don’t know how you define success. Personally, I thought Game Room was great, there are a lot of fun experiences there, but I also think that there is a sense of nostalgia you get from remembering those days, and then there is the reality of having to spend money and time playing skiing the way it existed fifteen years ago, or I can play Halo Reach. It is tough for some of those games to exist in the market today. But we are all proud of what we did with Game Room. It was unique, and as much as there is consumer demand and public demand, we will continue to support it.

GI: Ending on a different note, what would you say is Microsoft’s first-party publishing policy? Is there intent to expand Microsoft’s reach in this regard?

Greenberg: Absolutely. We believe it is important to work with the best game creators in the world. A lot of those we believe we have internally – Lionhead and what they are doing with Fable III, or Turn 10 with Forza, or Good Science with Kinect Adventures. But there are also a number of studios that we have creative partnership with. So those will continue to grow. What we announced with Crytek at E3 with Kingdoms, and then here in Tokyo with the five new partnerships. I think it shows that we are going to continue to invest as a first-party studio in great creative partners around the world to bring those exclusive experiences to our console.

GI: One final follow-up question, then. What is Microsoft’s relationships status with Mistwalker? Are there plans for more exclusive collaborations in the future?

Greenberg: I’m not sure what our formal status is – obviously we have a great history with them with Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey. And I know that Sakaguchi is still making games, but there aren’t any formal collaborations that I know of.

[Interview by Game Informer's Meagan VanBurkleo]